News on Youtube Sep 28 2018

Welcome back to Federal Flash.

I'm Jason Amos and I'm joined by Lindsay Dworkin.

A new Alliance for Excellent Education analysis finds that many states are not fully implementing

the letter--or the spirit--of the Every Student Succeeds Act or ESSA.

All4Ed released the analysis ahead of a Senate education committee hearing on ESSA implementation,

which we'll cover in just a minute.

All4Ed previously created "ESSA Equity Dashboards" for most state ESSA plans.

These dashboards, available at the link below, assess states on 14 equity-focused policies

in the law.

In terms of actual outcomes for kids, however, not all of our indicators are created equal.

That's why our new analysis summarizes the two most important equity policies from the

dashboards: (1) inclusion of subgroups in school ratings

and (2) definitions of "consistently underperforming"

subgroup used to identify schools for targeted support.

Unfortunately, the results are mixed, with many states at risk of masking the performance

of historically underserved students.

In other words, a school could receive an A rating, but have a graduation rate for African

American or Latino students of only 60 percent – which is hardly an A.

And in many states, low-performing students may not receive the assistance they need to

excel because their schools are not identified for support.

Specifically: 12 states are red because they don't include

subgroups of students in all school ratings.

Another 23 states get a yellow because they don't include all of ESSA's subgroups

in ratings or are at risk of obscuring subgroup performance on school report cards.

Just 17 states get a green rating for including all ESSA subgroups in all school ratings.

On the second indicator, 16 states are red because they are at risk for under-identifying

schools for targeted support.

30 states earn a yellow because students will likely need to fail across multiple indicators

before the school is identified for support.

In other words, it won't be enough for a subgroup to simply

be below grade level in reading.

Students would need to struggle in reading, math, and other areas before being identified.

Only 6 states get a green for using a definition of consistently underperforming where subgroups

receive support if students are struggling on a few key measures – like achievement

and/or growth.

Our full analysis is available at all4ed.org/essa.

These two issues – school ratings and school identification – were major concerns raised

by senate democrats in this week's committee hearing .

Here's a clip:

But ESSA accountability wasn't the only issue raised.

Democratic senators called on Secretary DeVos to use her authority to prevent states from

using federal funds for guns.

Republican chairman Lamar Alexander, while he dislikes the idea of arming teachers, said

states have the flexibility to use funds under Title IV of ESSA as they see fit.

Finally, the fiscal year 2019 funding bill for the U.S. Department of Education and several

other agencies passed both chambers of Congress this week and President Trump has said he

will sign it.

This is the first time since 1996 that the bill funding the Department of Education has

been signed into law before the start of the new fiscal year.

This is notable because it allows states, districts, and schools to know what funding

they will have for certain education programs prior to the beginning of the fiscal year.

That's a wrap.

For an alert when the next episode of federal flash is available, email Alliance@all4ed.org.

Thanks for watching.