A r c h i v e d  I n f o r m a t i o n

Goals 2000: Increasing Student Achievement Through State and Local Initiatives - April 1996

Introduction

Congress and President Clinton made a bi-partisan commitment to education on March 31, 1994, when the Goals 2000: Educate America Act was signed into law. Although education is and must remain a local function and a state responsibility, the federal government pledged to form a new and supportive partnership with states and communities in an effort to improve student academic achievement across the nation.

Educators, business and parent organizations, and Republican and Democratic elected leaders agreed that this national response was needed. Despite more than a decade of education reforms, students and schools are not measuring up to the high standards required to maintain a competitive economy and a strong democracy.

At the heart of the Goals 2000 Act is a grants program designed to help states and communities develop and implement their own education reforms focused on raising student achievement. States participating in Goals 2000 are asked to raise expectations for students by setting challenging academic standards. Each state is to develop comprehensive strategies for helping all students reach those standards -- by upgrading assessments and curriculum to reflect the standards, improving the quality of teaching, expanding the use of technology, strengthening accountability for teaching and learning, promoting more flexibility and choice within the public school system, and building strong partnerships among schools and families, employers, and others in the community. Finally, each state is asked to develop its improvement strategies with broad-based, grassroots involvement.

States that participate in Goals 2000 receive seed money to help launch and sustain their ongoing education reform efforts. States are also given unprecedented flexibility through Goals 2000. No new regulations have been issued to implement the program, and states and local school districts can use Goals 2000 funds for a wide range of activities that fit within their own approaches to helping students reach higher standards. In addition, Goals 2000 expands flexibility in other federal education programs by providing the U.S. Secretary of Education and some states with the authority to waive many federal rules and regulations if they interfere with local or state education reform strategies.

Goals 2000: Building on a Decade of Reform

Goals 2000 is a direct outgrowth of the state-led education reform movement of the 1980s. By the mid- to late-1980s a number of states had put in place a series of steps to improve education. Frequently, the state education reforms included increasing high school graduation requirements, particularly in math and science, instituting statewide testing programs, offering more Advanced Placement courses, promoting the use of technology in the classroom, and instituting new teacher evaluation programs.

These education reforms yielded important results. On a number of important indicators, academic performance has increased and the gap between white and minority students has decreased.

• Course taking patterns of high school students have shown important improvements. From 1982 to 1994, the percentage of high school students taking the challenging academic courses recommended in the 1983 A Nation at Risk report increased from 14 to 52 percent.¹ Enrollments in Advanced Placement (AP) courses have also increased significantly, and the number of students passing AP exams nearly tripled between 1982 and 1995.²

• The average performance in mathematics improved substantially on the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) between 1978 and 1992.³ Among 9- and 13-year olds, the improvement was the equivalent of at least one grade level. Performance in science was also higher in 1992 than in 1978 among all age groups, especially in general science knowledge and skills. At the same time, the gap in performance between white and minority students has been narrowing, especially in mathematics.

• Scores on SAT tests have also shown increases at the same time that the number of high school students taking the tests has increased.⁴ The combined verbal and math score on the SAT has increased 17 points from 1982 to 1995. During this period, minority students as a percentage of all test-takers increased from 18 to 31 percent. Both verbal and math SAT scores increased significantly for students from virtually all racial and ethnic groups from 1982 to 1995.

While these gains in academic performance are significant, they have not been sufficient. The math and science gains were generally not matched in reading performance, where NAEP results remain relatively unchanged. And while the gap in performance between white and minority students narrowed, it remains unacceptably large.

Further, it is increasingly important to judge educational performance against the performance of students in other countries, rather than against past performance in the U.S. Because of international economic competition, states have learned that they are competing with other countries, rather than other states, to attract and retain high paying jobs. The knowledge and skill levels of the state's workforce is one important resource for attracting employers. By the mid-1980s a series of studies demonstrated that the performance of U.S. students lagged significantly behind those of other countries. By this standard, the need for education reform was as urgent at the end of the 1980s as it was at the beginning.

The 1989 Charlottesville Education Summit

The 1989 Education Summit convened by President Bush and the Nation's governors, led by then-Governor Bill Clinton, further underscored the need for a national response to address educational needs.

The Charlottesville Summit led to a number of commitments and developments, each important for sustaining the momentum of education reform. These include:

• The creation of the National Education Goals which provide a national framework, but give states and communities flexibility to design their own strategies to achieve them.

• A clear recognition that state education improvement efforts need to focus on raising the achievement levels of all students, in all schools--rather than simply creating models of excellence and innovation.

• A broad consensus among state leaders, business leaders, parents and the education community regarding the overall direction education reform needs to take. This consensus centers on raising academic standards; measuring student and school performance against those standards; providing schools and educators with the tools, skills, and resources needed to prepare students to reach the standards; and holding schools accountable for the results.

