A new Heritage Foundation Backgrounder contains the findings of a 2001 survey that looked at how members of Congress practice school choice. (A similar survey was conducted in 2000.) It turns out that forty-seven percent of House members and fifty-one percent of senators have children who attend or have attended private schools-percentages far higher than those of the general populace. Similar data are available on members of important committees and caucuses, including the House and Senate education committees. The report notes that it's hard to see how opponents of school choice-such as Senators Clinton, Kennedy and Rockefeller-justify voting against allowing poor parents a choice in their children's education while availing their own families of such choices. This short report can be found at: www.heritage.org/library/backgrounder/bg1553.html

Bryan C. Hassel, Progressive Policy Institute
May 29, 2002

The Progressive Policy Institute recently published this 30-page paper by Bryan C. Hassel. It contends that American education would benefit from a "grand bargain": a sizable boost in teacher salaries combined with a modernization of the teacher compensation system. It's time, Hassel says, both to invest more in teacher pay and to "move beyond a pay method designed early in the last century." He does not promote a specific compensation system here but, rather, sets forth key design principles. He also provides brief glimpses of several extant alternative pay systems at the school, district and state level. Hassel's strongest recommendations entail widespread and deliberate experimentation "with alternatives to the traditional experience-and-degree-based pay system" and the building into such experiments of "significant flexibility in pay-setting" at the building level. This paper makes worthwhile reading for anyone seeking to understand the issues at the heart of teacher compensation policy. You can find it on the web at http://www.ppionline.org/ppi_ci.cfm?knlgAreaID=110&subsecid=134&contentid=250543.

National Center for Education Statistics
June 2002

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) has just published this year's edition of one of its most valuable (and bulkiest!) reports, the annual "Condition of Education" volume. "Mixed results" is how the Education Department characterizes its major findings regarding education performance in the U.S. Much other ground is covered in the 335-page report's 44 indicators, six major sections and two special analyses. One of the latter is especially interesting: a statistical portrait of private schools. Though limited by the fact that it only subdivides the complex private-school universe into Catholic, "other religious" and nonsectarian, some of the data are revealing, particularly the differences in public-private school teachers' sense of their influence over key school policies and practices. There's also a bit of data (for the first time, to my knowledge) on charter schools. This is a volume that wants to sit on the desk of every serious education analyst. You can order a hard copy by calling (877)-4ED-PUBS but it's faster to download one from http://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/.

William Lowe Boyd, Debra Hare and Joe Nathan, Center for School Change, Hubert H. Humphrey Institute for Public Affairs, University of Minnesota
May 2002

Choice in education is good for students, parents and school districts. That's the conclusion of a new study from the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs entitled "What Really Happened? Minnesota's experience with statewide public school choice programs." The report looks at the impact of four statewide public school choice laws upon Minnesota education since 1985. These choices include open enrollment, post-secondary enrollment options, second chance options, and charter schools. Key findings include:

• In the period 1988-89 through 2000-01, the proportion of students participating in a public choice program increased from about 1% to 17%. In 2000-01, 30% of secondary students participated in a choice option.
  
• Choice programs have caused some schools and districts to change the way they educate children.
  
• The vast majority of participating students and parents express a high degree of satisfaction with their education.
  
• Available evidence on academic performance-admittedly limited-suggests that students are making good progress in choice programs.
  
• Those who argued that choice in education would result in negative consequences for children and schools were off the mark.

The authors write that the vast majority of parents, educators and policy makers in Minnesota now support the idea of choice in education when it comes to open enrollment, post-secondary enrollment options and second chance options, but not charter schools. The Minnesota teachers union has been especially critical of charter schools, terming them "a vehicle for the enemies of public school education." Charter opponents say that these schools lead to the "resegregation of schools along racial, cultural or socioeconomic lines." The authors urge policymakers to be "vigilant" that charter schools are not used to promote racial and ethnic segregation, but note that "one rarely hears white policy makers or union leaders lamenting the extreme racial segregation and cultural and racial isolation common in white suburban schools and school districts." Because Minnesota has been at the forefront of providing choice in education, there is much here to consider. Check it out at http://www.hhh.umn.edu/centers/school-change/docs/wrh.pdf.

Dozens of times in recent weeks, people have asked what I expect will happen to Edison Schools, formerly known as the Edison Project, considering the parlous state of the company's stock price, other signs of financial woe, the gnarly situation in Philadelphia, and the recent separation of Edison from one of its first schools (Boston's Renaissance charter school).

No doubt I get asked this because I was once part of Edison's "core team" and helped develop its school design. People suppose that I must have inside knowledge or a particularly clear crystal ball. Neither is true. And I've had no financial entanglement with Edison for a couple of years. I'm just another nosy, puzzled observer. But it's worth pausing to ask what to make of Edison at this juncture, why it seems to be in trouble and what would be the implications of an Edison collapse.

Seven points seem especially important.

