September 2001
Paige Visits Private
School, Promotes School Choice
September 2001 - Ife Siffre and his classmates enjoyed what a lot of
pre-kindergarten children enjoy daily: a story read by a caring adult.
But while the story, Frog and Toad Together, may have been standard
pre-K fare, the adult doing the reading was definitely not. He happened
to be the country's top educator.
 U.S.
Education Secretary Rod Paige stopped by Ife's class at St. Francis Xavier
School in Kansas City, Missouri, last month as part of his three-week
multi-state Back to School, Moving Forward tour to promote school
improvement, accountability, local control, and parent choice. He also
visited the school's 5th grade, where he helped with a science lesson
on magnets, and then addressed an assembly of students, parents, teachers,
and public officials.
Reviewing the components of President Bush's education reform plan, Paige
said students should not be locked "into failing school systems"
but should be allowed to attend schools that meet their needs. Noting
that the country has a variety of great schools, including public and
private schools, Paige said more parental choice will improve education.
Later in the day, at a lunch sponsored by the Children's Scholarship
Fund of Kansas City, Paige again hit the theme of school choice, saying,
"No student should be chained to a desk in a deficient school."
The day before, at a stop in Tennessee, Paige was even more emphatic
about the value of parental choice in education. ''There is no force in
the universe more powerful, as far as school change is concerned, than
an informed parent with options,'' he said, according to a report in the
Nashville Tennessean.
A Catholic elementary school founded in 1910, St. Francis Xavier School
serves mostly low-income students. About 85 percent of the children are
African American, but only about 10 percent are Catholic. Six out of ten
students receive aid from either the Children's Scholarship Fund or the
Central City School Fund, two philanthropic partnerships dedicated to
providing tuition assistance to economically needy children. One of the
school's claims to fame is that Thomas M. Bloch, former president and
CEO of H&R Block, recently finished a three-year stay as the math
teacher for students in grades 6, 7, and 8.
School principal Lynne Beachner was honored by Paige's visit. She especially
liked the secretary's support of school choice and said the issue is often
mischaracterized as a religious matter, rather than an issue of social
justice. "Parents with money already have choice," she said,
"but any parent who thinks a school isn't working should have the
right to choose someplace else."
Judy Warren, superintendent of schools for the Catholic Diocese of Kansas
City St. Joseph, said the themes struck by Secretary Paige in his
remarks at the school - local control, parental involvement, accountability,
and choice - are the very elements "that have made Catholic schools
strong for more than 200 years."
New Publications
Secretary Paige's back-to-school tour began August 15 in Albuquerque,
NM, and concluded in San Diego, CA, on September 7. In connection with
the tour, Paige introduced three new publications from the Department
of Education to help parents, teachers, and communities improve student
performance.
The parent publication, available in English and Spanish, reminds parents
that the family is the foundation of good education. "You are your
children's first teacher. You play a critical role in ensuring that they
make steady progress in school, that they go to schools that hold them
to high standards, and that the schools help them meet those standards."
In announcing the publications on the tour's first day, Secretary Paige
said, "As we start a new school year, it is time for us to reach
out to parents, educators, and community and business leaders to engage
them in our plans to create a system of schools that fulfills President
Bush's promise that no child will be left behind." He added: "President
Bush and I know that change must take place at the local level, and we
look to families, schools, and communities to bring about that change
through high standards, annual measurement, and accountability for results.
As our children return to school to capture the promise of new opportunities
to learn and grow, we must embrace these simple principles for reform."
Click here
to visit the USDE Web site for more information about the Back to School,
Moving Forward tour and the new publications.
(Editor's Note: Information on the secretary's visit to St. Francis Xavier
School was based in part on a report provided to CAPE by The Catholic
Key.)
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High College-Going
Rates for Minorities in Private Schools
Minority students who graduate from private high schools are more than
twice as likely to attend four-year colleges than their counterparts in
public schools, according to data obtained by CAPE from the National Center
for Education Statistics.
 At
a time of widespread concern about the persistent disparity in educational
achievement among various population groups, the NCES data reveal college-going
rates that defy national trends. For example, black graduates of private
high schools went on to four-year colleges at a rate 95 percent higher
than white students in public schools and nearly 20 percent higher than
their white classmates in private schools. Hispanic private school graduates
attended four-year colleges at a rate 42 percent higher than white students
in public schools, though 10 points lower than whites in private schools.
