At the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, on the 45th anniversary of “Bloody Sunday,” Secretary Arne Duncan spoke before a group of students, community leaders, and elected officials about impediments to equal educational opportunity and the administration’s intentions to work with schools and postsecondary institutions to address them.
“The struggle for equal opportunity in our nation’s schools and universities is not at an end,” he said at the site where peaceful civil rights protesters were beaten 45 years ago, leading to the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. “We will work with schools and enforce laws to ensure that all children — no matter what their race, gender, disability or native origin — have a fair chance at a good future.”
Duncan later spoke with reporters by conference call about his intent to reinvigorate equity and enforcement activities in the Office of Civil Rights.
Secretary Arne Duncan and former Education Secretary Richard W. Riley participated in the fifth annual Celebration of Teaching and Learning 2010.
The conference in New York City brought together more than 8,500 educators with global experts, activists, academics and artists to share their experiences in and outside of the classroom. For more information, please see the press release.
“Because we know that about 12% of America’s schools produce 50% of America’s dropouts, we’re going to focus on helping states and school districts turn around their 5,000 lowest-performing schools in the next five years,” President Obama said this week.
Turning around the nation’s 5,000 lowest-performing schools, Secretary Duncan has said, is “part of our overall strategy for dramatically reducing the drop-out rate, improving high school graduation rates and increasing the number of students who graduate prepared for success in college and the workplace.”
The Obama administration is making an historic commitment to support state and local education leaders in turning around the nation’s lowest-achieving schools.
The U.S. Department of Education is providing $4 billion for this effort. To qualify for this funding under the Title I School Improvement Grant program, states must identify their lowest-performing schools in economically challenged communities and transform those schools using one of the four following intervention models:
Turnaround model: Replace the principal and rehire no more than 50% of the staff, and grant the principal sufficient operational flexibility (including in staffing, calendars/time and budgeting) to fully implement a comprehensive approach to substantially improve student outcomes.
Restart model: Convert a school or close and reopen it under a charter school operator, a charter management organization, or an education management organization that has been selected through a rigorous review process.
School closure: Close a school and enroll the students who attended that school in other schools in the district that are higher achieving.
Transformation model: Implement each of the following strategies: (1) replace the principal and take steps to increase teacher and school leader effectiveness; (2) institute comprehensive instructional reforms; (3) increase learning time and create community-oriented schools; and (4) provide operational flexibility and sustained support.
As Secretary Duncan has said repeatedly, this is difficult work—he took it on as CEO of Chicago’s public schools. No matter which model is used, turning around a chronically low-performing school requires hard work from our best teachers and school leaders.
State and local leaders around the country have taken on the challenge, with encouraging results.
In Chicago, Harvard School of Excellence, operated by the Academy for Urban School Leadership (AUSL), is an example of the turnaround model. Before 2007, it ranked among the 10 worst elementary schools in all of Illinois. Now, three years later, it has key components of the turnaround model: a new principal; highly trained and effective teachers; a curriculum based on high expectations and frequent assessments; and a culture of intellectual curiosity and personal respect.
In just two years, the number of Harvard students meeting or exceeding state testing standards has increased 25%. And AUSL is applying its turnaround model to more struggling schools in Chicago.
Johnson Public School in Chicago is another turnaround story. In 2008, only 40% of Johnson’s students met state standards in reading, math and science. There were gangs in the school and violence in the halls. Expectations were low. Many students were not succeeding.
The following year, AUSL took over the leadership of the school. Expectations and conditions in the school changed. The impact in a short time is clear.
In Los Angeles, Locke Senior High School took the restart path, bringing in Green Dot Schools, a charter operator. Locke’s teachers work under a union contract.
“I promise to read each day and each night. I know it’s the key to growing up right,” pledged a group of nearly 300 school children wearing red and white stovepipe hats on Tuesday, March 2, at the Library of Congress.
The children, from local Arlington, Va., and Washington, D.C. elementary schools, were gathered for the 13th annual “Read Across America Day” celebration, sponsored by the National Education Association. Nearly 45 million children and adults across the country were expected to participate in this year’s national program, which annually encourages children and communities to celebrate reading on March 2, the birthday of Theodor Seuss Geisel, the beloved children’s book author better known as Dr. Seuss.
First Lady Michelle Obama kicked off the celebration by reading “The Cat in the Hat,” the classic Dr. Seuss story that, for more than 50 years, has inspired children to imagine and to believe in a mischievous cat wearing a tall, red and white hat. Mrs. Obama noted that the first family reads all the time and that her daughters, Sasha and Malia, are allowed to stay up at night for an extra 30 minutes if they are reading. Secretary Duncan joined in the celebration by reading “Horton Hears a Who,” one of 48 books that Dr. Seuss authored and illustrated during his career.
NEA’s Read Across America initiative provides teachers, parents, and children with resources and activities that will help them to keep reading, not just on March 2, but every day of the year. For more information, please visit http://www.nea.org/readacross.
Today Secretary Arne Duncan announced the 16 applicants who are finalists in the first phase of the Race to the Top competition. Winners will be announced in April.
Courtesy of United Way of Southeastern Michigan and Rogers Wm. Foster.
More than 250 community leaders, government officials, educators, parents and students discussed turning around the Detroit area’s lowest-achieving schools with Director of Community Outreach Alberto Retana at two local summits Feb. 24, hosted by United Way of Southeastern Michigan’s Greater Detroit Education Venture Fund.
The visits were part of Retana’s community engagement tour throughout the U.S. to strengthen grassroots support for transforming America’s lowest-performing schools, and to inform communities about Title I School Improvement grant funding available for those efforts.
This spring, ED will award states a total of $3.5 billion in Title I School Improvement grants to turn around their lowest-performing schools. The funds will be awarded by formula to states, which will then make competitive grants to local education agencies (LEAs). Michigan is eligible to receive $135.9 million to turn around its lowest-performing schools.
Retana said that strong community support is required to ensure success of school transformation efforts.
“It’s not enough to have funding, it’s not enough to have charismatic leaders, and this is not just about opening another charter school,” Retana said to the morning session’s crowd at Detroit’s Cody Academies. “It’s also about community mobilization. We need a movement of people to stand up and say, ‘we will no longer accept low expectations for our children.’”
Retana also brought a similar message to Melvindale High School in suburban Detroit. Both Cody Academies and Melvindale High School are undergoing turnaround efforts supported by funding through the Greater Detroit Education Venture Fund. Both sessions also included panel discussions with educators and students that generated dialogue about what is and isn’t working with their respective transformations.
After the summits, Retana talked with Detroit Public Television about the importance of turning around low-performing schools, successes and challenges, and federal resources available to help. Watch the interview.
Secretary Arne Duncan testified before the House Education and Labor Committee on March 3.
He discussed President Obama’s education agenda, including the administration’s proposed fiscal year 2011 budget and the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.
Duncan talked about the importance of college and career-ready standards, supporting and rewarding excellence, focusing on growth and gains in student learning, and a “smarter, more targeted federal role to give states and districts as much flexibility as possible, while ensuring as much accountability as possible.”
Much of his testimony was devoted to the administration’s teacher quality agenda.
Join Secretary Arne Duncan and White House Domestic Policy Advisor Melody Barnes at 5:30 pm ET today for a live video chat on making college more affordable. They will discuss the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act and the Obama Administration’s efforts to reform student lending.
Read a blog post by Roberto Rodriguez, Special Assistant to the President for Education Policy, about President Obama’s plan to dramatically expand financial aid for America’s college-going students and restructure student aid programs to make them simpler, more efficient, and more reliable.
WhiteHouse.gov is featuring education each day this week in its blog. See more blog posts on education.
Census forms will soon arrive in America’s mailboxes, and the nation’s public school system is counting on those forms for accurate data to inform planning and funding allocations. Deputy Secretary of Education Tony Miller stressed the importance of the census last month, when he joined Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, Delaware Gov. Jack Markell, and Robert Groves, director of the U.S. Census Bureau to launch the 2010 Census in Schools program at Bancroft Elementary School in Wilmington.
Census data will directly affect how approximately $26 billion in annual federal education funding is distributed to local, state and tribal governments over the next 10 years, Miller said. Census data informs us of the needs and challenges students might face in their communities and is used to create funding formulas for over 30 formula-grant programs administered by the U.S. Department of Education that provide services to: students from low-income families; homeless children; migrant students; students with disabilities; Native American students; and English Language Learners.
“In order for this funding allocation to be accomplished fairly and accurately, the decennial census has to count everybody, especially children, who have been undercounted in every census since 1790,” the Deputy Secretary said. “For example, at Bancroft Elementary School, its allocations for services for low-income students are currently based on the census. Assuming that the composition of the student population has changed over the past ten years, federal education funding will be adjusted accordingly. Whether it increases or decreases – the goal is to make sure the dollars provide specialized services for these particular children in need.”
“President Obama’s Goal is that America will have the highest proportion of college graduates of any country by 2020. To accomplish this, we must: Improve student achievement; narrow achievement gaps; increase graduation and college enrollment rates. Census data will play a key role in helping us reach these goals. We stand ready, as an agency, to do all that we can to spread the message to our children, their teachers, school administrators and parents to participate in counting all Americans,” Miller said.
Census forms will be delivered to every residence in the United States and Puerto Rico in March. When you receive yours, just answer the 10 short questions and then mail the form back in the postage-paid envelope provided. And remember, We Can’t Move Forward Until You Mail It Back!
Get more information:
Fact sheet on the implications of the census on education
Next week, on March 10 at 1:30 pm, Secretary Duncan and ED senior staff will host a teleconference with tribal leaders across the country to discuss, among other matters, the upcoming reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.
Secretary Duncan will use the teleconference to:
Seek input from tribal leaders on ESEA reauthorization; and
Receive feedback on the Department’s proposed Plan of Actions for Implementing Executive Order 13175: Consultation and Coordination with Indian Tribal Governments (Plan of Actions).
You can download a copy of the Department’s proposed Plan of Actions here [PDF, 60K].
Comments on the proposed Plan of Actions are invited. Please send any comments to Tribalconsultation@ed.gov.
For background, please see President Obama’s November 5 memo on tribal consultation and the White House Tribal Nations Conference.
