|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
____________ School Choice Legislation (4/2/08) President Proposes Budget (2/5/08) White House Initiatives on Faith-Based Schools (1/28/08) 2-4-5 Alive (1/7/08) Loan Forgiveness (10/2/07) Blue Ribbon Schools Named (10/2/07) Loan Forgiveness (9/10/07) 2-4-5 Alive (7/20/07) Achievement Gap (4/6/07) Census Bureau Data (1/3/07) Pandemic Planning Guide (10/23/06) Congress Approves FEMA Fix (9/29/06) USDE Releases IDEA Regulations (8/3/06) Congress Approves Voc Ed Bill (8/1/06) CAPE Board Approves School Choice Principles (4/6/06) NCES Private School Report (12/12/05) Spellings Meets with CAPE Leaders (4/5/05) ___________ |
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
April 24, 2008 -- Saying that the country's inner-city faith-based schools are closing "at an alarming rate," U.S. President George W. Bush today called on Congress and elected officials at the state and local levels to help preserve such schools and to extend "lifelines of learning" to the children they serve.
At the White House Summit on Inner-City Children and Faith-Based Schools, the president said religious schools are "a glorious part" of the nation's history. "We have an interest in the health of these centers of excellence; it's in the country's interest to get beyond the debate of public/private, to recognize this is a critical national asset that provides a critical part of our nation's fabric in making sure we're a hopeful place."
The president said that between 2000 and 2006, nearly 1,200 faith-based schools closed in America's inner cities, affecting nearly 400,000 students and placing an added burden on public schools.
"In neighborhoods where some people say children simply can't learn, the faith-based schools are proving the nay-sayers wrong. These schools provide a good, solid academic foundation for children. They also help children understand the importance of discipline and character," Bush said.
April 2, 2008 -- The school choice movement experienced its own version of March Madness last month as initiatives in four states made significant advances.
In Louisiana, the state legislature passed, and Gov. Bobby Jindal signed, a bill to provide a tax deduction of up to $5,000 per student for educational expenses connected with private education, public education, or home schooling. Deductions can be taken for costs such as tuition and fees, uniforms, textbooks, and supplies.
Florida’s Tax and Budget Reform Commission cleared the way for a historic ballot vote this November to repeal the state’s Blaine amendment, which prohibits revenue from the state to be used “directly or indirectly in aid of any...sectarian institution.”
In another development, a bill to expand Florida’s corporate tax credit program over the next five years cleared a committee vote in the state Senate last month. Similar legislation is working its way through the House.
Corporate tax credits also gained ground in Maryland when the state Senate approved legislation to provide $5 million in tax credits for corporations that donate funds to charitable organizations supporting students and teachers in public or private schools. The “Building Opportunities for All Students and Teachers” (BOAST) credit program would allow businesses to take credits valued at 75 percent of their contributions. Of the $5 million set aside for credits, $3 million would help students and teachers in private schools and $2 million would help their counterparts in public schools.
Finally, on April 1 the Georgia Senate approved legislation providing tax credits for individual or corporate contributions to tuition scholarship programs. The House approved the bill in March.
February 5, 2008 – President Bush yesterday presented Congress with his budget proposal for FY 2009, setting the stage for a political and legislative process that is supposed to produce a final budget by October 1.
The education section of the budget includes funding increases for Title I, Reading First, and IDEA. It also calls for $300 million for Pell Grants for Kids, an initiative the president proposed in his State of the Union address last month to help students in poor-performing public schools attend alternative schools.
But the budget brings bad news for programs targeted by CAPE’s "Keep 2-4-5 Alive" campaign. There are no funds for either Title V-A (Innovative Programs) or Title II-D (Education Technology), and Title IV-A (Safe and Drug-Free Schools) would be reduced from $294.8 million to $100 million.
Federal Education Spending Levels |
|||
FY 2007 Final |
FY 2008 Final |
FY 2009 Proposed |
|
| Title II-D Education Technology |
$272.3 |
$267.5 |
$0 |
| Title IV-A Safe & Drug-Free Schools |
$346.5 | $294.8 | $100.0 |
| Title V-A Innovative Programs |
$99.0 |
$0 | $0 |
FY 2007 and 2008 Final = Budget signed into law |
|||
Other Programs
Below is a table of funding levels for other popular programs in which private school students may participate.
