Education Week - August 27, 2014 - 19

Policy Stakes High as Parties Vie for Control of U.S. Senate
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 17
Pensions Committee, he would make
ESEA reauthorization "a top priority."
The starting point would be a bill
he introduced last year to renew the
law, which garnered support from
every GOP member of the committee,
but didn't get a single Democratic
co-sponsor.
The measure would significantly
scale back the federal role in K-12
policy, allowing states to devise
their own accountability plans and
eliminate the federal role in requiring
states to set specific studentachievement
goals, or in identifying a
certain percentage of schools as lowperforming.
As
under No Child Left Behind,
schools would be required to test
students in reading and math in
grades 3-8 and once in high school,
and report the results, including
for subgroups of students, such as
English-language learners and those
in special education. Transparency
would become the main lever for
school improvement.
A similar measure passed the
House without a single Democratic
vote last year. But Mr. Alexander said
he's prepared to seek input from the
other side of the aisle.
U.S. Secretary of Education Arne
Duncan "has states over a barrel with
the need for waivers from unworkable
requirements," Sen. Alexander
said, which gives the federal Education
Department too much power
over state K-12 policy.
"I think there are a lot of Democratic
senators whose constituents
don't want a national school
board," he added, invoking one of
his favorite phrases.
Sen. Alexander has a history of
working with Democrats to get
changes to K-12 legislation that fly
in the face of the Obama administration's
priorities. When the Senate
education committee was considering
a renewal of the ESEA in
2011, for instance, Sen. Alexander
and some Democrats, with the help
of the 3 million-member National
Education Association, teamed up
on an amendment that seriously
watered down the administration's
signature School Improvement
Grant program.
Funding Fights
If Republicans assume control
of the Senate, Congress is almost
certain to use the budget process
to eliminate the Obama administration's
favorite competitive-grant
programs: Race to the Top, Investing
in Innovation, and the SIG program,
under which school districts
compete within states for school
turnaround money.
GOP lawmakers in the House have
tried for the past few years to scrap
those programs, but Senate Democrats
have always championed them
in budget negotiations.
They are probably going by the
wayside if Republicans take over the
Senate, leaving the administration
with virtually no incentive money to
help further its agenda.
"I think the federal government
spends education money best when
BLOGS www.edweek.org/go/blogs
Fla. Unlikely to Alter ELL Test Policy
Despite Objections From Ed. Dept.
| LEARNING THE LANGUAGE | Florida education officials and
honchos at the U.S. Department of Education are locked
in a staring match over when English-language learners
ought to be tested and when their results should count for
accountability purposes.
The question now: Who will blink first?
On Aug. 14, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan
approved a year-long extension of Florida's waiver from
portions of the No Child Left Behind Act.
But it came with the Education Department's stated
rejection of a part of Florida's plan to amend its waiver so
that English-learners with fewer than two years in a U.S.
school would not have to have their test scores factored
into school grades. That amendment would have
brought the state's waiver plan in line with its new
law around testing timelines for students still learning
English.
Federal law requires ELLs' results on content tests to be
used for accountability after such students have been in
school for one year. Florida's public schools educate more
than a quarter million English-language learners.
The Florida education department has said little
about how it will advise districts to proceed with this
conflict between state and federal law. Last week, Joe
Follick, a spokesman for the state education department,
said in an interview: "We are still reviewing their
response. We have not changed our position on the need
for flexibility that we feel is necessary for our Englishlanguage
learners."
That sounds a lot like Florida is planning to stick to its
guns on what it believes is the right testing policy for ELLs.
Will the Education Department do the same and pull the
plug on the state's waiver?
-LESLI A. MAXWELL
Common-Core Test Suspension
Lifted By Judge in Louisiana
| STATE EDWATCH | A Louisiana judge has granted a
preliminary injunction that lifts the suspension of the tests
aligned to the Common Core State Standards imposed by
Gov. Bobby Jindal nearly two months ago.
State District Court Judge Todd Hernandez on
Aug. 19 granted the injunction sought by the state
Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, state
Superintendent John White, and a group of parents and
teachers who have filed a lawsuit challenging the Louisiana
governor's decision. They argue that the state's testing
contract, which White and the state board had planned
to use next year to administer the test developed by the
Partnership for Assessment of Readiness of College and
Careers, or PARCC, has been illegally blocked by Gov. Jindal.
"Today's ruling allows teachers and students to continue
raising expectations in Louisiana. It enables our state to set
its aspirations high and to compete with states across the
country," White said in a statement responding to the ruling.
Gov. Jindal has argued that the state board and Mr. White
do not have the authority to use the PARCC exam under the
terms of their current testing contract. More broadly, he
has argued that because the tests are federally funded, and
because common-core supporters claim that uncertainty
over the state's tests has created uncertainty in Louisiana
classrooms, the tests amount to an illegal attempt by the
federal government to control curriculum.
"If this judge's ruling stands, it would cause chaos in state
government and bring us back to the old days in Louisiana
when it was OK to give no-bid contracts to your friends,"
Jindal said in response to the ruling.
In a separate case, state district court Judge Tim Kelley on
Aug. 15 denied a request for a preliminary injunction by state
lawmakers that would have stopped the use of the common
standards in Louisiana classrooms. The lawmakers have
sued the state board, saying it improperly adopted the
common core back in 2010, an allegation board members
have denied.
Coming to Cafeterias (Maybe):
Visiting Members of Congress
| RULES FOR ENGAGEMENT | If you regularly find yourself in
a school cafeteria, there's a chance you'll see a person in a
suit with a flag pin mingling with students there this fall.
Members of Congress might be more comfortable eating at
a political fundraiser than in a public school lunchroom, but
many of them are accepting invitations to check out exactly
what the kids are eating these days.
Organizations on all sides of the school lunch fight have
challenged supporters and public school administrators to
invite their senators and representatives to learn firsthand
about the U.S. Department of Agriculture's school meals
programs by visiting schools and summer meals sites. They're
motivated by two things: ongoing arguments about whether
Congress should provide a waiver for some schools from
heightened meal standards, and the coming reauthorization
of the Child Nutrition Act, which sets rules for all school
nutrition programs.
The School Nutrition Association, which has advocated for
greater flexibility under the heightened nutrition standards,
is entering members who host congressional visits into a
drawing for a free trip to its legislative conference. "Having
them visit, interact with your staff and see the kids is the
best way to highlight the importance of school nutrition
programs," the organization noted on its website.
The SNA has advocated for a plan that would give some
schools a one-year break from the rules if they can prove a
net revenue loss within a six-month period since they've been
implemented.
-EVIE BLAD
EDUCATION WEEK | August 27, 2014 | www.edweek.org | 19
it empowers states to do things. That
means fewer competitive-grant programs,"
Mr. Alexander said.
Renewed Focus
School choice legislation could
also take on new prominence if
the GOP takes over the Senate.
It's become a signature issue for a
number of high-profile Republican
senators widely seen as having
presidential aspirations, including
Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky and
Marco Rubio of Florida, both of
"
I think there are a lot of Democratic senators
whose constituents don't want
a national school board."
U.S. SEN. LAMAR ALEXANDER
R-Tenn., and ranking member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor,
and Pensions Committee
whom have written or co-sponsored
school choice bills.
Sen. Alexander also has a school
choice proposal, which would allow
states to take almost all of their federal
K-12 funds and combine them
into one giant block grant aimed at
creating scholarships for low-income
students that could be used at any
school, private or public.
He'd like that provision to pass, but
wouldn't insist on making it a part of
an ESEA reauthorization, since such
tuition vouchers could repel support
on the House education committee.
"The issue there is more a process
one of whether the Senate will ever
want to pass a targeted bill like that,"
separating charter legislation from
the rest of the ESEA, said Mr. Klatt,
who is now a principal at Penn Hill
Group, a government-relations firm
in Washington.
Lower-Profile Issues
And, no matter which party is in
charge of the Senate, there's reason
from Democrats and perhaps even
some Republicans.
Mr. Alexander has also worked
with Democrats, including Sen. Mary
Landrieu of Louisiana, on a bill to
revamp the federal charter-schoolgrant
program. A similar measure
passed the House with bipartisan
support earlier this year, but the Senate
has yet to act on it.
The charter bills' fortunes could
improve no matter what the political
landscape looks like, because the
issue has bipartisan support, said Vic
Klatt, a former aide to Republicans
for optimism on education legislation
beyond the ESEA. For instance,
the Carl D. Perkins Career and
Technical Education Act could be a
relatively easy lift.
Other, lower-profile bills have a
good shot too, including the Education
Sciences Reform Act, which
governs education research programs.
A bipartisan measure to
renew the law passed the House
with broad bipartisan support
earlier this year, but has yet to be
taken up in the Senate. And aspects
of the Higher Education Act reauthorization
also have gained momentum
in both chambers.
The political picture will change no
matter who wins the midterm elections,
since Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa,
the current chairman of the education
committee, is retiring after this
term. Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., is
likely to take his place as the panel's
chair or senior Democrat.
Sens. Murray and Alexander both
are seen as dealmakers who are
good at cross-aisle collaboration.
Ms. Murray, for instance, helped
craft a budget agreement with
Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and wrote
a workforce-development bill that
was signed into law this year.
And Mr. Alexander has a history
of working with Democrats
on education legislation, including
the America Competes Act,
which bolstered math and science
education.
"Between the two of them, for the
first time in a long time, I think
there's some reason for optimism,"
Mr. Klatt said.
-ANDREW UJIFUSA
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Education Week - August 27, 2014

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