Rick Miller, executive director of the California Office to Reform Education

Rick Miller, executive manager of the California Office to Reform Teaching. Credit: The Hechinger Report

Dozens of states have been granted waivers from No Child Left Behind since 2011, when the Obama administration adopted a more flexible approach to the Bush-era deed. When the Section of Education denied California's waiver application in December 2012, a consortium of eight districts pushed for autonomy from the land. Dubbed Core, the California Office to Reform Education, the districts developed their own set of strategies, emphasizing shared accountability and a holistic arroyo to student evaluation.

Earlier this calendar month, U.S. Secretarial assistant of Instruction Arne Duncan granted CORE a waiver from certain aspects of No Child Left Behind, the first waiver for districts rather than a state. Cadre districts now have the flexibility to spend approximately $110 1000000 in Championship I funding every bit they see fit. CORE Executive Director Rick Miller took inspiration from Michael Fullan, the mastermind backside world-renowned schools in Ontario, whose significant population of English language linguistic communication learners resembles California'southward. The Hechinger Study talked to Miller about what the waiver will mean for the about ane.two million students in CORE districts, including Fresno Unified, Long Embankment Unified, Los Angeles Unified, Oakland Unified, Sacramento City Unified, San Francisco Unified, Sanger Unified, and Santa Ana Unified.

Question: What is the nearly important attribute of the waiver for schools in Cadre districts?

Miller: I retrieve number i is the power to exist flexible with the dollars that yous have, and the ability to exist more than thoughtful with money for kids, rather than being constricted by a mandate. For example, several of our districts will no longer be using federal funding for transportation (to send struggling students to stronger-performing districts), just some are also committed to continuing to use that funding for transportation. There's not one reply beyond the board; it's the flexibility of knowing what'south best for your kids.

Q: Does CORE accept different plans for how each commune will move forwards, or is there 1 Cadre plan existence implanted?

Miller: A little of both. There is not one single plan beyond the districts, but in that location are things belongings us all together. We all agree on an accountability model, only how we respond to that and deal with that in each district will be different. Some things are all the same being discussed and will exist worked out over the course of the school yr. For example, we've all agreed that student engagement is an of import indicator of teacher effectiveness, but what should affair in engaging students is what we accept to determine by the end of this year. One of the unique advantages of Cadre is that while each district will develop its own strategies, we'll also be sharing with each other what works and what isn't successful. We'll continue to learn from each other and will be able to help those that are struggling more than.

Q: Nearly of the districts included in CORE are big and urban, merely non Sanger Unified; how does the waiver account for these different needs?

Miller: When you lot close the door in an urban not-poverty district versus a poverty commune, there are clearly differences. But when we pair districts with the aforementioned problems, for example a school with many English language linguistic communication learners in Fresno versus a school in LA with many linguistic communication learners, the issues are similar. Skilful instruction is adept instruction, just y'all can't divorce it totally from demographics.

Q: How does CORE's program meliorate prepare students for college and career?

Miller: The number ane matter is more robust accountability. There'due south more to accountability than just a score on a test. The reality is that when you narrow what you hold people answerable for, they're only accountable for those areas. So, broadening that accountability to civilisation and climate of a school, taking into account whether kids are safe, assessing non-cerebral skills like grit and resilience – when you look at all of these in total and ask a district to pay attending to the whole kid, and the school responds to what each child needs, information technology will amount to amend preparedness for college and career.

We have kids who are graduating high school with relative proficiency on tests but still need remediation when they get to college; this speaks to a disconnect. We have a lot of kids, far too many kids of color, who become to college but don't persist in higher. This is largely not an academic event. In that location is a lot going on in the lives of children that goes into whether or non they persist in higher, and there's a lot of research showing this, which is why we're trying to emphasize the whole child.

Q: How can y'all measure and meliorate non-cognitive skills like grit and resilience?

Miller: We've really said it's going to have a yr or longer to figure out ways of measuring grit and resilience. At that place are surveys that get at the notion. Just it'south less difficult for usa to envision how to measure out grit and resilience than to figure out how to build curriculum around how to ameliorate it. When you find out that you demand to improve students' grit and resilience, how do you do that?

Q: The waiver frees Local Education Agencies from the so-chosen highly qualified teacher requirements of NCLB, and from having to develop improvement plans for not coming together requirements for two consecutive years. Why is this good for students and teachers?

Miller: The NCLB highly qualified measurement is based on credentialing, and on the number of years someone has been didactics, but doesn't factor in effectiveness in dealing with students. Longevity matters but it doesn't guarantee effectiveness. We're existence more than nuanced in our evaluation of what makes a highly qualified teacher.

Q: Cadre's initial waiver awarding states that your plan "is rooted in shared learning and responsibility for student achievement." Who should exist sharing responsibleness for student accomplishment?

Miller: We should all share responsibility. Michael Fullan's book talks about the moral imperative to intendance how kids are doing in school and help them amend – that's the ethos that runs our organisation. And so, Chris Steinhauser of Long Beach Unified cares about kids in LA and in El Segundo and in Humboldt. Schools will exist reviewing schools and partnering with each other. We fully look lots of cross-district collaboration. A great school in LA could be mentoring a school in Fresno, or y'all could take a high-performing schoolhouse in Fresno partnered with a struggling school in Long Beach. Michael is helping u.s.a. with this, particularly with preparation. Just because y'all are a high-performing schoolhouse doesn't hateful you know how to teach what yous exercise; we need to train folks to be trainers.

Q: Did NCLB allow schools to evade responsibility for some students?

Miller: Under No Child Left Behind in California, in many schools, if y'all had less than 100 kids in a certain subgroup then you weren't responsible for that subgroup. In a loftier school of two,000 kids with 99 African Americans, when you lot produced your results, you didn't have to say how the African Americans in that school did, and then those kids could exist struggling and the school could appear to be doing fine. Nosotros dropped that number to 20, so you lot'll have thousands more children being accounted for.

Q: What does CORE hateful past emphasizing capacity building over accountability, and how does your strategy differ from NCLB's?

Miller: NCLB was more than nearly sanctions and saying, "You are not improving," with no system of "how do you get better?" Evaluation systems at their heart need to be fundamentally, "how practice we improve?" If I'm a teacher in the classroom, I want to become better. Information technology'due south actually orienting our entire organization every bit, "How do we get better at what we do?"

The story was originally published by The Hechinger Written report, a nonprofit news organization defended to education coverage.

Coming later this week to EdSource Today: Editor John Fensterwald explores the challenges awaiting Cadre districts during their first schoolhouse year under the NCLB waiver.

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