|
THE R xx |
![[image of the urban skyline]](ceic8-1_files/ceicban2.jpg) The National Center on Education in the Inner Cities |
THE CEIC REVIEW A catalyst for merging research, policy, and practice. |
|
Volume 8 / Number 1 / February, 1999 |
|
THE R xx |
The National Center on Education in the Inner Cities |
THE CEIC REVIEW A catalyst for merging research, policy, and practice. |
|
Volume 8 / Number 1 / February, 1999 |
|
CONTENTS Education in Cities: What Works and What Doesn't
School Variation and Systemic Instructional Improvement in
Community School District #2, New York City Strategies for Urban Reform: The New York State Reform Program: The Charter School Idea: Turning Around Low-Performing Schools is Possible: Redefining Success: Understanding Market-Based School
Reform Private Vouchers: Transforming Urban School Systems: Implications of School Choice
Experiments
Education in Cities: What Works and
What Doesn't In this issue of The CEIC Review, papers commissioned for a national invitational conference on "Education in Cities: What Works and What Doesn't" are summarized. The papers provide an overview of research and practical applications of innovative—even radical—school reforms being implemented across the nation. Cosponsored by the Johnson Foundation and the National Center on Education in the Inner Cites and the Laboratory for Student Success at Temple University Center for Research in Human Development and Education, the conference was held on November 9-11, 1998 at the Wingspread Conference Center in Racine, Wisconsin. The conference organizers brought together education leaders and scholars known for their differing views. Also represented were parents, teachers' union leaders, principals, superintendents, and state and federal officials. The overall goals were to provide a national forum for examining findings from the latest and most significant research on school reform and to showcase school systems and programs that appear to be effective in achieving student success. In addition to addressing the key issues framed by the commissioned papers, conference participants devoted much time in small work groups. They discussed what is known from research and practical applications of the various reform strategies and their implications for next-step recommendations to advance schools' capacity for achieving student success. Despite their differing opinions, the conference participants respectfully heard views sharply different from their own. They made constructive suggestions for improved policies and research that would be more definitive with respect to opposing views. Many approaches to school reform were discussed. They may be
characterized as along a continuum of parental choice vs. best practices.
Near one extreme are publicly and privately funded scholarships that allow
parents to choose and even govern schools for their children. Near the
other extreme are centralized state or district systems that specify
uniform goals, policies, and programs for each school. The commissioned
papers summarized in this issue of The CEIC Review describe these
alternatives and a range of intermediate forms. Parental Choice Parental choice includes both charter schools and scholarships. Charter schools are paid for and are accountable to the public, but are governed by private boards and are, to varying degrees, independent of state regulations, local boards, and teachers' unions. "Weak" charter laws in some states, however, allow unsympathetic local boards to retain considerable operating control over charter school staff. Private scholarships, now used in about 30 cities, are funded both by firms and wealthy individuals. They enable children and youth, usually from economically and educationally disadvantaged backgrounds, to attend private, that is, parochial and independent schools. Public scholarships distribute publicly funded scholarships to parents that can be employed in public and private schools. Many choice schools to which scholarship students may go are
oversubscribed because parents believe they emphasize academic content and
discipline. Contrary to common beliefs, the private schools to which
scholarship students go are more racially integrated than public schools;
their students have more positive inter-racial experiences in them, and
they more often endorse and engage in voluntary community causes. Through
increased competition, moreover, the presence of choice schools appears to
increase the effectiveness, cost efficiency, and responsiveness of nearby
public schools. Best Practices Experiences in several cities and discussions at the conference suggested a number of "best practices" that appear promising in increasing students' achievement. Many conferees, both those favoring best practices and those preferring parental choice, would agree with advisability of a core set of best practices including the following:
Consensual Conclusions Although conferees with divergent views were not expected to achieve consensus, it seems reasonable to say that most would agree to several general conclusions drawn from the deliberations: A. Even though some bright prospects can be cited, U.S. school systems, especially those in cities, are not performing well; they have not improved substantially since "A Nation at Risk" was published about 15 years ago. There was a consensual sense of urgency for advancing the current momentum to achieve reform success. B. The continuing lack in progress has induced ever bolder reform strategies—increased parental choice, decentralized governance from states and districts to schools and parents; high standards which many students may not attain in the short run; focussing on core curricula and examinations; and specific accountability and incentives for educators to do better. C. Recent research and experience suggest that some of these changes
are promising if not proven; they require further large-scale seem to
agree that both parental choice and best practices trials and careful,
rigorous, and independent evaluation and research. Nevertheless, the
conferees would have considerable momentum. Recommendations Those convinced by the evidence on parental choice recommended that it be further expanded and evaluated. Some recommended that substantially expanding the number of roughly 1300 charter schools in 35 states would suffice to accommodate parental preferences. Others believed that private and public vouchers demonstrate that freeing decision making from state and local boards is necessary to accommodate parental preferences. Those preferring choice observed that the poor and minority students in cities m ay benefit most from choice, but, in principle, choice should be extended to all students. The conference papers and discussion groups suggested a number of specific best practices that appear promising in raising student achievement. These include the following: A. Decentralize state and control. A state or district board can set achievement goals, allocate funds, and measure progress but delegate operational responsibilities to subordinate units within their purview while holding them accountable for results. B. Raise standards, measure results, and provide incentives. State and local boards, for example, may require students to pass examinations to drop out of or graduate from high school. They may heavily regulate, replace the staff, or close failing schools. Staff that raise achievement or otherwise perform meritoriously can be financially and otherwise rewarded. Students who pass Advanced Placement examinations can graduate from high school and college earlier, which saves time and tax funds. The award of federal funds for categorical programs may be made contingent on accomplishment of results. Funds for unproven programs, practices, and policies may be reallocated to those proven effective and efficient. C. Emphasize a solid academic core curriculum, set standards for teaching practices and student participation and effort including:
D. Engage universities, regional educational laboratories, and other research and development and technical assistance provider organizations to assist states, districts, and schools in implementing research-based innovations that work, particularly by providing instruments and procedures to measure implementation, classroom practices, achievement results, and parent views. E. Forge partnerships and joint programs among the national and local professional education associations. F. Establish coordination and collaborative partnerships among schools, social service, and health service organizations that are focused on educational improvement and student learning. G. Recruit teachers with broad knowledge of the liberal arts and sciences and a deep mastery of their teaching field; review and revise programs for the preparation of teachers and administrators; employ alternative certification programs to attract better teachers. H. Extend learning time through homework, after-school programs, and summer school; provide special services for students who do not meet new rigorous standards. I. Provide parents and the public with credible and reliable evidence upon which they can base decisions about their children's education.
J. Investigate and experiment further with the apparently positive
outcome effects of smaller schools and smaller school districts. What Might Work? The evidence from the two distinct lines of research on reform strategies identified at the conference, parental choice and best practices, is less than definitive, and the discussion around them on what works and what doesn't remains divided. Yet, in view of the continuing achievement crisis, especially in big cites, substantial changes seem required. Well-designed, careful trials and evaluation of alternative policies, as in medicine, seem the best course. Federal, state, and local policies might be usefully combined into what seems to work from the two reform strategies to make provisions for parental choice and resulting competition among providers to foster best practices. For example, a coordinated system of delivery might be established for categorical programs such as Title 1, special education, and bilingual education. States in turn might require potential recipients to submit research-based arguments for practices they would employ and to submit annual evidence for the attainment of achievement outcomes. Public schools including charter schools and private schools could compete for grants proportional to the number of students attracted to their programs. Most students in such categorical programs could receive the full benefit of their regular school. The categorical grants, however, would give them additional specialized services after school, on Saturdays, and during summers at the same or another public or private school. To restore the American tradition of local school control, the principle of combing choice and best practices might also be extended to states and local districts. They could, for example, set forth clear achievement standards. As long as schools meet these standards, they would remain free of operational regulation. If, on the other hand, a school failed to attain standards or make acceptable progress, best practices could be externally encouraged or imposed. Visiting teams of successful educators might assist in suggesting best practices and evaluating progress. Schools that continued to fail might be reconstituted with new leaders and staff. Alternatively, they might be closed, in which case their students would be given scholarships to attend nearby public and private schools. There are, of course, many variations on the design and details of such systems that are best left to states and local districts.
