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Yesterday, the US Department of Education released a new report addressing how districts qualified for Title I funds (higher poverty districts) often allocate resources across their schools inequitably, arguing that requirements for receiving Title I funds should be strengthened. The report is here: http://www2.ed.gov/rschstat/eval/title-i/school-level-expenditures/school-level-expenditures.pdf Related resources here: http://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/opepd/ppss/reports.html#comparability-state-local-expenditures It is certainly problematic that many public school districts have far from predictable, far from logical and far from equitable formulas for distributing resources across their schools. This is a problem which should be addressed. And improving comparability provisions for receipt of Title I funding is an appropriate step to take in this regard. However, it is critically important to understand that improving within district comparability of resources across schools is only a very small piece of a much larger equity puzzle. It's a drop in the bucket. Perhaps an important drop, but not one that will even come close to resolving the major equity issues that plague public education systems today.

A while back, when the NJ Opportunity Scholarship Act was a hotter topic, I wrote a post explaining how, depending on which districts were included in NJOSA and depending on how family income qualifications were set and eligibility for those already enrolled in private schools, the largest share of scholarships could actually end up going to Orthodox schools in Lakewood. After all, Lakewood is home to the largest private schooled population in the state. Not only that, most families in Lakewood whose children attend the Orthodox schools actually have income below the 250% poverty threshold.

In light of recent controversy over the role of state appointed "emergency" managers in Michigan,   I've been pondering the state of taxpayer rights under the current education policy agenda(s) in New Jersey

So, I've seen on more than a few occasions these last few weeks references to the recent Dobbie and Fryer article on NYC charter schools as the latest evidence that money doesn't matter in schools. That costly stuff like class size, or  overall measures of total per pupil expenditures are simply unimportant, and can easily be replaced/substituted with no-cost alternatives like those employed in no excuses charter schools (like high expectations, tutoring, additional time, and wrap-around services). I'll set aside the issue that many of these supposedly more effective alternatives do, in fact, have cost implications. Instead, I'll focus my critique on whether this Dobbie/Fryer study provides any substantive evidence that money doesn't matter - either broadly, or in the narrower context of looking specifically at NYC charter schools.

Many of us have had extensive ongoing conversation about the Big Study (CFR) that caught media attention last week. That conversation has included much thoughtful feedback from the authors of the study.  That's how it should be. A good, ongoing discussion delving into technical details and considering alternative policy implications.

Yesterday was a big day for big new studies on teacher evaluation. First, there was the New York Times report on the new study by Chetty, Friedman and Rockoff. Second, there was the release of the second part of the Gates Foundation's Measures of Effective Teaching project. There's still much to digest. But here's my first shot, based on first impressions of these two studies (with very little attention to the Gates study)

The Fordham Institute has just released its report titled "The Costs of Online Learning" in which they argue that it is incrementally cheaper to move from a) brick and mortar schooling to b) blended learning and then c) fully online learning.

I start this new year with reflections on some unfinished business from 2011 - Here are a few bits of information I anxiously await for 2012. Some are likely within reach. Others, well, not so much.

Any way you do the math, Teach For America raises a lot of money. And, this, in turn, raises a lot of questions. Corps members, their families, public agencies and others wonder, "Where does the money go?" It came as no surprise to me that more voices expressed concern about Teach For America's transparency in financial matters. These concerns persist across cohorts of corps members, and particularly in a tough economy, TFA interns suggest a hidden agenda that impacts financially struggling corps members and their families.

As we once again begin discussing & debating the appropriate role for Charter schools in New Jersey's education reform "mix," here's a round-up on the New Jersey charter school numbers, in terms of demographic comparisons to all other public and charter schools in the same 'city' and proficiency rates (across all grades) compared to all others in the same 'city.'

A series of studies from Roland Fryer and colleagues have explored the effectiveness of specific charter school models and strategies, including Harlem Childrens' Zone (Dobbie & Fryer, 2009), "no excuses" charter schools in New York City (Dobbie & Fryer, 2011), schools within the Houston public school district (Apollo 20) mimicking no excuses charter strategies (Fryer, 2011, Fryer, 2012), and an intensive urban residential schooling model in Baltimore, MD (Curto & Fryer, 2011).  In each case, the models in question involve resource intensive strategies, including substantially lengthening school days and years, providing small group (2 or 3 on 1) intensive tutoring, providing extensive community based wrap around services (Harlem Childrens' Zone) or providing student housing and residential support services (Baltimore). The broad conclusion across these studies is that charter schools or traditional public schools can produce dramatic improvements to student outcomes by implementing no excuses strategies and perhaps wrap around services, and that these strategies come at relatively modest marginal cost. Regarding the benefits of the most expensive alternative explored - residential schooling in Baltimore (at a reported $39,000 per pupil) - the authors conclude that no excuses strategies of extended day and year, and intensive tutoring are likely more cost effective. But, each of these studies suffers from poorly documented and often ill-conceived comparisons of costs and/or marginal expenditures.

