Last month I published a five-part critique of a recent AEI paper by Collin Hitt, Michael McShane, and Patrick Wolf that looked at the connection (or lack thereof) between test scores and long-term outcomes in school choice programs. Not surprisingly, last week Pat responded with a forceful rebuttal. I think many of his points missed the mark, as I noted on Twitter. But this one I liked:

The first rule of science is that you can’t prove a negative. The second rule of science is that the burden of proof is always on the person claiming that a relationship between two factors actually exists. One develops a theoretical hypothesis, such as “The achievement effects from school choice evaluations reliably predict their attainment effects.” One then collects as much good data as possible to test that hypothesis, certainly employing an expansive definition of school choice unless and until you have an overwhelming number of cases. One then conducts appropriate statistical tests on the data. If the results are largely consistent with the hypothesis, then one conditionally accepts the hypothesis: “Hey, it looks like achievement effects might predict attainment effects just as hypothesized.” If the results are largely inconsistent with the hypothesis, as in the case of our study, one retains a healthy amount of doubt regarding the association between achievement and attainment results of school choice evaluations. That’s what scientists do.

All fair, and a useful frame. But also telling, as we shall see.

Pat’s hyper-pithy hypothesis

“The achievement effects from school choice evaluations reliably predict their attainment effects.”

That is certainly parsimonious, but there are two problems with it. First, it’s simplistic. Which achievement effects? For all students, or certain subgroups? Are we talking about elementary, middle, or high schools? Which kinds? What counts as “attainment”? How big do the effects have to be? When would we expect these effects to move in the same direction, and when might we reasonably expect them to diverge? What exactly does “reliably” mean in this context? And what is the justification for that definition or standard?

The second problem with this hypothesis, as stated, is it’s only relevant to a small subset of the policy debates we’ve been having, and that Pat et al. referenced in their original paper. Yes, if this hypothesis is proven wrong—if it turns out that test scores don’t reliably predict important long-term outcomes—it would indicate that policymakers should be cautious about killing off school choice programs prematurely. Instead they should wait to see what their long-term impacts are, too, because there’s a decent chance that they will be more positive. On this I agree.

But the evidence examined against this narrow hypothesis would not tell us anything about the wisdom of holding individual schools accountable for short-term test-score changes, either within school choice programs or writ large. For that we’d need to craft a hypothesis, or set of hypotheses, that were directly related to that question.

My hypotheses about test-based accountability

So let me take a crack at identifying a trio of hypotheses that those of us who support test-based accountability would embrace and like to test. The first is about students, the second about elementary and middle schools, and the third about high schools.

1. Students who learn dramatically more at school, as measured by valid and reliable assessments, will go on to graduate from high school, enroll in and complete postsecondary education, and earn more as adults than similar peers who learn less. This is the heart of the matter for test-based accountability: We think student achievement matters for individuals in the long run. Of course, there a whole bunch of caveats that any reasonable person would apply. Learning just a little bit more probably isn’t enough to affect the longer term outcomes much; to change a child’s life trajectory, the intervention has to be pretty dramatic. We are more likely to see big impacts for low-income kids, for whom schools matter more, than for affluent children, many of whom are likely to graduate from high school and college regardless of their K-12 experience. And if we had ways to measure other important skills, knowledge, and characteristics that schools work to inculcate in children but that don’t reveal themselves in tests of ELA and math, we might see an even stronger association between school-based learning gains and long-term outcomes. But still, kids who become a lot better at math, reading, and writing than they otherwise would have should go on to have better outcomes than those who don’t. If not, that’s a problem for judging schools based on test score changes.
2. Elementary and middle schools that dramatically boost the achievement of their students should also boost their long-term outcomes, including high school graduation, postsecondary enrollment, performance, and completion, as well as later earnings. All of the caveats from above apply here, too.
3. High schools that dramatically boost the achievement of their students should also boost their long-term outcomes, including postsecondary enrollment, performance, and completion, and earnings. Same caveats apply. But note, too, a critical difference from elementary and middle schools. For the former, high school graduation is a legitimate “long term” outcome. But for high schools, it’s another short-term indicator, akin to test scores. And we know from prior research that high-expectations high schools may boost achievement while decreasing their graduation rates, as some kids decide they are not up for the challenge. So I would never hypothesize that we’d see high school achievement and graduation rates moving in the same direction. We also would have a different hypothesis for certain types of high schools, as I explained in my original critique. Career and technical Education, early college, and selective enrollment high schools, in particular, would be expected to have different outcomes for achievement and attainment, given their idiosyncratic missions and student populations.

Note that all three of my hypotheses call for “dramatic” learning gains, as I believe those are what will lead to changes in students’ life trajectories. Many of us testing hawks are big fans of KIPP and other high-performing charter networks and want to see them replicated because they are real outliers when it comes to student achievement. We believe that they are changing lives because their students are making gains that are much larger compared to similar peers. But we wouldn’t necessarily assume that a school performing at the fifty-fifth percentile would yield better results than a school at the fiftieth percentile when it comes to real-world outcomes.

The same goes for the flip side of accountability: intervening in or closing down chronically low-performing schools. No state accountability system or charter school authorizer goes after institutions performing at, say, the fortieth or forty-fifth percentile in student achievement growth. Rather they target those at the fifth or tenth percentile—those that are several standard deviations from the mean, schools where students are making virtually no progress from year to year, or even going backwards. So what we want to know from research is: What are the odds that those chronically low-performing schools are having a positive impact on kids? That’s a very different question from the one Pat asked: whether schools or programs that do marginally better or worse on test scores do marginally better or worse on attainment. And my hypotheses—which should be tested empirically—assume that it’s extremely unlikely that very low-performing schools are somehow helping their students prepare for long-term success.