Federal Education Spending Levels |
|||
FY 2007 Final |
FY 2008 Final |
FY 2009 Proposed |
|
| Community Learning Centers |
$981.2 |
$1,081.2 | $800.8* |
| English Language Acquisition |
$669.0 | $700.4 | $730.0 |
| Even Start |
$82.3 |
$66.5 | $0 |
| Math & Science Partnerships | $182.2 | $178.9 | $178.9 |
| Migrant Education | $386.5 | $379.8 | $399.8 |
| Reading First | $1,029.2 | $393.0 | $1,000.0 |
| Special Education (Part B) | $10,782.9 | $10,947.5 | $11,284.5 |
| Teacher Quality | $2,887.4 | $2,935.2 | $2,835.2 |
| Title I (grants to LEAs) | $12,838.0 | $13,898.9 | $14,304.9 |
| Vocational Education | $1,181.6 | $1,160.9 | $0 |
FY 2007 and 2008 Final = Budget signed into law FY 2009 Proposed = President Bush's proposed budget for 2009 *Proposed conversion to scholarship program to give parents greater choice |
|||
 |
January 28, 2008 -- President Bush tonight in his final State of the Union address told Congress that faith-based schools “are disappearing at an alarming rate in many of America's inner cities” and said he would “convene a White House summit aimed at strengthening these lifelines of learning.”
He then asked Congress to support a new “Pell Grants for Kids” initiative “to open the doors of these schools to more children.” The program would provide funds to allow low-income students in poor-performing public schools to attend religious or independent schools, or public schools in another district. “We have seen how Pell Grants help low-income college students realize their full potential,” said the president. “Now let's apply that same spirit to help liberate poor children trapped in failing public schools.”
The summit on inner-city children and faith-based schools will be held in Washington this spring. A White House briefing paper made the case for the summit this way:
"Non-public schools, including faith-based schools, have helped to educate generations of low-income students; however, they are disappearing at an alarming rate. As we continue working to improve urban public schools through the No Child Left Behind Act, we must also work to preserve the critically important educational alternatives for underserved students attending chronically underperforming public schools. This summit will help increase awareness of the challenges faced by low-income students in the inner cities and address the role of non-public schools, including faith-based schools, in meeting the needs of low-income inner city students."
The briefing document went on to explain that the summit will "bring together national, state, and local leaders in education, policymaking, research, philanthropy, business, and community development to:
January 7, 2008 -- Congress last month approved a massive omnibus spending package for fiscal year 2008 that eliminates funding for Title V-A, a popular program serving students in public and private schools. President Bush signed the measure December 26.
A coalition of public and private school organizations fought throughout the budget process to preserve Title V, also known as “Innovative Programs.” The program’s preservation was a focus of CAPE’s "Keep 2-4-5 Alive" campaign.
Two other programs targeted by the campaign will remain in operation, though with less funds than they currently receive. Title IV-A (Safe and Drug-Free Schools) will be cut from $346 million to $294.8 million; Title II-D (Education Technology) will be funded at $267.5 million, down from $272.3 million.
Federal Education Spending Levels |
|||
FY 2007 Actual |
FY 2008 Conference |
FY 2008 Final |
|
| Title II-D Education Technology |
$272.3 |
$272.3 |
$267.5 |
| Title IV-A Safe & Drug-Free Schools |
$346.5 | $300.0 | $294.8 |
| Title V-A Innovative Programs |
$99.0 |
$0 | $0 |
FY 2008 Final = Approved by Congress (12/18-19/07) FY 2008 Conference = Conference Report Approved by Congress (11/7-8/07) and Vetoed. |
|||
Other Programs
The bill approved by Congress would substantially bolster spending for the education of students with disabilities and for Title I grants, which help disadvantaged students improve math and reading skills. Students in private schools participate in both programs.
