McDermitt Combined Schools in the rural, northeastern corner of Nevada has been stuck in the academic doldrums for years. The school, which serves a high proportion of low-income Native American students, was flagged under the now-defunct No Child Left Behind Act and got nearly $140,000 in extra federal resources under the School Improvement Grant program.
But the school continued to founder, said David Jensen, the superintendent of the 3,400-student Humboldt school district.
Now, the district is taking advantage of flexibility in the Every Student Succeeds Act that allows superintendents like Jensen, with an assist from their states, to come up with their own school improvement strategies, backed by evidence, to help schools like McDermitt.
Nevada, which is one of the first states to embrace this new approach, helped hook Jensen and his team up with nationally recognized school improvement experts who are providing McDermitt with coaching, helping it to analyze student data, and more. It鈥檚 a significant鈥攁nd, Jensen says, welcome鈥攄eparture from the list of federally prescribed interventions of the past.
But big questions loom as persistently struggling schools around the country prepare to embark on a new school kind of school improvement journey. Will districts and schools use the new leeway in ESSA to find new solutions? Or will they keep doing the same things that they always have, with the same results? How seriously will states and districts take ESSA鈥檚 evidence-based requirement, if there isn鈥檛 a ton of federal oversight?
Experts see some promise in the new approach鈥攁nd plenty to worry about.
鈥淚鈥檓 concerned that people in the field will forget about the need to choose really good, evidence-based strategies and implement them really well,鈥� said Caitlin Scott, the manager for research and evaluation at Education Northwest, a nonprofit that works on school improvement. 鈥淚 think that is a danger. ... It鈥檚 easy to latch onto the next new, shiny, impressive thing without really doing the background-information gathering to see what the evidence is that something is going to be successful.鈥�
Lack of Capacity
The biggest potential challenge: capacity.
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ESSA, the latest version of the main federal K-12 law, got rid of the NCLB law鈥檚 controversial School Improvement Grant program, last funded at $450 million in fiscal 2016. But ESSA continued an Obama administration requirement that states identify schools performing in the bottom 5 percent. ESSA directs states to set aside at least 7 percent of their Title I money, which is geared toward disadvantaged students, for school improvement, up from an allowable 4 percent under the old law.
Low-performing districts that get a piece of the federal cash must choose an intervention that鈥檚 backed by what the law defines as either 鈥渟trong,鈥� 鈥渕oderate,鈥� or 鈥減romising鈥� evidence. And districts that don鈥檛 get federal funding to fix their lowest-performing schools must pick a plan that has a rationale behind it and then study it carefully to see if it鈥檚 working.
But district leaders may not have the time鈥攐r know-how鈥攖o take a hard look at the wide universe of potential solutions for low-performing schools and figure out which will really help the students they serve, experts say. And studying the impact of interventions could also prove tricky.
The Every Student Succeeds Act puts districts, states, and schools in the driver鈥檚 seat on school improvement. Instead of following federally-required strategies, local leaders can come up with their own interventions for struggling schools. But crucially, these must be backed by evidence.
- States must reserve at least 7 percent of their Title I funds for disadvantaged students for school improvement, and allocate that money to districts.
- These dollars can either be given out competitively, or by formula. At least 14 states plan to give them out competitively.
- If school districts use federal funding for school improvement, they must come up with a plan that is backed by 鈥渟trong,鈥� 鈥渕oderate,鈥� or 鈥減romising鈥� evidence.
- If schools don鈥檛 use federal funding, they must pick a plan that has a rationale behind it, and study it to see if it鈥檚 working.
The law requires these evidence-based interventions to be used in two broad categories of schools.
Schools in Comprehensive Improvement
This category applies to the schools considered among the bottom 5 percent of performers in the state, as determined by a mix of factors, including test scores, those where more than a third of students don鈥檛 graduate, and those where subgroups of students are chronically underperforming. Initially, the district comes up with a plan to fix these schools, monitored by the state.
Schools in Targeted Improvement
Schools where any particular subgroup of students鈥擡nglish-language learners, students in special education, racial or ethnic minorities, or disadvantaged children鈥攁re struggling. The school comes up with a plan to fix these schools, monitored by the district.
鈥淭he ask here is actually a really big ask for states and districts,鈥� said Carlas McCauley, who ran the School Improvement Grant program as a career official at the U.S. Department of Education during the Obama administration and is now the director of WestEd鈥檚 Center on School Turnaround in Sacramento, Calif., a research and consulting organization. 鈥淚t鈥檚 going to take time to completely move鈥� in this new direction, McCauley said.
Outside the 50 largest urban districts, the person who handles school improvement may be the same staffer who deals with other federal programs centered on factors like teacher quality and school safety. That means districts may be tempted to take outside consultants and providers at their word when they say a strategy meets ESSA鈥檚 evidence requirements, said Terra Wallin, who also worked as a career staffer at the federal Education Department on school turnaround issues and is now a consultant with Education First, a policy organization that is working with states on ESSA implementation.
鈥淢y guess is, you鈥檒l see a lot of people doing the things they were already doing,鈥� Wallin said. 鈥淵ou鈥檒l see a lot of providers approaching schools or districts to say, 鈥楲ook, we meet the evidence standard.鈥� 鈥� Districts, she said, may not be able to easily check those claims. 鈥淭hey won鈥檛 be doing an independent scan of what鈥檚 available.鈥�
On the plus side, there is a big potential benefit to allowing districts to choose their own improvement strategies: They鈥檙e more likely to stick with them, Wallin said. 鈥淚鈥檓 optimistic that people will choose interventions that are realistic for them to implement.鈥�
No Specifics
The capacity problem extends further up the food chain, too. It鈥檚 unclear if states have the bandwidth to sort through scores of applications and gauge whether districts鈥� proposed approaches meet the law鈥檚 requirements.
