Experts: Education Not Likely to be Priority at Democratic National Convention
Diverse: Issues Higher Ed
July 25, 2016

As more than 50,000 Democrats converge on the City of Brotherly Love this week to formally nominate Hillary Clinton as their presidential nominee, experts say education isn’t likely to take center stage at the Democratic National Convention.

“I would say that education is not functioning as a central issue among Democrats or Republicans,” says Dr. Barbara Stengel, Professor of the Practice and Director of the Secondary Education Department of Teaching and Learning at the Peabody College of Education and Human Development at Vanderbilt University.

U.S. Department of Education Releases Guidance On Civil Rights of Students with ADHD
U.S. Dept. of Education
July 26, 2016
The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) today issued guidance clarifying the obligation of schools to provide students with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) with equal educational opportunity under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. 

“On this 26th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, I am pleased to honor Congress’ promise with guidance clarifying the rights of students with ADHD in our nation’s schools,” said Catherine E. Lhamon, assistant secretary for civil rights. “The Department will continue to work with the education community to ensure that students with ADHD, and all students, are provided with equal access to education.”

Over the last five years, OCR has received more than 16,000 complaints that allege discrimination on the basis of disability in elementary and secondary education programs, and more than 10 percent involve allegations of discrimination against students with ADHD. The most common complaint concerns academic and behavioral difficulties students with ADHD experience at school when they are not timely and properly evaluated for a disability, or when they do not receive necessary special education or related aids and services.

This past week saw several key K-12 education meetings take place:  

• A newly constituted Joint Committee to Study the Future of Public Elementary and Secondary Education met for the first time last week, with Delegate Steve Landes taking up the responsibility of chairing the group.  We're happy to share an update in this newsletter on that meeting from our policy associate David Blount.  
• The SOL Innovation Committee, an advisory body to the General Assembly in its third year, met on July 21st, welcoming new members to the committee.  
• Later today, the Committee on the Standards of Quality meets - streaming video of the meeting can be accessed here.  

We hope you enjoy reading David's update below, but we were intrigued to note the reported emphasis placed by Dr. Billy K. Cannaday, the president of the Board of Education on " the five “C’s” which include the work/life skills of critical thinking, creative thinking, collaboration, communication and citizenship."

With the election atmosphere of the Republican and Democratic national conventions dominating the news coverage (including evaluations of what Virginia Senator Tim Kaine's selection as the Democratic VP candidate might mean for education) we were struck by the last "C" listed - citizenship.  

While much focus in education is placed on preparing students for the responsibilities of the workforce, another reason for universal primary and seconary education in a democracy is to prepare students for the responsibility of the voting booth, as well as the many other facets of civic engagement (volunteering, running for office, reading the news and thinking critically about issues before society, etc.)  In recent years, there have also been news stories on the poor knowledge of history or civics exhibited by grade school students (based on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) exam), college graduates (based on a report by the National Civic Literacy Board) or the general public (based on Pew Research surveys).  For example, the 2014 NAEP exam judged only 18% of 8th graders to be at or above proficient in U.S. History, while the number was 27% for geography and 23% for civics.  (Go here to look at who NAEP defines proficient.)  And only 34% of the U.S. public could identify John Roberts as the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court when presented the names of four sitting Supreme Court justices in a 2012 Pew Research Center survey.  

Since we're looking forward to the release of 2015-16 SOL test results in late summer, we were curious how Virginia students do on the Social Studies focused tests that are part of the state Standards of Learning (SOLs).  We decided to map the percentage of students who passed each of four tests in 2014-15 - World History I (to 1500 CE) and II (1500 CE to present), Virginia and US History, and Civics/Economics.  We should note immediately that passing for the SOL is measured differently than for the NAEP exam - passing the SOL test in World History I requires student to correctly answer 31 of 60 items.  (To see more about the Social Studies SOL's, visit the VDOE site dedicated to that here.)   

With that in mind, let's take a look at how school systems are doing.  Below, you can see a map for each of the four tests.  Numbers indicate the percent of students from that system who passed the test.  Shading indicates whether the system improved (green) or fell back (red) compared to the previous year.  (Click here or on the graphic below to explore the various visualizations in more detail.  If a system is not shown below, this is due to data not being reported in either 2013-14 or 2014-15.)   

Data drawn from 2014-15 VDOE Report on SOL performance at http://www.doe.virginia.gov/statistics_reports/school_report_card/index.shtml

Some clear takeaways from this data include the following:

• Pass rates vary significantly - on the Civics/Econ test, as many as 98% of students passed in Mathews County and Falls Church City, while 53% in Petersburg City passed. 
• Performance from one year to another is scattered - only 27 systems saw scores decline on Civics/Econ but some of those had high scores in 2013-2014 and others had low scores.  Meanwhile on the Virginia/US History test, 65 systems saw their pass rate decline.  It's important to remember that some of a school systems "performance" from one year to the next is random factors impacting performance on the day of the test.   
• Less easy to see here (because the shading emphasizes change from 2013-14 to the following year) is that the vast majority of school systems are meeting the accreditation benchmark on these measures.  For Virginia and U.S. History only six (6) school systems fell short.  The map below looks much greener as a result.  

So what is the needed amount of civic knowledge to participate in civic activies?  That's not a question we can answer here.  But it is interesing to note that the National Civic Literacy Board report cited above found a statistically significant correlation between civic literacy and successful election to public office.  What was surprising was that lesser civic literacy was correlated with getting elected.  (Frequently attending religious services, frequently reading websites, higher income and age were positively correlated with winning public office.)  

With that, we wish you a great week.  If you know when this heat wave is going to end for Virginia, please let us know!

 

Sincerely,
CEPI

CEPI Update - SOQ Study Committee Underway