School Variation and Systemic
Instructional Improvement in Community School District #2, New York
City One of 32 community school districts in New York City, District #2
includes 24 elementary schools, 7 junior high or intermediate schools, and
17 "option" schools organized around themes with an array of grade
configurations. The High Performance Learning Project, described in this
article, grew out of the district's interest in moving beyond its current
instructional strategy to one focused more explicitly on the use of
standards, including both standards of instructional practice and student
performance standards, to guide and motivate instructional improvement.
One question remained in the background in the early stages of the
district's reform process: How do we reconcile the requirements of
system-wide standards of practice and performance with the fundamental
reality of school-site differences? This article offers a few provisional
answers to that basic question and ends with a few additional questions to
ponder. Background Information on the District The central tenet of standards-based instructional improvement is that entire school systems can move collectively in the direction of more ambitious teaching and learning through a focus on common principles of instructional practice, clear standards for student learning, and assessments that accurately capture instruction and learning. The magnitude of the tension between systemic expectations and school variability can be seen by comparison of demographic information across District #2. The district's schools vary significantly in size, from over 1,000 students to under 200. The proportion of students eligible for free and reduced-price lunches varies from 100% to under 20%. Eighteen schools have more than 66% of their students coming from low-income families, and six schools have 20% or fewer of their students from low-income families. The proportion of limited English proficient (LEP) students—predominantly Hispanic and Chinese in District #2—varies from a high of nearly 50% to a low of less than 1%. Some schools serve LEP populations that are primarily Spanish-speaking, others primarily Chinese-speaking, and some a combination of both. Schools likewise are located in communities with very different racial and ethnic compositions. Eighteen schools are comprised of student populations that are more than two-thirds African-American, Hispanic, and Asian, while four schools have populations that are more than two-thirds White. As in most urban systems, District #2 has many schools in which the student populations are relatively mobile. In nine schools, the proportion of students who have changed schools within the last two years is greater than 20%. Variations in levels of student performance can also be examined by
school site. Aggregate performance on a city-wide assessment of reading
and mathematics has shown steady gains from the inception of the
district's improvement strategy, and the district ranks second in the city
among community districts on aggregate performance. Twenty-two schools
have less than 10% of their students scoring in the lowest quartile, while
14 schools have more than 20% of their students scoring in the lowest
quartile. Fourteen schools have more than 40% of their students scoring in
the highest quartile, while 15 have 25% or less of their students scoring
in the highest quartile. Clearly, then, even when overall performance is
high, schools face difficulties in connecting instructional improvement
with student performance, and these differences are played out in the
myriad variations in the students, teachers, and communities that
constitute a school. The Inquiry To explore the problem of school variability and systemic improvement,
District #2 engaged in two types of inquiry. First, the researchers talked
at length with key system-level administrators about how they think about
and respond to differences among schools. Second, principals were asked
how they interpret and respond to system-level expectations in the context
of the particularities of their schools. The result of this inquiry is a
framework that captures a "theory of action" and a "theory in use" that,
together, capture the implicit and informal adaptations made by
system-level administrators. Theory of Action: Systemic Instructional Improvement and School Variability The district's theory of action about systemic improvement and school
variability can be summarized briefly: Principals are the key agents in
adapting and orchestrating system-level expectations to the particular
conditions of schools, and their capacity to do this depends heavily on
their skills in dealing with instructional issues. Schools constitute
unique bundles of attributes, and skillful systemic improvement depends on
system-level administrators developing a deep understanding of
school-level particularities and tailoring their actions accordingly. The
skillful reconciliation between system-level expectations depends heavily
on (a) bilateral negotiations between system administrators and
principals, where principals are expected to actively represent the
particularities of their schools and system administrators are expected to
represent system-level expectations; and (b) common learning activities
cutting across schools that create and reinforce system-wide norms.
Increasing reliance on the quality of student work as the standard by
which schools' success will be evaluated creates a language between
principals and system administrators that focuses attention on a common
attribute of classrooms, rather than characteristics that distinguish one
school from another. Theory in Use: Differential Treatment in the Face of Constraints Much of the investment in instructional improvement and professional development in District #2 has come at a serious cost to system-level administrative resources. System-level administrators cope with this challenge by making hard choices about how to allocate their time. Among system-wide administrators, a pattern of differential treatment, a "theory in use" becomes evident, which is analogous to the situation in a hospital's emergency room. These administrators, like doctors, must decide which, among equally urgent and deserving cases, require the greatest attention at a given moment. District #2 administrators seem to group schools into implicit categories in order to direct and focus their attention:
The View from the Schools What does instructional improvement look like from the perspective of principals? How do the views of principals complement or conflict with those of district-level administrators? Interviews with District #2 principals revealed these preliminary findings: 1. The principals clearly and consistently report the values and goals of the district's strategy for instructional improvement, even while their implementation of the strategy is variable. 2. Most principals perceive a high degree of differential access to district administrators and to resources for instructional improvement, and for the most part they approve of this differential treatment. 3. The principals perceive a more or less explicit matching of leadership to schools in the district's assignment of principals, and they see themselves as having skills and aptitudes that are tailored to their settings. 4. The principals perceive that they participate in a vertically integrated structure of values and learning opportunities that are designed to create a common culture. 5. The principals see themselves as among the key purveyors of an increasingly explicit and widespread "technical culture" around instructional improvement that has a distinct set of norms, a professional language, and a set of practices. 6. The principals endorse for the most part the application of high standards across all schools and the view that school staffs should be held accountable for attaining them. 7. The principals report substantial variation in their relationships
with the teachers' union representative, but do not use union relations as
an excuse or explanation for their own performance. Conclusion Given this generally positive picture, we are left with several questions about the broader issues of systemic improvement and school variability that may be helpful to other districts as they go through the process of systemic improvement: 1. How should we think about "good" and "bad" variations among schools in the context of systemic improvement? 2. What are the most effective ways to teach system-level and school-level administrators the skills of tailoring, bilateral negotiation, and norm-setting that are at the core of reconciling systemic improvement with school variability? 3. What role should student performance standards play in an overall strategy of instructional improvement? 4. What are the future resource implications of the increasing demands of instructional improvement on school- and district-level personnel?