What鈥檚 more, there isn鈥檛 a lot of detail in state ESSA plans on school improvement, experts who have reviewed the plans say. States seem to place a lot of emphasis on identifying struggling schools but not much on how they鈥檒l help them get better, said Mark Dynarski, a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who reviewed a sample of 10 plans.
鈥淭he basic premise of the plans is that we are going to definitely know who these schools are and we鈥檙e definitely going to get around to thinking about them as soon as we do,鈥� he said.
To be sure, the Education Department didn鈥檛 ask states to put a lot of detail on school improvement in their ESSA applications. And Carissa Miller, the executive director of the Council of Chief State School Officers, argued that states are doing a number of things on school improvement that aren鈥檛 necessarily outlined in their plans. State leaders feel a 鈥渕oral obligation鈥� to fix struggling schools, she said.
Turnaround Menu
Some states are planning to guide districts through the turnaround maze by coming up with a list or database of evidence-backed strategies to choose from. Those include Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, and Washington, according to an analysis by Results for America鈥檚 Evidence in Education Lab, a nonprofit that helps policymakers use research to inform decisions.
A couple of states鈥攑articularly Massachusetts鈥攈ave been using research to guide improvement efforts for years.
But other states are putting new systems in place as they gear up for ESSA, including Nevada. Last year, the Silver State 鈥渟ent out the Bat Signal鈥� to organizations around the country that specialize in school improvement, said Brett Barley, the deputy state superintendent for student achievement. The state examined the strategies to see which ones met ESSA鈥檚 standards.
And then Nevada had a 鈥渟peed-dating event鈥� where district and school leaders could interview organizations like New Leaders for New Schools to see how they could meet their needs. Jensen, for instance, chose to work with TNTP and the Achievement Network, two national nonprofits, as well as a local school improvement partner.
Finding high-quality providers on their own isn鈥檛 something many district leaders in Nevada have time for, Barley said.
鈥淣evada is full of great educators, but I think the capacity issue is where we have seen things kind of fall down,鈥� Barley said. 鈥淲e have superintendents who are also trying to figure out what the lunch schedule looks like and serving as the crossing guard.鈥� He said it鈥檚 probably asking too much to ask them to also spend time examining the research behind different school improvement options.
Districts in Nevada don鈥檛 have to choose a strategy from the state鈥檚 list, but if they do, they鈥檒l get fast-track approval for their school improvement application.
The state is also using ESSA鈥檚 evidence standards in distributing other federal and state funding so that districts can put money from different pots behind battle-tested strategies.
Community Voice
On the other side of the country, Rhode Island is taking a similar approach. The Ocean State is coming up with what state officials are calling a 鈥渉ub"鈥攁 repository of strategies that have worked in different types of schools, with a range of challenges.
Districts that have their own improvement ideas don鈥檛 have to rely on the hub. But those that are looking for evidence-based interventions and don鈥檛 know where to start will have much of their work done for them, said Mary Ann Snider, the state鈥檚 deputy commissioner.
鈥淚t鈥檚 something beyond what you can accomplish in a Google search,鈥� Snider said.
Rhode Island is also asking districts with schools deemed among the worst in the state to set up 鈥渃ommunity advisory boards,鈥� which could be made up of parents, teachers, advocates, or anyone else the district thinks would bring a necessary perspective. These boards are expected to help conceive the district鈥檚 school improvement plan and monitor the whole process, helping to make changes if students continue to fall behind.
The state is also hoping to set up partnerships between schools that have challenges in a particular area鈥攍ike combating chronic absenteeism鈥攁nd pairing them with schools that have come up with successful approaches.
But Scott of Education Northwest advises states against coming up with a 鈥渧ery prescriptive list of possible strategies鈥� for school improvement. She suggests states and districts look to a national research repository, such as the What Works Clearinghouse, the Best Evidence Clearinghouse, and Results First. States can also partner with federal government鈥檚 regional education labs, with universities, and with other experts to help make sure school improvement strategies have grounding in research, the CCSSO鈥檚 Miller said.
鈥楥hiefs Are on the Line鈥�
Another looming challenge: Some states and districts searching for evidence-based strategies may have trouble finding something that meets their needs. For instance, there aren鈥檛 many successful, research-backed ideas for fixing perennially foundering rural schools and those with big Native American populations, Scott said.
The field was aware of that challenge when ESSA was written, said Wallin, the former Education Department staffer. But supporters of the idea hoped that requirement for evidence-based solutions would spur more research into school improvement. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a little bit of a chicken-and-egg problem,鈥� she said.
Ultimately, state leaders have a lot riding on whether this new approach to school improvement can work.
鈥淚 think state chiefs are on the line to demonstrate that with this new autonomy they have they can move the needle,鈥� said Sara Kerr, the vice president of education policy implementation at Results for America, a nonprofit. 鈥淚 think there鈥檚 no way to do that without investing in approaches that are likeliest to result in improvement and studying the heck out of them and learning from them and iterating and improving over time.鈥�
