Ed Policy - KIPP schools

On pages 135-137 of Death and Life of the Great American School System, Diane Ravitch criticizes certain aspects of KIPP schools. Based on this and the other assigned readings (particularly Mathews), would say her argument is valid? 

KIPP (Knowledge is Power Program) is a network of charter schools, often known as being 'no-excuses' with long hours and strict discipline. According to the KIPP website, they now have 162 schools “dedicated to preparing students in underserved communities for success in college and life”. KIPP focuses on character strengths as well as academics. KIPP says that their students are performing better than they would have otherwise.

Diane Ravitch and other critics wonder if the performance claims are accurate, and sustainable / scalable. Perhaps there's creaming happening, where only most motivated and school ready students choose the charter schools leaving the rest for the regular public schools? Or what about attrition – maybe the low performing students are counseled out of staying at KIPP schools, so then the overall academic performance looks higher? Even if the gains are true, can the intensity of KIPP schools continue, and scale into other regular schools? Do the schools have high teacher attrition, and thus need to rely on newcomers? Are KIPP schools spending more money from foundations, and what happens when the money starts to dry up?

Charter schools, whether run by KIPP, other organizations, or a few teachers, are schools of choice. Families decide to enroll in them, rather than being assigned to them like a regular public school. The active choice does mean that there are probably some factors that are different about charter school students and regular students. Because of this difference, we may not be able to extrapolate results from charter schools to what might happen if their methods were implemented in regular schools, but with lottery studies, we can see whether the academic gains are attributable to the charter schools or to the unknown difference factors. In the New York City Charter Schools article, Hoxby and Murarka show that the students did benefit from being in the charter schools, and that they were not the 'cream' (wealthier), but rather were more likely to be poor. In a Mathematica study of KIPP middle schools (http://www.mathematica-mpr.com/~/media/publications/PDFs/education/KIPP_middle_schools_wp.pdf), they found that “KIPP schools generally admit students who are disadvantaged in ways similar to their peers in local public schools”. This study also found that “attrition rates for KIPP students are not systematically different from those of students in local district schools, overall or for at-risk subgroups”. Another Mathematica study (http://www.mathematica-mpr.com/~/media/publications/PDFs/education/kipp_fnlrpt.pdf) found that achievement rates were higher for students who had ever attended KIPP, even if they didn't stay in KIPP. Overall, the academic gains do seem to be attributable to being at KIPP, not because of creaming or attrition.

So if KIPP does improve test scores, can we just create many more KIPPS and/or take their strategies into regular public schools? KIPP teachers and staff work much longer hours, and the successful NYC charter schools mentioned in the Hoxby & Murarka reading also had more school hours per year. Given union contracts and the increased finances of longer school day/year, extending hours may not be possible for all schools. Also these teachers who are working more seem more likely to leave - “the study found teacher turnover in KIPP schools to occur at slightly higher rates than traditional public schools (21 percent compared to 15 percent)” (http://www.kipp.org/news/education-week-kipp-schools-boost-academic-performance-study-finds) KIPP schools also receive more money than regular public schools, possibly $6500 more per student according to one study (http://virww.ncspe.org/publications_files/OP195_3.pdf). Also KIPP and often charter schools in general don't enroll as many English Language learners or students with disabilities as the local regular public schools.

While KIPP does seem to produce results for its students, the criticisms about scaling the model are valid. Like everything we've learned in this class, there's no silver bullet. Nothing is going to work for everyone, everywhere. KIPP isn't going to save the world, but it can certainly save its students' worlds.

Ed Policy - School Choice

In his interview with Professor Peterson, John Kirtley talks about the blurring that is starting to occur

between private and public delivery of education as customized choice options continue to grow in the U.S. Do

you approve of this development? What should be the next phase of this type of education reform?

In the video, John Kirtley spoke about how he views the definition of public education is changing, to a system where parents are allowed to direct the dollars to different providers using different delivery methods.  He also talks about how this blurring is already happening between public & private education - some public schools are run by private school management companies, some private schools are using voucher or other public funding.  His main point about choice was less so about getting rid of failing schools, and more so about meeting the needs of each child.  John Kirtley views school choice as a driver for customization, for students to be able to go to a school that works well for them.  An underlying belief in that view is that different students learn differently and that different schools could be better for different students.  This customization theory around choice is different from the the market theory reasoning often given for school choice (where schools compete for students to raise the bar for everyone).  It's also different from the political theory (public education is often burdened with too many rules and regulations and can't focus on the mission of teaching) and the social capital theory (private schools are better able to build community and socialization for students and families).