Strategies for Urban
Reform: Overview of the District The Houston Independent School District (HISD) is the largest district
in Texas and sixth largest in the nation. Covering 312 square miles with a
population of over 210,000 students in 280 schools, HISD includes students
from 90 countries, of which 52% are Hispanic American, 35% are African
American, 11% are White, and 2% are Asian American. In 1996-97, HISD
identified 57,076 limited English proficient students representing
approximately 73 native languages. As reflected by free- and reduced-lunch
statistics, the number of economically disadvantaged students, currently
at 73%, increases annually. The district mobility rate is 38.2%. HISD is
fiscally independent of municipal or county government, with state-level
oversight and governance provided by the Texas Education Agency. Improved Academic Performance State Accountability Over the last 6 years, the state of Texas has removed previous requirements and mandates and replaced them with an accountability system focused on results. This change has enabled HISD to alter the way it organizes and provides educational services to children. In addition, state statutes since 1990 have provided greater flexibility to schools to redesign their educational programs to meet individual student needs. The Texas Accountability System focuses on student dropout rates and student performance on state-mandated, criterion-referenced tests. The system establishes levels of performance based on the percentage of students passing the tests in reading, mathematics, and writing at the 70% level. The initial categories established for schools were:
These percentage levels have been raised each year. By 1998, the state required 40% (as opposed to 20%) to pass for "acceptable" and 80% (as opposed to 70%) for "recognized." At first, the accountability system was based on the number of students
passing all tests, but it now reflects the total number of students
passing each test. However, the easing of standards in the first case was
more than compensated for by changes in the consideration of the test
scores and dropout rates by specified student subgroups: African-American,
Hispanic, "other," and economically disadvantaged. A school's
accountability rating is now based on the performance rating of the
lowest-performing subgroup in any subject area. For example, if 92% of the
students at a school of 2,000 students pass the test, but there is a
subgroup of as few as 30 students in a school whose passing rate is 38%,
the school is ranked as low-performing. This rule has helped to focus the
school's attention on the performance of all students. Targeted Schools HISD's performance on the Texas Accountability System has improved annually. The number of schools rated as "exemplary" has increased from zero in 1993 to 36 in 1998, even with the higher standards. The number of low-performing schools has decreased from 55 to 8 in the same period. The improvement in schools designated as low-performing in 1993 has been largely the result of the district's program for targeted schools. This program provides low-performing schools with training and support in data analysis, program planning, identification of effective strategies, professional development, and acquisition of resources to improve the academic program. Each targeted school is paired with a team of principals, curriculum specialists, and researchers to observe current practices, discuss issues and data with the staff, and assist in the development and implementation of a district-funded improvement plan. Originally, the targeted schools were the 55 low-performing schools. This year, targeted schools were those with fewer than 50% of the students passing. Targeted schools can receive additional funds for up to 3 years that can be used for teacher training; extended-day or Saturday tutorial programs; additional teachers to lower the student/teacher ratio or provide expertise in specific subject areas; manipulatives, books, and materials; and/or establishment of computer-assisted instruction laboratories. Team visits are made to targeted schools on at least a quarterly basis
to monitor the effectiveness of the implementation and to consider
revisions to the improvement plan. Many of the schools that were targeted
in 1993-94 are now "recognized" or "exemplary" schools. District-wide Initiatives Contributing to Academic Success In addition to the state accountability system, a variety of district-wide initiatives have contributed to HISD's improvement. These include efforts to increase graduation requirements, define successful reading programs, improve the quality of mathematics instruction, and offer objective clarification for staff on meeting state accountability requirements (see Project CLEAR below).
Conclusion The accountability system created by the state, combined with the district's efforts, have focused teachers' and administrators' attention on improving achievement for all students. It has been Houston's experience that the key to improvement is the ability to identify what needs to be done and provide assistance in doing it. When teachers and other school staff know what they are doing well, and what needs to be improved, they are willing to do what it takes for students to be successful.
The New York State Reform
Program: Educational reformers and many Americans believe that teachers ask too little of their pupils. Parents, particularly those of African-American and Hispanic students, are quick to criticize the low expectations and goals that teachers and school administrators often set for their children. These low expectations result in what they perceive to be watered-down curricula, a tolerance for mediocre teaching and inappropriate student behavior. For decades, state-level policymakers and educational leaders have been concerned about these problems. One common response to the problem of low expectations and low achievement has been the use of minimum competency exams (MCEs), whereby schools define standards for learning, test students against these standards, and require that students pass exams assessing the achievement of these standards before graduating. This article examines the impact of making high school graduation
contingent on passing a series of MCEs on high school dropout rates,
college entrance rates, and college dropout rates; the quality of the jobs
obtained by high school graduates; and the different effects, if any, for
students from less advantaged or minority backgrounds. In addition, an
overview of New York State's Regents Exams policy is provided, and
implications for state policy are drawn. The Effects of MCEs on Dropout Rates, College Attendance, and Wages A number of studies have examined the effect of minimum competency exams graduation requirements on enrollment rates and high school graduation rates. Research has shown that dropout rates were reduced by increases in the number of courses necessary to graduate, but not by MCEs. Other studies have revealed that there is no evidence in these data that MCEs of the type that existed at the beginning of the 1990s lower graduation rates. New York State's voluntary Regents exams also appear to have no significant effects on dropout rates or graduation rates. MCEs are hypothesized to improve job opportunities in two ways. First, researchers indicate that, by improving student achievement, MCEs raise worker productivity. Second, MCEs signal employers that "all of the graduates of this high school meet or exceed your hiring standards." With the MCE requirement, the school's diploma now signals more than just seat time; it signals meeting or exceeding certain minimum standards in reading, writing, and mathematics. This should make local employers more willing to hire the school's recent graduates. The MCE graduation requirement should be particularly helpful in dispelling the stereotypes some employers have about minority youth. MCEs have been found to have a significant positive effect on the probability of attending college in a majority of subgroups during the four-year period immediately following high school graduation. The positive effect was largest for students in the middle and bottom of the test score distribution and tended to be greater in the second and third years following high school than in the first, fourth, and subsequent years. MCEs also have an immediate and significant impact on the college enrollment of low socioeconomic status (SES) students, while middle and high SES students are affected but not until the second and third year out of high school. Students from low and moderate SES backgrounds had significantly higher wage rates when they attended MCE high schools. High SES students did not. Finally, MCEs appear to have increased the wage rates of minority youth but not White youth. Except for Hispanics, graduates of MCE high schools did not earn more than graduates of non-MCE high schools in the years immediately following graduation. Earnings grew over time, however, so that by 1985 annual earnings were $484 higher for Whites, $808 higher for African Americans, and $703 higher for Hispanic Americans. For 1992 graduates, a number of the subgroups appear to have received statistically significant earnings benefits in the first calendar year after graduating from an MCE high school. Low-SES students who graduated from an MCE high school earned $694 extra, a more than 10% increase in earnings, their first year after graduation. Students from the middle of the test score distribution earned $424 extra (a 7.5% increase) when they graduated from a MCE high school. MCEs are changing. New states and cities have introduced them, while others are improving their exams and raising the standards for graduation. The New York State Regents Examinations: Implications for State Policy New York State has been administering curriculum-based Regents Examinations to high school students since June 1878. The examinations are taken throughout a student's high school career in such subjects as mathematics, biology, global studies, chemistry, English, American history, foreign language, and physics. For students, the stakes attached to Regents Exams are not high. Exam grades count for less than an eighth of the final grade in the course and influence only the type of diploma received. College admissions decisions depend primarily on grades and SAT scores, not Regents exam scores. Employers tend to ignore exam results when making hiring decisions. All of this is about to change. The New York State Board of Regents has announced that by the year 2003, students must take new, more demanding Regents exams in algebra, geometry, global studies, American history, and laboratory science and pass them at the 55% level. Once schools have adjusted to the new exams and the requirement that all students take them, the Regents intend to raise the scores necessary to pass from the 55% level to 60% and then to 65%. Requiring that all students reach the Regents standard in five core subjects has the potential to significantly increase student achievement, college attendance and completion, and the quality of jobs that students get after high school. The biggest beneficiaries of the policy will be the students, often from disadvantaged backgrounds, who have been encouraged or allowed to avoid rigorous courses in the past. Problems, however, may be inevitable. Once students start failing Regents exams and having to repeat courses in order to graduate, a crescendo of complaints will follow. Claims will be made that schools have not done enough to help students succeed on the new exams. What can the Regents and the state legislature do to help local schools meet their obligation to help students meet the new higher standards? How can the number of dropouts and graduation delays be minimized? The most important change will be to increase the amount of time that struggling students spend on the task of learning. This is the central recommendation of the Board of Regents, a representative group of teachers, school administrators, and parent representatives that was convened by New York State's Commissioner of Education. This group recommended a radical increase in the amount of instruction that struggling and disadvantaged students receive. Additional recommendations made by this group includ e:
Many school districts in New York State have already started shifting to an all-Regents curriculum in anticipation of the new requirements, and the numbers of students taking Regents-level courses and passing Regents exams is rising. Between 1995 and 1997, the proportion of students taking and passing Regents exams at the 65% correct level rose from 50.3 to 56.3% in English, from 53 to 59% in sequential mathematics I, and from 41 to 44% in biology. Nevertheless, extremely high failure rates are predicted—between 30 and 50% in some subjects—the first time Regents Exams are administered to all students. Even if the reforms proposed above were implemented immediately, they would not have been in operation long enough to prevent the predicted high failure rates. Many students will have to retake examinations after taking additional academic courses or special summer makeup courses. Will this generate an increase in dropout rates as students despair of ever passing all five exams? Not necessarily. The authors predict that students will study harder and stay in high school longer. The tougher graduation requirements will not be fully phased in until the class of 2003. By 2007, dropout rates are predicted to be at or below current levels; this will be accomplished without making the Regents Exams easier than they are right now. Let us imagine, however, that the prediction of stable or rising high school completion rates is wrong. Would a 2-4% decline in completion rates imply that increasing graduation requirements was a mistake? No. Focusing solely on graduation rates mistakes symbol for substance. It is the competencies developed in high school that enable a student to survive and thrive in college, not the diploma. Higher standards will result in all students learning more on average. Those who graduate will be more competent and will be able to command a better wage in the labor market. The average high school dropout will also be more competent. This, too, will result in higher pay and higher rates of college attendance. There will be losers—the hypothesized 2 to 4% of the age cohort that would have graduated under the old standards but do not under the new higher standards regime. But these losses pale by comparison to the wage rate gains experienced by the 96 to 98% of young people whose completed years of schooling are not changed by the higher standards.
