NCLB: Week In Review

Congress was busy with No Child Left Behind (NCLB) this week. Secretary Spellings sought to distinguish the reauthorization from the Congressional investigations into Reading First and the student loan scandals, the Chairman of the House Committee on Education and Labor hosted other members of Congress for a hearing on the reauthorization and bills were introduced that may have a good chance of working their way into reauthorization language. To be sure, the reauthorization momentum grew this week, even if it remains somewhat disjunctive.

Secretary Spellings is very eager to get the process underway in order to complete reauthorization while President Bush is still in office. One day after the contentious oversight hearings on Reading First and student loans, Spellings sent a cordial letter to the House and Senate education committee chairmen and ranking members asking them to make a distinction between their oversight activities and their reauthorization duties, and to discuss the reauthorization over lunch. She wrote:

I acknowledge your committee’s oversight function. I look forward to answering your questions and those of other members, and to meeting with any members who would like to discuss these matters in further detail. […] I am hopeful that the pursuit of oversight will not delay moving forward legislatively on these two important laws. [….]

I believe the coming weeks afford us the opportunity to collaborate to strengthen NCLB and the HEA. So that we may best prepare for this essential work, I offer to convene, at the earliest opportunity, a working luncheon with you and your staff. Together, we can make progress that will benefit America’s students, parents and taxpayers.

While Spellings warm outreach is welcomed, it does not make the work of the chairmen any easier. They must still negotiate the law’s many technical sections and secure political consensus around the changes. The work around Title I’s accountability sections will be the most contentious and this week’s represen­tatives-only hearing in the House Committee on Education and Labor made that clear.

On Wednesday, members of the House Education and Labor Committee held a bipartisan meeting to hear recommendations from other members of Congress on ways to improve the NCLB. Twenty-five members of the House presented their opinions of the law that covered a wide range of topics, mostly regarding Title I accountability. Most supported growth models, but the meaning of a growth model remained uncertain. Most wanted more flexibility for the assessment of limited English proficient (LEP) students and students with disabilities, but details were sparse. Many felt that the law is too punitive and expressed concerns about expanding the law’s testing provisions. There were so many varying opinions, in fact, that Education Daily described the task of reauthorization as follows: “If the House education committee’s representatives only hearing is any indication, NCLB reauthorization could be a cat-herding contest at best.”

While consensus on many Title I issues remains complicated, there is emerging clarity around Title II. Chairman Miller is a strong supporter of the existing highly qualified teacher requirements and, for years, he has been trying to supplement them with his Teacher Excellence for All Children (TEACH) Act, which he introduced last week. The bill, H.R. 2204, would provide $3.4 billion to improve recruitment, preparation, distribution and retention of public elementary and secondary school teachers and principals. The Washington NCLB intelligentsia believe that the Chairman will fold this bill into a new Title II bill, while retaining many of its existing requirements and allowing for more credentialing flexibility using the High Objective Uniform State Standard of Evaluation (HOUSSE).

This week also provided hope, if not clarity, for Title II (D), the Enhancing Education Through Technology Program (EETT). Under Republican leadership the program has program has fallen from an investment of $700 million to the current $273 million level of funding, but education appropriations chairmen Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Representative Obey (D-WI) are considering more funding for the program in fiscal year 2008. Advocates would like to see funding restored to the 2002 level of $700 million, but the chairmen have yet to subject the request to the give-and-take politics of appropriations negotiations. In addition to more funding for FY08, Congresswoman Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-CA) is expected to introduce a revamped Title II(D), titled Achievement Thorough Technology and Innovation (ATTAIN). The proposal improves on EETT, including a better acronym, by authorizing $1 billion for fiscal year 2008, of which 40% would go towards rigorous and ongoing professional development and 60% would go towards professional development or technology tools. The bill gives priority to schools in school improvement status with large populations of LEP students or students with disabilities. It would also promote technology literacy by creating a definition of student technology literacy and requiring that states assess technology literacy by the 8^th grade. The bill’s advocates report that the proposal has been very well received and that its language stands a good chance of being incorporated into the reauthorized NCLB Title II (D).

Finally, this week also saw the introduction of a bill that could influence community and parental participation in reauthorization. On Tuesday, Representative Steny Hoyer (D-MD) introduced H.R. 2323, the Full-Service Community Schools Act of 2007, a bill to award grants for the support of full-service community schools, which are defined as schools that participate in a community-based effort to coordinate educational, developmental, family, health, and other comprehensive services through community-based organizations and public and private partnerships and that provide access for students, families, and the community to such services. The bill would authorize $200 million for FY2008, of which 20 percent would go to state educational agencies that collaborate with at least two other state agencies for purposes of planning, coordinating and expanding full-service community schools. Five percent would go to technical assistance, training, data collection and evaluation. Daniel Cardinali, the President of Communities In Schools, Inc. and an architect of the bill, considers it a complement to the law’s current parental involvement requirements and hopes that it will make it as a stand-alone bill or become a part of the reauthorized NCLB. But its fate, he acknowledged, lies with the chairmen of the education committees and the politics of reauthorization ahead.

Resources:
“Secretary Spellings Invites House and Senate Education to Convene on No Child Left Behind,” US Department of Education, Press Release, http://www.ed.gov/print/news/pressreleases/2007/05/05112007a.html
Sarah Sparks, “House cires Usual Suspects for Reauthorization,” Education Daily, May 18, 2007.
David Hoff, “Miller Signals Openness to ‘Substantial Changes' to NCLB in Reauthorization,” Education Week, May 17, 2007.
“Education and Labor Committee Hears from Members of Congress on Ways to Improve No Child Left Behind,” House Committee on Education and Labor, Press Release, May 16, 2007, http://www.house.gov/apps/list/speech/edlabor_dem/RelMay16NCLB.html
Coalition for Community Schools, http://communityschools.org/HOyerleg.html
Author: DAD