Education Week - January 22, 2014 - 19

GOVERNMENT& POLITICS
Spending Plan Aims to Relieve Some K-12 'Sequester' Pain
Early education a winner,
Obama initiatives shorted
By Alyson Klein
The massive spending bill headed for pas-
sage in Congress last week aims to largely
restore federal aid for most schools after the
biggest cuts to K-12 funding in history, while
including a more than $1 billion down payment
on the Obama administration's proposal
to ramp up existing early-childhood programs.
But two initiatives high on the administra-
tion's wish list-a Race to the Top for higher
education and $750 million in new grants to
help states improve their preschool programs-
aren't slated to receive funding in the fiscal year
ending Sept. 30. And the bill would flat-fund, or
even cut, the marquee competitive-grant programs
that form the bedrock of the administration's
education-redesign strategy.
What's more, the high-priority School Improvement
Grant turnaround program would
undergo a major makeover, resulting in more
flexibility for states and districts to devise their
own strategies for fixing the lowest-performing
schools-an idea that's met with stiff resistance
in the past from U.S. Secretary of Education
Arne Duncan.
The $1.1 trillion spending bill for fiscal 2014
is the first since Congress temporarily put the
brakes on sequestration, the 5 percent, acrossthe-board
cuts to federal programs that went
into effect last March. It would largely affect
districts beginning in the fall, with the start
of the 2014-15 school year. President Barack
Obama is expected to sign the legislation.
Down the Road
The issue of sequestration hasn't gone
away entirely. Lawmakers are rolling back
roughly 86 percent of the cuts for the next
two years, but will have to come to a broader
budget agreement to permanently scale back
the reductions.
The big formula programs that nearly every
district depends on-Title I grants for districts
and special education state grants-would receive
slight increases under the spending bill.
Both programs were pinched by sequestration,
resulting in larger class sizes, delayed profes-
sional development, and other cutbacks at
schools around the country.
Neither program would make it back up to
the funding level it had before sequestration
hit in March 2013, but both would come close.
Title I grants, which help districts educate
poor children, would be financed at $14.4 billion,
a $624 million increase over sequestration
levels, but not quite to their previous high of
$14.5 billion in fiscal 2012. And special education
state grants would get roughly $11.5 billion,
a $497 million increase over sequestration
levels, but not as high as the nearly $11.6 billion
the program got before the decreases went
into effect.
Other formula programs-including the
grants to help districts create after-school and
summer programs or extend learning time,
grants to help educate English-language
learners, and money for career and technical
education-also would see their funding rise
close to levels before sequestration.
But competitive grants wouldn't fare nearly
as well. The administration's Promise Neighborhoods
initiative, which helps communities
pair wraparound services with education,
would be frozen at sequestration levels
Calif. Transgender Law Takes Effect
In Schools, Amid Efforts to Repeal It
By Evie Blad
As California school districts implement
a new law designed to accommodate
transgender students,
officials are reviewing petitions to
determine if the law's opponents
collected enough valid signatures to
ask voters to repeal the measure in
November.
Known as AB 1266, the new law
went into effect Jan. 1. It requires
public schools to allow a transgender
student to use restrooms, locker
rooms, and other facilities that are
consistent with his or her gender
identity, which may not correspond
with the gender listed on that student's
educational records. Schools
are also required to allow students
to participate in gender-segregated
sports, classes, and activities that
align with their gender identity.
The law comes at a time when
schools around the country are
working to address concerns raised
by families of transgender students,
who are asserting their gender
identities at earlier ages, supporters
say.
"Before this law, I didn't want to
go to school because I was treated
like somebody that I wasn't," said
Ashton Lee, a 16-year-old from
Manteca, Calif., who was raised as
a girl until he told his parents he
identified as male a few years ago.
Supporters of the law say schools
must work not to stigmatize students
like Mr. Lee, who was placed
in girls' physical education classes.
Sometimes the use of the wrong
pronoun or being directed to the
wrong bathroom can lead to bully-
ing or even more physically harmful
behaviors from peers, said Mr. Lee,
who has testified before legislative
committees in support of the law.
Since the law passed, "I feel safe
and happy at school," he said.
For and Against
The law's supporters say it gives
educators a blueprint for assisting
transgender students. Groups supporting
the measure include the
American Civil Liberties Union,
the California Federation of Teachers,
and the California State Parent
Teacher Association.
Opponents of the bill, who are
listed in legislative documents,
included Concerned Women for
America and the California Catholic
Conference.
Privacy for All Students, a coalition
of organizations that has petitioned
to overturn AB 1266, has
called the measure "an assault on
privacy and safety of vulnerable
children."
"First, it's an invasion of student
privacy to open sensitive school facilities
such as showers, restrooms,
and locker rooms to students of the
opposite sex," the organization's
website says. "Further, the legislation
is poorly drafted and flawed,
a one-size-fits-all approach that
contains no standards, guidelines,
or rules."
Without a legally prescribed
method for educators to determine
whether a student is legitimately
transgender, students are likely to
"game the system" and invoke it to
use whatever school restroom they
want, the law's opponents say.
But the 640,000-student Los Angeles
Unified School District, which
has had a policy for transgender
students that is very similar to AB
1266 since 2005, has never had a
problem with it, said Judy E. Chiasson,
the district's diversity program
coordinator.
"Being transgender is not something
that one does willy-nilly," she
said in an interview with Education
Week. "If someone was going
to try to declare themselves transgender
just so they could sneak
into the girls' restroom for lecherous
reasons, we would absolutely
intervene."
The district's principals design
accommodations for transgender
students on a case-by-case basis,
typically after meeting with their
parents, said Ms. Chiasson, who
said she assists with fewer than
10 consultations with transgender
students in a year. The district
doesn't track how many students
it accommodates under the rule,
she said.
Many state athletics and activities
associations, including California's,
already have regulations that
allow transgender students to play
on single-gender teams, regardless
of the gender listed on their educational
records, Ms. Chiasson said.
Setting a Clear Path
California's new law merely clarifies
what districts are obligated to
do, Ms. Chiasson said.
"This law solves problems," she
said."It doesn't create them."
The California School Boards Association
has released preliminary
guidance to districts that encourages
staff training about the law,
campus discussions about transgender
issues, and a system for
meeting with students and, "if appropriate,"
families before making
accommodations.
Privacy for All Students, the opposition
group, collected nearly
620,000 signatures in support of
PAGE 22 >
Transgender student
Ashton Lee in his room at
his family's home in
Manteca, Calif.
of $56.7 million. Investing in Innovation, the
grant competition that helps nonprofit organizations
and school districts scale up promising
practices, would get $141.6 million, and the
School Improvement Grant program would
receive $505.8 million.
Funding Priorities
Overall, the National Education Association
was pleased with the budget compromise.
"I think this appropriations bill is trying to
address the harm that has come to students
most in need under the sequester," said Mary
Kusler, the government-relations director for
the 3 million-member NEA.
But Mark Benigni, the superintendent of the
high-poverty, 9,000-student Meriden district
in central Connecticut, said he would have
liked Congress to direct even more funding to
formula programs, given that school systems
are being asked to serve more students and
roll out new standards and tests. Mr. Benigni's
district lost $300,000 in a $100 million budget
because of sequestration. The federal reductions
were a factor in its decision to eliminate
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Education Week - January 22, 2014

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