The Charter School
Idea: As of September 1998, nearly 1,200 charter schools are in operation across the United States, enrolling approximately 240,000 students. Thirty-four states and the District of Columbia have authorized a charter school law (though not all charter school laws are created equal). The charter notion enjoys wide bipartisan support, with President Clinton calling for 3,000 charter schools by decade's end. Charter schools may well be the most vibrant force in American education today, foreshadowing a revitalized K-12 public education—even in our nation's most challenged urban areas. The charter school approach to educational governance can be helpful to those in urban areas laboring to broaden and improve the educational opportunities available to families and the educational outcomes achieved by urban school children. The governance of public education today is based on an approach in which schools are seen as uniform instruments of government (i.e., they are owned and operated by school boards), staffed by government (i.e., civil service) employees, and held accountable by complying with government regulations, central office prescriptions, and union contract provisions. The charter strategy poses a challenge to this current understanding of public education governance. The charter school portends a view of a public school as any school that accepts all comers, is paid for by the public, and is accountable to a public authority for the results of student learning. Families should be free to choose among different, autonomous, and self-governing schools. This article provides a brief overview of school and student data on
urban charter schools, and examines four assumptions that undergird the
charter idea while simultaneously challenging the conventional approach to
the governance of public education. Urban Charter Schools Charter schools tend to be an urban phenomenon. In 1996-97, 51% of the then-existing 457 charter schools were located in large cities or on the urban fringe of a large city. And nearly one-third (32%) of the nation's charter school students attend schools in large cities. Nearly 7 in 10 (68%) charter school students in large cities are from minority groups, compared to almost 8 in 10 (78%) other public school students in those communities. A charter school, therefore, is about as likely as a regular urban public school to have a large minority enrollment. The median school size of a large city urban charter school (137
students) is much smaller than that of other public schools (625 students)
in urban communities. And the median student/teacher ratio for a large
city charter school (21.1:1) is greater than that of other public schools
in the same location (19.3:1). How Charter Schools Challenge the Traditional Education System There are over 15,000 local school systems in operation across the United States today, each with its own board and superintendent. The total public school payroll numbers nearly 5 million persons, and the schools spend about $255 billion, which averages to almost $5,700 per student. It is one of the largest bureaucracies in the world. Traditionally, public schools have been thought of as instruments of government, managed in a classic bureaucratic mode by lay boards that employ experts to carry out their directives. Public school systems are monopolies that typically deliver education through essentially identical schools. Reforms must be "systemic" and only the well-to-do have easy access to alternatives for their children. The quality of public education is gauged by inputs, resources, and compliance with rules. Results-based accountability is largely absent and resisted. Power rests with the producers, and the consumer is marginalized. Charter schools point us toward a new conception of public education, one that replaces the old assumptions with a striking new paradigm. The charter movement rests on four different assumptions:
Conclusion The charter strategy is changing the education world by inspiring educators and parents—and others, as well—to create independent public schools of choice that are freed from most bureaucratic hassles in exchange for a written contract to produce superior educational results. But how much of that change is for good? Now that we are beginning to discern a visible impact from the charter movement, attention must be turned to the important question of how these schools are actually doing. Are they successful enterprises? Are they boosting student achievement? How innovative are they? Because of the newness of the charter approach to school governance, it is difficult to discern how the movement will ultimately affect American public education. However, much of what has happened thus far bodes well for public education, in particular the governance of urban public schools.
Turning Around Low-Performing
Schools is Possible: This article summarizes the progress and outcomes of the implementation of the Community for Learning program (CFL), a comprehensive approach to school reform that aims to significantly improve student learning in six collaborative demonstration schools in the District of Columbia. This project is a joint venture between the District of Columbia Public Schools (DC Schools), the six demonstration schools, and the Laboratory for Student Success (LSS), the Mid-Atlantic Regional Educational Laboratory at Temple University Center for Research in Human Development and Education. The project was initiated during the 1996-97 academic year in some of the lowest performing schools in the District of Columbia. CFL provides an implementation delivery framework designed to assist
schools in implementing a comprehensive approach to school reform that is
systemic and sustainable in achieving student success. Program
implementation focuses on uniting the expertise and resources of the
school, family, and community to ensure a high standard of achievement for
each student. A high degree of program implementation of CFL is expected
to strengthen the capacity of schools to mobilize and redeploy school and
community resources to support a comprehensive, coordinated, inclusive
approach to achieving student success The CFL Demonstration Schools Five elementary schools began implementation of CFL during the 1996-97 school year. The five schools were identified by the DC Schools as among the lowest performing schools in the District and had shown a continuous pattern of decline in student achievement. The schools were mandated by the school district to participate in the implementation of a comprehensive school reform model—the Community for Learning program. All five Year 1 schools continued their implementation for a second
year during the 1997-98 school year, and another school was added to the
CFL network of demonstration schools at that time. This school was also
one of the low-performing schools identified by the school district for
"special intervention." Findings on Program Implementation and Outcomes As is typical of most, if not all, schools in large urban school districts, the six demonstration schools experienced a large teacher and student turnover rate during Year 2 implementation of CFL, as well as changes in their administrative staff. These changes resulted in the need for intensive implementation training and professional development support, in spite of the fact that five of the six demonstration schools were entering their second year of program implementation. Findings on program implementation and outcomes for the 1997-98
academic year are summarized below under four headings: (a) degree of
implementation of the instructional component; (b) patterns of changes in
classroom processes; (c) relationship between degree of program
implementation and classroom process; and (d) student achievement. Degree of Program Implementation Because of school-specific variations (e.g., the percentage of new teachers and new principals, organizational structure, student turnover rate, and other site-specific factors), the implementation progress varies across the CFL demonstration schools. Overall, across the six CFL demonstration schools, the degree of implementation data indicate a pattern of improvement in the degree of implementation across all demonstration schools. The CFL Degree of Program Implementation Assessment Battery was used to
collect information on the extent to which the 12 critical dimensions of
the instructional component of CFL (known as the Adaptive Learning
Environments Model, [ALEM]) were implemented in each class in all six
demonstration schools. These dimensions include interactive teaching,
developing student self-responsibility, record keeping, instructing, and
motivating. Findings showed that the fall and spring changes were
statistically significant for 11 of the 12 dimensions. Patterns of Changes in Classroom Processes One of the expected improvements in the degree of implementation of CFL is a concomitant pattern of change in classroom processes. For the six CFL demonstration schools, classroom observations were conducted in all six demonstration schools during fall and spring to obtain information on teacher and student classroom behaviors and to examine the pattern of classroom process changes resulting from program implementation. In general, findings suggest an overall pattern of positive changes in
student behaviors between fall and spring, including class time spent with
teachers on instructional versus managerial interactions, with peers in
sharing ideas versus causing disruption, interacting versus doing seat
work, and watching and listening. Results of teacher observations between
fall and spring were consistent with the student observation findings.
