U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan will engage with the Hispanic community through a twitter town hall at 3 p.m. ET on February 8 (today). The conversation will be conducted in both English and Spanish.

José Rico, executive director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics, will join Duncan for the virtual town hall. As head of the initiative, Rico helps carry out President Obama’s efforts to improve the academic achievement of Hispanic students. Duncan and Rico will discuss how Hispanic success in education is important to the country and respond to questions submitted on Twitter. The town hall will be moderated by Elianne Ramos and Cheryl Aguilar from LATISM, a nonprofit social media outlet aimed at advancing the social, economic and educational status of the Latino community. 

The event will be streamed live online at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/education-department. Twitter users can ask questions in advance and during the forum using the hashtag #HispanicEd. Community leaders and Education Department staff will help flag questions through retweets on Twitter. 

The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) will be more rigorous than previous state academic standards, but most states do not expect to have them in place until the 2014-15 school year or later, according to a new report by the Center on Education Policy (CEP). 

The report also finds that while state education agencies are taking steps to familiarize state and district officials with the new standards and are aligning curriculum and assessments, they caution that adequate resources and technology related to test administration remain major challenges to full implementation of the CCSS.

The report entitled “Year Two of Implementing the Common Core State Standards: States' Progress and Challenges” is the second in a series by CEP about state implementation of the CCSS. It is based on a survey of state education agencies conducted from October through December of 2011 to get updated information on state strategies, policies and challenges in the second year of transition to the CCSS. As of January 2012, 45 states and the District of Columbia have adopted the CCSS in English language arts and mathematics. The survey data included in this report is based on 35 states and D.C. that both adopted the CCSS and responded to the survey.

When asked about the rigor of the CCSS compared with current academic standards in their states, 32 of the responding CCSS-adopting states agreed that implementing CCSS will lead to improved student skills in English language arts and in math. Thirty of these states agreed that the CCSS will be more rigorous than current standards in English language arts while 29 states echoed that view for mathematics.

Survey states that have adopted the CCSS are taking actions to help teachers master the new standards and use them to guide instruction. Among the findings in this area:
• All of the states that responded to survey items about teacher strategies are creating professional
development materials to help teachers master the CCSS (34 states) and are conducting statewide
professional development initiatives (33 states);
• 27 states are aligning the content of teacher preparation programs with the CCSS, while five do not
intend to do so;
• 25 states are modifying or creating educator evaluation systems that hold educators accountable for
student mastery of the CCSS, while six do not plan to do so; and
• 23 states are developing and implementing new teacher induction programs to help new teachers
master the CCSS, while nine do not plan to do so.

When it comes to working with districts, 28 of the adopting survey states are requiring districts to implement the CCSS, but only 15 states intend to require districts to develop long-term, comprehensive plans for local implementation. In addition, 27 states plan special initiatives to ensure that the lowest-performing schools fully implement the CCSS.

The state K-12 education agencies in 26 of the CCSS-adopting states in the survey are establishing partnerships with the state higher education agency or with postsecondary institutions to implement the standards. But just 16 states plan to align undergraduate admissions requirements or the first-year undergraduate core curriculum with the CCSS.

Reflecting the complex nature of the transition to the CCSS, implementation is moving at different rates in different states. Six states in the survey expect to fully implement these standards before or during school year 2012-13. Nine states anticipate full implementation in 2013-14, 16 in 2014-15, and one in 2015-16. These state timelines are affected somewhat by the work of two state-led consortia, which are developing assessments aligned to the CCSS and do not expect their tests to be ready until 2014-15. 

At the same time, several challenges remain. Twenty-one survey states said that finding adequate resources to fully implement the standards will be a major challenge. Other major challenges include providing sufficient professional development (20 states), aligning the content of teacher preparation programs with the CCSS (18 states) and developing CCSS-aligned educator evaluation systems for teachers and principals (18 states).

States do not expect strong resistance to the CCSS to be a major challenge in 2011-12, though several states foresee minor challenges in the form of resistance from inside the K-12 system (14 states), from higher education (10 states), and from outside the K-12 system (nine states).

Technology related to the administration of aligned assessments is one final area of concern for many states. The CCSS-aligned assessments being developed by the two state consortia could be administered online, but many of the states planning to use these assessments do not currently administer their state tests online. When asked about technology related to the administration of assessments, 20 survey states said that the availability of sufficient numbers of computers in schools is a major challenge, while 15 states cited adequate internet access and bandwidth in schools as a major challenge. Of the states that cited technology as a major challenge, 10 states have plans in place to address these challenges and 16 do not.

Visit the CEP website to view the report.

 

 

President Barack Obama shared his plans to improve American education in his 2012 State of the Union address on Tuesday, January 24, at a little after 9:00 p.m. EST.  Below are his comments on education, excerpted from the speech’s transcript.