I share John Kirtley's underlying belief about different learning methods being better for different students.  While I am all about using evidence and research in education, I also know that just because one curriculum method works well for the majority of students doesn't mean that it's going to work well for me or my child.  With choice in educational options, parents and students can (ideally) find the best environment where they can learn well and feel safe and comfortable.  When I helped to start a charter school in San Diego, this was the main tenet underwhich we worked - our goal was to offer a different type of education with less typical classroom learning and more project-based learning, which may work better for some learners, but not all.

Unfortunately too much choice does have its limitations.  As a general psychological limitation, choice can be overwhelming and perhaps anxiety-producing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Paradox_of_Choice).  Also whether families are choosing the 'best' schools overall or the 'best' school for them, there are the same issues of building awareness about how a school is doing.  And with the customization theory, parents also need to know how a school does what it does, and to have enough self-knowledge to be able to make the decision about whether that's a good fit. 

John Kirtley mentioned in the video that in Florida, they found that it was mostly the low-income, low-performing students who used the vouchers to leave an environment which presumably wasn't working for them - but how much investigation did they do about their new environment?  Were they actively trying to choose something better for them educationally, or were they just looking for something different?  Based on some of our previous readings about how many low-income (or any type of income) parents chose schools based on convenience or social characteristics, rather than educational characteristics, I would guess that many families just chose the next school over. The statistics that John cited seem to indicate that the difference did work better for them educationally (regression to the mean?  if you're in a bad place, then most anything else will be better?), but I wonder how much better it could have been if there was very active trying to align student learning differences with a specific school environment.  (If someone knows of research showing how parents are making the decisions in using vouchers, please share!)

One aspect about this customization theory of choice is whether the choice has to happen at the school level.  What if instead more choice & customization could happen at the classroom or even the student level?  Some aspects of learning may be related to the total school environment (safety, overall culture, resources available, etc), but many may be more related to classroom environment (teacher interactions, etc).  What if different classrooms taught in different ways?  We may need to start thinking of them less as 'classrooms' and more like 'learning hubs'.  What if some teachers helped to guide students in technology based learning interactions?  What if some teachers guided students in real-world projects?  And maybe some teachers keep lecturing - because it does work well for some students.  And children could switch between different delivery methods and learning styles based on what they need for the subject/topic they're studying then.  I see a future where teachers are less about 'teaching' and more about guiding students to find the best learning for them.

Future for Ed - Final

In the first week, I noticed some aspects about my own learning that I hadn't really thought about before (learning better when I'm strongly motivated by the subject area, needing alone and quiet in order to focus on the material and process it, 'outputting' aka writing papers or completing projects better under the pressure of a deadline).  In the week about intelligence, I found myself honing my thinking about intelligence and potential.  While IQ might have some biological basis to it, there is still a lot of potential that goes unfulfilled for many learners because there's a mismatch between their environment and their learning.  In the week about teachers, my general image of a good teacher stayed fairly similar, but I gained new perspective on different types of learners may need different types of teaching.  Someone who is a good teacher for one person may not be a good teacher for someone else.

Thinking about the learning approach for this course, some aspects resonated more with me than others.  I'm fairly introverted and find that I often learn better through having time to myself to process my thoughts.  The reflections and padlet walls were interesting to briefly skim, and to get me to briefly engage more with the learning.  But I found the real learning and discovery for me came from my own introspection and research, not through the group work.  Although I liked having the variety of ways to learn, and I think that different learners probably found different aspects more helpful than I did.

My preferred future for education starts young!  Learning begins at (or even before) birth.  Not that we should have a curriculum or standardized tests for young children, but we can realize that their early experiences in play and interaction are building their neurons and laying the foundation for later learning.  By helping parents and early childhood educators to interact with young children, we may be able to close a bit of the school readiness achievement gap.  And then once the children are in school, my vision is for them to have choice and personalized learning.  With the resources we have from technology and other means, children (or any learners) don't need to sit in a classroom learning all exactly the same thing at the same pace.  Children can work on their skills through real projects, and connect with community members to see how their learning is used in the real world.

External Exams - Ed Policy

What is your assessment of the potential for external central exams to improve student motivation to study and do well at school and thus, increase student success? What are some potential pitfalls? How can these be addressed?