Since most federal education programs are forward funded, any funds provided in the final FY 2008 appropriation would not affect students until the 2008-09 school year.
Federal Education Spending Levels |
|||
FY 2007 Actual |
FY 2008 Conference |
FY 2008 Final |
|
| Community Learning Centers |
$981.2 |
$1,081.2 | $1,081.2 |
| English Language Acquisition |
$669.0 | $722.7 | $700.4 |
| Even Start |
$82.3 |
$62.6 | $66.5 |
| Math & Science Partnerships | $182.2 | $183.1 | $178.9 |
| Migrant Education | $386.5 | $390.2 | $379.8 |
| Reading First | $1,029.2 | $400.0 | $393.0 |
| Special Education (Part B) | $10,782.9 | $11,292.4 | $10,947.5 |
| Teacher Quality | $2,887.4 | $3,037.4 | $2,935.2 |
| Title I (grants to LEAs) | $12,838.0 | $14,311.4 | $13,898.9 |
| Vocational Education | $1,182.4 | $1,206.1 | $1,160.9 |
FY 2008 Final = Approved by Congress (12/18-19/07) FY 2008 Conference = Conference Report Approved by Congress (11/7-8/07) and Vetoed. |
|||
October 2, 2007 -- Congress last month approved a college loan forgiveness program for a broad swath of public servants, including educators in private and public schools, employees of nonprofit organizations, government workers, and others.
The program is one component of the College Cost Reduction and Access Act, an expansive piece of legislation that cuts college costs by overhauling various student aid and loan programs. President Bush signed the measure (H.R. 2669) into law September 27. Sponsors say the act provides “the single largest increase in college aid since the GI Bill.”
Private school teachers and other persons involved in public service could get a big boost from the federal government in repaying their college debt under the loan forgiveness program, but they have to know the program’s rules and may have to take steps to lock in the benefits. Two important steps are converting existing college loans into the federal direct loans that qualify for the program and reducing current loan repayments to the lowest amounts allowable, according to Georgetown University Law Center Professor Philip Schrag, a longtime advocate of the loan forgiveness program who was influential in getting the law passed.
In an article to be published this fall in the Hofstra Law Review, Schrag unpacks the benefits of the new law for “high-debt/low-income graduates,” and provides “a road map to the law’s provisions for obtaining loan repayment assistance.” Click here to download the article in PDF format.
October 2, 2007 -- U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings today announced the names of 287 schools identified by the U.S. Department of Education as the No Child Left Behind Blue Ribbon Schools for 2007. Schools were selected either because they dramatically improved student performance on standardized tests in reading and math or their test scores placed them in the top ten percent of schools in the nation or state. Fifty private schools were among the awardees this year, the maximum number of private school awards allowed. Each state’s commissioner of education nominates public schools for the award, and CAPE nominates private schools. All the schools nominated by CAPE received the award. Click here for more details about today’s announcement, including the list of awardees. Click here for information on the 2008 program and application.
September 10, 2007 -- Congress on Friday approved broad legislation to cut college costs by overhauling various student aid and loan programs. One provision in the bill (H.R. 2669) would forgive college loans after 10 years of employment for educators, employees of 501(c)(3) organizations, and other persons involved in public service.
A version of the bill that the Senate passed in July would have excluded teachers in religious and independent schools from the public service loan-cancellation program. CAPE, its member organizations, and state affiliates urged that the final bill incorporate language from the House version that included private school teachers (see story below). In fact, the House/Senate compromise bill (called a conference report) that Congress just passed goes even further by extending the benefit to all full-time employees in religious, charitable, and other not-for-profit organizations.
TEACH Grants
Another provision in the bill that could affect some teachers in private schools is the TEACH Grants program, which provides upfront annual tuition assistance to eligible undergraduate and graduate students who pursue a career as teachers in public or private schools serving low-income students. Benefits include annual grants of $4,000, up to a total of $16,000 for eligible undergraduate students who are studying to become teachers, and up to $8,000 for students studying to attain a graduate degree in teaching.
