Want to meet your child's first teacher? Look in a Mirror!

The first and most solidly based finding is that the largest source of variation in student learning is attributable to differences in what students bring to school – their abilities and attitudes, and family and community background. (OECD, 2005, page 2)

For some examples of the incredibly powerful nature of out-of-school factors, you might explore the Educational Testing Service report, “The Family: America's Smallest School (ETS, 2007). In this Policy Information Report, the authors point to research looking at state level data for four out-of-school factors in order to predict eight grade reading scores for each state. The four factors were ratio of students to parents (number of single parent families), attendance rate data, television watching data, and the percentage of children whose parents were reading to them every day. (Note that schools do not generally have any direct influence on three of these variables.) Using the data, researchers predicted the scores for each state, and in 45 states, the predicted scores were within six points of the actual scale score for that state. (Really close, in other words.) The authors from ETS are careful to point out the complex nature of student achievement factors, and caution the readers of their report about coming to premature conclusions about the relative importance of any factors.

When the OECD (The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, an international group which includes the United States, talked about the greater importance of outside (of school) factors in student learning, they followed the statement which opened this post with this statement.

Such factors are difficult for policy makers to influence, at least in the short-run.

Is it really beyond the realm of possibility to develop a comprehensive public relations campaign based on impacting at least three of the above factors? How controversial would it be to invite parents to understand the relationships between television access, reading to their children, getting them to school, and the academic achievement of their children? Is this really any harder than a similar campaign aimed at stopping parents and caregivers from “shaking babies”? Why do policy makers seldom consider these possibilities? In part, because we accept myth-information and are looking for “quick results.” Haven’t we learned anything from the business models so loved by those seeking to foster these “competitive practices” in our nation’s schools? A focus on the next quarterly earnings report, driving out a focus on long-tern viability or the public good, sounds an awful lot like focusing on the next round of student testing results.

It is my hope that those who read this blog will carefully evaluate the claims (and myth-information) presented by so-called education "reformers" and ensure that presentations and reports which might be used to guide their policies are screened and fact-checked prior to their incorporation into policies which impact our state’s school children. In addition, it is my fervent hope that the ideology of those who would hold our schools totally accountable for the academic achievement of all students will be questioned by leaders with an understanding of the research on educational achievement that clearly does not support such ideology or mythology.

Myth-Takes in Reform Efforts

Dr. Tabitha Grossman recently made a presentation to Louisiana’s Blue Ribbon Commission for Educational Excellence. In her remarks she made reference to the importance of teacher quality, as she does in documents referenced herein, saying that teacher quality is the largest single factor impacting student achievement. I would like to point out a major mistake in her reporting of research, and one that rises to such a level as to raise questions of whether such a mistake is possible given her credentials, or whether this was simply another, in a long line of “myth-takes” by prominent researchers based on ideology.

Dr. Grossman is listed as the author of “Building a High Quality Workforce: a governor’s guide to human capital development” (hereinafter referred to as The Guide) which was produced by the National Governor’s Association Center for Best Practices, Education Division, where Dr. Grossman holds a position as Senior Policy Analyst.

On page 1 of The Guide, the following quote appears:

Teacher effectiveness is the primary influence on student achievement, followed by principal effectiveness.1 Given this reality, state efforts to improve student achievement should focus on workforce policies and practices, and on workforce funding decisions that improve the quality of the education workforce. To do this, governors should consider a comprehensive human capital approach that strategically invests in teachers and principals and that, in turn, can improve student outcomes.

The reference given in the above quote is: 1. The Wallace Foundation, Becoming a Leader: Preparing School Principals for Today’s Schools (New York: Wallace Foundation, 2008). The quote below is the only location in that entire document on the relative importance of teacher and principal influences on student achievement. See if you can note the not-so-subtle differences between Dr. Grossman’s passage and the passage from the Wallace Foundation document.

The importance of effective school leadership and the accompanying need to provide principals with more appropriate training to meet today’s needs are getting long-overdue attention. Teachers have the most immediate in-school effect on student success. But there is growing agreement that with the national imperative for having every child succeed, it is the principal who is best positioned to ensure that teaching and learning are as good as they can be throughout entire schools, especially those with the highest needs. (page 1)

Any researcher specifically referencing another publication has a responsibility to accurately capture the essential elements of the publication being referenced, even if the researcher wishes to disagree with the findings outlined in the document. In this case, Dr. Grossman somehow confuses “…the most immediate in-school effect on student success” with her statement that “Teacher effectiveness is the primary influence on student achievement.” The two statements are not at all synonymous. If Dr. Grossman had merely made such statements in her spoken presentation to the BESE, one could argue that she simply made a mistake. Having included the statement, and the reference, in a written document does compound the error. But she doesn’t stop with the one reference.

On page 3 of The Guide, in a section titled “Why is a Human Capital Strategy Necessary?” Dr. Grossman again emphasizes the point she made earlier, by making a very clear statement. “Research shows that teacher quality is the primary influence on student achievement.5” Putting aside the question of whether such a statement should actually provide some reference to actual research, this statement might again have referenced the Wallace Foundation study cited above, but Dr. Grossman this time provides the following reference: “5. Organisation (sic) for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), Attracting, Developing and Retaining Effective Teachers—Final Report: Teachers Matter (Paris: OECD, 2004).” In its overview of this report, the OECD authors include the following on page 2:

Three broad conclusions emerge from research on student learning. The first and most solidly based finding is that the largest source of variation in student learning is attributable to differences in what students bring to school – their abilities and attitudes, and family and community background. Such factors are difficult for policy makers to influence, at least in the short-run.

The second broad conclusion is that of those variables which are potentially open to policy influence, factors to do with teachers and teaching are the most important influences on student learning. In particular, the broad consensus is that “teacher quality” is the single most important school variable influencing student achievement.

The first paragraph above makes it difficult to accept Dr. Grossman’s use of this document as a reference… since it makes clear that “the largest source of variation in student learning is attributable to differences in what students bring to school….” While it goes on to state “such factors are difficult for policy makers to influence, at least in the short run” we should be careful not to make the incredible ‘leap of faith’ that Dr. Grossman appears to have made. Just because taking policy actions directed at what students bring to school may be difficult, it does not then follow that “research shows that teacher quality is the primary influence on student achievement.” (I will be shortly providing a post on what we CAN do about some of the out-of-sachool factors!)

What is troubling about Dr. Grossman’s compounding of what I call “myth-information” is that it becomes part and parcel of public and political efforts to develop policies holding schools accountable for circumstances beyond their control, while carefully hiding from the public the actual research results which clearly point to the greater impact of out-of-school factors. These factors, pointed out in the OECD report cited earlier, are best summed up in the words of the group, “A Broader, Bolder Approach to Education.”

Evidence demonstrates, however, that achievement gaps based on socioeconomic status are present before children even begin formal schooling. Despite impressive academic gains registered by some schools serving disadvantaged students, there is no evidence that school improvement strategies by themselves can substantially, consistently, and sustainably close these gaps. A Broader, Bolder Approach

Through the creation (or repetition) of a myth about teacher quality being the most important factor in student achievement, Dr. Grossman, et al. develop the groundwork for such policies as “pay for performance” and the “competitive compensation” proposals so enamored by those who see as socialist evils, unions, teacher pay scales, and civil service policies.

Such “myth-informed” policies cannot have the impact suggested by Dr. Grossman and others, since the impact of teachers on student achievement is much smaller than her statements suggest. In fact, policy makers would do well to heed the suggestions of the signatories to “A Broader, Bolder Approach” by focusing on issues related to out of school factors as well as in school factors. In future posts I will outline some of my proposals in these areas.

Reflections on a neighborhood walk through North Baton Rouge

Today I was privileged to join with member of the East Baton Rouge Parish School System, the District Attorney's Office, the Sheriff's Office and a number of other groups to walk the neighborhoods of one of our North Baton Rouge Schools. The purpose of our walk was to remind parents of the fact that school starts this coming Wednesday, to ensure that their children were registered, and to provide information to help them get to school on time and prepared.

Jennie Ponder from the Truancy Office and I teamed up to walk one side of the street, and we met some of the nicest, most sincere and caring parents one can find anywhere. We also saw living conditions that were absolutely appalling. We saw well-kept lawns and small, cute houses, and we saw totally overgrown lawns and boarded up houses covered with graffiti. We saw adults drinking beer and smoking cigarettes (this was at 9 a.m. on a Saturday morning) surrounded by young kids. At one home we suddenly realized as we were talking to a mother that her young child, perhaps 18 months old, had a pack of cigarettes in one hand and was chewing on one. While the situation was quickly dealt with by the mother, when she noticed us looking at her child, it was a scary reminder of what children live with. In a number of homes kids were home alone, and we spoke through the doors to children who knew not to open the door to strangers.

I am always reminded anew, when I walk through neighborhoods and see the conditions in which some of our students live, that those who argue that teachers alone are responsible for the education of our youth somehow just don't get it. We are educated from the moment we enter this world, and the conditions of our young lives impact us every day of our lives. While we all know of children who have overcome tremendous odds to succeed, we can also recognize the incredibly strong correlations between early childhood resources and conditions and academic success. In all the homes we visited, we saw not a single book. Televisions were on, and children were present, but no books did we see. The words of Peter, Paul, and Mary come back to me…. "Oh, when will we ever learn? Oh, when will we… ever learn?" I often end a speech in the community with these words… "We will have the schools, and the community we want, when each of us wants, for other people's children, what we want and demand for our own children." It is going to take so much work, and so much caring, to short-circuit the cycles of poverty, economic and spiritual. There is no better time to start than today!