First, when properly implemented, Edison's basic school design works well to educate children, especially disadvantaged youngsters. No single feature is revolutionary-not the longer day and year, not the academic standards, not the specific reading and math programs, not the multi-year "team" approach to teacher-student relations, not even the intensive technology-but nobody else has stitched all these elements together in so promising a way.

Second, neither this nor any other whole-school design is foolproof. Much can go wrong in even the best-intentioned implementation effort. Bad personnel decisions lead to principals or teachers who don't grasp (or like) the design, lack essential skills, have conflicting loyalties, don't possess the requisite drive, etc. The sponsoring body-be it a charter board or school system-may have a leadership change, get cold feet, or be rattled by politics. The building can be faulty or unready. The state's reimbursement system can leave the school under-financed, etc.

Third, in its eagerness to grow its business and revenues, Edison has agreed to compromises in many places that weaken either the school design (such as forfeiting the longer day or year) or the company's ability to staff it with people who will be effective in carrying it out. Personnel compromises are the worst: agreeing, for example, to keep the current staff of a school that Edison is taking over. (It looks like this is in the cards in Philadelphia.) Another compromise in pursuit of fiscal viability is to accept new children into the upper grades of a school rather than starting only with, say, youngsters in K-2 or K-3 and "growing" them the Edison way. As other school founders have learned to their peril, it's damnably hard to succeed with a new 7th or 8th grader who has failed badly in previous schools, is way behind grade level, and has already developed an "attitude" about school. Yet for economic reasons, education management organizations (EMO's) such as Edison-and plenty of garden-variety non-profit charter schools-have agreed to take these older students so as to build enough enrollment fast enough to generate the revenue they need to operate at all.

Fourth, many such compromises are dictated by labor relations and the politics that accompany them. Never forget that the teacher unions HATE Edison and the other EMO's and are doing their best to subvert and bankrupt all such ventures.(There are rare and limited exceptions, such as Dade County, Florida.) They are also looking to safeguard their members' jobs. The upshot is that the unions lay down conditions before a school district (such as Philadelphia or New York) can engage Edison at all, and these conditions may prove fatal both to a school's instructional effectiveness and to the profitability of its parent firm. Retaining highly-paid but poorly performing teachers is usually the big challenge. In New York City, on the other hand, the unions and their allies maneuvered the board of education into holding a neighborhood referendum on Edison. It was stacked against Edison and, indeed, that firm lost its bid to run half a dozen public schools in the Big Apple.

Fifth, the hundred-plus public schools that Edison now operates-making it one of the nation's biggest (and certainly farthest-flung) school "systems"-are important to dozens of communities and tens of thousands of children and families. Edison can no longer be viewed simply as a brash start-up firm of interest to Wall Street and the teacher unions. It is also responsible for-as an example-half the charter-school students in Dayton, Ohio (where Edison runs two of a dozen charters but these are by far the largest). If Edison collapsed, it would be a profound blow to those kids and families, to the charter movement, and to the idea that education reform can be advanced by starting new schools run by someone other than "the system."

Sixth, many assert that "mom and pop" charters are doomed due to their small scale, lack of business acumen, and meager capital resources. Such observers generally contend that "The future of the charter movement rests with large national operators like Edison." I don't know whether that's so; I still have high hopes for the better put together of the "mom and pop" schools (so long as they're not reregulated into oblivion or starved of resources). But Edison's demise would be a terrible setback for those who believe that it's companies like this that will determine the future of the charter-school endeavor itself. Alternatively, it might turn out to be a learning experience for other EMO's, driving home the lesson that too many compromises are as harmful to a firm's viability as a stubborn, unbending stance toward community (and political) realities.

Seventh, the hypocrisy just won't quit regarding the role of "for-profit" enterprises in K-12 education. It's Edison's desire for profits that most enrages the teacher unions and others in the public-school establishment. Never mind that, after a decade of trying, Edison hasn't yet made a profit. Never mind that profitability in the EMO world will likely never be great (except for those who luck out in the stock market), probably more like a classic "public utility" margin than the eye-popping returns that venture capitalists seek. This is true both for political reasons and for reasons of school economics. But what's wrong with making money by delivering a superior product or delivering the same product more efficiently? Do we object to IBM and Apple profiting from the computers they sell to schools? To dividends for shareholders of the catering firms that operate school cafeterias, the bus companies that carry children to and fro, the cleaning firms that tidy up the school after hours, or the textbook and testing companies that rule the curriculum? Do we object to individual teachers profiting by getting paid salaries that exceed their living costs? As for "non-profit" organizations, beloved as they are by ideologues in education (and other fields), many of them generate hefty annual surpluses, often AFTER paying handsome salaries, juicy bonuses and generous benefits to their key people. The teacher unions are themselves examples of such enterprises. Their surpluses aren't called "profits" but I fail to see any moral distinction. Indeed, the biggest difference is that "non-profits" pay no taxes on their surpluses while profit-making firms do. Which is the better citizen?

