Copyright 1999 Federal News Service, Inc.
Federal News Service
JUNE 10, 1999, THURSDAY
SECTION: IN THE NEWS
LENGTH:
4088 words
HEADLINE: PREPARED TESTIMONY OF
RANDI
WEINGARTEN
PRESIDENT, UNITED FEDERATION OF TEACHERS
VICE-PRESIDENT,
AMERICAN FEDERATION OF TEACHERS
BEFORE THE HOUSE EDUCATION
AND THE WORKFORCE COMMITTEE
BODY:
Mr. Chairman
and members of the committee, I am Randi Weingarten, president of the United
Federation of Teachers, in New York City, and Vice-President of the American
Federation of Teachers. Thank you for the opportunity to appear as a witness
before the House Education and the Workforce Committee on the reauthorization of
Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. Title I is an enormously
important program that is making a significant contribution to improving the
education of our neediest students.
Congress made radical changes and many
improvements when it last reauthorized Title I in 1994. Most importantly, you
and your colleagues insisted that poor children be included fully in the
nation's effort to raise academic standards. And we've already seen positive
results in five short years, even though some of the law's provisions are only
now taking effect. The Final Report of the National Assessment of Title I, as
well as data from states and school districts, indicate that children in
high-poverty schools have made significant improvement in reading and math. Most
encouraging, the lowest-performing students have shared in these gains.
We've seen this success in New York City, where 819 of our more than 1,110
public schools are Title I schools and two-thirds of our students receive free
lunch. Many of our schoolwide programs have been models of success by
integrating their Title I programs into their comprehensive education plans.Now,
we need to build on this success by developing and implementing high standards
for all students in the core academic subject areas, and - this is the hard part
by providing the resources and support needed to help every student actually
reach those standards. This means continuing ongoing efforts such as aligning
assessments with higher standards; enhancing professional development to raise
the standards in teaching; identifying and providing intensive assistance to
chronically low-performing school districts and schools; and establishing
greater and properly shared accountability for school and student progress.
(1) First and foremost, Congress must concentrate Title I resources on
school districts and schools with large numbers or proportions of poor children.
Historically, the federal government's main role in education has been to
support equal educational opportunity for students. More recently it has been
the promotion of equal opportunity for all to get a high quality education. To
continue the gains recently made, I believe Title I resources must be targeted
to quality programs for poor children and especially to programs which serve
high concentrations of poverty. Indeed, the targeting should be increased. In
addition, the 50 percent poverty threshold should be maintained. Furthermore, no
flexibility in any part of federal law should be allowed to undo this targeting
of resources.
We must increase the funding for school districts and schools
with large concentrations of poor children, so these schools can serve all
eligible children. Title I should allow poor children to compete educationally
with more fortunate children, not force them to compete among themselves for
inadequate resources.
(2) There should be a greater focus, or alignment, of
all parts of the educational system, including assessments, on establishing high
standards in the core academic subjects and on practices that are known to be
effective in improving student achievement. To begin with, the development by
states of new academic standards has not been matched by the development of
curricular and instructional materials that are necessary for high-standards
teaching and learning. That is, the reforms have not been fully translated into
the classroom. That's one of the reasons the UFT decided to undertake a
five-year, $2 million plan to produce a core curriculum for teachers in New York
City. The federal government should help states, or consortia of states, pursue
this work, including by supporting state grants to local districts. It is
essential to base these materials on the state academic standards, develop them
with the involvement of distinguished teachers, accompanied by high-quality
professional development programs to assure their effective use, and field-test
and evaluate them before putting them into widespread use.
To achieve a
greater focus on establishing high academic standards, there also must be better
planning at all levels of the educational system. State planning should focus on
strategies for improving student achievement in the core academic subjects for
which states have standards. And it should include strategies for professional
development for teachers, paraprofessionals and other instructional support
staff. At a minimum, there should be a literacy and mathematics focus in the
early grades and help for older students who face new testing and other
end-point standards. District planning requirements should be similar to those
for states and, because student achievement is closely related to discipline,
they should address how the district will improve discipline in schools. At the
school level, planning requirements should focus on standards-based student
achievement in the core academic subject areas, including the professional
development necessary to achieve those goals. There should be a further priority
in the elementary' grades on students' achieving reading proficiency by at least
the third grade, as we have done in New York City.
Committees of
Practitioners are an important and often untapped resource. States should
involve these committees in the development and monitoring of their plans and
coordinate their work with school support teams. Committees and support teams
should each have a role in hearing district and school appeals about
identification for intervention and about state and district failure to provide
Title I- required services and supports.
