In
April, I wrote about the Equity and
Excellence Commission’s report to Arne Duncan, “For
Each and Every Child: A Strategy for Education Equity and Excellence.” The
report is broken into five sections: equitable school finance; teachers,
principals, and curricula; early childhood education; mitigating poverty’s
effects; and accountability and governance. Here, I will focus on the first two
sections.
While many leaders lament the inequity of educational
opportunities, little is done to stop it (pg. 9). One area in which such
inequity is clearly evident is school finance. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the U.S. spends 35% more
than the OECD average on education; yet, no other country has inequities as
systemically ingrained as the United States (pg. 15). One factor of the systemic
inequity prevalent throughout the U.S. is the reliance on property taxes to
largely fund education. Such a reliance on property taxes allows for
municipalities with higher value homes to bear a smaller relative tax burden
while enjoying higher levels of funding compared to municipalities with lower
value homes. In 14 states, over 50% of school funding comes from property
taxes, and in Illinois and Nevada it is over 60% (pg. 17). An important, but
often overlooked, source
of unfair education funding is the inequity within districts. Developing a
funding formula that addresses both inequities between districts and between
schools in the same district is an important step in improving equity and
excellence for every student.
The second section of the report responds to recent trends
related to the de-professionalization of teaching, which some have linked to alternative
teacher preparation programs, such as Teach
For America (TFA). Between 2005 and 2011, TFA has increased its number of
corps members from 2,173 to 19,699, a significant increase especially considering
that a traditionally certified teacher spends about 1,200 hours in pre-service
training compared to a TFA teacher’s 145 hours in pre-service training (Brewer,
in press). The report from the Equity and
Excellence Commission calls for actions to increase the professionalization
of teachers by improving preparation, compensation, and evaluation (pg. 21).
The Commission calls for significant change in how we attract, prepare, and
support teachers, including expanding teacher preparation that offers intensive
coursework that is integrated with clinical models that are often only found in
more expensive programs. Attracting well-prepared teachers to communities that
serve populations of students that have not had the privilege of highly funded
schools requires teacher salaries that are competitive with more advantaged
communities. Finally, supporting teachers requires professional development,
collaboration, time, resources, and meaningful and fair evaluations, all of
which require fiscal resources (pgs. 23-24).
The Commission rightly embraces the stance that schools
serving all students deserve adequate resources to close the equity gap. In our
current times when education reform is based so much on ideology
rather than research and evidence, the Commission’s call for the “use of
research to overhaul teacher evaluation and professional development” (pg. 26)
is refreshing. To teachers who are blamed for failing schools and bombarded
with calls
for more accountability,
this report’s recommendation to reform teacher-training programs and use valid,
comprehensive measures to award teacher tenure and employment decisions is a
welcome addition to dialogue.
By: Matthew Linick
Brewer, T. J. (in
press). Accelerated burnout: How Teach For America’s “academic impact model”
and theoretical culture of hyper-accountability can foster disillusionment
among its corps members. Educational
Studies.