• A clear statement of an important and carefully defined federal role in improving education. While reaffirming that education is and must remain a state responsibility and a local function, the governors and President Bush also agreed in Charlottesville that states need assistance from the federal government in order to succeed. More specifically, they agreed that the federal government: (1) must maintain its financial role in education, especially with regard to providing disadvantaged students and students with disabilities access to education at all levels; (2) must support state-led education reforms, through research and development, data gathering, and assistance to help spread effective practices; and (3) must administer federal education programs with greater flexibility and in a fashion that supports state leadership of education reform.

The Goals 2000 Act reflects these commitments. The Act endorses the national education goals that provide voluntary direction for education improvement efforts. It provides a broad framework for education reform, built on the direction to which states and local communities were already committed, and is easily adaptable to the unique circumstances in each state and community. Goals 2000 provides support to state and local education reforms with exactly the kind of flexibility called for at the Charlottesville Education Summit.

A Grounding in State Experience

To fully appreciate the approach embodied in Goals 2000, it helps to examine a pair of states that launched similar efforts prior to the enactment of the Act. In both Maryland and Kentucky--after six years of sustained effort and commitment to high standards--students are showing achievement gains.

In 1990, the Kentucky State Legislature passed the comprehensive Kentucky Education Reform Act. A central feature of the Act is high academic standards for all students: each strategy is tied to achieving high standards so that all activities complement and reinforce one another. For example, a curriculum framework provides schools with the tools to develop a curriculum based on the state's high standards, as well as assessments to measure student progress.

New state assessments tied to high standards have been in place since 1992. Every year, schools are held accountable for student learning through a school performance reporting system that includes rewards for outstanding schools and interventions for low-performing ones--ranging from technical assistance to state takeover. At the same time, schools have been given greater autonomy and authority to manage themselves through school-based decision-making councils that include teachers, parents and community members.

A new financing system brought greater equity across districts. Teachers now get more training to teach to high standards, and schools have better access to educational technology in their classrooms. Also, more students enter school ready to learn due to expanded preschool programs, family resource centers, and extended school services for those who need additional support to achieve high standards. Kentucky has targeted its Goals 2000 funds toward accelerating local reforms, with a particular emphasis on strengthening parent involvement in schools.

Comprehensive reform is beginning to pay off in Kentucky. Students are showing gains in academic achievement. The state's 4th, 8th, and 12th graders made substantial improvement on the 1993-94 state assessment and continued improvement on the 1994-95 assessment, with the most dramatic gains experienced by 4th graders.⁵ In all grades, the percentage of students performing at the proficient/distinguished level in mathematics, reading, science, and social studies increased over time. In grade 4 the average of the scores across all subjects tested rose from 24 points in 1993 to 38 points in 1995, on a scale of 0 to 140. In reading, the percentage of 4th graders scoring at the proficient/distinguished level increased from 8 percent in 1993 to 30 percent in 1995.

Similarly, Maryland launched a comprehensive reform effort -- Schools for Success -- after the Charlottesville Education Summit in 1989. The cornerstone of Maryland's reform effort is its accountability system that establishes high standards for student achievement and related statewide assessments of student progress toward meeting the high standards. More than 3,000 teachers have been involved in designing and scoring test items for grades 3, 5, and 8 as part of the Maryland School Performance Assessment Program (MSPAP). Every year the state reports school progress along such indicators as student achievement in relation to the state's standards and school attendance and dropout rates. Low-performing schools receive such interventions as training, consultations and grants, and, if performance does not improve, can ultimately face reconstitution which may involve changing a school's administration, staff, organization, and/or instructional program.

The state has also developed curricular frameworks in subject areas that are designed to assist administrators and teachers in planning, developing, and implementing local curricula and assessments that support the achievement of state standards. Schools are forming School Improvement Teams--comprising the principal, school staff, parents, and business and community members--that develop and implement school improvement plans with objectives, strategies, and activities to achieve the state standards.

Maryland chose to use Goals 2000 to comprehensively review and refine its Schools for Success initiative. A 54-member statewide planning panel--co-chaired by a local educator and a business partner--reviewed current school reform activities and developed strategies to fill in gaps. In particular, Goals 2000 funds are being used for local improvement initiatives, to increase public involvement in education, accelerate the development of a high school performance assessment, and develop strategies to improve educational technology throughout schools.

Maryland reforms are also showing positive results. In comparison with 1994 state assessment results, in 1995, 52 percent more schools met or approached the standards for satisfactory performance at the third grade level.⁶ The number of schools similarly improving has increased by 13 percent at the 5th grade level and by 32 percent at the 8th grade. Students have also made gains: 40 percent of all students statewide met the state standards--a 25 percent gain over 1993.

Both Maryland and Kentucky are examples of the depth of activity and long-term commitment to standards that are required to raise student achievement. Both states set high targets for performance, measure progress, and continually refine their strategies. They still have a long way to go--but their gains are mounting and demonstrate to other states and communities the value of sustained effort.

The rest of this report demonstrates the efforts that states and communities are making to improve education. Federal funds are serving as catalysts and supports, but the real leadership is in states and communities that are forging new partnerships to design and implement the school changes that will bring students into the 21st century.

[State Leadership For Local Improvement]