Announcements

NASSP Releases Statement on President Obama’s State of the Union Address

“We call on the President to renew his pressure on Congress to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act and fix what is not working for all schools in No Child Left Behind. While the current law did some good in highlighting the achievement gap, the law’s high-stakes testing and onerous AYP provisions do little to reduce the gap. If education is indeed to become our national mission, the commitment must begin with a fairer and more flexible federal law.” Read the rest of NASSP’s statement here.

President Obama’s FY 2013 Budget to Be Released Monday, February 13

President Obama will lay out his FY 2013 budget proposal on February 13, which will reflect his priorities for spending for the next fiscal year. NASSP is actively involved in the Committee for Education Funding, a coalition of over 90 education organizations that advocates for adequate federal funding, and that publishes and distributes on the Hill a budget response book (in response to the President’s budget) outlining the conditions and needs for various federal programs, including school leadership. We will take part in the same effort this year to ensure that as the Congressional budget and appropriations committees draft their FY 2013 budget proposals, they are aware of the need to invest in education. Go here to see CEF’s budget response for FY 2012: http://cef.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Budget-Response-FY-12-FINAL.pdf.

News

President Obama Delivers State of the Union (SOTU) Address

The text of the speech and additional materials are available at: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/01/25/president-obama-state-union. Also see the Department of Education blog post: An America Built to Last and the Blueprint for An America Built to Last (pdf). Senate Democrat leaders said on Wednesday they plan to bring pieces of President Obama’s economic “blueprint” unveiled in his State of the Union speech to the floor in coming months. In the President’s Blueprint that follows much of his SOTU address, there aren’t many specific proposals for education. Below, however, are the excerpts from the Blueprint on proposals related to K-12 issues:

Attract, prepare, support, and reward great teachers to help students learn: Teaching is a profession and should be treated like one. The latest research says a great teacher could increase the lifetime income of an entire classroom by hundreds of thousands of dollars. The President is fighting to protect our schools from being hurt by the recession by providing states and communities with funds to prevent teacher layoffs, and avoid increases to class sizes or decreases in the number of school days. The President is also asking for a new competitive program that will challenge states and districts to work with their teachers and unions to comprehensively reform the teaching profession by:

• Reforming colleges of education and making these schools more selective;

• Creating new career ladders for teachers to become more effective, and ensuring that earnings are tied more closely to performance;

• Establishing more leadership roles and responsibilities for teachers in running schools; improving professional development and time for collaboration among teachers; and providing greater individual and collective autonomy in the classroom in exchange for greater accountability;

• Creating evaluation systems based on multiple measures, rather than just test scores;

• Re-shaping tenure to raise the bar, protect good teachers, and promote accountability.

Keep students in high school: The President challenged state governments to live up to their responsibilities by calling on every state to do what 20 states have already done: require students to stay in school until they graduate or turn 18. Studies show that stronger dropout laws keep students in school longer and increase their lifetime earnings as a result. Raising compulsory school requirements, in conjunction with the Administration’s historic investments in low-performing schools, will curb the high school dropout crisis and set students down a path of academic and career success.

See statements from leading members of Congress in response to the President’s address:

Kline Responds to State of the Union Address

Rhetoric vs. Action: State of the Union Promises and the House Republican Agenda

Harkin Statement on President Obama’s Third State of the Union Address

Rehberg Response to President Obama’s State of the Union

DELAURO RESPONSE TO STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS

Enzi response to President’s State of the Union address

Miller Statement on President Obama’s State of the Union Address

President Obama Proposes a Race to the Top Program for Higher Education

In a speech President Obama delivered this morning at the University of Michigan, he proposed a $1 billion competitive grant for states to improve their higher education systems.

As stated in Education Week, “To snag the grants, states would have to smooth the transition between K-12 and college education by aligning entrance and exit standards between the two systems. That proposal would appear to build on an incentive in the original, $4 billion Race to Top for K-12 (Race to the Top Classic), which rewarded states for many things, including if they signed onto the Common Core State Standards Initiative—an effort by states to create more uniform, rigorous standards that prepare students for post-secondary education.

That may be a tall order in the current cloudy economic forecast, in which nearly every state has squeezed funding for post-secondary education in recent years.” Read the entire article here: http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/2012/01/white_house_proposes_new_race.html.

More States Encouraging Students to Graduate Early

More states are increasing the pace of high school curriculum and giving college scholarships as strategies to encourage students to graduate early in order to save district money and allow students to start their post-secondary careers or education sooner. New scholarship programs for early high school graduates are being introduced in Idaho, Indiana, Minnesota, and South Dakota, while legislation is pending in other states.

As quoted in Education Week, “Still, the model can face opposition when state money to districts walks with the departing students. And others are skeptical that students can be truly ready for college a semester or two early. With a growing emphasis on individual and online learning, as well as continued budget pressures, experts anticipate that the option of graduating early will continue to be debated in statehouses in the new legislative sessions.” Read the rest of the article here: http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2012/01/25/18graduation_ep.h31.html?tkn=PLRFiP4FV0m%2FB%2B7SDbe4P7FQdSVDqNgVEUBp&cmp=clp-edweek.

Center on Education Policy Report Finds Progress with Common Core Implementation but Challenges with Budgetary Constraints

In a report published this Wednesday, Center on Education Policy staff report on the progress of implementing common core standards now that efforts are in year two. While the report finds that the “vast majority of survey states are taking steps to familiarize state and district officials with the new standards and to align curriculum and assessments,” most of the states surveyed for the report do not expect to implement the standards until the 2014-2015 school year or later. Further, most states prophesied the challenge of adequate resources to fully implement the standards. Read the report here: http://www.cep-dc.org/displayDocument.cfm?DocumentID=391.

Research

States Vary on Special Education Enrollment: “An analysis of Department of Education data shows that the percentage of students in special education varies widely among states. While Rhode Island tops the country at 18%, Texas, at 9%, is at the bottom. The average percentage across all states is 13%.” See: State Special Education Rates Vary Widely

Resources

CEP Report: The Center on Education Policy recently issued: A Public Education Primer: Basic (and Sometimes Surprising) Facts about the U.S. Education System, 2012 Revised Edition.

ECS Report: 12 for 2012: Issues to Move Education Forward in 2012

Events

Chairman Kline ESEA Event: Chairman Kline will speak about his ESEA bills at an American Enterprise Institute (AEI) event on February 9. For details and to register: Chairman Kline Unveils GOP Vision to Fix No Child Left Behind