Should schools be held primarily responsible for improving student achievement, or do they need help from health and social programs to ensure their students鈥� success?
Two sets of prominent educators and policy leaders released statements last week emphasizing different answers to that question. But both groups acted with the same purpose: to inform and highlight the debate over education in the 2008 presidential campaign and to influence the future of the No Child Left Behind Act and other policies of the next president.
The Education Equality Project, formally launched last week by New York City Schools Chancellor Joel I. Klein and the Rev. Al Sharpton, the civil rights activist, plans to organize events at the Democratic and Republican national conventions to promote its message that 鈥減ublic education today remains mired in the status quo鈥� and 鈥渟hows little prospect of meaningful improvement鈥� without significant changes in the ways schools are structured, .
, made up of researchers and former federal officials, is trying to focus debates about the NCLB law in the campaign and elsewhere on the difficulty schools have raising achievement if students don鈥檛 have access to health care, early education, and other services.
鈥淥ur notion is that schools can鈥檛 do it alone,鈥� said Helen F. Ladd, a professor of public-policy studies and economics at Duke University and one of the three co-chairs of the group that produced
鈥淲e need to work on these other fronts as well,鈥� Ms. Ladd said in an interview, referring to the call for better health services for children and high-quality preschool, after-school, and summer programs.
An adviser to the presidential campaign of Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois said the presumptive Democratic nominee agreed with the goal underlying both statements that schools need to improve for all children, but that the candidate didn鈥檛 state a preference for one approach or the other.
鈥淗e views continuing down our present path as morally unacceptable and economically untenable, and agrees with the signatories to these statements that it is time to move beyond the tired debates of the past and towards a new era of reform,鈥� Danielle Gray, the deputy policy director for the Obama campaign, said in an e-mail.
In a meeting with reporters last week, Lisa Graham Keegan, the top education adviser to Sen. John McCain of Arizona, said that the presumptive Republican presidential nominee would lead a 鈥渞enaissance鈥� in education that would make significant changes to the K-12 system.
鈥淚t鈥檚 very easy to write a detailed program for an old system,鈥� Ms. Keegan said about the candidate鈥檚 plans, although not discussing either statement. 鈥淲e鈥檙e looking at an entirely new landscape.鈥�
Lessons From NCLB
Leaders of the groups said release of their statements on consecutive days was a coincidence after months of work.
But their unveiling one week after the end of presidential-primary season was a sign that advocates hope to raise the level of debate over education in the general election. In the primaries, education played a low-key role in the debates and speeches of the candidates. (鈥淐andidates Are at Odds Over K-12,鈥� June 11, 2008.)
The leaders of both groups hope to change that low profile now that Sen. McCain and Sen. Obama are preparing for the Nov. 4 election.
In releasing the Education Equality Project鈥檚 statement at a Washington news conference on June 11, that group called on policymakers to take six 鈥渋mmediate steps鈥� to improve schools.
Those are: ensure all schools have effective teachers and principals; give parents choice among public schools; design systems that hold classroom teachers, principals, and administrators accountable for student progress; spend money 鈥渨ith a single-minded focus: what will best serve our students鈥�; ask parents and students to demand more from school officials and themselves; and 鈥渟tand up to those political forces and interests who seek to preserve a failed system,鈥� the statement says.
鈥淓ducation and equal access to achievement is the civil rights issue of the 21st century,鈥� said Mr. Sharpton, the New York City-based minister and community organizer who ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004.
鈥楤roader鈥� Vision
By contrast, the ad hoc group advocating the 鈥淏roader, Bolder Approach to Education鈥� doesn鈥檛 call for increasing accountability measures on schools. Instead, it emphasizes that schools need help from other quarters to boost achievement.
The group鈥檚 three-page document, published June 10 as an advertisement in The Washington Post and The New York Times, says that federal policies need to help schools reduce their class sizes鈥攑articularly in the lower grades鈥攁nd to ensure that high-quality teachers work in hard-to-staff schools. Policymakers should continue to pursue efforts to 鈥渦se assessments that provide guidance to teachers and principals,鈥� to improve the quality of professional development, and to coordinate K-12 policies with preschool experiences and higher education, it says.
The statement adds that schools 鈥減ay attention not only to basic academic skills and cognitive growth narrowly defined, but to development of the whole person, including physical health, character, social development, and non-academic skills, from birth through the end of formal schooling.鈥�
And it says governments at all levels should provide 鈥減reventative and routine鈥� medical care that can 鈥渕inimize the extent to which health problems become obstacles to success in school.鈥�
Members of the Education Equality Project said that they agreed, in principle, that governments should improve health and social services for poor children. But they chose to focus their efforts on changing schools, they said, because they believe educators have the ability to improve student achievement without the assistance of health care or other services.
鈥淲e don鈥檛 know yet what schools can achieve,鈥� said Mr. Klein, who was a senior official in the U.S. Department of Justice under President Clinton. 鈥淪ome schools today are getting entirely different outcomes with the very same kids people tell me you can鈥檛 educate to high levels of achievement. If that can happen for some, why can鈥檛 it happen for all?鈥�
The includes Democrats such as Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory A. Booker; Peter Groff, the president of the Colorado Senate; and former Colorado Gov. Roy Romer, who is now the chairman of ED in 鈥�08, a foundation-backed effort to raise the level of debate over education in the 2008 campaign. (鈥淓ffort for Education as Campaign Issue Fights for Traction,鈥� Dec. 5, 2007.)
The Equality Project group includes the chiefs of the Baltimore, Chicago, and District of Columbia school systems, as well as Republicans Marc S. Lampkin, a lobbyist and a former congressional aide, and former U.S. Rep. J.C. Watts Jr. of Oklahoma, who are affiliated with ED in 鈥�08.
New Accountability
The 鈥淏roader, Bolder Approach to Education鈥� states that K-12 schools need to be held accountable, but envisions a type of accountability different from that of the Education Equality Project or the NCLB law. The federal law relies primarily on reading- and mathematics-test scores in grades 3-8 and once in high school to determine whether schools are meeting student-achievement goals.
鈥淣ew accountability systems should combine appropriate qualitative and quantitative methods, and they will be considerably more expensive than the flawed accountability systems currently in use,鈥� the statement says.
The statement has fewer politicians signed on than the one issued by the Education Equality Project, but are five former members of the Clinton administration鈥攊ncluding former Attorney General Janet Reno and former Deputy Secretary of Education Marshall S. Smith鈥攁s well as former Seattle Mayor Norman B. Rice, a Democrat.
The statement was also signed by two former members of President Bush鈥檚 administration: Susan B. Neuman, who was the Department of Education鈥檚 top K-12 official from 2001 to 2003, and John J. DiIulio Jr., who directed the White House鈥檚 faith-based initiative early in the president鈥檚 first term. Diane Ravitch, an Education Department appointee under President George H.W. Bush, also signed the 鈥渂roader, bolder鈥� statement.
