Fwd: Where Do Public School Teachers Send Their Kids to School?
Does it matter where public-school teachers send their own children to school? If so, how and why? What can we learn from them?
Does it matter where public-school teachers send their own children to school? If so, how and why? What can we learn from them?
Co-published by the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation and AccountabilityWorks, with support from the Smith Richardson Foundation, this report looks at six elements of K-12 accountability systems in 30 different states. Each state is rated on standards, test content, alignment of tests to standards, test rigor, testing trustworthiness and openness, and accountability policies. The major conclusion: while some states have the basis of a sophisticated and rigorous accountability system in place, no state has every element of a serious standards-based education reform package in place. And few states are as open to evaluation as they ought to be.
With the passage of the politics-governance Act (NCLB), states have had to adjust their accountability systems to comply with federal law. As a result, in the summer of 2003 Ohio's Governor Taft signed House Bill 3, which dramatically changed the state's assessment system and what it means for charter schools. This report helps charter school leaders coordinate their testing and data reporting procedures to meet state and federal guidelines, in the hope that all students might surpass Ohio's academic expectations.
This report, published jointly by the Fordham Institute and The Broad Foundation, contends that American public education faces a 'crisis in leadership' that cannot be alleviated from traditional sources of school principals and superintendents. Its signers do not believe this crisis can be fixed by conventional strategies for preparing, certifying and employing education leaders. Instead, they urge that first-rate leaders be sought outside the education field, earn salaries on par with their peers in other professions, and gain new authority over school staffing, operations and budgets.
Will the sanctions for failing schools laid out in the politics-governance Act (NCLB) succeed in turning those schools around? This report draws on the results of previous efforts to overhaul failing schools to provide a glimpse at what may be expected from NCLB-style interventions. The results: no intervention strategy has a success rate greater than 50%, so policymakers are urged to consider additional options for children trapped in failing schools.
The Thomas B. Fordham Foundation's first-ever Five-Year Report reviews our major education reform activities, products and expenditures, both in the national reform arena and in Dayton, from 1997 through 2001 and sums up the work of the Foundation from its rebirth in the mid-1990s until today. In the report, we endeavor to show what we think we've accomplished, where our efforts have fallen short, and what we've learned.
Just one month after President Bush signed the politics-governance Act into law, a provocative set of expert papers commissioned by the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation explores the legislation's key features: it's testing and accountability provisions. The papers identify the questions left unresolved by Congress and the many hurdles facing the U.S. Education Department and states, districts, and schools as they try to make this ambitious law a reality. The papers also offer suggestions for clearing those hurdles.
The Thomas B. Fordham Foundation asked experts to share their knowledge and ideas on topics related to effective education philanthropy. Here are seven papers that answer some of philanthropists' most important questions in the education reform arena.
Recommending sweeping changes in federal special ed policy, this new volume of 14 papers scrutinizes the education now being received by 6 million U.S. children with disabilities. Jointly published with the Progressive Policy Institute, the report will help shape discussion of the next reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). It identifies the problems that now beset this important program, analyzes their causes, and suggests solutions. All who care about the education of children with special needs will want to read it for themselves.
This unique survey compares the views of parents with children in private, public and charter schools on the quality of their own schools as well as a range of education reform issues. Conducted in Dayton, Ohio, home to one of the nation's fastest growing charter school programs as well as a strong private voucher program, the data show that, while public school parents are generally less satisfied with their children's present schools, the overwhelming majority of parents and non-parents support bold reform in the public school system. The survey also shows strong support among all groups for publicly funded vouchers, higher academic standards and performance pay for teachers.
This report traces an initiative that was launched a decade ago by business and government leaders seeking to spark a transformation of K-12 education in American. The New American Schools Development Corporation (NASDC) vowed to cast aside traditional ideas about schools and apply a no-nonsense, business-savvy approach to the design and deployment of "break-the-mold" schools. Ten years later, New American Schools (as the organization is now named) looks a lot more like a member of the education establishment. Mirel's fascinating report shows how this happened.
Charitable giving in the U.S. is at an all-time high, as is the public's concern with the state of our K-12 education system. This guide provides practical advice for the philanthropist who is fed up with the status quo and eager to support effective education reforms. Making it Count reviews the state of U.S. public education, examines different ways that philanthropists are trying to improve it, explains why some strategies work better than others, profiles a number of education philanthropists, and recounts the experiences of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation.
Why does our system of teacher certification emphasize training in pedagogy rather than subject-matter knowledge? The answer can be found in this report, which traces the emergence of state control over teacher certification. The focus is on efforts by the teacher education establishment to gain monopoly control over the licensing of teachers.
President Bush campaigned on a strong education-reform platform, promising the American people that for the first time in a long time, commonsense?not special interest groups?would dictate federal education policy. Just before he entered the Oval Office, we handed him a briefing book on steps he could take to help transform the K-12 education system. In this "Memorandum to the President-Elect and the 107th Congress," we explained how the federal government has wasted billions of dollars on ineffective programs and offered suggestions for making continued federal funding matter.
How much government aid do parochial schools and their students actually receive? Connell finds that public aid flows to church-affiliated schools through many channels, though amounts vary greatly from state to state. This report is especially timely in light of the Supreme Court's important decision upholding government aid to religious schools.
According to this new study, Ambassador Annenberg's gift has left only small footprints on the urban school systems it set out to reform. Good intentions and a generous checkbook were not enough to transform troubled urban schools. This report includes case studies of New York (by Raymond Domanico), Chicago (by Alexander Russo) and Philadelphia (by Carol Innerst) and an afterword by Chester E.Finn Jr. and Marci Kanstoroom.
Minnesota was the first state to embrace many important education reforms, from statewide open enrollment to charter schools to tax credits for parents paying certain education expenses. This report, written by Dr. Mitchell Pearlstein, President of the Minneapolis-based Center of the American Experiment, tells the stories behind Minnesota's unique policy experiences. What lay behind Minnesota's worthy innovations? Who was responsible for the bad ideas? Mitch's short answer: governors were behind most of the proposals that expanded education choice, while the flawed policies emerged from the state's education bureaucracy.
According to this 250-page volume, proposed federal and state policies aimed at boosting teacher-quality may well worsen the problem. Instead of adding even more politics-governance to the teacher training system, policymakers should open up the profession to well-educated individuals and should hold principals accountable for student learning.
A policy statement endorsed by governors, chief state school officers, state board members, prominent education thinkers and analysts, and veteran practitioners, which sets forth principles and policies to guide states as they prepare to hire a teaching force for the 21st century.
This book is a guide to ten of today's best-known school designs. It is meant for parents, teachers, school board members, philanthropists, civic leaders and other 'consumers' who must evaluate which, if any, of these models they want to pursue.
Cizek provides a helpful primer on standardized testing. He identifies key terms, clarifies important distinctions between types of tests, and explains how to interpret (and not to interpret) their scores.
With OECD data, Walberg shows that the United States' educational system is the 'least productive in the developed world.'