A focused agenda
Dr. Stephen Dolinger
January 1, 2007
So how can and should the business community target its efforts to address key educational issues?
As Georgia continues to examine its education investments, the Top Ten report serves as a blueprint of where we should focus our collective energies this year. It takes a three-tiered approach. It highlights the key political factors that will drive the issues to the top of the state and nation's agenda. It further offers insight from the research and what's happening in other states by examining the policy perspective. Perhaps most informative is the publication's focus on what's next for Georgia.
Education policy historically has been plagued by its own search for silver bullet answers to the question of improving student achievement. All too often, this quest has taken us down the road of unproven strategies or perhaps the abandonment of solid policies and practices before such efforts are able to demonstrate return on investment. Top Ten Issues to Watch is one of the Georgia's Partnership's efforts to ensure Georgia's education policy discourse is both relevant and systemic.
Among the key issues examined in the 2007 publication:
Choice will be a significant issue in both state and national discourse as education stakeholders are likely to turn their attention to the impact of choice at improving student achievement. Key drivers of the discussion, national stakeholders are likely to debate the school restructuring provision of No Child Left Behind, which provides for chronically low-performing schools to be restructured as charter schools.
EDUCATION POLICY HISTORICALLY HAS BEEN PLAGUED BY ITS OWN SEARCH FOR SILVER BULLET ANSWERS TO THE QUESTION OF IMPROVING STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT. ALL TOO OFTEN, THIS QUEST HAS TAKEN US DOWN THE ROAD OF UNPROVEN STRATEGIES OR PERHAPS THE ABANDONMENT OF SOLID POLICIES AND PRACTICES.
In Georgia, the new lieutenant governor has articulated that charters are a signature component of his education agenda. School choice in both its private (vouchers, tax incentives, tax deductions) and public (charters) iterations over the past 16 years has begun to transform the landscape on the provision of K-12 education.
Since 1991, when the first charter school legislation was passed, charters have grown significantly, serving over 1 million students nationwide in more than 3,500 schools. In fact, in seven school districts nationwide, charters represent a significant proportion of market share, where at least one of five public schools is a charter.
While historical debate on school choice has focused on issues like implications for segregation and greater parental satisfaction, the most important issue is what does choice mean for improving student achievement? The Ten Issues to Watch delves into the research on this issue and frames the changing political landscape on private school choice.
The national business community has articulated the fact that the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind is an educational priority of the first order. In fact, NCLB has marked a significant shift in the business community's involvement in the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which has been around since 1965.
However, the law's reauthorization faces an uphill battle in securing its place on the 2007 agenda. Reauthorization provides an opportunity for key tenets of the law to be changed or modified. Among key provisions of the law that will face heated debate are the testing component, choice provisions and how schools are allowed to track their progress toward proficiency for all by the 2014 goal. The Top Ten Issues takes a closer look at what key education stakeholders are advocating and what the implications are for Georgia.
Investing in education
With significant tax changes expected to top the legislative agenda in 2007 and recommendations from the Governor's Investing in Educational Excellence Taskforce still pending, legislators will be challenged to determine how to invest the state's limited resources in education. With education comprising almost 55 percent of the state's $16 billion budget, deliberate and strategic investments are critical.
The Top Ten Issues examines the current state of affairs on school funding and the status of the litigation filed by the Consortium for Adequate Education, as well as considers the implications of this current dynamic environment for the future of school funding in Georgia.
WITH SIGNIFICANT TAX CHANGES EXPECTED TO TOP THE LEGISLATIVE AGENDA IN 2007 AND SEVERAL RECOMMENDATIONS FROM THE GOVERNOR'S INVESTING IN EDUCATIONAL EXCELLENCE TASKFORCE STILL PENDING, LEGISLATORS WILL BE CHALLENGED TO DETERMINE HOW TO INVEST THE STATE'S LIMITED RESOURCES IN EDUCATION
Can Georgia look to the experience of other states to chart its course on school funding?
Teacher quality is the single most influential, school-based factor toward improving student achievement, yet nearly one of two new teachers will exit the profession within five years. In Georgia, one of three new teachers will exit the profession within three years. In addition to its impact on student achievement and its impact on school culture, conservative estimates suggest new teacher attrition costs Georgia taxpayers $81 million annually.
National data further suggests that students who need highly effective teachers the most are least likely to get them. Poor and minority children are significantly more likely to be taught by new, inexperienced teachers and teachers who lack content knowledge in the subject they teach.
States across the nation are beginning to address the issue of teacher quality. Alabama has released a set of recommendations on how to strengthen the cadre of teachers. The Georgia Partnership has released its Teacher Quality Gap Analysis (available at www.gpee.org) with a set of five specific strategies to improve teacher quality and student achievement. The Top Ten Issues highlight current efforts underway at the national level to address equitable teacher distribution and the growing move to transform the profession.
The report also highlights higher education affordability, high school reform, early learning, single-sex schools, the achievement gap and the importance of quality data systems.
Improving educational outcomes
As we release the third edition of our publication, it strikes us that the imperative to improve educational outcomes is more pronounced than ever. The state is challenged to address the rising cost of health care and provide critical governmental services. Policymakers face a formidable challenge in balancing the often-competing policy priorities.
We believe this document, along with the Partnership's continued policy efforts, crystallize the systemic need for investment in education. It is too easy to short shrift critical investments in education with hopes that we can make it up on the back end.
But one thing is certain – we will pay. We can pay now by investing in improving teacher quality, developing reliable data systems, investing in additional time for our most academically vulnerable students and strengthening the quality of early learning so that all students will enter school ready to learn, or else we will likely pay later in decreased purchasing power, elevated costs of remediation and job-training, increased need for social services, higher unemployment rates and inability to attract and retain industry.
The document is loaded with relevant information for all Georgians, since quality public education is everybody's business. The entire Top Ten Issues to Watch in 2007 report is available at the Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education website at www.gpee.org.
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