***

Pat is right, then, that we need to be clear about the hypothesis we’re testing. The review that he completed with Collin and Mike is appropriate for examining the relationship between achievement and attainment effects in school choice evaluations. (Though my serious qualms about which studies they included and how they analyzed the findings still stand.)

But that review is not at all appropriate for examining the assumptions—okay, hypotheses—upon which test-based accountability rests. Pat and his colleagues were stretching far beyond their findings when they wrote, in the original AEI paper, that “insofar as test scores are used to make determinations in ‘portfolio’ governance structures or are used to close (or expand) schools, policymakers might be making errors.”

Policymakers might be making errors—but we can’t know that from the studies that Pat and his colleagues examined. And that’s what’s wrong with their review: They went searching for evidence to disprove an overly simplistic hypothesis that is ultimately irrelevant to much of the debate over test-based accountability.

As Pat sometimes observes, I’m not a “scientist.” But I believe that the hypothesis that he and his colleagues claim to have disproved is what scientists would call a straw man, no?

Student walkouts have been a hot topic lately and the media has been quick to swoon with round-the-clock coverage. There is no doubt that an important national conversation has been driven, at least in part, by the student activism on display in Parkland and nationally.

But what’s less talked about is the outside interest groups and prominent players in the Democratic Party that have funded and supported these high-profile walkouts and marches.

Some Parkland students have been so embraced by the media that they are now household names. Other Parkland students, who happen to hold different views, have been virtually ignored. And we already know that African American students have long been ignored on the issue of gun violence.

Imagine

Now, imagine a day when these very same groups of political operatives, interest groups, and student leaders make school quality and student achievement their cause célèbre and students across America walk out of school in protest, not over gun control, but over school quality, low literacy rates, and the achievement gaps between white students and black and brown students.

Then imagine the media refusing to break away from constant coverage of these walkouts, where students hold up bright posters with the words “18 percent of Black eighth-graders read at grade level” and “28 percent of my teachers are chronically absent.”

Imagine cities across America filled with students, teachers, parents, and celebrities chanting in unison about the belief gap, classroom conditions, and single-digit math proficiency while cable and network news stations blanket the country with reporters covering the fiery speeches of students and Hollywood’s biggest stars who say #EnoughIsEnough when it comes to the millions of American children who can’t read at grade level.

I imagine third-graders parading through towns across America with posters about the importance and predictive nature of third-grade reading scores. Or maybe they could just huddle in groups of ten and chant, “It’s the work of the devil, fewer than five of us can read at grade level.”

Students in California could wear #BlackLivesMatter t-shirts and hold up signs that say “75 percent of Black boys in California don’t meet reading standards.”

Students in my state of Rhode Island would carry posters with the number 50 on them and spread the message that, when it comes to likelihood for success in the future, Latino students in Little Rhody rank fiftieth in the nation.

Ashley Judd, Oprah Winfrey, and George Clooney would lend their money and voices to this cause too, right?

Massachusetts students would spread the message that despite their gold star status in the national K–12 rankings, they also rank third in the nation for the widest achievement gaps. So while lots of students in Massachusetts are doing really well, many—mostly low-income Black and Brown kids—are consistently well below grade level in reading and math.

Reporters would swarm and chase after the crowds, asking them why they think so many of them have been pushed through the grades without knowing how to read or do math.

Jake Tapper of CNN and Savannah Guthrie at NBC would ask the state commissioners and union leaders—who would undoubtedly be on hand for the march in a “we support our students” spirit—how graduation rates continue to rise while math and reading scores are flat and in many places, even on the decline.

They would press these education leaders on the disconnect between high school graduation rates and the concerns of employers and colleges and universities over the lack of preparedness they see in recent graduates.

John King of CNN would be managing the coverage from their New York studio. On his TV studio smartboard, he’d be showing the world how American students are doing as compared to students in other industrialized nations. He’d help his viewers at home to see how seismic the achievement gaps are between black and white students. He’d shine a light on the poor performance of low-income students and rural students and he’d ask America, “Is this really who we are?”

“60 Minutes” would undoubtedly jump into the fray and Leslie Stahl would ask how can we keep talking about STEM and STEAM as the new cool buzz words when America ranks fortieth in math and twenty-fourth in science among developed nations worldwide and only half of our high schools even offer Calculus.

She’d have data about how many school buildings had ceilings fall down this year while school was in session. And then she’d dig into the abysmal record high college remediation rates, further evidence that our diplomas are not indicative of twelfth-grade skills, let alone college readiness.

It would really be something

Yes, it really would be something to see wall-to-wall coverage of students walking out of school to protest chronically low math proficiency, embarrassing international education rankings, and the millions of children who can’t read at grade level. This type of civil disobedience would finally add some real teeth to the overused platitude that “the children are our future” and shine a much needed spotlight on a system of schools that is leaving far too many children behind.

Armed with data, personal stories, and a few celebrity mega-stars, students walking out of school and holding marches in every major city would start a long overdue national conversation about education, arguably the civil rights issue of our time.

Sadly, experience tells us that the same outside interest groups and political hotshots who were all over the recent March for Our Lives wouldn’t be nearly as interested in this effort.

Celebrities would likely be less moved to participate or pony up their megabucks and the media would probably rather cover the latest stories about the Kardashians or Donald Trump’s latest tweets than the deplorable math and reading proficiency in our schools and the total inequity that exists based on zip code.