Recipients of the grants must agree to serve as a full-time teacher for at least four years in a public or nonprofit private elementary or secondary school located in a school district that receives Title I funds, as long as the school’s enrollment of students in poverty exceeds 30 percent. Grants are limited to persons who teach mathematics, science, a foreign language, bilingual education, or certain other specified subjects. Participants must also comply with the requirements for being a “highly qualified teacher” as defined in the No Child Left Behind Act. And to ensure that the grants are only used to recruit top-notch students, recipients must earn at least a 3.25 GPA or must score above the 75th percentile on a standard undergraduate or graduate admissions test.
August 20, 2007 -- The House and Senate have recently passed very different versions of H.R. 2669, a college cost-reduction bill that, among other things, provides college loan forgiveness for K-12 educators. The House version extends loan forgiveness to all educators, including those in private schools; the Senate version provides the benefit only to teachers in public schools. The Senate language represents a serious and troubling departure from Congress’s tradition of treating private school educators equitably in college loan forgiveness programs.
A House/Senate conference committee will soon meet to reconcile the two bills and present a compromise for both chambers to consider. If your senator or representative is a member of the conference committee, please urge him/her now to make sure the compromise bill includes equity for private school teachers. You can do so easily by visiiting CAPE's Legislative Action Center and entering your ZIP Code.
For more information about this issue, read CAPE’s letter and background paper.
April 6, 2007--What can be done to narrow the achievement gap? That question, in one form or another, has been challenging policy makers for decades. Grand national strategies, like the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, Head Start, and the No Child Left Behind Act, have been promoted by presidents and passed by Congress to help address the problem through expensive programmatic and instructional interventions. But what if the solution to the achievement gap is to be found in other domains, such as school culture, family support, or religious commitment?
|
||
| Subject | Black and Latino |
White |
| Reading | 4.6% | 3.4% |
| Mathematics | 4.2% | 3.0% |
| Social Studies | 5.2% | 3.4% |
| Science | 2.0% | 1.2% |
| Total Composite | 4.8% | 3.8% |
On April 3 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., Dr. William H. Jeynes, a professor at California State University at Long Beach and a scholar with the Baylor Institute for Studies of Religion, released a study showing that the achievement gap between majority students and minority students, as well as between students of high- and low-socioeconomic status, is significantly narrower in religious schools than in public schools. The study also found that “when African American and Latino children who are religious and come from intact families are compared with white students, the achievement gap disappears.”
Jeynes drew much of his data from the massive National Education Longitudinal Survey (NELS:88), which tracked a nationally representative sample of eighth graders through high school and beyond. NELS:88 provides data on a host of school and student variables, allowing Jeynes to look at whether schools were religiously affiliated and to examine other factors like school culture, curriculum, race relations, discipline, violence, and homework practices. The student questionnaire enabled Jeynes to isolate students who considered themselves “very religious,” those who were actively involved in religious youth groups, and those that regularly attended religious services. He also examined other variables, such as test results, socioeconomic status, race, gender, and family structure.
The NELS data showed that twelfth-grade religious school students in all SES quartiles achieved at higher levels than their counterparts in public schools, with the religious school advantage being highest for students in the lowest SES quartile. Religious school students in the bottom SES quartile had a 7.6 percent advantage in reading scores over similar public school students, while students in the highest SES quartile had a somewhat lower 5.2 percent advantage.
Looking at achievement by race, Jeynes found similar results: higher overall achievement for both minority and majority students in religious schools when compared to their counterparts in public schools, but with minority students (i.e., African American and Latino students) enjoying an even greater religious school advantage than white students. For example, before controlling for gender and SES, black and Latino students scored 8.2 percent higher than their public school counterparts in reading achievement, while white students scored 6.0 percent higher than their counterparts. But even after controlling for gender and SES (see chart), black and Latino students outscored their public school peers in reading by 4.6 percent, while white students did so by 3.4 percent.
With the achievement advantage among religious school students greater for low-SES students than high-SES students and greater for minority students than majority students, Jeynes concluded that both the SES and racial achievement gaps are narrower in religious schools than public schools.