External central exams would be outside tests that are given to students, most likely at the high school level.  So rather than students being graded by their teachers, they are given grades or scores based on how they achieve on these external tests.  The tests could be just one overall test for high school graduation, or could be multiple subject tests at different levels - although they should all be tests that a student can prepare and study for.  AP tests are one form of current external central exams, but their level is above what most high school students are achieving.

Some possible benefits of these tests are that students (and teachers) would have more clarity on what they need to learn (although this benefit only comes if the tests are well-constructed).  Another possible benefit is that students would stop seeing their teacher as the 'judge', and start seeing their teacher more as a coach - someone who is in the situation with them and ready to help them.  While this may happen a bit, I think that there would need to be some change in teaching style in addition to the change of testing for most students to change their vision of the teacher to a coach.

Student accountability and external exams are being brought up as an issue for older children, because as "The Adolescent Society" article notes, "adolescents don't like school".  However, I don't know if more tests are going to help teens to like school more.  As the article also talks about, the school culture is in part defined by the structure of rewards.  If the football team is always celebrated after a win, then playing football will be the popular thing to do.  Where as if the science olympiad team is celebrated after a win, then perhaps science will become the popular thing to do.  (Which reminds me that I've been wanting to send an email to the local high school I drive past some days that congrats students for academic achievements on their scrolling electric signage!  It always makes me happy because my high school growing up had a state ranked football team and a nationally ranked science olympiad team - but guess which one got much more publicity?) 

Anyway, we need to consider if the external exams will help to shift schools back to their latent function, or if students still won't care.  Or if there may even be a negative effect.  If the external exams are seen a the 'white' way to achieve, then will African Americans and Hispanics underachieve?  I think this may be the case if there are multiple levels of the external exams, such as an academic test and a general test.   While African-American participation in AP tests has increased recently, the percentage of African-American students taking the test is still very low, and their scores are lower as well (http://www.jbhe.com/features/59_apscoringgap.html).  It would be interesting to see how this external test taking and scoring correlates with Fryer's work on 'Acting White'.  Do more or fewer minority students take AP tests in integrated schools vs more segregated schools?

There's also the basic issue of type of motivation.  Having an external test that the students and teachers can rally together to do well on may be motivating to some.  But do we want to focus on external motivation or internal motivation?  Do we want to students to be studying because they want to ace the test or because they're engaged and interested in the material and see its relevance in their life?  Granted, building internal motivation is often more difficult and a longer process than giving out gold stars, but internal motivation and grit seems to be more important in the long run.  In one study, they looked at West Point cadets and found that those who were internally motivated were more likely to make it through than those who were going for outside reasons (http://news.sciencemag.org/brain-behavior/2014/07/one-type-motivation-may-be-key-success)

Overall external tests may help for curriculum clarity and possibly to have teachers work more as coaches.  But unless the overall culture of the school and the local community rewards higher test scores, I don't know if just the tests will motivate students to achieve at higher levels.  And even if the external rewards are in place, what about internal motivation?

One way to possibly increase internal motivation while using external tests is diversity of choice, that Bob Schwartz mentioned briefly in the video.  If different subjects had different external tests, and students could choose a selection of which courses & tests they would take, that may increase some internal motivation because students would likely be taking courses and tests based on what they're interested in or want to do in the future.  The International Baccalaureate or IB Diploma has a system like this, where students choose one subject from five groups to ensure breadth, but also choice.  http://www.ibo.org/diploma/curriculum/

Ed Policy - NCLB

As Martin West talks about in the end of Video 3, No Child Left Behind was set to expire in 2007, but was slow to be reauthorized in part because of a lack on consensus about what to learn from the various failings of NCLB.  No Child Left Behind was originally passed in 2002 with overwhelming bipartisan support.  While the initial utopian 'every child proficient by 2014' seems like it was a good 'shock' to the educational system as shown in the NAEP score increases immediately after (at least in math), obviously we are not to that utopia now that it is 2014.  The overall NCLB vision of raising student performance is of course a worthy (and needed) goal, but the specifics of the original law need to be updated.