And that, America, is a big problem.

Editor’s note: A version of this essay was original published in a slightly different form by the Education Post.

The views expressed herein represent the opinions of the author and not necessarily the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.

Thirty-five years ago this month, the National Commission on Excellence in Education released A Nation at Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform—a transformative report that has helped reshape education policy over the past four decades.

At the Walton Family Foundation, where I lead the K–12 Education Program, we think of Nation at Risk as the moment in which our strategy—founded in the two enduring ideas of choice and accountability—was conceived. And so we take the occasion of its thirty-fifth anniversary as a moment to pause and reflect—both on how far we’ve come and how far we have to go.

Today, hundreds of thousands of children living in low-income communities are in new kinds of schools—private schools, public charter schools, traditional district schools—that are succeeding in a manner that is widespread and pervasive, proving beyond any doubt that quality schools at scale are possible for every child in every neighborhood.

When we think about the ‘new basics’ that were highlighted in A Nation at Risk, we should look to these schools—full of classrooms where students are developing skills for continuous learning and educators that are innovating and fostering creativity.

These are the types of schools that the National Commission on Excellence in Education could have only dreamed of when they released the report. This progress is something to celebrate.

Our view is that the publication of A Nation at Risk marked the moment at which the need for accountability at scale was first articulated. It was the moment at which our nation acknowledged broadly that school systems should be held to account for outcomes and that we had to get serious about measurement.

But today, we fear that this legacy and commitment to measurement and accountability is itself at risk and needs refortification.

For years, a bipartisan group of policymakers across the country have built education policy on three essential ideas. First, parents have the right to know how schools are performing. Second, they have the right to choose their child’s school. And third, these schools must be held accountable for the results of student learning.

As President Reagan said: “All of American education needs to be accountable for the only result that matters: student learning.”

But what was once a fundamental and essential principle to improving our public schools – accountability for student learning—can no longer be taken for granted. This is especially true as the Every Student Succeeds Act rolls out, as responsibility for measuring student learning becomes primarily a state responsibility—putting state and local leaders in new positions of authority at a politically polarizing moment.

There’s so much to celebrate. But hard work is ahead. I say this as a former teacher and school leader who knows firsthand how important strong, meaningful performance measures are.

That is why today is so important. A conversation about the new basics must include, at its root, a standard definition of what a great school looks like and how we think about measuring and reporting on its success. Reading and math proficiency and growth are essential to measure and know; but so are new and novel measures about things like kindergarten readiness and workforce preparedness.

As we best try to prepare our children for the demands of college, career and citizenship, we must challenge ourselves to address what the future of education looks like. What are the new new basics?

This article is adapted from Marc Sternberg’s remarks to Rise 2018 on April 12 in Washington, D.C.

The views expressed herein represent the opinions of the author and not necessarily the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.

If you were on vacation earlier this month—lucky you—you may have missed the release of the 2017 NAEP results. On the whole, you didn’t miss much. With NAEP results flat in much of the country, the prevailing narrative is that education progress has stalled. There were some exceptions around the country, like Florida, that continued to make impressive gains. Unfortunately, Ohio wasn’t one of those exceptions, as my colleague Aaron Churchill has explained.

Don’t take my word for it though, here are some data comparing Ohio and Florida’s NAEP performance.[1]

In summary, Florida is now cleaning Ohio’s clock on NAEP. But that wasn’t always the case: Notice how in 2003 Ohio had better NAEP scores in both fourth and eighth grade reading and math for black and low-income students. In 2017, Florida was superior in EVERY one of those categories. Florida’s most disadvantaged students made tremendous gains while Ohio’s languished. The progress hasn’t been limited to historically disadvantaged students, either. In fourth grade, improvements among Florida’s white students also noticeably outpaced Ohio (though eighth grade appears to be more comparable).

If you’ve followed Ohio’s education reforms closely, you might be saying “wait a minute.” Ohio adopted many of the same reforms that Florida implemented during Jeb Bush’s tenure as governor—things like instituting A-to-F school grades, providing incentive funding for performance, requiring third graders to read on grade level before promotion to fourth grade, raising expectations for high school graduation, and implementing vibrant public and private school choice. Why is Florida making progress but Ohio is mostly treading water?

To put it simply, success rests on both sound policy and robust implementation. Florida is a positive example for both. Ohio, conversely, despite good intentions, has repeatedly faltered on either policy details or its commitment to implementation.

Before we dig in, though, one caveat is necessary. Education is both complex and complicated. It’s difficult in all but the rarest of circumstances to distinguish between causation and correlation. That disclaimer aside, it’s also fair to say that the reforms highlighted have dominated education policy in Florida for the better part of two decades and student academic outcomes have never been higher.

A-to-F school grades

Issuing every school a summative A-to-F letter grade was one of the first reforms in Florida. Since implementation, the state has been unwavering in its commitment to school grades to make certain that parents and the public knew which schools were performing well and which needed help. In fact, at several instances along the way, Florida increased the level of achievement necessary to earn an A, a clear example of using school grades to both raise expectations and drive increased school quality. Living in the Sunshine State at the time this reform was implemented, I can attest to the controversy that it created and that the resolve of Florida’s leaders didn’t waver. Ohio, on the other hand, came later to A-to-F school grades and adopted the policy in late 2012. The Buckeye State opted to take it slow and implement the grades over time, adding additional graded measures each year. By the 2016–17 school year, there were fourteen separate graded categories but not a single summative grade—that critical piece of the accountability system was delayed for several years, and will finally appear this September.