Turning to the more complicated question of why religious schools have a narrower achievement gap, Jeynes examined factors relating to school culture, family, social capital, and religious commitment. Although the methodology did not allow a determination of the cause or causes of the higher student performance in religious schools, the study offered some interesting candidates and correlations.
Exploring the role played by school culture, Jeynes statistically examined five separate components, namely, school atmosphere, racial harmony, level of school discipline, school violence, and amount of homework done. According to the report, “The results demonstrate that religious schools outperform nonreligious schools in all of the five school trait categories and in nearly all of the individual questions that make up those categories.” The study also found that religious school students enjoyed an advantage over public school students in the three learning habits that were most strongly related to academic achievement: taking harder courses, diligence, and overall work habits.
Jeynes reviewed the research literature for clues about other possible explanations for private school achievement. Parental involvement, religiously committed parents, intact families, and caring teachers were all potential contributing factors. Jeynes also explained that religious schools encourage a religious commitment among students, which could affect achievement because of an associated religious work ethic, a stronger internal “locus of control,” and “the tendency for religious people to avoid behaviors that are typically regarded as undisciplined and harmful to educational achievement.”
In connection with what he described as one of the study’s most notable findings, Jeynes looked at what happens to the achievement gap for religiously committed students from intact families. He found what he called an “amazing” result: “The achievement gap disappears.” Put another way, “[W]hen the data are adjusted for SES and gender, black and Hispanic adolescents who are religious and from intact families do just as well academically as white students.”
Turning to the policy implications of the study, Jeynes suggested that “showing that factors as simple as religious commitment, religious schools, and family structure can reduce or eliminate the gap may inspire educators and social scientists to encourage policies that are supportive of faith and the family so that the gap can be narrowed significantly.” He argued that including private schools in school choice initiatives “conceivably could improve the overall quality of the U.S. education system,” and he suggested that public schools “can benefit by imitating some of the strengths of the religious school model.”
Jeynes concluded that “religious education is a vibrant part of the education system in the United States” and called for further study on “why students from religious schools outperform students in public schools.”
January 24, 2007--The U.S. Department of Education today unveiled key components of the Bush Administration’s plan to improve the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), which is up for reauthorization this year. Several pieces of the plan relate to private schools.
Promise Scholarships: Parents of children in public schools that go into restructuring status would be offered Promise Scholarships, worth approximately $4,000, to allow students to attend a private school or an out-of-district public school. According to a USDE briefing document, students using the scholarships to attend a private school would “take their state’s assessment or a standard national assessment in the same grades and subjects assessed in their original school.”
Opportunity Scholarships: The federal government would establish a competitive grant program to enable willing local communities to provide Opportunity Scholarships, similar to those offered in the D.C. choice program currently funded by the federal government. Low-income families whose children are assigned to schools identified for improvement, corrective action, or restructuring could use the scholarships to attend private schools.
Flexibility in the Use of Federal Funds: School districts would be given greater latitude to transfer funds from one federal education program to another. What’s more, “the transferability provisions will be revised to make it easier for local education agencies (LEAs), in consultation with private schools, to consolidate and transfer funds reserved for private school students and teachers.”
Equitable Services to Private School Students and Teachers: The USDE briefing document describes the equitable services proposal this way: “At-risk students should have access to academic services regardless of where they attend school. We propose extending the longstanding requirements for equitable participation by private school students and teachers to new programs and initiatives where appropriate, as well as to existing programs such as Striving Readers and Troops-to-Teachers. Service providers affiliated with a religious organization should not be restricted from providing services so long as those services are secular, neutral and non-ideological, as required under NCLB. Additionally, we support greater private school flexibility in the use of federal funds and improved communication between private and public schools.”
January 3, 2007--Where do the children of the wealthy go to school? The U.S. Census Bureau last month released data on the social and economic characteristics of students enrolled in the nation’s schools in October 2005. It turns out that of the eight million youngsters in grades K-12 who come from families with annual incomes of $100,000 or more, 80 percent (6.4 million) attend public schools and 20 percent (1.6 million) attend private schools.
October 23, 2006--Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings and Secretary of Health and Human Services Michael Leavitt have issued a letter to educators reporting on federal plans to help schools prepare for a possible pandemic flu. The secretaries also unveiled a new pandemic flu planning guide for educators and announced that funds from Title IV, Part A may now be used for pandemic flu planning activities. Click here to read the letter and download the planning guide.
September 29, 2006--The House and Senate voted today to amend the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (Stafford Act) to provide direct federal aid for the repair, restoration, and replacement of private nonprofit educational facilities that are destroyed or damaged by a major disaster. The amendment was included in the fiscal 2007 appropriations bill for the Department of Homeland Security.
Unlike public schools, private schools devastated by earthquakes, tornadoes, floods, or hurricanes were not able to get a direct grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for permanent work on damaged facilities. They first had to apply for a loan from the Small Business Administration and then could only apply for a FEMA grant for the amount not covered by the loan. The amendment approved by Congress defines education as a “critical service,” thereby allowing private educational institutions at the elementary, secondary, and post-secondary levels that may be affected by any FEMA-declared disaster to be reimbursed directly by FEMA.
CAPE and other organizations representing private schools and colleges have been advocating for the so-called “FEMA fix” in the aftermath of last year’s Gulf Coast hurricanes, which provided a tragic illustration of the inequity of FEMA assistance to private schools. Advocates argued that private schools, which are every bit as important as public schools to the recovery and revitalization of a community destroyed by a disaster, should be treated the same as their public counterparts when it comes to funds for the repair, restoration, and replacement of facilities.
Rep. Kendrick Meek (D-FL) introduced bipartisan legislation in the House last December to provide equitable FEMA assistance to private schools and to apply that assistance with respect to any major disaster declared from Hurricane Katrina onward. Soon thereafter, Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA) introduced a similar bill in the Senate. Unlike the Landrieu/Meek proposal, the legislation approved today by Congress does not apply retroactively.
August 3, 2006--The U.S. Department of Education today released the much-anticipated final regulations to implement the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act as amended in 2004 (IDEA 2004). The regulations, available in unofficial form on the department's Web site, are scheduled for official publication in the Federal Register on August 14 and will take effect 60 days thereafter.
"I am pleased that the final regulations were completed before the new school year begins." said U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings. "This gives parents, teachers and administrators time to become familiar with the changes prior to the start of the instructional year."
The regulations include provisions covering services for children placed by their parents in private schools. CAPE has prepared a side-by-side comparison of the principal private school provisions in the new and old regulations. Click here to download the document.
August 1, 2006—Last week the House and Senate approved the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Improvement Act of 2006 (H. Rept. 109-597). The legislation includes provisions relating to private school students and teachers. CAPE’s side-by-side comparison of the new career education law with its predecessor is available here.
April 6, 2006--As lawmakers across the country continue to consider tax credits, vouchers, and other incentives to promote parent choice in education, CAPE’s board of directors have weighed in on how to construct such programs. At their semi-annual meeting last month, the board approved a statement of principles concerning school choice legislation.
Driven by CAPE’s mission to “preserve and promote educational pluralism so that parents have a choice in the schooling of their children,” the document maps out, for the first time, those areas of broad consensus within the private school community on important components of school choice legislation. In putting the statement together, CAPE’s directors—the CEOs of the nation’s major private school organizations—found themselves wrestling with the core issue of how to expand educational freedom while maintaining educational pluralism.
CAPE has long recognized that without diversity in education there is no freedom in education. It has encouraged legislators to avoid provisions that would destroy differences among schools. Specifically, the new document seeks school choice proposals that preserve the right of participating schools to control instructional programs and curricula, to hire staff, and to retain admissions policies. Under such criteria, Montessori schools, for example, could preserve their unique pedagogy; religious schools could hire teachers who share the sponsoring community’s beliefs and values, and single-sex schools could retain their identity.
Level and Distribution of Benefits
The document also addresses the issue of how funds should be distributed to parents who participate in school choice programs. Consistent with sound constitutional precedent, benefits “should flow through parents rather than directly to schools” and should be “substantial enough to allow families to select from a variety of schools.” Further, benefits “should vary with family financial need to ensure that families with the greatest need receive the greatest benefit.” And to ensure equitable treatment for needy parents who currently sacrifice to send their children to religious and independent schools, the document insists that families with children already in private schools should be among those eligible for benefits.
Responsibilities of Schools
Even as they seek to protect the independence of private schools, the CAPE directors recognize that private schools, whether they participate in school choice programs or not, perform a public service and have attendant obligations. The document states that schools “should comply with federal, state, and local requirements that currently apply to private schools, including those relating to civil rights, nondiscrimination, background checks for employees, and student health and safety.” It goes on to insist that choice legislation “not give rise to additional regulation of private schools.”
Entering the debate over testing and accountability, CAPE’s board cautions that test scores in a school choice program “should never be allowed to become a sole or dominant indicator of achievement or failure.” The board took the same stance two years ago in a statement on school accountability. Noting at the time that test scores “are seen by some as the ultimate measure of attainment,” the board said, “The accountability of private schools for student achievement, teacher quality, and school success cannot be addressed by standardized testing alone or any single scale of measurement.” The board went on to call for “a much broader, long-term assessment of outcomes,” including measures such as “the family’s educational goals for its children, how students do at the next level(s) of schooling, accomplishment in life, and evidence of productive good citizenship.”
Click here to download the PDF version of the CAPE statement on principles relating to school choice legislation.
December 12, 2005--The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) today released a comprehensive statistical analysis of the performance of private school students on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) from 2000 to 2005. The report shows above-average performance of private school students in every grade, subject, and year tested. The report also examines student scores for various racial/ethnic groups, showing that Black students, Hispanic students, and White students in private schools outperform their counterparts in public schools.
Click here to download the PDF version of the report.
August 31, 2005--The College Board announced yesterday that SAT math scores for 2005 hit an all-time high, up two points from last year to 520. Newspaper headlines today touted the achievement.
Overlooked in the SAT news release, however, was the significant role played by private school students in the math uptick. It turns out that average public school math scores actually stayed stagnant at 515 from 2004 to 2005, while religious and independent schools logged gains—from 531 to 534 for religious schools and from 574 to 577 for independent schools.
Private school students account for 17 percent of SAT test takers, although they enroll only about 7.5 percent of the nation’s secondary school students.
As for the verbal component of the SATs, public school students in 2005 scored 505, religious school students 539, and independent school students 553. The national average was 508.
SAT Test Scores |
||
Verbal |
Math |
|
| National | 508 | 520 |
| Public | 505 | 515 |
| Religious | 539 | 534 |
| Independent | 553 | 577 |
April
5, 2005--With a solid command of the issues, an engaging presence, and
a down-to-earth demeanor, Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings held
her first meeting with representatives from CAPE and in the process generated
an abundance of respect and good will. The meeting on March 14 provided
the secretary and private school leaders a valuable opportunity to establish
a working relationship and discuss issues of common concern.
Secretary Spellings, known for her focus on essentials, used the forum to communicate her respect for the role played by private schools in American education and to encourage those schools to serve as providers of supplemental services to children in poor-performing public schools. Attributing the success of private schools to the high expectations they have for students, Spellings told the group, “You truly are leaving no child behind.”
A principal architect of the administration’s accountability and standards approach to school reform, Spellings proclaimed her support for performance-based assessment. “In God we trust; all others bring data,” she said.
Topics of conversation that CAPE brought to the table centered on three themes: choice, accountability, and equitable participation in federal programs. Dan Vander Ark, executive director of Christian Schools International and president of CAPE, chaired the meeting, presented some indicators of private school success, and invited the secretary to visit private schools, which she enthusiastically agreed to do.
School Choice
Ken Smitherman, president of the Association of Christian Schools International and vice president of CAPE, acknowledged the accomplishments of the Bush administration in the arena of school choice and urged the secretary to continue to lead the charge for choice. Adding a sense of urgency to that call, Michael Guerra, president of the National Catholic Educational Association and CAPE’s treasurer, recounted the closings in recent years of hundreds of private schools in central cities, affecting hundreds of thousands of students. Guerra called those schools “civic assets” and described their demise as a loss for the communities, cities, and country they served.
