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WELCOME Welcome to the Policy Brief. The purpose of this brief is to provide a resource for teacher education professionals, administrators and students from which teacher preparation, recruitment, retention and renewal programs and policies can be developed. According to a new national study entitled
"Latino Youth Finishing College: The Role of Selective Pathways," by
the Pew Hispanic Center, Latinos do not graduate as often or as quickly
as Anglo students and many attend less-demanding schools that may
impede their graduation track. The study indicates that Hispanic youths are
confronted with challenges that Anglo youths are not. These
include delayed entry to college, greater financial responsibility for family
members, living with family while in college
rather than in campus housing, and the tendency to attend secondary
institutions that are less selective. It finds that the gap in
white/Hispanic bachelor's degree completion could be substantially
closed if these well-prepared Latino youth attended the same kind of
colleges as similarly prepared whites and graduated at the same rate. A few of the report’s key findings include :
Read the
full report here. According to an article in Stateline.org, new education proposals are rare in the country's 11 governor's races - issues are more focused on struggles with school spending, job creation, health care and other economic issues. The only campaign debating the No Child Left Behind law is in Utah where the Republican nominee proposes the state opt out of the law's mandates and nearly $100 million in federal funding. The other 10 gubernatorial campaigns have had little focus on the law, besides complaints about an under-funded mandate. According to ASCD, the lack of debate about NCLB may stem from the public's general ignorance about the law. The latest Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup poll indicates that 68% of people know "very little" or "nothing at all" about the NCLB law. Read more on this at Stateline.org. Source: Stateline.org [August 24, 2004]
A recent analysis conducted by the Education
Department's National Assessment of Educational Progress found that
students in charter schools lagged about
six months behind peers in traditional schools. The data shows that
only 25% of the fourth-graders attending charter schools were
proficient in reading and math, against 30% of who were proficient in
reading and 32% in math, at traditional public schools.
Source: ASCD
Smart Brief [August 19, 2004] According to the National
Conference of State Legislatures, all
50 states now have implemented performance-based accountability
measures that aim to improve the overall academic performance of
schools. The article states that "it is not necessarily the capability
of the American education system that is in question, rather it is the wide disparities that
exist within the American education system that warrant attention."
This achievement gap exists due to disparities that exist between race
and ethnicity, economic status, geography and parental education. A standards-based accountability system sets goals in the form of standards, assigns responsibilities for meeting those goals, and holds the system accountable for its performance. According to ASCD, in some states, policy-makers have instituted exit exams -- tests that all high school students must pass to earn a diploma. These have stirred up a great deal of controversy in the education community and beyond, particularly in states with large subgroups of students who may have difficulty passing them. Visit ECS for extensive information on accountability and assessment. Source: ASCD
SmartBrief Special Report: High Stakes Testing [August 2004].
To reduce costs and manpower, three of New England's smallest states are developing common standardized tests in a first-of-a-kind partnership in the nation. New Hampshire,
Rhode Island, and Vermont have teamed up in the effort to comply with
the federal No Child Left Behind Act, which requires annual testing of
students in grades 3 through 8. Interestingly, these three states also
are among those nationwide that have
questioned the costs of the stringent NCLB requirements. Last year, the New Hampshire Legislature cut $3 million from its state testing program. This cut forced the state Department of Education to eliminate the writing, science, and social studies components of its assessment tests this year. The partnership, known as the New England Compact, will test reading and math exams this fall, followed by testing of more than 208,000 students in grades 3 through 8 starting in December 2005. Rhode Island officials estimate they will save $5 million through the combined effort and state education officials for New Hampshire and Vermont say they could reduce per-student testing costs from $22 to approximately $12. Peter McWalters, Rhode Island's education commissioner said he does not see a movement developing towards a single national test. The three states are also developing future combined tests for science and a high school level exam. Source: ASCD SmartBrief Special Report II: High Stakes Testing [August 2004]; The Boston Globe [June 22, 2004]. According to a report from the American Association
of Colleges for Teacher Education, the
ultimate goal of education reform should be the creation of a seamless,
P-16 education pipeline. The report says all early childhood educators
should have at least a bachelor's degree in
early childhood education and those teaching 4- to 8-year-old children
should be certified. Read more here. There is an emerging track record of success in using
key elements of standards based reform to raise student
achievement, a new report finds. The report seeks to distill the
lessons learned from efforts in Massachusetts and Washington to make
academic standards and high-stakes assessments successful. Read
more here. Chicago's Test Scores
Higher New Jersey Board Adopts New NCLB Policy Percentage of Teachers in Louisiana at
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