The difference between the two states here supports the old adage that you really can, as we’ve written, have too much of a good thing. Assigning as many as fourteen school grades to a single school or district assures that virtually every school will earn a failing mark in one category or another, thereby playing into the false claim that the purpose of school grades is to make schools look bad rather than to drive improved academic performance. This has led to a major push in Ohio to jettison A-to-F grades before they’ve truly taken hold. Moreover, the delay in assigning a single summative grade to schools has made it a far less useful tool for parents seeking to use it a source of information for choosing their children’s school, let alone using it to drive an increase in school quality.

Incentive funding for academic performance

For almost twenty years, the Florida School Recognition Program has awarded bonuses to any school that earns an A on the state report card or improves its letter grade from the prior year. The funds, $100 per pupil, are awarded to the school and can be spent on staff bonuses, educational equipment, or temporary personnel to assist with improving student performance. The policy’s real genius is that staff and school advisory councils jointly decide how the dollars are allocated. In 2017 alone, more than $129 million was distributed to 1,723 schools.

In the last few years, Ohio has experimented with its own version of incentive funding by providing additional funding for schools with high third grade literacy and graduation rates. Unfortunately, the provisions are structured in a manner that is unlikely to have any impact. Ohio’s framework spreads a little money ($35 million in fiscal year 2016) to each and every school, which effectively minimizes the likelihood that it will act as an incentive for anyone. Finally, unlike their colleagues in Florida, Ohio teachers have no say as to how the dollars are allocated. Ohio could learn much from Florida’s approach in this area.

Third grade reading

Florida ended social promotion for third graders who couldn’t read on grade level in 2002. Research has largely reinforced the importance of ensuring students can read proficiently before entering fourth grade. The Sunshine State held back fourteen percent of third grade students in the policy’s first year. Working near the capital at the time, I still recall the tearful testimony of parents imploring legislators not to enforce the requirement. To their credit they didn’t take that advice; instead, Florida leaders provided summer reading camps, created a system of reading coaches and mentors, and established a framework allowing for mid-year promotion for students who caught up with their peers the following year.

Ohio, like many states around the country, has followed Florida’s lead and adopted its own version of the policy it’s dubbed the Third Grade Reading Guarantee. The law spurred a statewide emphasis on identifying and assisting struggling readers in grades K–3. Attempting to soften the effect of the new policy, Ohio legislators asked for the state board to adopt a promotion score below the proficiency threshold at the outset and to raise the required score over time until the two scores were aligned. The first year saw only 4 percent of third grades students retained. Now in its fifth year, Ohio still promotes students with reading scores below proficient. In fact, in 2016–17, 18 percent of third graders were promoted, even though they scored below proficient.

If Ohio continues to put off aligning its promotion and proficiency scores, it’s hard to see how the policy will boost third graders’ reading level any further. Florida, in both word and deed, believed that it was critical its third graders read on grade level before advancing to fourth grade. Ohio does in word but time will tell if it does in deed.

Rigorous high school graduation requirements

Florida and Ohio have followed a similar path on graduation requirements. Both states have long mandated specific coursework and passage of required examinations to receive a high school diploma. Florida has transitioned more seamlessly to using robust end of course exams (in algebra I and tenth-grade English language arts) as a graduation requirement. Ohio has found itself mired in controversy as it moved from the very basic Ohio Graduation Test to more rigorous end of course exams. A feared drop in the number of students likely to graduate generated an outsized response aimed at undercutting the increased expectations even before implementation. In what’s become an all too common response to such concerns, the Ohio State Board of Education urged the legislature to adopt a watered-down high school diploma pathway for the class of 2018 that didn’t require students to pass a single assessment in order to get a diploma. The state board has again asked for alternative graduation pathways, this time for the classes of 2019 and 2020. It’s hard to determine if students are ready for post–high school success when expectations are repeatedly lowered. Again, failure to stick with this reform threatens to derail Ohio’s effort.

Vibrant public and private school choice

Both Ohio and Florida are rightfully thought of as national leaders in school choice. Ohio has five private school choice programs, more than 300 charter schools, and open enrollment is allowed in more than 400 school districts. Once again, though, Florida has gone a couple of steps beyond the Buckeye State. Florida’s four private school choice programs serve almost three times as many students and include a tax credit scholarship which makes every low-income student—regardless of where they live—eligible for a scholarship.[2] In the charter school space, Florida hasn’t been plagued by the same quality questions as Ohio and, potentially as a result, has grown more quickly with more than 650 charters. Moreover, recent legislation in Florida has given charter funding a big boost and contributed to closing the charter-district funding gap that exists in much of the country. Finally, Florida has made statewide open enrollment the law. This allows students to attend school in any district as long as it has open seats. Meanwhile, Ohio’s opt-in open enrollment model has resulted in districts near the state’s neediest districts closing their schoolhouse doors to non-residents. While there is much to praise in both states, the opportunities available to low-income Floridians far eclipse those enjoyed by their Midwestern brethren.

*****

The message for Ohio policymakers and those around the country is clear: If you really want to change the way things are done, passing good laws isn’t enough. You may breathe a sigh of relief—especially if the measure is controversial—when your governor signs new education policy into law, but don’t think for a moment that the work is complete. As this analysis of Florida and Ohio demonstrates, similar policies can—if NAEP is to be believed—result in very different outcomes depending on implementation and the political resolve shown by a state’s leaders. If you believe a policy will help students learn, you need to have the courage of your convictions and not walk it back at the first sign of controversy. After all, anything worth doing should be worth doing well.