Changes were observed between fall and spring in terms of teachers
spending more time instructing rather than managing students, and
increasing the amount of time spent conducting small-group lessons and
working with individual students. Relationship Between Degree of Program Implementation and Classroom Process To determine the extent to which the positive changes in the patterns of classroom processes and behaviors can be attributed to changes in the degree of program implementation, a multiple correlation analysis was carried out. Using the results from the classroom observation study carried out for the pre- and postimplementation periods and the degree of implementation measures, the degree of implementation was found to be significantly correlated with classroom process and student behaviors (p<.05). The incremental increase in the degree of implementation and
concomitant changes in classroom behaviors and the instructional/learning
process are significant in two ways. First, these findings validate the
CFL program design in terms of its feasibility and positive impact on the
classroom process and how teaching and learning take place in CFL
classrooms. Second, and perhaps more importantly, these findings provide
reassurance to school staff that their efforts in achieving a high degree
of program implementation result in observable, positive changes in their
classrooms. Student Achievement For the 1997-98 academic year, the superintendent of the DC Schools stipulated that all of the schools must show at least 10% gain between fall and spring testing as measured by the Stanford Achievement Test, 9th Edition (Stanford 9) for both reading and math. All of the six CFL demonstration schools exceeded this improvement standard. This finding is particularly noteworthy in light of the fact that, despite beginning the 1997-98 academic year with lower scores when compared with the other targeted assistance schools, the CFL demonstration schools made equal gains in reading, and a slightly lower gain in math. Although the schools varied in the amount of progress made, there was a pattern of positive progress in math achievement across all six CFL schools during the 1997-98 academic year. For example, there was a decrease in the percentage of students who scored in the below-basic performance level for the spring testing compared to fall testing, and an increase in the percentage of students who scored in the basic, proficient, and advanced levels. Another noteworthy finding in the pattern of progress in student achievement in math and reading is the gains made by students who scored at the top 20% across all CFL demonstration schools. By the end of the school year, all students in the top 20% of each school were performing at the basic performance level or higher for both math and reading. In fact, many of these students were performing at the proficient or advanced levels. In addition, the number of students performing at the below-basic level
in both reading and math at the beginning of the school year decreased by
the end of the school year. At the same time, the number of students
performing at the proficient and advanced performance levels in reading
and math increased during the 1997-98 school year. Conclusion Findings on program implementation and student achievement in the CFL demonstration schools during the 1997-98 school year show a continuing pattern of improvement for a second year. On average, the CFL demonstration schools showed greater achievement gains than other targeted assistance schools, even though the CFL demonstration schools were among the lowest performing schools in the District of Columbia. Data from the second year of implementation reconfirmed the complexity of implementing a comprehensive approach to school reform in large, urban school systems such as the DC Schools. However, despite the high mobility level of students and the high turnover rate of teachers which are typical of large urban schools, it is particularly encouraging that major progress in program implementation and student outcomes was achieved in every CFL demonstration school. The ability of the CFL demonstration schools to maintain the initial gains they made during Year 1 of the program, in spite of the turbulent start of Year 2, and the institutional resilience of the school staff who continue to face many challenges in bringing about changes in the learning of children in their schools, are particularly noteworthy. This upward trend in student achievement patterns is highly impressive, particularly in light of the previous pattern of decline prior to CFL implementation. Development of strategies to encourage students in the CFL demonstration schools to perform at high standards that are comparable to the national and regional norms will continue to be a priority for school and teacher development in DC and other participating CFL schools across the country.
Redefining Success: The San Antonio Independent School District has a student population of 61,000. Eighty-five percent of its students are Hispanic, 10% are African American, and 5% are "other." Approximately 92% of its students come from low-income families, 16% have limited English proficiency, and 10% receive special education services. In 1994, student academic achievement in the district consistently ranked below the state average in all areas of testing. The percentage of students passing the state-mandated Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) was 60.8% in writing, 56.2% in reading, and 34.8% in math. The first time the district's students took the TAAS end-of-course algebra test, only 3% passed compared to the state's 17% average. In biology, 38% passed compared to the state's 84% average. Also problematic was the district's hierarchical organizational structure, its deeply entrenched practices, and its rigid and narrow job descriptions. Accountability was insufficient as well, and the mechanisms for ensuring it were either lacking or un clear. The district espoused the rhetoric of wanting more parental involvement, but was only minimally receptive of parents who wanted to become involved. The opportunities for employees to engage in personal and professional growth were limited. In the last 4 years, the San Antonio Independent School District has
made modest increases in student achievement in reading and writing and
significant gains in mathematics. In reading, the percentage of student
passing the TAAS test has increased by 15.5% to 71.7%. In writing, the
gain is 14.9%, with 75.7% of the district's students now passing this
component of the test. The district's greatest gains were in mathematics,
with a 30.6% gain since 1994. Sixty-five percent of the district's
students now pass the TAAS math test. This article explores how the school
district engaged in systemwide change to achieve academic excellence and
sustained student learning. Increasing Student Achievement A new organizational structure focusing on instruction and the needs of students was put into place in the summer of 1995. The district is now divided into four learning communities, each headed by an Instructional Steward, who is responsible for the instructional and professional development needs of 20-25 schools. Another change was the creation of a new position at each school—the Instructional Guide. This individual supports the principal in providing meaningful instructional leadership by linking research findings to professional development and classroom practices and providing coaching and technical assistance to teachers. The district's middle schools were the first priority for change, as
examination had revealed numerous inconsistencies in curriculum both
between and within schools. At present, the middle schools are beginning
the third year of the process, which involves establishing and aligning
standards with national and state accountability measures. The high
schools are entering their second year of this process, and the elementary
schools are just beginning. Other District Initiatives Bilingual education. Instead of being scattered over a multitude of classes, the district's bilingual students are now clustered in a program that builds a strong foundation in Spanish and helps students learn English. All bilingual students in the district are expected to be readers and writers in their native language as well as in English. In addition, bilingual students will take the TAAS test in Spanish, and their scores will be included in the state accountability system for the first time this year. Magnet schools. In 1995, the district began implementation of nine magnet school programs, which are open to district students and students from surrounding districts. The magnet programs include Communication Technologies; Fine Arts; Health Professions; International Banking and Business; Law and Research; Science, Engineering, and Technology; Media Productions; Multilingual Studies; and International Baccalaureate. High school redesign. The staff of each high school, along with parents and community members, have been exploring, planning, and designing schools where all students are successful and will graduate. Schools were assured that there was not a single way to redesign a school, but that their plan had to address four different parameters: the formation of small, caring teaching and learning environments; academic rigor and high standards for all students; an infrastructure of support for student success; and curriculum alignment. Each high school has access to a district-appointed facilitator, funds for study materials, and summer stipends for redesign teams. The district's goal is to open the 1999-2000 school year with all of its high schools reorganized. Targeted Assistance. Schools designated as "low-performing"
according to state accountability standards are targeted for intervention
by the district. Targeted assistance is also provided to "priority"
schools, where less than 50% of students pass any subject at two or more
grade levels. Each targeted school receives support for data analysis and
development of a plan of action. Content-specific Emphasis The district has implemented a balanced literacy approach, a curriculum
framework that gives reading and writing equal status. This framework
combines explicit instruction in skills and content, balanced with skills
taught in the contexts of a variety of reading experiences. A literacy
center has been created in one of the district's schools, and more are
planned for the future. The center provides on-site demonstration of
research-based literacy practices, offers mentorship and classroom support
for reading teachers, builds model literacy-based classrooms throughout
the school, and serves as a laboratory for collection of data to assess
the effects of specific reading practices on student achievement. Building an Infrastructure The term "infrastructure" is used here broadly to include anything that facilitates the professional development of teachers and others. The number of professional development days has been increased from 2 to 8 over the past 4 years. Teachers have 3 additional non-teaching days, to be used as workdays. Scheduling is done creatively to provide teams of teachers with common planning time. In addition, the district has shifted its thinking about professional development from the narrow view of "sitting and getting" workshops to a broader understanding that includes all those activities that teachers and others engage in to improve teaching and learning. The development of a wide-area technology network that links all its schools to each other, to the central administrative offices, and to the Internet, provides staff with a wide range of possibilities for sharing with colleagues and exploring other avenues for professional growth. Through the district's Teachers and Teaching Initiative and the Teacher
Incentive Program, school staff have further opportunities to grow
professionally and personally. They can participate in several different
activities, including working toward certification by the National Board
for Professional Teaching Standards; mentoring of new teachers;
participating in a professional development residency with a designated
master teacher; taking sabbaticals; or participating in teacher networks,
focus groups, or incentive programs. In addition, the district has
implemented required technology competencies, to be effective in 3 years
when computers are uniformly accessible. Strengthening Parent and Community Involvement The district's Parent and Community Partnership Network, initiated in
1995, has fostered the expansion of parent and community participation
through mentoring and partnership programs, increased offerings in
community and adult education, and parent and community membership in the
schools' instructional leadership teams. Current projects include a parent
academy; a parent-community help line; home-based parent education
services; the migrant education federally funded Even Start project;
conflict resolution and mediation training, an integrated social services
program (Project Milano); and the Seamless Support for Academic Success
program, financed by the Ford Foundation. Conclusion The stakeholders of the district have learned a number of lessons about the realities of what works when engaging in systemic school reform. Here are a few examples:
In stressing the academic, personal, and service dimensions of learning, the district's vision encompasses the whole child. The zeal and commitment of all is needed to do whatever it takes for each child to achieve academic success. The San Antonio Independent School District promotes a culture of revision where change, growth, and risk-taking in the service of children is welcomed, appreciated, and encouraged.
Understanding Market-Based School
Reform The sudden emergence of well-organized and often well-funded advocates of market-based school reform caught many long-time participants in the school reform debate off guard. The most dramatic change in the national debate over school reform in the U.S. has been the rise in influence and sophistication of market-based reforms. Pilot voucher programs are operating in Milwaukee and Cleveland, and proposals for statewide voucher plans were introduced in over 20 states in 1998. Nearly 800 charter schools were approved and 750 were expected to be operating in 1997, triple the number of 2 years earlier. Approximately 200,000 students were expected to be enrolled. In addition, significant tuition tax credit legislation was enacted into law in Arizona and Minnesota in 1997 and narrowly missed adoption in Illinois. The notion that private-sector initiatives can produce better schools received another boost during the past decade from the private scholarship movement, a loosely organized national effort to test the voucher idea through privately funded tuition scholarships to benefit school-age children. The number of such programs rose from one in 1991 to 41 in 1998. These programs can be distinguished from other private scholarship efforts by the random selection of recipients and other devices that allow social scientists to isolate and study the effects of choice on student achievement. Politically, the profile of free-market reform ideas has risen concomitantly with Republican advances in federal and state government. Opinion polls show rising public support of vouchers as well, with nearly 70% approval among African Americans. Voucher proponents also have won major victories in both federal and state courts since 1996. The resources and sophistication of the organizations devoted to
studying, popularizing, and advocating market-based school reform have
grown considerably in the past 10 years. Public interest law organizations
are helping to draft and successfully defend tuition tax credit and
voucher bills; national think tanks have published books and policy
studies on the subject; and state-based think tanks in some 35 states play
a leading role in formulating school reform legislation and reform
coalitions. New foundations promise to provide additional funding to think
tanks and other organizations that explore or promote market-based school
reform. The following brief overview introduces non-economists to those
aspects of economic methodology that are most often misunderstood or
misrepresented by opponents of market-based reform. What Economics Can Tell Us About Education Economics is the science of how a particular society solves the problem
of allocating scarce resources to fulfill competing needs. Delivery of
education, or schooling, in the U.S. clearly fits the description of an
economic problem. Most of the known resources that make schooling possible
are scarce: teachers, administrators, books, other learning aids, and
facilities all must be purchased, which means bidding them away from
competing uses. The remaining children attend private schools, where
policy is more often determined by contract, or are homeschooled, where a
parent sets the rules. Public Choice Theory Economists accept as given the rules and ends of the institutions they study. The fact that over 80% of schooled children in the U.S. attend government schools, where policy is generally set by voting, does not mean that economics is an inappropriate tool to explain why schools do (or do not) achieve the ends they seek. Economists generally view voting as a possible substitute for contract or price systems in cases where jointness of consumption and nonexcludability of free-riders would otherwise lead to "market failure." Whether voting works better than markets in such cases, or leads to even less efficient "government failures," is often an empirical question. Economists utilize a model of human behavior, called rational choice theory, that minimizes the number of assumptions allowed to enter into an economic analysis. The model stipulates that human agents will tend to choose rationally among the choices they face. Rational choice theory is silent on whether or not the agents' ends are rational or desirable in any way except that they are voluntarily chosen by the agent over other ends. When economics is applied to social and political institutions, it produces propositions and predilections that can be validated by empirical research. This growing body of thought and evidence is called public choice theory. Some of the phenomena documented by public choice theory include log rolling (strategic voting), the "capture" of regulators by those they are supposed to regulate, and the organizational advantages of small interest groups over the much larger, but less-interested general public. Public choice theory has also produced many testable propositions concerning education, including the illustrative list below: 1. In school systems where there are no consequences for either success or failure, higher spending will not produce better results. Repeated study by independent researchers has found little or no positive correlation between higher spending on government schools and student achievement. 2. As the source of a school's funding shifts farther away from those who benefit from the school, the school's cost-effectiveness will fall. Student achievement is closely and positively related to the percentage of funding derived from local sources. Waste and lack of measurable results is greatest for Title 1 programs and Head Start, both programs that rely on federal rather than local funding. 3. Competing special interest groups will capture the surplus "rent" generated by the government schools' monopoly on tax funding. Average government teacher salaries and benefits are significantly higher than those of comparable professions. Bureaucracies in government school systems are far larger and more costly than those in private school systems. Public elementary and secondary schools in 1995 employed 2.3 million people who do not teach, compared to approximately 2.5 million teachers. Whereas less than 11% of the private sector workforce was unionized in 1995, over 80% of government schoolteachers belong to unions. 4. Because they can be held accountable to their customers, private schools (all other things held constant) should produce larger gains in student achievement per dollar spent as well as report superior results by other measures than their government school counterparts. Catholic schools in the U.S. spend significantly less per student than government schools, but they dramatically increase educational achievement among minorities in urban areas compared to minorities attending government schools, even after the schools' allegedly tighter admission criteria have been taken into account. 5. Opposition to cost-cutting and reforms that would provide greater accountability to customers will come primarily from the interest groups benefiting from the government school monopoly. Teacher unions spent $30 million to defeat Proposition 226 (the "Paycheck Protection Act") in California in 1998 and are expected to spend $4 million attempting to defeat Measure 59, a similar measure on the ballot in Oregon in late-1998. Litigation against tax credits, charter schools, and voucher bills has been initiated and is usually funded by teacher unions. Teacher unions uniformly and adamantly oppose contracting out—even when it could save a school considerable amounts—because it threatens their own job security. The strength of public sector unions has a statistically significant negative effect on the likelihood of U.S. county governments contracting for goods and services. 6. School Board members are likely to be "captured" by administrators and teacher unions. Local school boards around the country are thoroughly cowed by teachers unions. Historically, school boards did not resist teacher unionization or collective bargaining. The National Association of School Boards adopts positions that are largely indistinguishable from those of unions, including calling for more funding and opposition to school choice. 7. Because they are more likely to be held accountable to parents, private schools are more likely to adopt policies popular with parents than are government schools. Polling reveals that parents and the general public are more likely to agree with private school administrators and teachers than with government school administrators and teachers on issues such as discipline, core curriculum, and the goals of education; polling data reveals that parents of students attending charter schools are more likely to approve of the policies of their chosen school than are parents of students attending government schools. 8. Programs that require schools to compete for tuition dollars
should show improvements in student achievement and in measures of
effective organization. Student achievement is statistically and
negatively related to the degree of market concentration in the local
school market. Conclusion Charter schools, private scholarship programs, tuition tax credits, and pilot voucher programs for low-income students are now operating throughout the U.S. It may be just a matter of time until states opt to allow all parents the choice of a government or private school for their children. It is the authors' hope that the conceptual framework provided in this article will help educators and other stakeholders to avoid some of the common misconceptions about market-based school reform.
