Equality of access and opportunity for all

As we begin the 2013-14 school year, there is much to be proud of with regard to Kentucky P-12 education.

Since the 1990 Kentucky Education Reform Act and more recently with Senate Bill 1 of 2009, Kentucky has made significant improvements in raising graduation rates, lowering dropout rates, increasing college- and career-readiness rates and improving rankings on national assessments. However, as I look to challenges facing our educators, parents and students, I am concerned about state and federal budget cuts damaging educator morale and limiting the resources our children are able to access. Perhaps the most concern I have is the continuing gaps in equality of access, opportunity, and performance among our schools and our communities.

On a daily basis, I do a quick scan of the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, state newspaper highlights, and education highlights from around the state, nation, and globe. Over the past few months, I have seen an increase in articles that deal with the challenges of equality of opportunity and the income inequality facing our country. 

Recently, the Equality of Opportunity Project released a major report. This report measures the likelihood of children from families who are in the bottom fifth of income averages being able to rise to the top fifth.

Courtesy: The Equality of Opportunity Project

Of course, education in the United States has always been touted as the way to level opportunity and achieve equality. As educators, we always look to education as the means for children to rise out of poverty and break the cycle of impoverishment into which they were born.

As an educator, this report causes me great concern. Looking at the largest 100 cities, what researchers  found was that there is less than an 8 percent likelihood that children of families in the bottom fifth for family income averages would likely escape poverty and rise to the top fifth. Louisville is our only Kentucky city in the top 100 and the rate there is 6.2 percent.

An editorial from Rebecca Strauss posted June 16, Schooling Ourselves in an Unequal America , talked about the “unequal America.” Ms. Strauss’ premise is that the wealthiest 10 percent of children in America receive some of the best education in the world and the quality keeps getting better.

However, our rankings among other industrialized countries show that America is losing ground. America is not getting worse, by most measures we are improving. The reason our rankings are slipping is due to the dramatic gains made by other countries and huge increases in poverty and widening equality, opportunity, and access gaps in America.

Ms. Strauss further suggests that money is not necessarily the issue. Her position is that other countries that have surpassed America spend about the same or less on education. She provides evidence that other countries make different choices in spending. She shows that other countries spend MORE on disadvantaged children and LESS on advantaged children.

As we watch our legislators and policy makers make decisions about funding and addressing equality of access, opportunity, and performance of ALL children, we should all be aware of these trends and the increasing gaps highlighted by the two sources referenced in this blog. These are extremely complex issues and some would even call them “wicked” problems. These issues will not be solved by reading a list of talking points prepared by a right or left leaning think tank. These issues can only be solved through honest and open dialogue between decision makers and higher expectations for equality from our communities.

Success hinges on alignment, communication, resources

Back in April 2013, I met with the Executive Board of the Kentucky Association of School Superintendents (KASS). Superintendents were concerned about the increasing challenge of balancing budgets with increasing demands for improving performance. Also, during that time a number of issues surfaced surrounding school district audits that were raised by the Office of the State Auditor and in KDE communications. I certainly can understand superintendent concerns about public perceptions and communications. I wrote about this meeting in my April 19 blog.

I have made several commitments to superintendents regarding actions that I would take as commissioner to address the concerns cited above. The purpose of this blog is to highlight a few of the steps the Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) has taken as follows:

--Hired a chief of staff – Recently, KDE hired Dr. Tommy Floyd, former superintendent in Madison County, as chief of staff. Tommy will be very accessible to superintendents to help resolve issues before these become major concerns. Tommy also will provide a “local superintendent’s” perspective to KDE staff to help them better understand the potential impact of KDE’s decisions and initiatives on local school districts.

--Scheduled a statewide superintendent meeting – KDE has scheduled a meeting of superintendents with senior KDE staff and me on September 5. This meeting, which is only for superintendents, will provide them with ample opportunity to offer feedback on state budget issues and key statewide initiatives.

--Regularly scheduled senior staff and commissioner’s visits to regional cooperatives – KDE has updated its liaison list for regional cooperatives to ensure superintendents have a regional connection to senior staff at KDE. Also, Tommy Floyd and I will each visit a cooperative per month to ensure we hear directly from superintendents.

--Scheduled Superintendents Advisory Council (SAC) and regional superintendent LYNC sessions – Using the Microsoft Office 365 technology, we are scheduling “virtual” meetings with the Superintendents Advisory Council and with each region’s superintendents to provide additional opportunities to hear directly from superintendents.

--Regular meetings with Kentucky Association of School Superintendents (KASS) Executive Board – Wilson Sears has committed to schedule time on the KASS Executive Board’s meetings for me to meet personally with KASS leadership.

--Weekly highlight of districts – Starting in August, KDE will highlight one district superintendent per week in the Fast Five on Friday. We want to take this opportunity to highlight the great work going on in school districts.

These new initiatives should provide numerous opportunities to improve communications between KDE and superintendents. In addition, we will continue the existing practices of sending out the Monday E-mail and Fast Five on Friday along with conducting monthly superintendent webcasts. The connection between KDE and local superintendents is extremely important to educators across Kentucky. It is our goal to ensure that every educator in Kentucky has timely information about the Unbridled Learning strategic plan, and every educator has an opportunity to provide feedback about the components that impact the day-to-day work.

We are making tremendous progress in Kentucky; however, our ability to reach the vision of “every child proficient and prepared for success” hinges on alignment, communication, and having the resources to do the work. My commitment as commissioner is to work on all three.

There is danger looming

I am constantly amazed at the terrific job that Kentucky educators are doing. In spite of numerous budget cuts and dwindling resources, Kentucky educators are leading the nation in the focus on improving student college- and career-ready rates.

This week, I had the pleasure to attend a meeting in Seattle, Washington that was sponsored by the Gates Foundation. This convening was a cross-state collaboration of Louisiana, Kentucky, and Colorado. State representatives from Tennessee and New York were also in attendance. Kentucky educators were highlighted in numerous sessions. Boone County teacher Chris Crouch helped kickoff a general session that focused on implementation of common core standards. Numerous Kentucky Department of Education staff presented on the great work of our Unbridled Learning strategic plan. Kentucky was well represented by several superintendents, principals, teachers, the Kentucky Education Association and the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence.

It was very rewarding to hear about great progress in other states and refreshing to hear that other states also are facing challenges. This convening reinforced for me how important it is that educators have time for sharing and learning with other educators. Whether it is a Professional Learning Community (PLC) at the school level or a national convening, learning from other educators is critically important if we are to improve student learning outcomes.

I am thankful to be in Kentucky during a time of great progress in focusing on student learning. Another highlight recently was the huge success of the Blitz to 96 campaign. As of this writing, more than 100 districts have raised the dropout age to 18.

The eyes of the nation are certainly on Kentucky; however, there is danger looming. Without additional funding and resources, our educators in Kentucky will soon burn out and student learning will suffer. As we get ready for the 2014 General Assembly, my number one priority is to share this concern with legislators. At a minimum, I will be pushing for restoration of funding to 2008 levels. Our children and educators deserve this investment.

Our results are striking; the more our education outcomes improve, the more our economy in Kentucky can grow.  I hope readers will join me in this push to restore education funding to 2008 levels or higher.

Americans’ confidence or lack thereof in institutions

Every year, the Gallup organization conducts a poll on the level of confidence Americans have in institutions. For the 4th consecutive year, Congress is at the bottom of the list with a confidence rating of 10 percent (down from 13 percent in 2012).

Pollsters stated, “I am going to read you a list of institutions in American society. Please tell me how much confidence you, yourself, have in each one—a great deal, quite a lot, some or very little?”

Here are some of the results from the 2013 poll sorted by most confidence to least confidence (based on “a great deal” and “quite a lot” percentages combined).

The Military	76%
Small business	65%
Police	57%
Church or organized religion	48%
The presidency	37%
The medical system	35%
U.S. Supreme Court	34%
Public schools	32% (up from 29% in 2012)
The criminal justice system	28%
Banks	26%
Television news	23%
Newspapers	23%
Big business	22%
Organized labor	20%
HMOs	19%
Congress	10%

                               

While the Congressional rankings are no surprise to educators given the lack of progress Congress has been able to make on reauthorization of major education bills, I do think educators should look at the rankings for public schools. It is a concern that only 32 percent of Americans polled have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in our public schools.

PDK/Gallup Poll
Another poll that has been taken for many years is the annual PDK and Gallup poll on education. For years, the results of this poll have revealed the interesting finding that public school parents and Americans grade their children’s schools and local schools very high, however, when we ask about schools in general, the ratings dip significantly.

Here are some select questions from the 2012 PDK/Gallup poll on education.

Students are often given the grades A, B, C, D, or Fail to denote the quality of their work. Suppose the public schools themselves in your community were graded in the same way. What grade would you give the public schools here — A, B, C, D, or Fail?

National Totals (shown in percentages)

	2012	2007	2002	1997	1992
A & B	48	45	47	46	40
A	12	9	10	10	9
B	36	36	37	36	31
C	31	34	34	32	33
D	13	14	19	11	12
Fail	4	5	3	6	5

Using the A, B, C, D, and Fail scale again, what grade would you give the school your oldest child attends?

Public School Parents (shown in percentages)

	2012	2007	2002	1997	1992
A & B	77	67	71	64	64
A	37	19	27	26	22
B	40	48	44	38	42
C	16	24	20	23	24
D	6	5	6	7	6
Fail	0	3	2	4	4

What grade would you give the public schools nationally — A, B, C, D, or Fail?

 National Totals (shown in percentages)

	2012	2007	2002	1997	1992
A & B	19	16	24	22	18
A	1	2	2	2	2
B	18	14	22	29	16
C	47	57	47	48	48
D	23	18	13	15	18
Fail	7	5	3	6	4

What are the implications for local schools/districts and state education agencies? The major implication is that communication about progress schools are making and the great things happening in public schools must expand beyond parents and local communities. Americans are bombarded by many of the negatives about schools -- low test scores, dropout rates, shootings in schools, and the like. We must do a better job about communicating our successes.