“…These reforms will help people get jobs that are open today. But to prepare for the jobs of tomorrow, our commitment to skills and education has to start earlier.

“For less than 1 percent of what our nation spends on education each year, we've convinced nearly every state in the country to raise their standards for teaching and learning, the first time that's happened in a generation.

“But challenges remain. And we know how to solve them.

“At a time when other countries are doubling down on education, tight budgets have forced states to lay off thousands of teachers. We know a good teacher can increase the lifetime income of a classroom by over $250,000. A great teacher can offer an escape from poverty to the child who dreams beyond his circumstance.

“Every person in this chamber can point to a teacher who changed the trajectory of their lives. Most teachers work tirelessly, with modest pay, sometimes digging into their own pocket for school supplies, just to make a difference.

“Teachers matter. So instead of bashing them, or defending the status quo, let's offer schools a deal. Give them the resources to keep good teachers on the job, and reward the best ones. And in return, grant schools flexibility: to teach with creativity and passion; to stop teaching to the test and to replace teachers who just aren't helping kids learn. That's a bargain worth making.

“We also know that when students don't walk away from their education, more of them walk the stage to get their diploma. When students are not allowed to drop out, they do better. So tonight, I am proposing that every state, every state, requires that all students stay in high school until they graduate or turn 18.

“When kids do graduate, the most daunting challenge can be the cost of college. At a time when Americans owe more in tuition debt than credit card debt, this Congress needs to stop the interest rates on student loans from doubling in July.

“Extend the tuition tax credit we started that saves millions of middle-class families thousands of dollars. And give more young people the chance to earn their way through college by doubling the number of work-study jobs in the next five years.

“Of course, it's not enough for us to increase student aid. We can't just keep subsidizing skyrocketing tuition. We'll run out of money. States also need to do their part, by making higher education a higher priority in their budgets. And colleges and universities have to do their part by working to keep costs down.

“Now, recently, I spoke with a group of college presidents who've done just that. Some schools redesign courses to help students finish more quickly. Some use better technology. The point is, it's possible.

“So let me put colleges and universities on notice: If you can't stop tuition from going up, the funding you get from taxpayers will go down. Higher education can't be a luxury. It is an economic imperative that every family in America should be able to afford…”

To read the transcript of the entire 2012 State of the Union address, visit WhiteHouse.gov/SOTU (updated link). 

 

 

In recent years, governors and other state leaders have shown an increasing interest in creating new models of teacher compensation that would reward educators based on their contributions to student learning. The National Governors Association (NGA) hosted a policy academy focusing on that issue and today released an issue brief, New Models of Teacher Compensation: Lessons Learned from Six States, based on the discussions.

Founded in 1908, the National Governors Association (NGA) is the collective voice of the nation’s governors and one of Washington, D.C.’s most respected public policy organizations. Its members are the governors of the 50 states, three territories and two commonwealths. NGA provides governors and their senior staff members with services that range from representing states on Capitol Hill and before the Administration on key federal issues to developing and implementing innovative solutions to public policy challenges through the NGA Center for Best Practices.

The policy academy provided teams with assistance and advice from NGA Center staff, access to other experts and an opportunity to network with other states confronting similar issues and challenges. During the academy, state leadership teams recognized some common challenges, allowing them to learn from each other, share best practices and commit to some common principles that could guide their efforts.

“Many questions remain about how new teacher compensation models should be structured,” said NGA Executive Director Dan Crippen. “By providing this type of assistance, states have an opportunity to look at ways to change how teachers are paid and the essential elements of teacher pay models.”

As states seek to create new models of teacher compensation, NGA advises governors and states leaders to consider assessment and data systems that measure growth in student learning and link the scores of student assessments to individual teachers. They should also use additional tools and measures for gauging teacher effectiveness that go beyond student test scores (e.g., classroom observations and teacher portfolios) and using evaluation results to identify opportunities for professional development to help teachers improve their effectiveness. There needs to be high-level leadership to engage key stakeholders, especially teachers and principals and the organizations that represent them, to develop frameworks, guidelines and details of new compensation structures as well as comprehensive reform employing unconventional resources and lessons from other states to support the state’s reform agenda.

Visit http://www.nga.org/cms/center/edu to learn more.

 

 

Carl Harvey, an elementary school librarian from Indiana and president of American Association of School Librarians, has begun a White House petition asking that every child in America have an effective school library program. In order to meet the threshold that triggers a White House response, the petition must reach 25,000 signatures by February 4, 2012.

The petition webpage states, "Every child in America deserves access to an effective school library program. We ask that the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) provide dedicated funding to help support effective school library programs. Such action will ensure more students have access to the resources and tools that constitute a 21st century learning environment. Reductions in school library programs are creating an ‘access gap’ between schools in wealthier communities versus those where there are high levels of poverty. All students should have an equal opportunity to acquire the skills necessary to learn, to participate, and to compete in today’s world."

Click here to view the petition webpage.