1. Data from Fordham’s new 2018 edition of Ohio Education by the Numbers is quoted in this piece which discusses a proposed moratorium on imposition of new Academic Distress Commissions in Ohio—no matter how low a district’s performance sinks. Luckily, the Fordham-provided data are accurate, because there is some serious misinformation about ADCs in here. (Elyria Chronicle, 4/28/18)
    
2. The biggest piece of misinformation in the above article is the assertion that the state chooses/imposes/installs (select one as your dudgeon level compels you) the CEO. Of course, that duty falls to the Academic Distress Commission members themselves. Speaking of which, after some weeks of chaos in Youngstown, one of the several empty ADC seats has been filled with what sounds like a very solid choice. (Youngstown Vindicator, 4/27/18)
    
3. OK. So setting aside the misinformation and the high-quality, dedicated ADC members working away to help improve education for students in Youngstown and Lorain (and, presumably, in any other district which falls under Academic Distress designation), apparently we’re still anti-ADC these days here in Ohio. In that case, let’s take a look at a district long on the cusp of Academic Distress designation—Fordham’s hometown schools in Dayton—and see how things are going. Citing four years of poor academic progress, in part because previous editions went on “too long”, Dayton City Schools is changing things up for summer school programming this year. The sessions will be shorter during each day, run for a shorter length of time, include a couple of field trips to encourage attendance, and will be run by a private company based in New Jersey. Locations TBD. (Dayton Daily News, 4/27/18)
    
4. So the answer in Dayton is privatization and less time on instruction, it seems, at least in summer school anyway. Let’s check in on Akron, then, another longtime low-performer in the state. (Don’t believe me on that? Check out these stats from the article: A four-year graduation rate of 74 percent, 10 percent of students meeting college readiness benchmarks on the ACT and a mere 3 percent of graduates emerging with industry-recognized credentials.) The answer in Akron, as we have previous discussed here in the Bites, is to entirely blow up the status quo. All of Akron City Schools’ general education high schools will disappear by the 2019-20 school year, to be replaced by college and career academies. All students remaining in the district will be required to choose an academy of interest to them (think, healthcare or business) and a pathway within that academy (think, hospital tech or business administration). All general education classes will be retooled and geared toward that path’s specific needs and students will take other, new classes specifically  toward certification/credentials/next steps in that field. This is a pretty detailed description here, and at least one parent says she’ll hang on for a while instead of moving her kids to a private school because of it. Kudos. (Akron Beacon Journal, 4/30/18) Despite all of the foregoing, the reporter does note that some parents still have questions. If someone were to ask me, I might surmise that the questions deal with some of the following issues: what to do if your kid doesn’t want any of the pathways offered in the high school nearest them, what if the preferred pathway is across town (city bus passes!), what if the closest or most preferred pathway is full, what if the closest or most preferred pathway is underutilized, and/or what to do if your kids get two years into a pathway that they don’t like/don’t want anymore. No one has asked me, of course, so you can all disregard the preceding questions. The ABJ’s year-by-year breakdown of how things will evolve with the new academies is aimed at providing even more answers for those folks with lingering questions, but I’m not sure it hits the mark. (Akron Beacon Journal, 4/28/18)
    
5. So if ADCs, summer school, and job training academies are not apparently the recipes for academic turnaround, how about open enrollment to another school district? Well, if you’re in the Youngstown area, you might steer clear of that option for a little while too. As we discussed last week, things are a bit dicey on the open enrollment front there. I am not sure that this open letter from Liberty Local Schools’ superintendent makes things any better or presages a resolution any time soon. Especially since we are still missing some vital information about open enrollment into Liberty. Maybe this week’s meeting with the NAACP will help. (WFMJ-TV, Youngstown, 4/30/18)
    
6. So what are we left with? Maybe we need to hit up a private school instead. Here’s a look at the schmancy new St. Martin de Porres High School building in Cleveland. Nice. Why yes, they do take students on Cleveland vouchers, EdChoice, Ohio Autism, and Jon Peterson special needs scholarships. Why do you ask? (Cleveland Plain Dealer, 4/27/18)

According to the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, 2016–17 was one of the slowest-growth years for charter schools in recent memory. Whereas the Race to the Top era usually saw an annual net gain of 360–380 more charters, by 2016–17 that increase dropped to roughly 120. Nobody knows for sure why this happened, but one hypothesis is saturation: With charters enjoying market share of over 20 percent in some three dozen cities, perhaps school supply is starting to meet parental demand, making new charters less necessary and harder to launch.[i] If so, perhaps it’s time to look for new frontiers.

One option is to launch more charter schools in affluent communities. This would not only provide opportunities for sector growth, but would also broaden the political base for these schools of choice. Fordham senior visiting fellow Derrell Bradford candidly assessed the risk associated with today’s relatively narrow base: “Our [charter sector’s] anchor constituency is black and Hispanic families who don’t vote in the same numbers or contribute the same dollars as, say, the affluent Nassau County moms who typify the opt-out movement.”

We understand the political logic and surely support efforts to expand charters wherever they might satisfy parental demand. But we couldn’t help but wonder: Are we overlooking neighborhoods in America that are already home to plenty of poor kids, and contain the population density necessary to make school choice work? Especially communities in the inner-ring suburbs of flourishing cities, which are increasingly becoming magnets for poor and working-class families priced out of gentrifying areas?