Private Vouchers: The voucher movement is one of the most controversial forces for change in American education today. What it proposes—that government provide grants to parents who wish to send their children to private schools—may seem, on the surface, to be simple enough. However, the voucher movement has ignited explosive political battles, as defenders of the public system have put up fierce resistance at every turn. It has also spawned heated intellectual debate, as supporters and opponents have offered conflicting claims about how these reforms would work out in practice. While the battle over vouchers has been raging, a little-noticed development has been taking place outside the public sector. Individual, corporate, and philanthropic contributors in major American cities have begun setting up their own programs to offer "private vouchers" to the parents of disadvantaged children. As of the 1997-98 school year, 30 of these programs were up and running, involving over 12,000 children; 11 more are scheduled to open in 1998-99. The private voucher movement is in its early stages, and research on
its programs has only just gotten underway. This article examines the
empirical evidence that has been generated on the efficacy of private
vouchers in an effort to provide a fresh perspective for thinking more
generally about the "new politics of education" and where it seems to be
taking us. The Evidence Surrounding Private Vouchers Reasons for Participating A common criticism from the opponents of school choice is that parents cannot be counted on to make choices on the basis of sound educational criteria or values. Parents—especially those from low-income backgrounds—supposedly care about practical concerns, such as whether or not the school has a good sports team, and place little emphasis on academic quality and other properties of effective schooling. As a result, they fail not only to make good decisions for their children, but to give schools strong incentives, in competing for parent support, to provide high-quality education. Until recently, the most suggestive data on parental choice came from the Milwaukee public voucher program. Although the number of private-sector choices is limited there, parents are still allowed to choose between public and private, which is a significant choice. Findings from studies on the Milwaukee program reveal that low-income parents in the voucher program single out academic quality as the most important reason for using the voucher, followed by discipline and the general atmosphere of the school—clear indications that their choices are driven by educational concerns. Voucher parents are also motivated by frustration with the public schools, and are much more dissatisfied with them than parents who remain in the public sector. Yet this motivation, which appears to derive from the same concerns for academics, discipline, and atmosphere, receives somewhat less emphasis. Private voucher programs ought to provide even better evidence than Milwaukee has been able to generate thus far, because these programs give parents the entire private sector to choose from, and thus greater opportunities to act on their own values. The evidence they yield is strikingly consistent with findings for the public voucher system. Indeed, the results for the two Milwaukee voucher programs, one public and one private, are virtually identical. More generally, parents uniformly indicate that academic quality is their most salient reason for participating. Discipline is typically very highly ranked, as is the school's general atmosphere. And frustration with the public schools, while not the top motivator, is a consistent complaint. It is of no small weight that the programs being studied here do not
target suburbanites, or even average middle-class families, but low-income
families—precisely that stratum of society that critics regard as the
least capable or responsible. The evidence suggests that, even within this
stratum, parents who use vouchers put very substantial emphasis on
educational concerns in making their choices about schools. Parent Satisfaction What are the impacts of vouchers on children? For most observers, the acid test is whether vouchers lead to higher student achievement, and thus whether voucher children do better on standardized tests than children in public schools do, once other factors are properly controlled. But while learning is a crucial outcome of schooling, it is not the only aspect that contributes to the well-being of children. To get a more broadly based view of how well children are doing, we need to look at a wider range of indicators, and recognize that many of the important aspects of schooling—including those that have to do with how much students learn—are intangible. In a choice system, the people whose judgments matter most are parents. They may not be experts, but they know what they want for their children, they know what they are looking for in a school, and they can provide summary judgments of how well schools—and their children—are doing. Parent satisfaction, then, is important evidence; although it is subjective, it is anchored in direct experience, reflects the kinds of judgments on intangibles that are needed to assess important components of schooling, and addresses a fundamental issue that needs answering about any school system: whether it pleases the people it is supposed to be serving. Data on parent satisfaction offer some of the best evidence available on the impact of vouchers. Studies on the Milwaukee public voucher system have already shown that voucher parents are substantially more satisfied with their new private schools than public school parents are with their public schools. And while the size of the satisfaction gap depends on what aspect of schooling is being evaluated—from learning to discipline to textbooks to opportunities for participation—voucher parents are consistently more satisfied than their public school counterparts, whatever the issue. The data coming in from the private voucher programs strongly and consistently reinforce these results, and show that private voucher parents are not only considerably more satisfied than public school parents across all issue areas, but are even more satisfied than the parents in the public voucher program. This makes sense, because they have more to choose from than the public-voucher parents do, and have more opportunities to find schools they are happy with. Thus the people who do choose to participate in voucher programs—a
subset of low-income parents—are considerably more satisfied with their
new private schools than they were with their original public schools, and
they are much more satisfied than other parents who have been in the
public schools all along. These are among the strongest findings in the
entire literature. In the eyes of parents who have actually used vouchers,
the verdict is that vouchers work. Student Achievement For almost everyone involved in the national debate over vouchers, the most salient issue is student achievement. Advocates gain credibility for their cause by showing that parents subjectively believe vouchers are working well for them. But what uncommitted people want to see—and what opponents demand—are objective assessments of whether vouchers "really are working" to promote higher levels of student achievement. Achievement, however, is an issue that is difficult to investigate. Most voucher programs are quite young, and it is risky to try to evaluate the impact of vouchers by studying systems that are still in their early stages. The changes that parental choice sets in motion may take time to be realized. Children have to settle into their new schools and be shaped by their new settings, and schools have to come to terms with their new incentives and have a chance to adjust. Even if these problems could be dealt with, studying the effects of vouchers on student achievement would still be very difficult. Among other things, for instance, simply getting test scores is a forbidding task. Researchers would need to get the same or comparable test scores for both public and private school students. This is harder than it seems, since private schools may not test their students at all, or use a variety of different tests that may not match those given by the public schools. Public school test scores, meanwhile, are often subject to all sorts of legal restrictions, and may be unavailable to researchers. Once test scores are obtained, moreover, researchers have to deal with the problem of controlling for other variables—such as family background—that could also play a role in explaining how much students learn, and that may account for why some children show up in voucher programs to begin with. It is hard to carry out research that controls for all the variables we know might be relevant, or even for the important ones. The data on achievement are complicated, and there is not enough evidence as yet to say with confidence that the students who take advantage of vouchers clearly learn more than the students who don't. Yet there has been real progress in the study of student achievement. And at this stage, the weight of the research—including the most recent work, based on the best data and methods—leads to the tentative conclusion that voucher students do indeed learn more. Additional research on the topic is forthcoming, and whether these early results will hold up over time remains to be seen. These results have given rise a fundamental point that is little
appreciated in the debate over vouchers: design is the key. How vouchers
work in practice is critically dependent on the framework of rules in
which they are embedded. As private voucher programs expand and multiply,
researchers will have increasing opportunities to observe how different
designs work out in practice, and, more generally, to explore the range of
issues—from student performance to parental participation to information
to equity and access—that need to be jointly assessed and fitted together
in any coherent treatment of vouchers. This is an exciting prospect, and
for the first time promises to generate an extensive body of empirical
research to inform the public debate. As it does, it may well change that
debate dramatically, along with the path of American education reform. Conclusion On the whole, what researchers have to tell us about vouchers is positive and encouraging. The evidence suggests that there is indeed a genuine demand for vouchers among low-income families, who respond enthusiastically and in large numbers when given the opportunity to participate in these programs. Free to choose, they distribute themselves across a wide variety of private schools; and these schools, contrary to the prevailing myth about private-sector elitism, appear only too happy to take them in. When poor children have vouchers, they have access, and there is good reason to believe that their educational opportunities are expanded considerably. Experience from private voucher programs also casts doubt on the myth of parental incompetence. The evidence suggests that participating parents make good choices for their children, or at least make a serious effort to do so; for they appear to be guided by precisely the sorts of educational criteria that concerned parents ought to be guided by—academic quality, discipline, and other indicators of effective schooling. To the extent this is so, moreover, they are probably transmitting the right kinds of incentives to participating schools, which are put on notice that they need to do their jobs well if they are to attract parent support. The evidence also tends to suggest—at least so far—that vouchers work. Data on parent satisfaction indicates that, on a variety of different dimensions, voucher parents are highly satisfied with the schools they have chosen, think the shift from public to private has been a beneficial one, and evaluate their schools more highly than public school parents do. These are important measures of how well students and schools are doing. In the eyes of the people who use them, vouchers seem to be working well. However, we cannot lose sight of the fact that the private voucher movement is a far more important social phenomenon than a focus on evidence and research alone can suggest. It is a movement that opens new educational opportunities to thousands of disadvantaged children, and promotes innovation and change by loosening the iron grip of established interests. It adds fire and momentum to the larger movement for school choice. But above all, it embodies and advances a new politics of education—a politics that stands traditional alliances on their heads, and promises to transform the constellation of pressures that shape our nation's educational policies and practices.