I was intrigued by this post from Jay Greene today, in which he points out that public schools can learn from charter schools and perhaps can implement some of their successes. Specifically, Greene is referring to KIPP-like "no excuses" charter schools as a model, and their strategies for improving outcomes including much extended school time (longer day/year).  As the basis for his argument, Greene refers specifically to Roland Fryer's updated analysis of Houston's Apollo 20 schools - which are - in effect, models of no excuses charters applied in the traditional public district.

What I'm not for… and I'm not yet sure what's going on here… is pretending that we can simply shut down schools in high poverty neighborhoods, blaming teachers and principals for their failure, and then either a) replacing the school management and staff with individuals likely to be even less qualified and less well equipped to handle the circumstances,  or b) initiating an inevitably continuous pattern of displacement from school to school to school for children already disadvantaged.

I've seen a number of tweets and vague media references of late about the fact that NJ Education Commissioner Cerf will at some point in the near future be providing recommendations for how to change the School Funding Reform Act of 2008.

In Ed Schools housed within research universities, and in programs in educational leadership which are primarily charged with the training of school and district level leaders, we are constantly confronted with deliberations over how to balance teaching the "practical stuff" and "how to" information on running a school or school district, managing personnel, managing budgets, etc. etc. etc., and the "research stuff" like understanding how to interpret rigorous research in education and related social sciences (increasingly economic research).  Finding the right balance between theory, research and practice is an ongoing struggle and often the subject of bitter debate in professional programs housed in research universities.

Any reader of my blog knows already that I'm a skeptic of the usefulness of Value-added models for guiding high stakes decisions regarding personnel in schools. As I've explained on previous occasions, while statistical models of large numbers of data points - like lots of teachers or lots of schools - might provide us with some useful information on the extent of variation in student outcomes across schools or teachers and might reveal for us some useful patterns - it's generally not a useful exercise to try to say anything about any one single point within the data set. Yes, teacher "effectiveness" estimates tend to be based on the many student points across students taught by that teacher, but are still highly unstable. Unstable to the point, where even as a researcher hoping to find value in this information, I've become skeptical.

Let me start by pointing out that Mathematica Policy Research, in my view, is an exceptional research organization. They have good people. They do good work and have done much to inform public policy in what I believe are positive ways. That's why I found it so depressing when I started digging through the recent report on Charter CMOs - a report which as framed, was intended to explore the differences in effectiveness, practices and resources of charter schools operated by various Charter Management Organizations.

A major unintended consequence of this ill-conceived reform movement is that it is distracting local school administrators and boards of education from closing and/or reorganizing schools for the right reasons by focusing all of the attention on closing schools for the wrong ones. In fact, even when school officials might wish to consider closing schools for logical reasons, they now seem compelled to say instead that they are proposing specific actions because the schools are "failing!" Not because they are too small to operate at efficient scale, that local demographic shift warrants reconsidering attendance boundaries, or that a facility is simply unsafe, or an unhealthy environment. In really blunt terms, the current reformy rhetoric is forcing leaders to make stupid arguments for school closures where otherwise legitimate ones might actually exist!

"It's about time we all suck it up and realize that the best of economic research on factors associated with test score gains not only can, but must absolutely drive the redesign of our obviously dreadful American public education system! [despite substantial evidence to the contrary!] With that in mind, I have selectively mined some of my own favorite studies and summaries of studies in order to develop a framework for the absolutely awesomest school ever! I've chosen to focus on only economic studies of measurable stuff that is actually associated with measured test score gains. After all, that's what matters - that's all that matters! Mind you that this school will be awesomest not merely in terms of overall effectiveness, but also in terms of bang for the buck, because I'm not messin' around with expensive curriculum or elaborate facilities… or high priced consultants… or really expensive strategies like class size reduction."