The advantage for private school students was most dramatic when rates
were examined within racial and ethnic groups. Black students in private
schools attended four-year colleges at more than double the rate of black
students in public schools. The story for Hispanic students was the same.
The private school payoff for white students, though not as spectacular,
was still significant. Whites in private schools were 63 percent more
likely to attend a four-year college than their peers in public schools.
The data came from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988
(NELS: 88), a government study that tracked a nationally representative
sample of 8th grade students in 1988 as they progressed through high school
and into college. The cohort examined by CAPE included students who graduated
high school in the 1991-92 school year and then entered a four-year college
sometime between June 1992 and August 1994.
The findings are especially intriguing at a time when educators and policymakers
are frustrated by the inveterate achievement gaps between white students
and minority students. Last month, College Board President Gaston Caperton
attributed the score gaps on the SAT and other achievement measures to
"inequitable access to high-quality education." College Board
researchers have found that students exposed to rigorous coursework have
higher SAT scores than other students. "Urgent steps must be taken,"
said Caperton, "to increase the access of minority and low-income
students to high quality K-12 education."
The higher college-going rates for minority students in private schools
may in part be attributed to exposure to a more demanding curriculum.
Another possible explanation may be the high expectations and culture
of achievement that exist in private schools. Factors outside the school,
including family characteristics, may also be playing a role.
Given the fact that a host of measures of educational attainment, including
college enrollment rates and SAT scores (see page 4), are remarkably higher
for minority students in private schools, it is no surprise that some
policymakers and researchers have called for school choice demonstration
projects and studies to examine more fully the private school performance
phenomenon and to test the value of having more minority students attend
high quality private schools. They argue that an objective, scientific
investigation by impartial researchers could yield a breakthrough in narrowing
the nagging achievement gap.
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Private School Enrollment Continues to Climb
Six million students -- 11.4 percent of the nation's K-12 population
-- attended private elementary and secondary schools in 1999, according
to officials at the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES).
Since 1989, the private school enrollment figure has risen 15.8 percent,
about the same as the 15.6 percent public school growth rate for the same
10-year period.
The figures were released last month in connection with NCES's annual
projection of education statistics, a document that provides actual enrollment
counts through 1999 and projections through 2011. Total national K-12
enrollment is expected to increase slightly from 53.1 million to 53.4
million between now and 2005, the projected peak year, but the degree
and timing of enrollment shifts will vary at the elementary and secondary
levels. Public and private K-8 enrollment is set to drop about 1 percent
between 2001 and 2011, while 9-12 enrollment is expected to grow by nearly
7 percent through 2006, when it will then begin a gradual decline.
The NCES 10-year enrollment forecast presumes a static 11 percent share
of the nation's students will attend private schools throughout the projection
period.
On the teacher front, NCES is predicting that 3.65 million elementary
and secondary school teachers will be employed nationally in 2011, an
increase over 2001 levels of 87,000 teachers in public schools and 11,000
in private schools.
Also last month, NCES published the results of the biennial private school
survey (PSS) conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau in the 1999-00 school
year. The survey identified 27,223 private elementary and secondary schools,
about 23 percent of all schools in the country, and nearly 5.2 million
students. (Though derived from the same Census Bureau survey, the PSS
enrollment figure for 1999 is about 800,000 less than the figure published
in the NCES projection document principally because the latter includes
some pre-K students in its enrollment counts for both public schools and
private schools.)
Where do private school students
go to school?
|
|
89-90
|
99-00
|
Catholic |
54.5% |
48.6% |
Nonsectarian |
13.2% |
15.7% |
Conservative
Christian |
10.9% |
15.0% |
Baptist |
5.8% |
6.1% |
Lutheran |
4.4% |
4.3% |
Jewish |
3.2% |
3.3% |
Episcopal |
1.7% |
2.2% |
Seventh-day
Adventist |
1.6% |
1.2% |
Calvinist |
0.9% |
0.8% |
Friends |
0.3% |
0.3% |
The PSS report showed some significant demographic shifts within the
world of private education. Since 1989, conservative Christian schools
have seen an astounding increase of 46 percent in enrollment. The 245,000
additional students in those schools accounted for 75 percent of the total
rise in private school enrollment during the past decade. Other types
of private schools that posted noteworthy percentage increases in enrollment
during the same timeframe included Episcopal schools (37 percent) and
nonsectarian schools (26 percent).
CAPE Members' Numbers
CAPE member organizations, which collectively represent 80 percent of
the nation's private school enrollment, have also seen some sharp increases
in student counts. The Association of Christian Schools International,
which serves evangelical Christian schools, had a K-12 enrollment gain
of 70 percent between 1989 and 1999. During that period, ACSI moved from
the third largest to the second largest association of private schools
in the country. Other CAPE organizations with substantial 10-year enrollment
hikes were the Oral Roberts Educational Fellowship (53.4 percent), the
American Montessori Society (53.2 percent), the National Association of
Episcopal Schools (20.7 percent), the Solomon Schechter Day School Association
(also 20.7 percent), the Friends Council on Education (18.1 percent),
and the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (15.6 percent).
Two of CAPE's newest members, the National Christian School Association
and the Southern Baptist Association of Christian Schools, while not on
the NCES list of private school associations in 1989, had enrollment counts
in 1999 of 34,122 (NCSA) and 27,468 (SBACS).
The 1999 enrollment figures for states showed California to have the
highest private school enrollment (619,067) and Wyoming to have the lowest
(2,221). Other states with large concentrations of private school students
included New York (475,942), Pennsylvania (339,484), Illinois (299,871),
Florida (290,872), Ohio (254,494), Texas (227,645), New Jersey (198,631),
Michigan (179,579), and Maryland (144,131).
Small and Urban
According to the survey, most private schools are small, with 80 percent
having enrollments under 300. Nearly half of all students in private schools
(49.2 percent) attend schools located in central cities; another 40 percent
attend schools in an urban fringe or large town. Only 11 percent of private
school students are in rural or small-town schools.
]This fall NCES and the U.S. Census Bureau will be conducting the 2001
private school survey by contacting every private school in the country.
Schools are encouraged to assist with this massive undertaking by returning
the survey forms promptly, thereby reducing the need for expensive follow-up
phone calls and letters.
The 1999-2000
Private School Universe Survey is available on the NCES Web site.
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CAPENotes
• The College Board last month released SAT results for the high
school class of 2001. But while the nation was busy celebrating a nearly
negligible 1 point increase in the average combined (verbal and math)
score since last year, it all but failed to notice the dramatic differences
in the scores of students in public schools and private schools (see chart).
 Since
1996, SAT scores have risen 7 points for the nation as a whole, 4 points
for public schools, 18 points for religious schools, and 13 points for
independent schools. Even though they enrolled 9 percent of the nation's
12th graders, private schools accounted for 17 percent of senior-year
SAT takers from traditional schools (a term that excludes charter, correspondence,
and home schools).
In announcing the scores, College Board President Gaston Caperton noted
"some troubling realities that must be addressed," including
the persistent performance gaps between minority and majority students.
Although the private school breakout by race and ethnicity is not yet
available for the class of 2001, in 1999 (the most recent year for which
CAPE has the data) black students in private schools scored 84 points
higher than black students in public schools, and the gap in scores between
black students and white students was 46 points narrower in private schools
than in public schools.
• Students in the nation's public and private schools have made
appreciable progress in math over the past 10 years, according to a report
released last month by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES).
At the fourth-grade level, public schools posted a score of 226, and
private schools 238, on the 0-500 scale of the National Assessment of
Educational Progress (NAEP) math test administered lasts year. The scores
for each sector shot up 14 points since 1990.
Eighth-grade scores jumped 12 points in 10 years for public school students
and 16 points for private school students. The year 2000 assessment showed
eight-grade scores of 274 for public schools and 287 for private schools.
Twelfth-graders also made gains during the past decade. Public school
students improved 6 points, and private school students 15 points, to
attain respective scores of 300 and 315.
• This fall the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Non-Public
Education will sponsor three regional workshops for private school officials
on October 18 in Mobile, November 14 in Reno, and December 18 in San Antonio.
The free, full-day workshops will feature presentations on federal programs
that serve children in private schools, new initiatives in reading, and
the new administration's perspective on private education. The program
will also provide private school officials a chance to discuss their concerns
and issues. To register or to find out more information about the workshops,
contact Hia Quach at hia.quach@ed.gov.
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