Pros/Cons & Possible Moves Forward...
* One major benefit from NCLB was a general increased focus on accountability and measuring performance.  The videos mentioned how parents used to judge schools based on dollars spent per child, etc, and after NCLB, schools had to be public with their math and reading test scores.  This transparency is definitely a pro that should be continued.  Although how much the transparency actually affects school choice, especially for those most in need, is debatable.  In previous weeks' readings, we've seen how families often choose schools by proximity, community, etc - not on test scores.  Just being transparent is not enough.

* While accountability is good, we need to think more carefully about what schools are being accountable for.  Having unattainable goals is not the way to go.  NCLB wanted all students to be proficient by 2014 - but achieving 'all' of anything is often impossible.  Also as the Prof Peterson pointed out, having everyone going for the same goal means that those who are most behind and most in need have the hardest time getting to the goal.  Perhaps adequate yearly progress could be redefined not as how to get to 100% proficiency, but as adequate yearly gains given previous levels of performance.  I don't think that it's necessarily unfair to expect schools with lower levels of achievement to have larger gains (given more resources) as gains may start to reach an asymptote where it's harder and harder to get gains, but unrealistic gains towards 100% in only a few years are unfair.  Having more appropriate target goals, specifically around yearly gains not overall performance, would be needed in a new NCLB.

* Another issue with the original NCLB was that states were allowed to set their own standards of what was proficiency.  This led to states having widely different standards, and the case where a student could be passing with flying colors in one state and failing miserably in another state.  Also states could change their standards to make their numbers look better when reporting.  Going forward, perhaps the minimums could be set nationally, with states allowed to raise their minimum above the national minimum if they'd like.

* Measurement is important, but accountability is not only about measurement - it's about what happens in response to the measurements.  The NCLB accountability of what happens after a school fails were not very impactful - as the videos note, often only the principal changed or no action was taken even when a school had failed for five years.  In how to improve this accountability, I always think of failure as feedback - schools that are failing should be helped to figure out how they're failing.  Letting students go to another school or having extra tutoring doesn't help the school get any better (it may help the students which is important as well - although the evidence shows that many students did not leave or get the tutoring).

* Another large issue not mentioned much in the videos and only a bit in the readings is around whether NCLB focuses too heavily on math and reading, and on standardized testing - to the exclusion of other subjects and other evaluation methods.  We don't want teaching to the test - we want students learning higher levels of thinking.  Creating a national standard for other methods of evaluation in multiple subjects might be a tough task, but certainly a new NCLB could encourage states to use multiple measures.

Other interesting resources I found in looking more at the effects of NCLB...
http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monographs/2010/RAND_MG977.pdf
http://www.ed.gov/blog/topic/esea-reauthorization/

Giving 2.0 Week 2

Exercise:
Overview
Complete after Week 2, Video 1.1 -
Philanthropic Strategy
This activity may take a considerable amount of reflection and brainstorming. Think
about your issue area, under what conditions would you feel comfortable saying, this
problem is solved? What would your issue area look like in a perfect world? At what point
of improvement in your issue area would another issue eclipse yours as being a greater
social need? After these reflections, try to answer, in one sentence, what is your mission?


Given my issue area of early childhood education in the US, I would say that this problem is solved if all children enter school ready to learn at a high level.  In a perfect world, all children would have had safe, healthy, and enriching childhoods so that they are physically, emotionally, and mentally 'school ready'.  My mission is to ensure that all children in the US start school ready to learn at a high level. 


Exercise:
Overview
Complete after Week 2, Video 2.2 - Guest
Speaker: Alexa Culwell - Comparing
Intervention Strategies
Brainstorm and research at least five different intervention strategies that are being used
on your issue area. Be creative and feel free to brainstorm many more than five. After
comparing, researching and thinking about your personal passion, select an intervention
strategy and write down why you chose it and why you think it is the best intervention
strategy

Strategy #1 - helping parents early on.  Nurse Family Partnership
Strategy #2 - having volunteers reading with preschoolers.  Jumpstart
Strategy #3 - promoting for better teachers.  NAEYC
Strategy #4 - building knowledge around nurturing early dev.  Zero to Three
Strategy #5 - building parents as teaachers.  Parents as Teachers

I don't know if I can make a judgment around the 'best' intervention strategy, because they all serve their part.  We need research and knowledge, we need better policy, we need better teachers, we need parents to support their kids. 