This dynamic—labeled the “Great Inversion” by Alan Ehrenhalt, a senior contributing editor for Governing Magazine—is familiar to those of us living in Washington and other booming cities. The District of Columbia is home to a thriving, high-quality charter sector that has benefited from supportive public policies and ample private philanthropy. That’s all well and good—but the city’s affluence has put it out of reach of many poor and working-class families. The District is home to roughly 37,000 poor children and 120 charter schools. Yet neighboring Montgomery County, Maryland, has many more low-income students—some 55,202 of them, a 50 percent increase—and exactly zero charter schools. And in chronically low-performing Prince George’s County, Maryland, there are 81,055 low-income students, but just eleven charter schools.

The inner suburbs of Washington, D.C. are awash in poor kids, but they’re charter deserts—causing us to wonder whether this is common in other places as well. (Maryland and Virginia, as is well known, have been charter-averse at the political and policy levels.)

As the geography of poverty in America changes, are there many neighborhoods with plenty of population density and lots of disadvantaged kids but few or no charter schools? Or do the schools actually set up shop where poor families live—whether in cities, small towns, or the suburbs?

Those are the questions that Fordham’s new report, Charter School Deserts: High-Poverty Neighborhoods with Limited Educational Options, and its accompanying website address. The report analyzes the distribution of charter elementary schools across the country to provide parents, policymakers, and educators with information about which high- and medium-poverty communities do not have access to charter schools today. These groups can use our findings to better understand the supply of schooling options in their states and cities and perhaps press for changes that would improve that supply. Likewise, charter operators and authorizers will find the data helpful as they consider where to establish new schools.

To conduct the study, we recruited Andrew Saultz, Assistant Professor at Miami University, whose primary area of research is school quality and accountability. Dr. Saultz previously studied factors related to charter openings in New York City, as well as where charter schools are located in Ohio relative to that state’s demographics. He was keen to expand the latter study and recruited a trio of talented graduate students, Queenstar Mensa-Bonsu, Christopher Yaluma, and James Hodges, to help with the mammoth task.

Since distance from home is a key factor in families’ school selections, particularly at the elementary level, Saultz and his team defined “charter school deserts” as areas of three or more contiguous census tracts with moderate or high poverty and no charter elementary schools.[ii] They also show where elementary schools are located relative to census data on poverty, mapping every traditional district and charter elementary school in the country using geographic information system (GIS) software.[iii] Their results highlight patterns of charter location for each state and what that means for how these schools are ultimately distributed.

As expected, they find that most charter schools are overwhelmingly located in large metropolitan areas. Yet almost all states with charter school laws also have deserts; specifically, thirty-nine of forty- two charter states have at least one desert each—and the average number of deserts per state is a worrying 10.8.

Six states have no more than two deserts: Alaska, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, New Hampshire, and Wyoming.[iv] Yet twelve other states have more than fifteen apiece: California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas. Make no mistake, that’s a lot of deserts—and particularly surprising in many of the latter states that are home to lots of charter schools.

The number of census tracts that comprise states varies greatly, however, so it’s helpful to look also at what proportion of a state’s high- to mid-poverty tracts are charter deserts. In seven states, it’s more than 30 percent (Alaska, Delaware, Georgia, Mississippi, Nevada, Rhode Island, and South Carolina), but in seven others, it’s less than 10 percent (California, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, and New Hampshire).

To be sure, readers should consider these findings with some caution. They are approximate due to several reasons: the shape or positioning of some contiguous census tracts on a map means that deserts could in fact be “drawn” differently; some areas meet the definition of a charter desert not because they lack charter schools but because they lack inhabitants, meaning they are literal deserts, or otherwise barren (for example, central Alaska); and still other areas have few charter schools yet miss the cut-off for high-poverty status. Still, a quick look at the interactive map shows that charter school deserts  can appear anywhere. In fact, analysts find that, on average, states have 7.7 charter school deserts in urban areas and 3.1 in rural areas.

We draw two key takeaways from these findings.

First, the charter sector needs to move beyond city boundaries. Many poor families are moving— or getting pushed out—to the suburbs. Chalkbeat recently published a piece titled, “As low-income families exit Denver, charter network KIPP is looking to follow.” It chronicled how gentrification in Denver is pushing low-income families to the surrounding suburbs, and reported that KIPP is considering following them there. Kimberlee Sia, the CEO of KIPP Colorado, said the network’s leaders “believe there is need beyond what is going on in Denver.”

The “need beyond” is not unique to Denver. This study documents charter deserts not only in cities, but in inner-ring suburbs and rural areas too, which means that we are palpably failing to locate schools where the greatest need exists. That’s not to say that middle class and more affluent families can’t or shouldn’t benefit from charter schools, nor does it negate the potential benefit to the charter movement of including more such families in our coalition. Our immediate point is simply to urge charter management organizations, other school operators, and philanthropies and organizations that boost, assist, encourage, and study charters to widen their gaze and consider opening schools in places that haven’t yet been on their radar but whose residents need more options.

Second, we must address the policy and practical barriers in some states that keep charter schools from locating where they are needed.

We already noted the challenge of political resistance in the states surrounding Washington, D.C. Recently, Robin Lake and her colleagues at the Center for Reinventing Public Education dug into the barriers that impede charter growth, particularly in the San Francisco Bay Area. The rising cost of doing business, a dearth of school facilities, and funder preference for particular locales were a few obstacles they cited. Yet, when these colossal hurdles collide with the Great Inversion’s funneling of low-income urban families into the suburbs, they thwart new charter schools. As Lake et al. explained:

Operators are finding it easy to access philanthropic funding in urban Oakland and San Francisco, but see those places as “over-saturated” and gentrifying. By contrast, in the less urban area of western Contra Costa County, there are more available facilities and a growing population of students that match most charter schools’ target populations—but fewer opportunities to access philanthropic dollars to start up new schools.

