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In the current fiscal climate, all government entities – schools most certainly included – are being asked to justify their costs. But given that they are typically measured by standardized test scores, graduation rates and other academic measures, how can schools show their cost-effectiveness?

Economist Michael Walden has provided one example, conducting a study on the impact of the Virginia Beach City Public School System on the metropolitan Virginia Beach economy. And he recently shared the experience in School Administrator (a publication of the American Association of School Administrators, AASA).

One thing I appreciated: The opening acknowledgement that while there is much rhetoric about bringing business principles to government, government is fundamentally different than business. As Walden points out, “a strong argument can be made that government exists to perform those functions that private companies can’t do and make a profit.” ...

At a recent reception in the august Mansfield Room in the the U.S. Capitol celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversary of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS), Ron Thorpe, the new President and CEO of NBPTS, compared the Board certification that almost every physician earns in order to practice medicine to the status and importance of Board certification for teachers in K-12 classrooms.  He specifically asked if we’d be willing to send our child (or grandchild) into surgery if the physician doing the work wasn’t Board certified in his or her field.  Of course, none of us is willing to send a loved one into the operating theatre under the care of a surgeon who is not Board certified, so why should we be willing to send our children to schools with teachers who may or may not be skilled in their practice? 

The National Board for Professional Teaching Standards was established twenty-five years ago with support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York and under the leadership of then North Carolina governor, James Hunt.  The Carnegie Forum on Education and the ...

As with many developments in public education, when you hear about a “public private partnership”, you would do well to ask a few follow-up questions. For example, you might wonder about the true business interests – given that many entities are profit-driven. If the company has a foundation arm providing grants, what are their metrics pushing for schools or districts to demonstrate? To what extent does the business respect education experts and maintain a respectful distance from policy decisions?  Are these programs operating in traditional public schools and are they successfully expanding? Do these programs support equity? In an era where tax dollars are scarce and public schools are struggling under the challenges of tightening budgets, it is tempting to cite examples of cross community collaboration as a possible solution to school funding issues. However, not all partnerships are the same when you compare quality, mission or implementation, and continued questioning is essential. ...

Shortly after I wrote a blog post in late April about the data showing the effect of poverty on student academic achievement, I received an article from OnlineUniversities.com listing and describing the ten poorest high schools in the United States.  The data sadly correlates the level of poverty and student achievement in a manner that is in line with the data Stanford University has gathered through years of research around contributing factors in student achievement.  The surprise is that not all the ten poorest high schools are traditional public schools:  one is a charter and one is a virtual high school. And they too have trouble helping students succeed, once again illustrating that school structure – charter, traditional or virtual – is not the determining factor in educating children to their highest potential.  A sampling of the schools on the list— ...

On May 17, the Learning First Alliance (LFA) honored Jack Jennings, who founded (and recently retired from) the Center on Education Policy after a long and distinguished career on Capitol Hill, with our 2012 Education Visionary Award. In accepting the award, Jennings explained what he believes will bring about major improvement in education in the United States: A focus on curriculum, teacher quality, and funding.

What follows is an excerpt from his speech.

We are in a world where you can’t stand still. We are in a world where we have to improve. And unfortunately, national leaders are coming across in education as saying that things are okay, and I don’t think that is helpful. I think that it is much more helpful to say that American education must be better than it has been in the past for the sake of the kids, but also for the sake of the country.

But I also believe that we are on the wrong agenda today. We are on an agenda that is not going to get us very far. We need a new vision and we need a new agenda for education.

Let me tell you how I arrived at this. I wrote a paper…looking back on 50 years of school reform. We’ve had three major movements in school reform. The equity movement of the 1960s and 1970s, which brought about a lot of good, especially for kids with disabilities, for women, for ...

Policymakers, researchers, practitioners and the general public all seem to agree: Improving teacher quality is one of the most promising strategies for improving education outcomes in our nation. But to date, most policies on teacher quality revolve around teacher evaluation – identifying weak performers and helping them improve (and getting them out of the profession if they don’t). And most seem to rely on one of two tools for measuring quality: Observations by school administration (some of whom have little time for, and training in, this particular activity) or standardized test scores (which are of questionable value in assessing educator performance).

Often ignored in the teacher quality conversation are those first entering the classroom. How can we be confident that they are able to teach effectively starting their first day as a teacher of record?

Recognizing the need for a new standard for determining teacher readiness, the American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education (AACTE) and Stanford University have partnered to ...

McDowell County Public Schools have been in the news a lot recently and for good reason. They are part of an exciting partnership that brings together public and private partners to revitalize the rural West Virginia community in which they are located.

McDowell faces an uphill battle, especially where statistics are concerned. Once a vibrant coal mining community with more than 120,000 people, McDowell experienced a mass exodus and decline after the industry collapsed in the early 1960s. Today, the county has around 22,000 residents with a median household income of $22,000. For the past decade, McDowell County has ranked last in the state in education, over 40% of students don’t live with their biological parents and 72% of students live in households without gainful employment. Roads are in a poor state of repair, making transportation difficult, many homes lack running water and medical care is hard to find. Significant problems for schools come with these realities – property taxes generate low revenue to fund schools, teachers are hard to recruit and keep, and resources of all kinds are scarce. ...

Earlier this week the State Education Technology Directors Association (SETDA) released its latest report, The Broadband Imperative: Recommendations to Address K-12 Education Infrastructure Needs, at an event featuring presentations by a panel that included two state leaders from Maine and West Virginia along with a district administrator from New Jersey.  Once again, we were reminded of the opportunities that are opened up for students and teachers (and those administrators that lead districts and schools) when robust connections and ubiquitous communications devices are available for teaching and learning.  However, having more years of experience than I like to admit in advocating for the appropriate use of technology to support personalized learning opportunities and teaching effectiveness, I was struck with the realization that this meeting and its recommendations, while important, were not new.   ...

Studies show that the physical and mental health of students is inextricably linked to their academic success. Fourteen percent of students in school have asthma that impacts their daily living. One third of teen girls will become pregnant before age nineteen, and many of them will not complete high school successfully. Eleven percent of families are food insecure—their children do not get enough to eat and they may come to school hungry.

That is precisely why schools can and should create the conditions for optimal learning, including the basics of health services, from healthy meals to physical activity to health education that teaches life-long skills.

“Our members work with students every day whose health and school conditions impede their ability to learn. That’s why NEA members are taking the lead to advocate for school and learning conditions that result in a higher level of student engagement and fewer absences” said National Education Association (NEA) President Dennis Van Roekel at Health in Mind,  hosted by ...

Chronic absenteeism is often thought of as a middle and high school issue. As children become responsible for getting themselves to school, those who are disengaged stop showing up.

But did you know that nationally, one in ten kindergarten and first grade students miss the equivalent of a month of school each year? In some districts, it is more than one in four. Why don’t we talk more about these shocking statistics?

Perhaps because we don’t know them. I had no idea that chronic absenteeism (when a child misses 10% or more of the school year) in the early grades was so common until a session last week at the Coalition for Community Schools’ 2012 National Forum, when Hedy Chang, director of Attendance Works, and representatives from school districts across the nation helped illuminate the scope of the problem.

I doubt I am alone in my ignorance on this issue. When data in Multnomah County (Oregon) showed that 20% of K-3 students are chronically absent – 28% of kindergarteners – stakeholders in both the schools and the community were shocked. ...