To help schoolwide projects better
focus on high academic standards and effective practices, other changes are
needed. States and districts should assume most information and data-gathering
and analysis burdens necessary for planning and effective practice, and then
disseminate that information to schools. Districts also should be required to
provide information to schools on proven models and research-based practices.
This includes the opportunity for teachers, principals, and other school staff
to visit with practitioners and experts who have direct experience with these
models and practices.
Although schoolwide project schools should not be
required to adopt particular whole-school models (except in the case of
corrective action), their plans should be developed with close reference to
research-based models. In elementary schools, in particular, plans should
discuss how the schools will put into practice the latest research on reading
instruction. Schoolwide projects should be required, as in present law, to
devote sufficient resources to professional development for teachers,
paraprofessionals,parents, and others to help all children meet the state's
performance standards. Ongoing professional development should be a priority for
those who provide or support instruction in the areas of reading and math. And
professional development should focus on subject matter and pedagogical skills
that will help students meet state academic standards. Schoolwide projects
should specify how those students who are furthest from meeting standards will
be given supplemental services - and this should be clearly allowable under the
law. Plans should explain the school's system for supporting student
disciplinary standards.
(3) Congress should preserve funding for
paraprofessionals under Title I. When appropriately used, as in New York City,
paraprofessionals serve as crucial support for teachers and students - not as
teacher substitutes, which is inappropriate - and make a real difference in the
lives of their students.
Paraprofessionals allow teachers to provide more
individual and small group instruction to their students. By taking care of many
classroom duties, they free teachers for more instructional time. Paras working
under teacher supervision also reinforce lessons initially given by teachers.
This support helps every kind of student, but it is particularly crucial for
those who need extra help to keep pace or catch up to their peers.
Paras
provide invaluable support in other ways. In New York City and other urban
areas, paraprofessionals help mitigate a critical shortage of bilingual
teachers. In a school system in which more than 17 percent of its students -
more than 180,000 children - are enrolled in bilingual or English as a Second
Language classes, this is particularly important. In addition, paras serve as a
critical link to immigrants' home cultures, helping students adjust and
facilitating communication with parents. Many of our paras were teachers in
their native countries, and many go on to earn New York State credentials.
In fact, paraprofessionals are a crucial source of new teachers. As you
know, a wave of baby boom retirements and other factors are expected to cause a
nationwide teacher shortage. In New York City alone, we will need to hire 30,000
- 40,000 new teachers over the next four years. Training paraprofessionals to
become teachers, as we have for more than 1,700 paras since 1995, will help
mitigate a major crisis. Paras make great teachers not only because of their
years of classroom experience, but because they bring a community connection to
the classroom. In fact, they are New York City's single greatest source of
teachers of color.
(4) Congress should expand and improve the requirement
for teacher professional development and paraprofessional training and the
capacity for intensive assistance, as the current law envisions, to
low-performing districts and schools.
The professional development
provisions in Title I and the remainder of ESEA should focus on
helping students meet high standards in core academic subjects. They should also
accord with principles of effective professional development. For example,
professional development should emphasize content knowledge and related
instructional practices; be based on best evidence; allow sufficient time,
support and resources to be integrated into actual practice; be designed with
the strong participation of teachers and experts in the field; and emphasize
teacher collaboration.
Title II professional development services should be
more readily available to Title I teachers and staff, who are presently
underserved. Congress could rectify this shortcoming by allowing states or
districts to address Title I and Title II professional development together, in
either program's plan or a consolidated plan. Another means of strengthening
Title I professional development is ensuring that members of school support
teams fully understand state standards; effective curricular and instructional
practices aligned to the standards; and the principles of effective professional
development. Teacher input into professional development should be strengthened
at all levels, and priority should be given to the latest research on effective
instructional practices in reading.
As key contributors to the success of
Title I schools, paraprofessionals should be included in all professional
development. This has been the case at PS 161 in Brooklyn, and the results have
been dramatic. PS 161's staff of paraprofessionals and teachers are well-trained
in the school's reading program as well as other topics, such as the recently
adopted New York State standards.
Just how successful has PS 161 been?
First, it is important to know that 97 percent of the schools approximately
1,400 students are eligible for free lunch; 90 percent are African American and
eight percent are Latino. These students have posted the highest test scores in
their district, and have done just as well on state tests as students in much
more affluent neighborhoods. For example, in 1996, 80 percent of the school's
third graders scored above the minimum on the state reading test. That puts the
students more than 30 points above the state average of 47 percent for schools
with similar student populations.