In short, if needy families and available facilities are increasing in numbers outside the city, so should the number of philanthropists willing to support them there.

But philanthropists, operators, and educators can’t forge new paths alone; they need their policymaking brethren in elected and appointed offices to adopt more supportive school choice policies. The current report provides several examples of states that restrict the number, expansion rate, and/or location of charter schools. Washington State, for instance, allows a total of forty charter schools statewide. Rhode Island permits just thirty-five. And Ohio limits charter openings to districts that the state considers “challenged.” Such policies stifle the creation and expansion of new schools in the numerous places that need them. Eliminating such policies should be high on reformers’ priority lists.

Our results suggest that some inner-ring suburbs and small towns are prime locales for rekindling charter growth. But that’ll only happen if funders, operators, and state and local policymakers expand their horizons. What’s the first step? Simple. Read this report and use our interactive map to locate your state, district, and neighborhood. Find the “charter deserts” nearby that contain sizable populations of needy kids who would benefit from the presence of more school options. Then roll up your sleeves and start irrigating.

It’s no secret that identified gifted and talented populations are dominated by students from white and Asian American families and that students from African American, Latinx, and Native American families are disproportionately underrepresented. Less well known is the degree of this proportionality at individual schools or school districts. Disproportional representation in any educational service or program cannot be addressed through policy and practice if individual schools don’t know the scope of the problem or how long it’s been going on. Luckily, the data are now available to answer such questions.

Since the 2009–10 school year, the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) in the U.S. Department of Education has conducted a biannual survey of every school in the country on a range of civil rights issues. (These data were part of a large Fordham report entitled Is there a Gifted Gap? earlier this year.) Although this data collection has been going on since the late 1960s, what made 2009 a breakthrough year was that all schools were surveyed instead of just a sample. This universal data collection has continued ever since. What this means for practitioners is that information on gifted education service populations is now available for every school and school district in the country. School districts are required by law to participate, and the 2015–16 data collection included more than 96,000 public schools. What’s even more exciting is that the 2015–16 data just recently came available via the OCR school and district search tool on their website.

The OCR collects information on the racial, ethnic, language, and disability proportionality of identified gifted and talented populations. Using the OCR school or district search function, anyone can view these data within any school or district in the United States for a four-year period (2009, 2011, 2013, and 2015). It’s not the most intuitive website, but after searching for a school or district, there’s a “Gifted/Talented Enrollment” report hidden about halfway down the page on the right that pre-populates a range of important information. See, for example, figure 1 below, which displays selected gifted and talented identification data for Cleveland, Ohio, for the 2015–16 academic year. (Additional information on how to compute proportionality, as well as state tables and figures from the 2013–14 and 2015–16 OCR data collections, can be found here.)

Figure 1. District enrollment compared to gifted and talented identification, by race and disability status, Cleveland, Ohio 2015–16

These figures show that some students, such as those served under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act or who are from African American families, are underrepresented in gifted programs. All schools need to know these data exist—and, more importantly, schools need to use them as a call to action. There are no simple solutions to addressing disproportional representation within gifted education and closing excellence gaps, but only through broad awareness at the individual school and district level can efforts be taken to better meet the advanced learning needs of all students.

Scott J. Peters, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor in the Department of Educational Foundations and the Richard and Veronica Telfer Endowed Faculty Fellow of Education at the University of Wisconsin – Whitewater.

The views expressed herein represent the opinions of the author and not necessarily the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.

California’s NAEP scores in eighth grade reading grew faster than any other state during what Fordham President Mike Petrilli claims was a “lost decade” in education: an eleven-point average scale score gain from 2007 to 2017. (See table 1.) In fourth grade reading, the state grew seven points, tying for second place in ten-year gains. Indeed, California is one of only five states—along with Arizona, Florida, Hawaii, and Nevada—that saw improvements in three out of four age/subject groupings over this period.

Table 1. NAEP statistically significant average scale score changes, 2007–17, California and nation*

* Blank cell indicates no significant change.

In California, where I am the President of the State Board of Education, we have the most English language learners of any state by far: 29 percent of all ELLs nationwide reside here. (Texas has 18 percent, Florida 5 percent, and New York 4 percent.) California also has proportionally more low-income students, and its ethnic and racial makeup is different than other states: Hispanic students make up 54.3 percent of the K–12 population. And when NAEP scores are adjusted for demographic differences across students in each state—as the Urban Institute does—between 2007 and 2017, California has moved up in the latest NAEP state rankings from forty-fifth to seventeenth in eighth grade reading, forty-first to twenty-seventh in eight grade math, and forty-fourth to twenty-fourth in fourth grade reading.

Yet you wouldn’t know all this by reading Petrilli’s NAEP post mortem because he chose a limited window to analyze California’s progress. He compares 2013 and 2017 scores and declares that California scores are “as flat as a pancake.” There is no justification offered for the selection of 2013 as a starting point for the conclusions that follow. In fact, a link in the post takes you to an earlier post in which he advises analysts to “follow trends over a long period of time. Obsessing about gains or declines over a two-year period doesn’t tell us much. Long-term changes are more compelling and important.”

Nevertheless, using 2013–17 data, Petrilli asserts that “there’s not a single statistically significant change for either subject or grade level for any subgroup in California.” Table 2 offers a more compelling and important longer view of our NAEP results:

Table 2. NAEP statistically significant average scale score changes by race and ethnicity, 2007–17, California and nation

Petrilli asks in his post if the “California Way” is working, referring to the education overhaul that’s been underway since the move to Common Core standards and the start of Governor Brown’s administration in 2010. He answers “Perhaps, but only by standing still,” again using 2013 as the base year.

