The Education Gadfly Weekly

No two charter public schools are alike and the guiding purpose of the Pathway to Success series is to highlight the breadth of quality options available to parents and students across Ohio. Our latest profile, featuring Near West Intergenerational School in Cleveland, is a perfect example of a charter school born from a community’s desire for something different.

Near West Intergenerational School serves an eclectic urban neighborhood that is one of Ohio’s most racially, ethnically, and socio-economically diverse. The intergenerational aspect is equally unique, as the school model intentionally connects its young students to adults in the nearby area who serve as mentors and tutors throughout their schooling.

Cleveland resident and author Lyman Millard of Bloomwell Group details the school’s formation and shares with readers a compelling real-life story about how Near West has deeply impacted one Cleveland family who was once at their wit’s end trying to find the right school for their son.

At the most recent State Board of Education meeting, the Ohio Department of Education (ODE) reported preliminary test results from the 2017–18 school year. The numbers still need to be verified by districts before they can be used to calculate report cards, which will include more detailed data and be disaggregated by subgroup. But the early results are promising.

In grades three through eight, proficiency rates went up in math and English language arts (ELA) in every grade except third. Third grade rates dropped by 3 percentage points in math and 2 points in ELA—but were still higher than rates from 2016, the first year that Ohio’s current state tests were administered. See table 1.

Table 1. The percentage of students who scored proficient or above in math and English, 2016–18 

Source: Ohio State Board of Education

Proficiency rates have increased in every subject since 2016. In some cases, the improvements have been large: In fifth and seventh grade ELA, for instance, proficiency rates have increased by 12.5 and 12.7 percentage points since 2016, respectively. And science scores, not included in the table, are also up 3.7 percentage points in fifth grade and a 5.5 percentage points in eighth.

As for the seven End of Course (EOC) exams that students must pass in order to graduate via the state test graduation pathway,[1] proficiency rates increased on every test except English I. See table 2.

Table 2. Proficiency rates on the major End of Course exams, 2016–2018

 Source: Ohio State Board of Education

Two EOCs boasted the highest percentage gains of any state test between 2017 and 2018: Biology, which rose by 9.6 percentage points, and American Government, with a rise of 8.8 percentage points. But the story’s different when you going back two years: Biology’s rise shrinks to 4.9 percentage points, English II’s increases to 7 percentage points, and American Government’s rate growth goes up to a whopping 13.3 percentage points. Yet unlike the elementary and middle school assessments—which all had higher proficiency rates in 2018 than in 2016—rates for two EOCs have decreased since 2016: American History, with a drop of 1.6 percentage points, and Geometry’s dip of 2.4 points. We don’t know what’s caused these declines, but they warrant further investigation.

Nevertheless, there’s more good news than bad. A growing percentage of students are reaching proficiency in a bevy of subjects, despite more rigorous assessments, and students and teachers deserve credit for clearing these higher bars. Going forward, schools should focus on the few areas where scores dipped and continue to improve their efforts in others. As for policymakers, these data should be a clear indication that setting high expectations—and sticking to them—is important. Ohio’s teachers and students are proving that they’re up to the challenge. Now it’s time for lawmakers to do their part and hold the line.

A couple of years ago, I had the honor of interviewing for a vacancy on my local school board. Working at an education think tank, especially one that supports school choice, leads many to assume I’m not supportive of traditional public schools. They are mistaken. My three kids have all attended their neighborhood schools, and my school district is a critical part of my community. So serving on the board seemed like an amazing opportunity to give back to that community and learn more about the challenges school boards face.

I didn’t anticipate receiving, and ultimately didn’t get, the position, but the interview process was positive and educational. Being a school board member is clearly hard work. Most members have full-time jobs, but they still spend a significant amount of time participating in and preparing for full board and committee meetings, attending other community-related obligations, and representing the board at school-sponsored events. And that’s only part of the work. Members also play an important role in contract negotiations and spearheading efforts to pass school levies—and do it all for shockingly little pay. School board service is not for the faint of heart.

My short-lived candidacy, and day job as an advocate for quality schools, got me thinking about what boards could do to strengthen the schools in their communities. What follows are my recommendations. They have the potential to increase both student achievement and public support for the district’s schools, so I hope school board members—to the extent the issues raised are problems in their districts—will discuss and consider adopting them.

Eliminate test prep

I made this recommendation to my own school board two years ago, and there’s no better place to start. I’m not talking about teachers going over test instructions the day before the exam and making sure that students know what to expect. As a parent myself, that’s not a problem. What shouldn’t happen, though, are days or even weeks (as suggested in this teacher survey from the Education Writers Association) of worksheets and drill-and-kill exercises aimed at eking out an extra point or two on a once-a-year state assessment. Media reports suggest that this type of test prep happens in far too many places, and the opportunity cost is huge. Time could be better spent reading great books, ensuring struggling students get extra help, and providing enrichment activities for high-flying students.

It is possible the lack of test prep could cause the district’s performance to drop a few percentage points, at least initially, on state assessments. If this did occur, it would be very unlikely to result in any sanctions or consequences based upon state accountability frameworks that leave 95 percent of schools largely untouched. For school board members, the shift could be a helpful barometer as to how the district is performing. After all, strong performance is supposed to represent excellent curriculum and instruction, not just effective test prep.

Require daily science and social studies instruction

Test prep might be the leading complaint against standardized testing, but it’s not the only one. Close on its heels is the crowding out of other subjects to spend more time and energy on the tested subjects—English and math, in most grades. The result, according to research (see page 5) summarized by the Washington State Board of Education, found that during the No Child Left Behind era significantly less time was spent on science and social studies instruction. School boards are uniquely positioned to stop this slide, at least in their districts, by requiring that elementary school teachers devote time every day to both subjects. Far from hurting schools on state test results, there’s a strong argument that the increased content knowledge would actually help students in the long term. Perhaps even more importantly, great science and social studies instruction can engage students and make school more enjoyable.

Provide funding and support for the arts

Another way that school boards could help make school more enjoyable is to strengthen arts programs. Research has found large systemic reductions to theater and dance programs, and news stories proliferate about districts finding arts programs to be easy budget cuts in tight fiscal times. Whether it is music or the visual arts, providing young people with an avenue for creative expression has been shown to provide myriad benefits, including increased critical thinking and attainment of background knowledge that contributes to improved literacy. Moreover, giving students an appreciation for art and music, especially in the early years, can lead to more satisfying and happier lives.

Require all elementary and middle schools to provide daily recess

Speaking of leading a happier life, remember returning from recess after playing red rover or freeze tag—still sweating—and listening to your teacher read aloud from Charlotte’s Web? One survey, admittedly a little dated, suggests that 20 percent of districts have reduced recess. Unfortunately, such reductions are likely pennywise but pound-foolish approaches to maximizing classroom time. A vast collection of research suggests that physical exercise can help with learning and social development. Go figure.

If you prefer an anecdote to research, Eva Moskowitz, leader of the Success Academy charter network, is also a firm believer in recess. And her schools produce some of the highest reading and math scores in the state of New York. Even if that wasn’t the case, in an era when children struggle with obesity and Type 2 diabetes, there are many benefits to ensuring kids get regular physical activity—likely leading to this persuasive position paper from the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Ensure schools in the district are using a top-notch curriculum

As Peter Parker’s Uncle Ben would say, with great power comes great responsibility. So it goes with school districts. Districts have and deserve local control regarding how their schools educate students. One of the most important decisions is the curriculum that will be used in each subject and grade. There are a huge number of options on the market, and not all of them are very good. Board members, who usually don’t have the time or expertise to dig into the minutiae of particular curricular options, should require that all learning materials recommended by the superintendent or principals be high quality. More than ever before, experts at places like EdReports are digging in and evaluating the various options, making it easier than ever to rely on objective evaluations rather the flashy marketing materials or long-term relationships with textbook vendors.

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School board members have hard jobs that entail many tough decisions. They have the responsibility to provide oversight and quality control that safeguard their communities’ interests. And these recommendations are right in line with those duties—even if they might feel risky to some members. I believe that most reject over-testing, want and value schools that offer a solid curriculum, and desire diversified school days with art, science, social studies, and physical activity. So I urge them all to have the courage of their convictions. One warning, though, to boards that publicly adopt these changes: Be prepared to start thinking about new school facilities because families from all over the area will want to move to your town.

Death, taxes, and the Browns missing the playoffs are just about the only predictable things on this earth. But far greater uncertainty exists in other aspects of life, including matters of school finance. A new paper by Stéphane Lavertu and Travis St. Clair examines the accuracy of Ohio school districts’ revenue predictions. They also study whether districts’ forecasting errors—a surplus or shortfall relative to predicted amounts—affect student achievement. The analysis relies on state-required financial forecasts produced by Ohio’s 611 districts from 2007–08 through 2014–15.

In terms of forecasting accuracy, Lavertu and St. Clair find that districts underestimated following-year revenues by an average of 2.7 percent during the period of study—what they call a “conservative bias” in districts’ predictions. But as the authors note, it’s not just conservative budgeting that explains the underestimates: Districts also have an incentive to “deflate” revenue predictions in efforts to rally voters to approve local taxes (local news stories illustrate how they can use projected deficits in levy campaigns). But the average masks variation, with a significant number of cases in which districts overestimated revenues, leading to unexpected shortfalls.

Using a battery of analyses, the researchers examine the relationship between districts’ forecasting errors and their value-added scores, a measure of academic performance based on student growth. They conclude that inaccuracies—whether over or under the actual revenues received—have relatively modest effects on value-added results. Specifically, they find that a 1 percentage point increase in forecasting errors is associated with a loss equivalent to one to two days of student learning. But when focusing on districts that overestimated revenues—those that reported rosy predictions but later faced shortfalls—the analysts find somewhat larger negative effects, equivalent to losses of about four to eight days of learning per percentage point increase in errors. Since they run statistical models that control for per-pupil spending, the authors conclude that “the impact of forecast error is unlikely to be attributable to any link between achievement growth and district spending levels.” Finally, based on supplemental analyses, the study offers evidence that teacher attrition and a focus on passing new taxes to fill unexpected budget holes might explain these findings.

Accuracy in revenue projections is surely to be encouraged, and both local and state leaders can take initiatives to this end. On a local level, school leaders can conduct detailed analyses of housing and demographic patterns to better predict local revenues and expenditures. State legislators can do their part as well by creating straightforward, predictable funding formulas that determine districts’ state allocations. A couple steps, described in more detail here, that Ohio can take are: (1) funding districts based on prior-year enrollments, instead of “real-time” headcounts that cause fluctuations in state aid; and (2) phasing out funding caps and guarantees, which are policies that are sharply debated every two years and yield an overly complicated and less predictable formula.

Just like the weather, no organization can perfectly predict future revenues. But helping schools to better plan for the future, so that they don’t end up in financial straits, is a task well worth undertaking.

SOURCE: Stéphane Lavertu and Travis St. Clair, “Beyond spending levels: Revenue uncertainty and the performance of local governments,” Journal of Urban Economics (2018); an open-access version is available here.

With summer vacations now in full swing, the Ohio legislature is taking a breather after an eventful first half of 2018. The sudden resignation of House speaker Cliff Rosenberger and a contentious battle for his replacement stalled legislation for weeks. But once new speaker Ryan Smith was elected in early June, a flurry of bills passed. Let’s recap what the General Assembly has (and hasn’t) done so far this year on the most talked about education issues.

