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TEXAS AFT LEGISLATIVE HOTLINE--WEDNESDAY, JULY 15,
2009 Darling-Hammond cited familiar statistics showing that the United States has fallen behind other countries in education indicators--but then drew some unfamiliar conclusions about how the United States might emulate our competitors in education. She said U.S. fourth-graders are 35th out of 40 in math performance and 31st of 40 in science. Our high school graduation rate is 70 percent. In Korea, by comparison, 95 percent of students graduate from high school, and 85 percent go on to college. In California, where Darling-Hammond is an education professor at Stanford University, just 28 percent of high school graduates go on to college. Our top international competitors do several things differently from the United States, Darling-Hammond said. They provide a safety net for kids featuring adequate health care, universal preschool, and housing. They fund education "centrally and equally," and add more funds to schools that have the greatest need. These countries have a well-organized and "lean" curriculum. They teach one-third as many concepts in math and science, and they teach them well. They have performance assessments that are meaningful and not standardized. Finally, they support a strong teaching system, with adequate compensation, mentoring and working conditions that foster collaboration, adequate planning time, and opportunities for active research. It is these policies, Darling-Hammond said, not more "mediocre , multiple-choice education" tied to standardized tests, that our educational system should emulate. U.S. Secretary of Education Exchanges Views With AFT Members: Appearing at the same conference a day earlier, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan engaged in a spirited dialogue with AFT members from across the nation on hot topics including charter schools, "merit pay," and reform of the No Child Left Behind Act. Several AFT members asked what the Obama administration would do to ensure charter-school growth would not siphon resources from traditional schools and would not deny educational opportunity to English-language learners, special-education students, and other groups that are often underrepresented in charter schools. "I'm not a fan of charters, I'm a fan of good charters," said Duncan. He laid out three conditions that need to be in place for a charter school to qualify as a good institution: They must have a strong, evidence-based action plan before they open; they must have real autonomy to innovate; and they must have clear accountability for the results they produce. He reminded the audience that, as head of Chicago Public Schools, he closed three charter schools for academic failure, and he promised, as education secretary, to monitor charter schools closely and hold them accountable for actions such as failing to serve English-language learners or systematically counseling hard-to-educate students out of the building and back into traditional public schools. "I don't want charters to get a dime extra, and I don't want them to get a free pass," Duncan added. "These are public schools. These are our tax dollars. And these are our children." The education secretary also was asked to detail his position on teacher evaluation and merit pay. An AFT college-faculty member recounted how her institution had implemented a merit-pay plan without giving faculty a voice in the process--and now was struggling with a system that had become a byzantine, bureaucratic nightmare that is draining time and energy from the faculty. Duncan responded that, when it comes to incentive pay, "You cannot do this unilaterally; you have to bargain it through the union." Morale and factors outside of student test scores also can't be overlooked when it comes to these new approaches, the education secretary stressed. "You can't pit professionals against each other," he explained, adding that strong approaches recognize the value of the entire school team, both inside the classroom and out. Duncan also agreed that the No Child Left Behind Act stands in need of a thorough overhaul, citing the "blunt instrument" nature of the law's "adequate yearly progress" measure, the irrationality of relying on 50 different state definitions of proficiency, and the insufficient emphasis under the law on support for struggling schools. AFT President Randi Weingarten thanked Duncan for engaging in a real conversation on the issues and observed that educators want to be "worked with, not worked over" as their schools and institutions of higher education respond to the administration's education agenda. |