A more accurate base year for analyzing the changes underway would be 2009. Using that base year, here are some of California’s results:

• Eighth grade reading: Largest improvement in the country, with a ten-point average scale score increase, and now within two points of the national average.
• Fourth grade reading: Second largest improvement in the country, with a six-point average scale score increase, and now within six points of the national average.
• Eighth grade math: Second largest improvement in the country, with a six-point average scale score increase, and now within five points of the national average.
• Fourth grade math: Fifteenth largest improvement in the country, with a one-point average scale score increase, and now within seven points of the national average.

Moreover, comparing the latest NAEP results to 2015, the previous testing year, also shows progress for California, further refuting the “flat” narrative. See table 3.

Table 3. NAEP average scale score changes by subject and grade, 2015–17, California, Massachusetts, Texas, and nation*

*2017 score is significantly different from 2015 score.

Confirmation of our NAEP progress can also be found in the most recent Smarter Balanced Assessment scores in eleventh grade English language arts, in which 60 percent of students tested reached the “standards met” level, a level consistent with college readiness.

Finally, Petrilli’s question at the heart of his musings on California—“Is the California Way working?”—implies that one can draw causal connections between NAEP results and the education overhaul underway. A fundamental problem here is that NAEP is not aligned to the Common Core or the instructional shifts necessary to teach these new standards. While we are pleased with our students’ progress on NAEP, the test should not be used to judge classroom learning.

There is much more work to be done to narrow achievement gaps and ensure that all California students are graduating from high school prepared for college and careers. As I have counseled many times, we must continuously push for improvement with persistence, patience, and humility. And while test scores are certainly important, California, like other states, has moved on to measuring success on multiple data points. Through that lens, California is far from standing still.

The views expressed herein represent the opinions of the author and not necessarily the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.

1. A weird and less-coherent-than-usual set of clips to end the week. First up, a middle school track meet was postponed this week after aggressive geese, protecting their nest on the infield near Lane 1, could not be moved. Concerns for student safety prevailed. And in what remote, bucolic outpost of Ohio did this beastliness occur? Right here in the big city of Columbus. (Columbus Dispatch, 4/26/18)
    
2. Athletics-related problems of a far more human kind continue to dog Dayton City Schools. A court decision in the district’s favor last month, which affected then-current basketball playoffs for multiple teams in Dayton and elsewhere, was proven to be incorrect as new evidence surfaced this week. There are a lot of allegations flying around, and it will take a long time before everything is settled, but the viability of most (if not all) of the district’s varsity athletics currently hangs in the balance. (Dayton Daily News, 4/26/18)
    
3. Speaking of flying allegations, a couple of the newly-announced turnaround principals in Lorain are under scrutiny; and with them, the entirety of the search process. (Northern Ohio Morning Journal, 4/26/18)
    
4. Perhaps Portsmouth High School should rethink their mascot and dump the Trojans in favor of the Sharks. Why? Because students in the school’s personal finance and business class are apparently ready for the tank after winning nearly $4,000 in prize money pitching innovative business ideas to a group of local business owners and entrepreneurs. Nice! (Portsmouth Daily Times, 4/26/18)

2016–17 was one of the slowest-growth years for charter schools in recent memory. Nobody knows exactly why, but one hypothesis is saturation: With charters having achieved market share of over 20 percent in more than three dozen cities, perhaps school supply is starting to meet parental demand, making new charters less necessary and harder to launch. If so, perhaps it’s time to look for new frontiers, especially if we want more children to enjoy the benefits of high-quality charters.

One option is to open more charter schools in affluent communities, which we surely support. But we couldn’t help but wonder: Are we overlooking neighborhoods in America that are already home to plenty of poor kids, and contain the population density necessary to make school choice work, but lack charter school options? Especially communities in the inner-ring suburbs of flourishing cities, which increasingly are becoming magnets for poor and working-class families priced out of gentrifying areas?

That’s the question that Fordham's new report, Charter School Deserts: High-Poverty Neighborhoods with Limited Educational Options, and its accompanying website address. The study, led by Miami University (of Ohio) Assistant Professor Andrew Saultz, analyzes the distribution of charter elementary schools across the country to provide parents, policymakers, and educators with information about which high and medium poverty communities do not have access to charter schools today.

Saultz and his team defined “charter school deserts” as areas of three or more contiguous census tracts with moderate or high poverty and no charter elementary schools. They find that thirty-nine of forty-two charter states have at least one desert each—and the average number of deserts per state is a worrying 10.8. Make no mistake: That’s a lot of deserts—and it’s particularly surprising in states that are home to lots of charter schools.

We draw two key takeaways from these findings.

First, the charter sector needs to move beyond city boundaries. We urge charter management organizations, other school operators, and philanthropies and organizations that boost, assist, and encourage charters, to widen their gaze and consider opening schools in places that haven’t yet been on their radar but whose residents deserve more options.

Second, we must address the policy and practical barriers in some states that keep charter schools from locating where they are needed. In short, if disadvantaged families are increasing in number outside the city, so should the number of philanthropists willing to support them there. We also need elected and appointed officials to adopt more supportive charter school policies, including those that allow these innovative public schools of choice to locate anywhere in the state.

***

Thirty-nine out of forty-two charter states have at least one charter school desert, with over 500 existing nationwide. Find out if you live in one using our interactive map: