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I spent all of last week in Hyde Park, Chicago, currently the epicenter of American political activity because of its most prominent resident, President-elect Barack Obama. Technically, I was on vacation, but I couldn’t help asking folks I met what they think about Arne Duncan, CEO of the Chicago Public Schools, one of Obama’s basketball buddies and a man who is increasingly looking like the president-elect’s choice for education secretary.

Unlike other candidates mentioned for education secretary, who wear their ideologies strongly on their sleeves, Duncan has (like Obama) walked a finer line, signing onto both of the dueling petitions on where Obama should take his policy. So it seems more important, in his case, to figure out what exactly he has done.

The results of my completely non-rigorous reporting were not too encouraging. One parent at the private school attended by Obama’s daughters — which Duncan himself attended and where his wife now teaches — said the scuttlebutt was that Duncan lacks the political savvy to cut it on the national stage. And when I popped into a neighborhood clothing store, I spoke with several public school mothers who were adamant that there hasn’t been widespread improvement under Duncan’s leadership. (Catalyst-Chicago, which provides independent reporting about the city’s schools, says some of Duncan’s major initiatives haven’t had the impact he’d hoped.) (more…)

John McCain paid tribute to the New York City schools at last night’s debate, using the system as one of two examples of how “choice and competition” can improve public schools. (The other example was New Orleans.) McCain also borrowed a phrase Schools Chancellor Joel Klein often uses. “Well, it’s the civil rights issue of the 21st century,” was the first sentence of his response to Bob Schieffer’s education question. This follows McCain’s endorsement of Klein’s national manifesto on how to improve schools, the Education Equality Project, over the summer.

Barack Obama did not mention New York City’s school overhaul, but he did sing the praises of a chancellor who has cited Klein as a mentor, Michelle Rhee of Washington, D.C. Klein has praised Rhee and worked together with her on his Education Equality Project effort, while the teachers union president, Randi Weingarten, has criticized her more than once.

Given all the New York City love, it’s no surprise NYU education historian Diane Ravitch’s was not impressed: “Neither candidate showed a deep understanding of the needs of our public schools,” she wrote at Politico.

When Randi Weingarten was elected president of the American Federation of Teachers, the country’s largest teachers union, back in July, she proposed creating “school-based community centers” to serve needy students and their families. Now, she’s behind a coalition to promote her vision.

The Community Agenda for America’s Public Schools calls for strong partnerships between schools and communities as a strategy to “close the opportunity gap” by increasing the quality and diversity of services that schools offer. Backers say their goal is to outline an agenda that is politically and practically feasible, rather than purely ideologically driven, in contrast with two other coalitions currently dominating debate in education circles: the “no excuses,” accountability-based Education Equality Project and the Broader, Bolder Approach to Education, which holds that schools alone cannot close the achievement gap. The group seeks a broad range of outcomes for children, from academic success to physical and emotional health, arguing:

Every institution that influences positive outcomes for children and youth must be part of the agenda — schools, families, government, youth development organizations, health, mental health and family support agencies, higher education and faith-based institutions, community organizing and community development groups, unions, and business.

Weingarten joined a handful of other education leaders in Washington, D.C., this morning for the campaign’s inaugural press conference. The Community Agenda has already been endorsed by dozens of national education and community organizations, as well as by a number of local school districts, including those in Baltimore, Chicago, and Portland, Ore. The New York City Schools are not on the list of endorsers.

The Community Agenda for America’s Public Schools is administered by the Coalition for Community Schools. A full list of the agenda’s policy recommendations is after the jump. (more…)

Paul Tough and others knowledgeable about urban education have been discussing his book, Whatever It Takes, at Talking Points Memo’s TPM Cafe this week. Tough’s book chronicles the life of Geoffrey Canada and the creation of the Harlem Children’s Zone, which brings together a number of programs to help children growing up in poverty. Unlike schools, which usually don’t work with children until they are 4 or 5 years old, the HCZ approach starts even before children are born, with a parenting program called “Baby College.”

TPM Cafe invited the Education Trust’s Amy Wilkins, Teach For America’s Kira Orange-Jones, the Education Sector’s Andy Rotherham, and Alex Kotlowitz, author of There Are No Children Here: The Story of Two Boys Growing Up in the Other America to respond to Tough’s book. The conversation started with a look at how the HCZ approach fits into the two education platforms battling for candidates’ attention this summer, the Broader, Bolder Approach and Education Equality Project (click either for a refresher).

Alex Kotlowitz pointed out that poor families need both, to which Rotherham replied (and Amy Wilkins agreed) that it’s really a question of where to begin:

All else equal we can expect a great deal more from our public schools than they’re delivering today. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to do more on the other issues that affect achievement, but that in the meantime educators should seek to do more today in the realm they directly control – the schools.

Tough responded that what makes the most sense is doing all of the above, simultaneously: a spectrum of early-childhood interventions plus more accountability for schools. But he acknowledged that one side of that equation is easier to push for than the other, which brings me back to an earlier question. If it’s common sense to work on closing the achievement gap from all angles, how do we make sure that happens? (Rotherham and Tough think Barack Obama might be the answer — but what about in the long-term, beyond any individual political leader?)

In a major address about education yesterday in Ohio, Barack Obama provided more detail about his nearly year-old education platform and took aim at his opponent’s education policies, saying, “John McCain doesn’t get it. He doesn’t understand that our success as a nation depends on our success in education. I do.”

In the course of the lengthy speech, Obama promised to double federal funding for charter schools; invest in early-childhood education; give low-income students access to college-level courses; fund “innovative schools”; increase access to after school, summer school, and extended day programs; recruit and train high-quality teachers; and create a “parent report card” to update families about their children’s progress. He also swore to replace weak teachers, send teams to improve “bad programs,” and shut down unsuccessful charters. All this sounds like an expensive proposition — but Obama notes that it will come at “the cost of just a few days in Iraq.”

On Monday, I said I thought Obama had tipped his hand in favor of the “Bolder, Broader” crowd, but several of the policies he discussed yesterday — support for charter schools, differentiated teacher pay, stringent consequences for weak teachers and failing schools — sounded like they came straight from the Education Equality Project playbook. (more…)

Tucked in at the end of Elizabeth Green’s Sun story about Obama’s education orientation, Obama advisor Jonathan Schnur argues that dividing education policy into two camps — those who side with the “Broader, Bolder” platform and those who prefer the Education Equality Project’s — “presents a ‘false choice.’” Philissa hinted at the same point in her post about “total schools.” The more I read posts accusing “Broader, Bolder” supporters of making excuses or “Education Equality” supporters of scapegoating schools and teachers, the more I tend to agree.

As an educator, it makes no sense to sit around and wait for society to level the playing field so that all your kids come into school healthy, prepared to learn, and fully supported at home. You see that you have kids who didn’t benefit from good prenatal care, nutrition, early childhood education, or clean air, and who face physical and developmental challenges as a result – but what are you going to do about it? You throw yourself into your teaching, and, if you’re lucky, your school comes together to tackle the other issues to the extent possible. You can work some wonders this way, but you know, deep down, that while it’s not an excuse, you could do more if the background issues were addressed.

As a policymaker evaluating schools, it makes no sense to ignore context. (more…)

Mind the gap, by Marcin Wichary

The internet has seen a flurry of activity recently over the DOE’s claim that it has reduced the achievement gap between black and Hispanic students and their white and Asian peers. Testing that claim, the New York Sun submitted the ELA and math scale score data for students in grades 3-8 to three independent analysts, who concluded that the gap has decreased in ELA, but has stayed flat since 2002 in mathematics, confirming much of Eduwonkette’s analysis.

The new analysis emphasizes the difference between closing the proficiency gap by comparing the percentage of students who score at a level 3 or 4 on state tests, and closing the achievement gap by comparing mean scale scores.

(more…)

Yesterday, we noted that Chancellor Klein hadn’t signed on to the “Broader, Bolder” platform. Today, we learn that Klein has a coalition and platform of his own. In Washington, D.C., today, Klein and the Reverend Al Sharpton announced the launch of the Education Equality Project, a new campaign to position education as “the civil rights issue of the 21st century” and to challenge politicians and educators to reform schools in a way that puts children’s needs before their own.

Stacked with leaders of ED in 08, an education-focused political action committee, the campaign is clearly intended to influence discussion of education policy in the presidential election. In fact, the project includes members from both political parties and plans to hold forums at both the Democratic and Republican conventions later this summer.

The 15 founding members of the project — more will join shortly, they say — represent a strange set of bedfellows. Klein and two urban superintendents created in his image — Andres Alonso, the former DOE official who now leads the Baltimore schools, and Washington, D.C., chancellor Michelle Rhee — are on the list. But so is Geoffrey Canada, whose Harlem Children’s Zone programs perhaps best approximate a vision of the Broader, Bolder approach in action. Arne Duncan, the reformist superintendent of the Chicago Public Schools, signed onto both agendas. And some of the African-American leaders who have signed on, including Sharpton and radio personality James Mtume, have in the past expressed skepticism about political leaders’ commitment to helping poor children.

The Education Equality Project’s guiding principles are essentially a summary of the DOE’s recent talking points. They call for increased pay and professional development for teachers and principals, and recourse to fire those who don’t perform well; school choice that includes charter school options; and accountability at every level. In addition, the project’s principles take aim at those who they believe make decisions in order to “make people happy” — as Rhee puts it in the DOE’s press release — instead of based on the best interests of children.

The contrast with Broader, Bolder is obvious. Adherents of the Broader, Bolder movement will say that the Education Equality Project promotes shortsighted solutions that cannot possibly equalize educational opportunity; Education Equality proponents think the Broader, Bolder folks are merely offering excuses for failing schools. And where yesterday’s statement couched a moral argument in the language of accountability-driven reform, the Education Equality Project frames a contemporary reformist agenda in starkly moral terms, alluding repeatedly to the civil rights movement. “It took our country 165 years to conclude that, under our Constitution, separate isn’t equal in education, but, still, 54 years after Brown v. Board of Education, too often our schools fail our highest needs students,” Klein said in the press release. “We need to get serious about giving all children the education they need to succeed. It won’t be easy—the status quo has lots of defenders—but it can be done and it is absolutely essential that we do it.”

With its roster of activist superintendents espousing specific policy remedies that have already gained traction in many districts, including in New York City, the Education Equality Project is poised to influence national politics this year. If it does, several undercurrents of its agenda are worth monitoring. First, the campaign appears to use the past to justify the implicit attack on organized labor contained in its agenda, saying, “As the civil rights movement itself makes clear, such transformations inevitably generate resistance and political conflict.” In addition, the project’s call for “an honest and forthright conversation about the root causes of this national failure” rings hollow given that its leaders aren’t willing to contemplate the possibly that the causes of national educational failure may have their roots outside of the schoolhouse doors. Finally, we should consider the possibility that the two coalitions rolled out this week present approaches that are not mutually exclusive; perhaps there is room for a middle path toward improved academic achievement.