The lesson is this: school districts must
train paraprofessionals, under the direct supervision of a teacher, so they can
provide the knowledge and skills to support teachers in helping students meet
high standards. Too many districts do not properly train paraprofessionals, or
have improperly assigned them - administrative failures for which
paraprofessionals are now being blamed. Like teachers, paraprofessionals should
participate in the design and evaluation of their training, and be provided
opportunities for advancement and career ladders.
Schools and districts
identified as low-performing should be entitled to immediate assistance from the
district or state's school support teams, as appropriate. At a minimum,
assistance should consist of detailed and comprehensible student assessment
information; information on research-based instructional practices and
whole-school models; opportunities to visit schools using those models;
opportunities to consult with staff from the schools or from networks associated
with those models; and the opportunity to select from among models or develop
their own approaches based on research and resources from successful models and
practices, including assistance with parent involvement, student discipline and
student mobility issues.
Schools in need of improvement should be given
priority for filling teacher vacancies due to retirement or transfer with fully
credentialed and appropriately assigned new staff. These schools should receive
priority for federal resources specifically related to improving student
achievement, such as class size reduction, reading excellence, and after-school
programs. The lowest-performing students in the school should have priority for
supplemental services designed to accelerate their progress toward academic
standards.
With respect to identifying or intervening in low-performing
districts or schools, the AFT has a number of technical suggestions. I will only
mention one: keeping the requirement that such schools devote at least 10% of
their Title I funds to professional development, with the professional
development focused on helping students meet academic standards, on the
particular problem areas identified for the school, and on meeting the
principles of effective professional development.
(5) Congress should
require that states strengthen the alignment of assessments with standards and
improve shared accountability systems, so their sole purpose -- improving
student achievement and life prospects -- is well-served. Mandatory state and
district assessments of Title I students should be the same as those required of
other students; aligned with the state content and performance standards; used
only for the purposes for which they have been deemed valid and reliable
(including use for promotion decisions); and consistent with nationally
recognized professional and technical standards for assessments.
States have
made laudable progress in developing content standards in core academic
subjects, but the same cannot be said about the alignment of their assessment
systems with those standards. Since federal requirements for Title I
accountability are based on state assessment systems that are aligned with state
content standards, states should be required to provide more stringent evidence
that their assessment systems are indeed aligned with their content standards.
There must be technical and educational evidence of validity and reliability for
the performance standards on their Title I-required assessments and for their
Title I-required definition(s) of the "adequate yearly progress" to which
schools and school districts are held. In addition, the results of mandatory
assessments should be disaggregated and reported when statistically defensible.
Also,scores of students who have not been in a school or a district for a full
year should be reported but not used in accountability assessments. The AFT has
several specific suggestions with respect to retaining provisions in current law
dealing with accountability and corrective action. However, I would like to
focus here on measures that will assist, rather than punish, schools and their
students. I believe the list of corrective actions to be taken to support
schools that have failed to make adequate progress and are identified as needing
improvement, even after receiving intensive assistance, should be revised as
follows:
1.
1.
Redesign the school by requiring it to adopt one
of the Comprehensive School Reform Demonstration, research-based, whole-school
models or to reopen as a magnet school, as has been done for several schools in
New York City. Preference should be given to Title I eligible students in the
attendance area, and any parent who does not want their child to attend the new
school should have a priority right of transfer, with transportation provided,
to another public school in the district. Parents should receive full
information about the schools' programs and record.
2. Offer each student
who has not made adequate progress in the school designated for corrective
action every available district and state resource to accelerate the student's
progress in each content area in which the student is deficient.
Some states
have plural and overlapping, often contradictory, accountability systems. States
that have accountability systems that meet or exceed the requirements of this
act should be allowed to use their accountability system in lieu of the
federally prescribed one. Moreover, in no cases should Title I schools and
students be subject to more or fewer, and more or less rigorous, accountability
systems than non-Title I schools and students. In the case of states that do not
take corrective action, and whose Title I districts and schools chronically fail
to make adequate progress, the law should specify revoking their eligibility to
be an Ed-Flex state.
(6) Congress should expand research, development,
demonstration and dissemination efforts to increase "what works" knowledge and
practices to improve the performance of Title I students and schools. There
should also be a new effort to reach and reclaim low-achieving secondary-level
students. An excellent place to begin would be to enlarge the Comprehensive
School Reform Demonstration program to include resources for additional,
rigorous, and independent evaluations of the wholeschool models included in the
program. It should also include opportunities for additional, promising whole-
school and non-whole-school models and instructional practices to apply for
research and evaluation funds. After meeting criteria of effectiveness, they too
could be suggested as CSRD activities and be otherwise disseminated for
widespread use.
Another excellent expansion would be a grant program for
research, development, and demonstration aimed at secondary schools (middle,
junior and senior high schools) serving high-poverty, low-performing students.
Such an expansion should address the following:
1. The need for effective
programs and practices to accelerate the achievement of secondary-level students
whose basic academic skills and study habits are so deficient they receive
little benefit from a regular, high-standards, secondary school course of study.
One example would be a "preparatory school" model, commonly associated with
advantaged youngsters, to provide up to an additional year of intensive,
needs-based schooling; and
2. The need for effective programs and practices
for secondary-level students who are facing much higher academic standards,
including new testing requirements, than those for which they have been
prepared, as a condition of graduation. (7) Congress needs to promote systems of
teacher quality. The first step
should be abolishing the official
malpractice of issuing "emergency" credentials to individuals not qualified to
teach youngsters, and of assigning teachers to fields in which they are not
qualified to teach. There are currently 10,000 uncertified teachers in New York
City, and a high proportion of them are in low-performing schools. New York is
phasing out hiring uncertifieds over the next few years.
Title I should
require that all new hires be licensed or in a regular or alternative program
that leads to licensure within three years and be assigned to teach in fields
for which they are qualified or working to become qualified. In addition,
individuals who are either in a regular or alternative licensing program, but
not yet fully qualified to teach, should be required to pass the general
literacy and subject- matter parts of their state's teacher licensing tests (or
another state's valid tests) before they may become a new hire in a Title I
district.
Title I districts should be encouraged to provide newly hired
teachers the opportunity to be mentored and observed by highly-qualified veteran
teachers for a period of at least one year. The union successfully lobbied for a
mentoring program for uncertified teachers in New York City.
States and
districts receiving Title I funds should address how they will recruit and
retain high-quality teachers and principals for participating districts and
schools. Such plans should be developed in consultation with representatives of
teachers and principals and take account of surveys of veteran and prospective
teachers and principals. They should incorporate relevant research on barriers
to entering and remaining as teachers and principals in districts and schools
serving poor youngsters. States should also be encouraged to remove barriers to
inter-state portability of licenses, while assuring that the most rigorous
teacher entry standards, and not the least rigorous, prevail.
It is as
important to retain, as it is to attract, quality teachers, particularly in
districts and schools serving poor youngsters. Incentives for attracting
high-quality teachers should be paralleled by incentives to retain high-quality
veteran teachers. These incentives could include such things as loan-forgiveness
programs and subsidies for advanced education in a teacher's present field or a
field in which there are teacher shortages. Moreover, professional development
should continue throughout a teacher's career.
(8) We must strengthen the
parent-teacher-school connection by involving parents more centrally in "what
works" knowledge and skills that will bolster their role as their child's first
teacher.
I have several suggestions. Congress should continue support for
Even Start and parent involvement provisions for parents of children in Title I
schools; encourage districts and schools to seek parent input into designing
report cards that are clear and comprehensive; and encourage districts and
schools to involve parents in improving and monitoring discipline codes. In
conjunction with the Reading Excellence Act, Congress could develop and
distribute parent-friendly materials to help stimulate oral and print literacy
and school- readiness in their children, starting at birth.
The union has
made extensive efforts to strengthen the parent-school connection in New York
City, through a homework hotline for students and parents, an annual parent
conference on important issues like standards, and a parent newsletter.
Conclusion
At a time of extraordinary economic prosperity in America, it is
within our reach to provide all children with an education meeting high
standards. I believe we can do this by building upon the improvements made in
the last reauthorization of Title I. Continuing in this direction makes much
more sense than pursing measures like "portable entitlements" or "super flex,"
neither of which will do anything to improve student achievement. The AFT is not
the only group that believes this. We, along with several major public and
private education groups, agreed that private schools should continue to
participate in Title I as they currently do and that Title I should not be
voucherized or block granted.
On behalf of the American Federation of
Teachers, we look forward to working with you to continue to improve Title I.
Again, thank you for the opportunity to appear as a witness today. I will be
happy to answer your questions, either orally or in writing.
END
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