Foundations
* Brady Education Foundation - http://www.bradyeducationfoundation.org/grantsawarded.html
* Helios Education Foundation - http://www.helios.org/investment-history-helios-education-foundation.aspx
* Heising-Simons Foundation - https://www.cybergrants.com/pls/cybergrants/heisingsimons.heisingsimons_grant_search.search_page
* RGK Foundation - http://www.rgkfoundation.org/public/grants

Online Nonprofit Evaluations
https://www.myphilanthropedia.org/top-nonprofits/bay-area/early-childhood-education/2010
http://www.socialimpactexchange.org/focus/education/early-education

Articles & Blogs
http://www.teach-nology.com/teachers/early_education/organizations/
http://www.scpr.org/blogs/education/2014/04/17/16403/nonprofits-get-nearly-1-mil-to-train-parents-to-ad/

Experts
http://www.nea.org/home/18226.htm
http://www.edfunders.org/
http://earlychildhoodfunders.org/

I really enjoyed looking at what the foundations were choosing to fund.  Lots of interesting initiatives that aren't 'normal non-profits'!  Some of the online evaluation websites were good for browsing, but they seem more useful once I have a non-profit in mind that I want to research.




Pick two of your nonprofits and think about them in terms of these three criteria: 1) geography/population, 2) scale, and 3) risk. Write down what makes these two nonprofits unique for each of these criteria. Brainstorm for yourself at least two other criteria you could use to help you choose between nonprofits and write what makes the two nonprofits you wrote about previously unique for these two new criteria as well.

For myself, I'm looking for organizations that have a wider reach, preferably national.  I'm looking at organizations that focus on 0-8, or anywhere in that range.  For monetary funding, I'm drawn more toward proven organizations, although for volunteering, I'm drawn more to 'risky' new organizations.  My personal criteria also include being research-backed and data-driven.  And I think that working directly with the children, parents, or teachers is important to me - policy and research are important, but for me, I want to work with people (more important when volunteering, perhaps less important for monetary donations).
For this question, I'll look at Jumpstart and Zero to Three.
Both of these non-profits have national reach, which is important to me.  Zero to Three obviously focuses more on the younger side, where as Jumpstart focuses more on 4-5 year olds.  Zero to Three is more about research and policy, where as Jumpstart is about interactions with the preschoolers.  Both are 'older' organizations.  Because Jumpstart has a specific intervention, they have done research studies to show good short-term outcomes.  Jumpstart is definitely research-backed and data-driven as well as people interactions, where as Zero to Three is less so.

Ed Policy - Ed Spending

For those of you who just can't get enough of this topic, you might enjoy this recent video from Stanford University. At the 50:25 min mark, Prof. Linda Darling Hammond says, "One other interesting fact when we compare spending in the US and in other countries is that in virtually all the countries we would be compared to in the OECD rankings, they have nationalized or other buckets in the society from which they pay healthcare. So about 20% of the US education budget actually goes to healthcare for employees [...] and in other countries that's paid outside the education budget"
 What's your response to her point?  Is it misleading to state that the US is one of the top spenders on education? Why/Why not?
 https://medium.com/state-of-the-union-2014/state-of-the-union-2014-class-3-education-a9387c9884fe

Thanks for the link to the Stanford video - very interesting!

In general, the US spends a lot on education.  This interesting infographic shows that we spend much more in total, and more per student - http://rossieronline.usc.edu/u-s-education-versus-the-world-infographic/

Linda Darling Hammond brings up a good point that the way we allocate our spending on education may not be comparable to other countries' education spending.  She brings up that we pay for health care through education, as well as pensions for teachers and other ed professionals.  Also food services for students ($14.8 billion according to this article - http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/02/27/putting-a-number-on-federal-education-spending/)  And we spend a lot on special education services for a small set of students.  Our education budget number may also be including early education, which I'm not sure if other countries include in their ed budgets, or in their social services budgets. And what about school sports?  Are those finances included in our US education budget?  (http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2014/10/21/taking-sports-out-of-school-2)  In most other countries, sports are done on a club basis, not primarily through schools.  Given all of these non-educational aspects that may be included in our education budget, I think that it may be misleading to say that the US spends more per child than other countries.

One other big issue as talked about is not how much we spend in general, but how much we spend in different districts.  Many other countries equalize funding, or even send more funding to high need schools (I believe Finland does this).  Where as in the US, there is wide variation in spending on education in different parts of the country - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/05/23/the-dramatic-inequality-of-public-school-spending-in-america/  Some of this is of course due to differences in cost of living, but still the differences are wide.