Online schools

Fallout from the mid-year collapse of ECOT continues to unfold. The legislature, undoubtedly sensing the need to ensure a debacle like this never occurs again and worried about its impact on the fall elections, passed several provisions aimed at improving online education. Some of them were introduced in House Bill 707 and later enacted as amendments to House Bill 87 and Senate Bill 216. Our more detailed comments on e-school policy are here, but three important provisions that passed last month are well worth a review.

First, e-schools are now required to withdraw students who fail to participate in learning opportunities without excuse after 72 instead of 105 consecutive hours. This change will result in chronically disengaged students transferring more quickly to settings with greater educator supervision. Second, the state superintendent must recommend clearer definitions for key terms in the rules for counting e-school students—e.g., “participation” and “idle time”—which are part of the full-time equivalency manual, an Ohio Department of Education (ODE) document that has been at the center of the legal fight between ECOT and ODE.[1] Third, a committee will study competency-based funding for e-schools. If done well, shifting to this approach—as other states have done for online learning—would allow Ohio to avoid the problems of using “screen time” proxies for participation (and in turn to calculate funding), and instead fund e-schools based on demonstrations of pupil competency.

The legislature also made a minor misstep and missed an opportunity. Regarding the former, lawmakers extended a “safe harbor” to charter schools whose enrollment increased by more than 20 percent as a result of accepting displaced ECOT students in the middle of 2017–18. Though likely limited to other e-schools, as they enrolled significant numbers of former ECOT students, any eligible school is partly shielded from the threat of automatic closure through 2019–20.[2] Furthermore, all displaced ECOT students will be excluded from the academic portion of charter sponsor evaluations for 2017–18 and 2018–19. While these allowances may appear reasonable at face-value, they unnecessarily weaken accountability. For 2017–18, the test scores of mid-year transfers would already be excluded under Ohio’s full academic year rules. In future years, schools (and their sponsors) should be held accountable for ECOT transfers because they will have attended their new schools for an entire year.

As for the missed opportunity, legislators failed to pass an important provision introduced in HB 707 that calls on ODE to create rules that would permit e-schools to disenroll students refusing to actively participate. This is different than the consecutive hour rule because it’s focused on students who attend but aren’t doing academic work. Allowing e-schools, as Indiana now does, to hold pupils accountable for active participation would better ensure that online learners are working to learn the course material instead of cruising along. The legislature should revisit e-schools’ enrollment policies in the coming months.  

Graduation requirements

Aside from ECOT, the most talked about issue in education has been Ohio’s graduation requirements. Starting with the class of 2018, the state now requires young people to pass state end-of-course exams, earn a college-ready score on the ACT or SAT, or gain industry-recognized credentials. Last July the legislature approved various alternatives to these pathways for the class of 2018, including softball options such as attendance rates or volunteer hours. Although several policymakers pushed to extend these weakened alternatives to the classes of 2019 and 2020, the legislature stood firm and rebuffed the competency-free approach to earning diplomas. The debate around graduation requirements is unlikely to cease, but this is a hopeful sign that the appetite for basement-level standards might be waning.

School accountability

For the past year, Ohio’s school report cards have been a front-burner issue. Since 2013, Ohio has assigned A–F ratings on various report-card components, with an overall composite grade being included for the first time this year. After sharply criticizing this system last fall, Representative Mike Duffey introduced legislation in April (House Bill 591) that would transition Ohio to a “dashboard” system in which various academic data are displayed, but no ratings appear. We at Fordham opposed the legislation, stressing the critical importance of clear ratings for families and communities (though also noting the need to make important tweaks). As the bill began to receive committee hearings, Governor Kasich stepped up and reiterated his support for school ratings. Administration spokesperson Jim Lynch told the press, “Removing the letter grades returns to the situation where it is impossible for the public or the community to understand how well their schools and districts are doing.” To his credit, the governor has halted this badly misguided attempt to overhaul school report cards—and that’s good news. Nevertheless, lawmakers still need to undertake a more careful revision that retains key A–F grades but also yields simpler, fairer report cards.

Also of note with respect to school accountability, legislators spurned attempts to raise the minimum “n-size” that determines whether schools are held accountable for the performance of individual subgroups (e.g., ELL students and students with disabilities). Under the Senate-passed version of Senate Bill 216, schools would have been accountable for subgroup performance when they enroll at least thirty students in a subgroup—a higher number than what is being implemented under the state’s ESSA plan, which reduces the n-size to fifteen by 2019–20. House legislators wisely removed this provision before SB 216 passed the full General Assembly. As a result, Ohio will continue to implement an n-size policy that ensures schools pay attention to the needs of children from all backgrounds.

Teacher evaluation and licensure

Known as the “Public School Deregulation Act,” Senate Bill 216 aims to reduce the regulatory burdens on schools. While the passed version of SB 216 covers a number of topics (we discussed some of them here and here), the most substantial issues addressed are related to teacher evaluation and licensure. On evaluation, the legislation wisely scraps OTES—the current framework that calls for the explicit use of student test scores—with a more observation-driven rubric based on the Educator Standards Board’s recommendations. OTES has been panned for its burdensome requirements, inability to differentiate performance, and the need for testing above and beyond state exams. It’s yet to be seen whether trading OTES for the ESB rubric will decrease administrative burdens, better differentiate teachers, or provide educators with more useful feedback. However, the shift should at least reduce some of the more onerous testing requirements, such as developing local assessments for student learning objectives, which are now forbidden.[3] After a pilot year, the new evaluation framework will go into full effect starting in 2020–21. 

As for licensure, the Senate-passed version included provisions that allow district leaders to assign educators to teach in grades or subjects for which they are not specifically licensed. Under a few reasonable safeguards, the proposal would have given superintendents greater latitude in addressing instructional needs. For example, under the initial proposal, a school leader could fill a need for a tenth grade math instructor with a math teacher licensed in grades four through nine. Sadly the House did not approve such broad flexibilities for local management, and the enacted version of SB 216 requires the state board to create a “supplemental license”—which includes several bureaucratic stipulations—that can only be issued by the state at the request of superintendents who need to fill classroom vacancies. Though this provides some leeway around licensing regulations (in a “mother may I” kind of way), the state still has a long way to go before it fully entrusts and empowers school leaders to manage their staff and build teams of excellent educators.

Governance

Finally, two issues of school governance came into to the spotlight this spring. First, the state’s Academic Distress Commissions (ADCs) came under fire, with several lawmakers attempting to put a three-year moratorium on them. However, Governor Kasich, who has strongly supported the ADC model for turning around struggling districts, threatened to veto legislation that included this moratorium. As a result, the General Assembly instead tasked the state superintendent with reviewing ADC policies and producing a report by May 2019. Second, in a high-profile effort backed by Speaker Rosenberger, several legislators sought in House Bill 512 to consolidate ODE, the Ohio Department of Higher Education, and the Governor’s Office of Workforce Transformation. The proposal aims to improve the alignment between K–12 and post-secondary policy, while also enabling the next governor of Ohio to wield stronger leadership in K–12 education. Vigorous debate ensued over the proposal, but the legislation was shelved after the former speaker’s departure.

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In an “off-budget” year for Ohio, we’ve seen an unexpected amount of discussion on key education issues in the first half of 2018. Some policy developments have been encouraging; for instance, we’ve seen positive movements to improve online learning and to preserve critical accountability measures. But various policies remain disappointingly unsettled. Despite much chatter from legislators about “deregulation,” Ohio still has hundreds of frustrating “input” based regulations—things like licensure requirements—that hamper school-level flexibility and innovation while doing little to boost student achievement. Meanwhile, governance matters such as whether and how the state should intervene in poor-performing districts remain subject to considerable debate. With the election season now at hand, the rest of 2018 may not be as exciting on the policy front. But come January—with a new governor in office and a state budget to pass—all bets are off!

I recently wrote about some big changes that are coming for Ohio’s dropout prevention and recovery schools (DPRS), thanks to recent adjustments made by the State Board of Education. This piece examines the potential impacts of those changes.

Identification as a dropout prevention and recovery school

Previously, a DPRS was defined by the Ohio Administrative Code as a school in which a majority of students were enrolled in a dropout prevention and recovery program. Under the new rules, identification will be based on a much higher percentage of students: The minimum percentage will rise to 65 percent for the 2019–20 school year, and then increase again to 75 percent for 2020–21.

Based on the Ohio Department of Education’s dropout recovery enrollment verification data from September 2017,[1] here’s a breakdown of current DPRS and the percentages of their students who are between the ages sixteen to twenty-one and enrolled in a dropout recovery program:   

Although these percentages change from year to year, we can see the potential impact of new identification rules by examining how they would affect the current numbers. For example, all of Ohio’s current DPRSs would be eligible for dropout recovery status for 2018–19 because the minimum threshold will remain at 50 percent. But for 2019–20, eleven schools that are currently labeled as DPRS would not be eligible for dropout recovery status unless they increase the percentage of eligible students they are serving. An additional seven schools would not be eligible for 2020–21.

Losing DPRS identification is a big deal. It means that schools will be subject to the state’s traditional school report card, which assigns an F to schools with a four-year graduation rate of less than 79 percent, instead of the less stringent DPRS report card that awards a “meets standards” designation to schools with a four-year graduation rate of 8 percent or higher. Fifteen of the eighteen schools that would no longer be eligible by the 2020–21 earned a “meets standards” designation on the most recent DPRS report card, but all of them would have earn an F on the traditional report card.

DPRSs are also charter schools, so they’re subject to the state’s automatic closure law. Although there are closure criteria for DPRSs, those losing this status will likely face a stronger threat of being closed once they’re under the criteria for traditional schools. And their academic results are included in the state’s sponsor evaluation system, which has stiff and far-reaching consequences for sponsors that earn poor ratings. Authorizing a DPRS that suddenly isn’t a DPRS could cause some sponsors to consider non-renewing these schools’ sponsorship contracts.

Graduation rate performance levels

The majority of Ohio’s current DPRSs will be unaffected by the change in identification, but they could be impacted by the state board’s second adjustment, which changed graduation rate performance levels. (For those benchmarks, see here.)

Since DPRSs serve students who aren’t on track to graduate, DPRS report cards assign a designation of “exceeds standards,” “meets standards,” or “does not meet standards” for the six-, seven-, and eight-year graduation rates, in addition to the traditional four- and five-year rates. The state board increased the minimum percentage required for each rating category and graduation rate, thereby making DPRS accountable for graduating a higher percentage of students. Here’s a look at the number of schools that fell into each rating under the current rules compared to the number that would fall into each category had the revised rules been in effect for 2016–17:

For the four- and five-year rates, twenty and twenty-three schools, respectively, did not meet standards under the current benchmarks, but that number would have doubled had the tougher standards been in effect (forty-nine and fifty-one schools). The difference between current and revised numbers in the remaining cohorts is even larger: The tougher standards almost quadruple the number of schools that won’t meet expectations. In short, a whole lot more DPRSs are likely to receive “does not meet” graduation-rate ratings. Because these ratings account for 30 percent of a school’s overall rating, we should expect to see lower overall ratings as well.     

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It’s impossible to predict exactly how many schools will be impacted by these new rules, but quite a few of them—and their sponsors—will likely have some big decisions ahead. As school administrators and sponsors consider their next steps, it’s important for them to remember that their decisions will seriously affect thousands of students and their families. Students who aren’t on track to graduate deserve quality instruction, consistent support, and to be held to high standards. The state board has set higher standards for DPRSs. Here’s hoping that the schools can rise to the challenge.