I doubt that Edison will collapse. Chris Whittle is one of the most astute, creative and tireless people I've ever met, and his key associates are plenty savvy, too. They've made their share of mistakes but I suspect they'll live to fight another day. I hope so. Not just because of my own fond memories and residual loyalty. But because so many kids, and more than a little of the future of the charter and school-choice movements, are enmeshed with Edison's prospects. Of course that's also why its many foes will do their utmost to kill it off-and why they so look forward to dancing on its grave.

While the debate over school choice tends to focus on things like whether vouchers weaken public schools by draining away state funds or creaming the best students, most such contentions can be refuted by evidence. But the root of the hostility to school choice among many who see themselves as progressives is really something far deeper, writes Peter Berkowitz in a recent review of four books on school choice. At bottom he finds a disagreement about the ends of education in a free society. What choice opponents really fear, Berkowitz suggests, is that private schools, particularly religious ones, won't educate children to be autonomous free agents who transcend narrow communal and religious attachments. But he would have us resist this impulse to force all citizens into a single mold, to use the state to rescue children from sectarian parents (a strand that Berkowitz names "homogenizing liberalism"). True liberals recognize that there are a variety of human goods, and that the role of the state is not to regulate private affairs in order to liberate individuals from ways of life it deems hidebound, cramped, or fettered (which is to say, lives that incorporate tradition and religion). For more see "Liberal Education," by Peter Berkowitz, The Weekly Standard, May 20, 2002.

What does it take to be a successful principal? In the 1980s, "effective schools" research introduced the idea of instructional leadership. In the most recent issue of Educational Leadership magazine, a number of authors examine the theme "Beyond Instructional Leadership." In one article, a high school principal from Illinois argues that the concept of instructional leadership was flawed because it focused school leaders on inputs and intentions rather than results. As a principal, Richard DuFour devoted years to observing and improving individual teachers and their classroom strategies until he realized that he needed to shift his attention from teacher behavior to student learning. When the attention of the school was re-focused on which students were learning and what could be done to improve it, he writes, the structure and culture of the school changed. Teachers learned to work together to clarify the desired outcomes, to develop common assessments, to analyze the results, and to develop strategies for improvement based on the analysis. The key, DuFour writes, was his own conversion from instructional leader with an emphasis on teaching to the leader of a professional community with a focus on learning. "The Learning-Centered Principal," by Richard DuFour, Educational Leadership, May 2002.

edited by Edward P. Lazear, Hoover Institution
2002

Hoover's Edward P. Lazear is the editor of this 190-page collection of essays on education by Hoover scholars and others. The first half is devoted to "education and income." Authors here are Gary Becker, Robert Barro, Robert Hall and Paul Romer. It contains some interesting findings, such as Barro's observation (in a fine essay on education as a determinant of economic growth) that the quality of a country's education system is considerably more consequential for that country's economic development than the amount of formal education that its people obtain. Paul Romer also contributes a very skeptical look at the distributional consequences of education choice. (He's unconvinced that it'll be good for the poor.) The volume's second half, grandly entitled "education and society," contains excellent essays by Hoover's Shelby Steele and Thomas Sowell as well as contributions by Andrew Coulson and Jennifer Roback Morse. The ISBN is 0817928928. You can obtain additional information at http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/homepage/books/ed21st.html.

edited by William Damon, Hoover Institution
2002

Another new edited volume on education from the Hoover Press, this one put together by Stanford education professor William Damon, addresses character education, a topic much discussed but little understood. In 190 pages, it pulls together 9 essays by interesting writers (e.g. Christina Hoff Sommers, Amitai Etzioni, Irving Kristol) plus an excellent introduction by Damon that doesn't shy away from either religion or patriotism as important wellsprings (and manifestations) of character. The ISBN is 0817929622 and you can obtain further information at http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/homepage/books/character.html.

Education Week
May 2002

One of Education Week's annual emanations (this is the 5th such) is its 90-page account of technology in education, the preparation of which is underwritten by the Hewlett Foundation. This year's edition, entitled "E-Defining Education," follows the familiar pattern of introductory essays, then pages of national and state data, then profiles of individual states. The most interesting items this year involve the ways that "cyber schools, online teaching and testing, and other e-learning initiatives are changing how schools operate." There's a LOT of activity on this front, though it's changing so fast that we must assume that any hard-copy publication on the subject is already partly obsolete. Also visible in these pages is the mounting resistance of traditional education groups, who doubtless see this technological change leaping right over them and gradually marginalizing them. There are worthwhile essays on what it's like to be an on-line teacher, how good is the academic content, what students (at the high-school level) think of it, and what primary-secondary education can learn from higher education's ventures into cyber-education and distance learning. Note how far we've come from our previous pre-occupation with simple access to technology-it's now nearly ubiquitous in conventional schools and in kids' lives-and how we're now focusing on what it can be used for. Along the way, of course, we find that it's beginning to redefine what we mean by school itself. If you don't already have a copy-many are in circulation-you can find out how to order one at http://www.edweek.com/sreports/tc02/.