Education Week

VOL. 35, NO. 26 * MARCH 30, 2016

edweek.org:

BRE AKING NEWS DAILY

State Boards
Feel New Need
To Flex Muscles
ESSA Seen Adding to Urgency
As Others Eye Policy Leverage

Ryan Henriksen for Education Week

By Daarel Burnette II

SCHOOLING STABILITY: From left, Justin Barreras, 10, Adam Barreras, 11, and Garrett Barreras, 8, complete science schoolwork with their mother, Mariel Barreras,
before soccer practice in Omaha, Neb. Mariel Barreras, whose husband is in the U.S. Army, is one of a growing number of military parents home schooling their
children, in part to bring stability amid frequent relocations and long deployments. PAGE 9

Can 'Micro-Credentialing' Salvage Teacher PD?
By Stephen Sawchuk
Last year, Kay Staley and Jessica Scherer,
literacy coaches in the Kettle Moraine district
in Wisconsin, led groups of teachers in a book
study on close reading-a complex and important skill emphasized in the Common Core
State Standards.
Participants were paired with a coach and
peers as they wrestled with how to teach
kids to analyze details of an author's narrative technique. At the end of the school year,
the teachers documented how they applied
close-reading instruction in class and how it

impacted student learning. A panel of educators reviewed the submissions, and the
best earned those teachers salary increases
worth several hundred dollars.
Welcome to the brave new world of teacher
"micro-credentialing," an effort to make professional development more personalized,
engaging, and relevant to teachers. All in all,
the two Wisconsin teachers say, it's a lot more
focused and practical than the stereotypical
continuing-education class.
"You think back to, 'I took basket-weaving,
and it moved me up on the salary scale,'
and people are like, 'What the heck?' " said

Sanders Gets Educators' Attention
Despite Limited Specifics on K-12
By Andrew Ujifusa
As he continues his campaign for the
Democratic presidential nomination,
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders keeps hammering
away at concerns that
N
TIO
resonate with many
ELEC
educators, including
higher-education access
and income inequality.
But with a few exceptions, pre-K-12
issues have been left out of Sanders'
speeches at rallies, town halls, and
other high-profile political events. And

2016

his record on school issues in his combined 25 years in the U.S. Senate and
House of Representatives also hasn't
been a big part of his campaign.
To the extent he has focused on education, Sanders has spent much of his
time pitching a proposal to raise taxes
to provide free tuition to public colleges
and universities-a more dramatic
plan to increase college affordability
than his rival, former U.S. Secretary
of State Hillary Clinton, has proposed.
True, during a town hall event in
Columbus, Ohio, broadcast by CNN
PAGE 17 >

Staley, who works at the district's middle
school. "But with micro-credentials, you
have to show that the learning applies right
now. And that matters."
A small but growing handful of advocates
think that initiatives like Kettle Moraine's
have the potential to move the moribund
professional-development field forward.
Among other things, they note, micro-credentials offer an opportunity to shift away
from the credit-hour and continuing-education requirements that dominate the PD apparatus in most states, toward a system based

NEW ROLES FOR A NEW ERA:
Chief Academic Officers
& Chief Technology Officers
This special report
profiles the growing
interrelationships
between school district
CAOs and CTOs,
and looks at how five
very different school
systems supervise
technology and
curriculum.
See the pullout section
opposite Page 14.

PAGE 12 >

State boards of education are seeking to reassert their influence in the advent of the Every Student Succeeds Act, as much of the decisionmaking
around standards, assessments, and accountability devolves back from federal to state control.
Yet those boards-many of them a blend of retired educators and business leaders who take office by appointment or election, depending on the
state-often find themselves squeezed between
local boards, state education departments, and
legislatures over who's calling the policy shots.
All those entities are expected to vie for a share
of the flexibility under a newly revised federal K-12
law, which gives states greater authority to design
school- and teacher-accountability systems as they
see fit.
It's a volatile moment for power sharing. This
legislative session, state board members in a number of states have spent time stalking the capitol
chambers to block or modify legislation that would
drastically alter state standards or prescribe the
details of statewide accountability systems.
And this year alone, several states saw measures that would either strip or bolster boards'
authority. In Kansas, for example, lawmakers proposed a bill that would have prevented its board
from using any standards similar to the Common Core State Standards. (It was defeated last
PAGE 19 >

Distress Call Issued
On K-12 Facilities
By Denisa R. Superville
American children spend about six hours a day
in their schools, much of that time in buildings
that are decades old, deteriorating, and in need
of significant repairs.
Those conditions are a direct result of the
nation's underinvestment in public school facilities-a lack of support that falls short by
$46 billion annually, according to a new report
on the state of America's K-12 infrastructure.
"It is totally unacceptable that there are millions of students across the country who are
learning in dilapidated, obsolete, and unhealthy
facilities that pose obstacles to their learning
and overall well-being," said Rick Fedrizzi, the
CEO and founding chairman of the U.S. Green
Business Council, whose group co-authored the
report with the 21st Century School Fund, and
the National Council on School Facilities, groups
that push for modernizing school buildings.
"U.S. public school infrastructure is funded
through a system that is inequitably affecting
our nation's students, and this has to change,"
Fedrizzi said.
While the physical conditions of schools-the
PAGE 11 >

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Education Week - March 30, 2016

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Education Week - March 30, 2016

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Education Week - March 30, 2016