Spellings pledged to use her bully pulpit to promote the president’s school choice initiatives. She reminded the group of the “aggressive choice agenda” advanced and realized by the Bush administration—the D.C. voucher program being the most notable example—and said no other administration has promoted school choice so successfully. Referring to the president’s budget proposal for $50 million for a Choice Incentive Fund, she said success for such initiatives starts at the local level with grassroots support. The fund, according to the Department of Education’s 2006 budget summary, would “provide the parents of students who attend low-performing schools with expanded opportunities for transferring their children to higher-performing public, charter, or private schools.” Similar to the opportunity scholarship program in the District of Columbia, the program would only apply to states and school districts willing to participate.
Accountability
Patrick Bassett, president of the National Association of Independent Schools, described the multiple accountability mechanisms at work in private schools, which include but go beyond standardized assessments. He said that although private schools test students regularly using national standardized tests like the SATs, CTPs, and the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills, one of the real measures of accountability is “how our graduates succeed at the next level of schooling and in the workplace.” He noted that “mountains of evidence,” including studies by the federal government, demonstrate above-average levels of performance and dramatically higher college-going and college-completion rates for private school students.
One of the reasons private schools succeed, Bassett explained, is that “they are not burdened with onerous regulations and government testing and so have the freedom to teach what and how their mission dictates they should.” And while private schools comply with applicable government regulations, for example in the area of health and safety, Bassett noted court determinations that such rules should never be so extensive as to dismantle the distinction between public and private schools.
Bassett listed the various entities that hold private schools accountable, including boards of trustees, membership associations, accrediting bodies, local communities, and graduates. But families have a privileged place in holding private schools accountable. “Private schools are like businesses,” said Bassett, “in that they are held to a daily accountability by their families. If private schools don’t serve their clients well, they fail. This is accountability in its truest sense: immediate, decisive, and real.”
Bassett said the government has directly recognized the value of schools being free of regulatory burdens by creating charter schools. He said he hoped that “the government will continue to recognize the benefits that our private school freedoms bring to our students, to our schools themselves, and to our schools in their pubic purpose. Not only are private schools ‘good for kids and good for families,’ but also they are ‘good for America.’”
Equitable Participation
Joe McTighe, CAPE’s executive director, took up the topic of equitable participation of private school students in federal programs. Acknowledging differences within the private school community about whether or not to participate in federal programs, McTighe said there was, however, unanimous agreement on this point: “Federal programs that benefit public school students and teachers should offer equal benefits to comparably situated private school students and teachers.” He said that principle has been part of much of federal education law since the mid-1960s.
During his remarks, McTighe said that, despite some notable exceptions like Title I and IDEA, recent trends in federal spending and proposed spending have been in the direction away from some programs that private schools have participated in for years (e.g., Title V, Safe and Drug-Free Schools, and EdTech) and toward programs that do not provide equitable services. He said that given the value of these traditional programs, especially in schools with scarce resources, the shift in funds was causing considerable concern within the private school community. He urged that some way be found to ensure equitable participation or comparable assistance for students in those private schools that want to participate in federal programs.
On the issue of accountability for federal resources, McTighe said the private school community is not opposed to mechanisms that ensure federal dollars are well spent. He noted, for example, that Title I teachers in private schools, who are public school employees, take baseline data and measure student progress. But the private school community is opposed “to regulations that would destroy the distinctiveness of private schools” or destroy the ability of those schools to fulfill their unique missions. Picking up on Pat Bassett’s point, he said “Our independence and freedom help make us good for students, good for families, and good for America.”
Home | News |
Private Schools | Public
Policy | Teaching Jobs | Publications |
NCLB-BRS Program | About
CAPE | Contact Us
Copyright © 2007. Council for American Private
Education.
13017 Wisteria Drive #457, Germantown, MD 20874
E-mail - cape@capenet.org Tel - 301-916-8460 Fax - 301-916-8485