Transforming Urban School
Systems: Current reforms in U.S. and U.K. "sister cities" Chicago and Birmingham, England, provide valuable lessons in urban educational transformation for other urban school systems. Recent accomplishments of the two systems must be considered to be significant, as their schools were once publicized as the worst in their respective nations. The two systems also confront numerous structural constraints associated with urban society. This article looks at the educational reform process underway in both cities and at implications for educators and policymakers in both countries. Since Mayor Richard Daley took over the Chicago Public Schools in July 1995, the district has made significant improvements in its financial management, administrative functions, and educational performance. Major initiatives that once posed political risks, such as an end to "social promotion" and the creation of "summer bridge" programs, are now endorsed by national, state, and local leaders. Across the Atlantic Ocean, the Birmingham Local Education Authority (LEA) has undergone a transformation. The Birmingham City Council reversed a decade of neglect in education with its appointment of a nationally-known reformer, Professor Tim Brighouse, as the Chief Education Officer in September 1993. Brighouse's charismatic leadership has energized and inspired the rank-and-file in the teaching force. Since 1994, the city's budget for education has consistently exceeded the national spending standard. These investments have produced significant gains in student performance. The sister systems are closing the gap with their national averages. In
Birmingham, significant gains have been made in student test scores in the
last 3 years. In 7 out of 10 national tests in key subject areas across
four different grade levels, Birmingham students showed improvement at a
much faster rate than the national average. In Chicago, elementary reading
and math test scores have showed consistent gains over the past several
years. Clearly, Chicago and Birmingham are in the midst of an
unprecedented drive toward educational improvement. Integrated Governance as a School Reform Model The successes of the two systems closely relate to the recent redesign of district-level governance and management. The sister systems share several institutional characteristics that can be broadly described as "integrated governance." The major institutional features include:
With integrated governance in place, conditions of teaching and learning in the Chicago public schools have been improved in several ways:
Through integrated governance, the educational system in Birmingham has been transformed in several ways:
Considering the Cross-national Context The two sister systems operate in very different policy and political contexts. The United Kingdom has instituted a national examination, a national curriculum, and a national inspectorate on schooling standards, whereas schooling in the U.S. is defined by the constitutional framework of individual states. In addition, local management gives schools in the UK more control over financial and human resources, where such autonomy is lacking in the U.S. Parents in England can select from a broader pool of schools, including state-affiliated (government), religious, and grant-maintained, while parents in the U.S. have more limited options. On the other hand, the two systems have many demographic similarities.
Both are large and urban, and have several hundred schools. Both are
racially and ethnically diverse, with relatively large percentages of
students speaking languages other than English. In addition, the
percentage of students from low-income families in both cities is higher
than the national (for Birmingham) and state (for Chicago)
averages. Systemwide Reform in Chicago Passage of the School Reform Amendatory Act in 1995 compelled leadership of the Chicago Public Schools to target the city's lowest-performing schools for intervention. In 1996, the district placed 109 of its schools on probation because 15% or fewer of their students scored at grade level on nationally normed tests. Probation schools are held accountable for improving student
performance on standardized tests. The district provides several types of
support to facilitate this improvement. Each school must select from a
list of board-approved external partners, which include teams of personnel
from local universities and national reform groups. The district also
provides probation managers to oversee the schools' improvement plans and
assist the principal in all areas of school operations, and business
managers to oversee financial operations. All of these supports are
intended to enable the principal to become an effective instructional
leader. Seven schools with a continual record of low performance were
"reconstituted." Five of the seven schools had their principals replaced,
and 29% of their teachers were not rehired. These schools will have to
improve their test scores or risk being shut down. An Ambitious Agenda At the end of its third year under integrated governance, the Chicago Public Schools has developed a reform agenda that includes the following new initiatives:
Transformation in Birmingham Local Education Authority (LEA) Like its counterpart in Chicago, the political leadership in Birmingham has made a strong commitment to education in recent years. The best indication of the city's political will toward improvements in education was a shift toward educational funding that coincided with the appointment of Tim Brighouse as Chief Education Officer in 1993. The new leadership saw the need to maintain a balance between elaborate construction projects to renew the city's central business district and human capital investment through funding of educational reform. The Birmingham LEA maintains two essential characteristics of integrated governance—unified political structure that is committed to education, and a vision that aims at better student performance. Overall, a vision of the LEA as a critical friend to teachers lies at the core of the Birmingham model. This vision, in turn, relies on a well-designed infrastructure at the central office focused on bringing about school improvement and academic gains. First, the Chief Education Officer spends most of his time visiting
schools, talking to teachers, and observing classroom instruction.
Teachers are constantly reminded of broad principles that guide good
practices, such as inclusiveness, celebrating success rather than focusing
on failure, and seeing education as a lifelong activity. Second, the
educational needs of the schools drive central office organization rather
than the other way around. Third, a full-scale infrastructure provides
ongoing professional and technical support to schools. Conclusion From the examples of these two school systems, several policy challenges emerge. For policymakers, the key is to develop strategies that will sustain and broaden the accomplishments of the last 3 years. For practitioners, there is a need to improve organizational coherence and programmatic alignment between the central administration and the individual school to meet the challenge of educational accountability. For researchers, the challenge is to raise analytical standards in conducting research that is less grounded in advocating a particular ideological or partisan point of view. In Chicago, the central administration has successfully addressed fiscal and managerial problems. It has raised performance standards for the whole system and instituted an ambitious accountability agenda that provides both pressure and support for school improvement. Several urban school districts in the U.S. are following Chicago's lead, including Cleveland. The Birmingham LEA has experienced similar success under integrated governance. The LEA has significantly improved its fiscal operations and has mobilized teachers around its innovative educational agenda. Its professionally oriented support model has led to significant school improvement and played a crucial role in improving student achievement. As the national government in the UK reinforces the LEA's monitoring function, Birmingham offers a promising model by which to balance pressure and support. While the sister systems have made significant gains, their approaches to school improvement reflect both differences in vision, leadership, organizational structure, and local political realities. As the educational visions of both administrations continue to evolve and as the political and organizational realities change, continued study of how integrated governance operates within each system may provide further insights into successful strategies for improving urban schools.
Implications of School Choice
Experiments Whether viewed in comparison with other countries or looking within the United States over time, the state of American education appears pretty grim. For example, recent studies have shown that students are learning less during their middle-school years than they once were. When test-score growth in the 1990's is compared with growth a generation earlier, their results show that students are slipping in math, science and writing. African-American students are slipping just as much as White students—even more so in reading. Furthermore, studies show that American students are slipping far behind their peers internationally in math and science. As a result of these problems in American education, many are giving serious consideration to the possibility that school vouchers or some other mechanisms for increasing parental choice provide a way of reversing these educational trends. However, these same people also wonder whether this solution to our educatio |
