State asks to renew No Child act waiver
The Arkansas Department of Education has applied to the federal government for the renewal of the state's waiver from the federal No Child Left Behind Act, also known as the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.
Arkansas' initial waiver of the 2002 federal law was approved in 2012 and expires in June, Annette Barnes, the department's assistant commissioner for accountability, told the state Education Board on Friday.
The waiver makes up the state's system of holding public schools accountable for student achievement as measured by the state-required math and literacy tests.
The new waiver application, sent to the U.S. Department of Education by a March 31 deadline, is 207 pages.
Among its provisions are plans for once again identifying the 5 percent of the public schools that are the lowest achieving in the state. Those lowest-achieving schools -- 48 of which were last identified based on 2011 test results -- are labeled "priority" schools and required to carry out specific steps for raising achievement.
The average literacy achievement rate at the priority schools improved from 40.62 percent proficient in 2011 to 51.06 percent proficient in 2014.
Math performance over time at the schools was basically unchanged, 43.41 percent proficient in 2011 to 44.52 percent proficient in 2014.
Also required in the proposed waiver renewal will be the new identification of "exemplary" schools and "focus" schools.
Focus schools, last identified based on 2011 data, are schools with the largest achievement gaps between the student groups made up of special education, poor, and/or English-language learners, and students who are not in that group.
The achievement gap in the focus schools dropped an average 8.23 points from a 33.43 percentage point gap in 2011 to 25.20 points in 2014.
The waiver application is attached to Commissioner's Memo 15--063 at the "Commissioner's Memos" link on the Department of Education website arkansased.gov.
Improvement plan said on schedule
The Forward Arkansas initiative, a joint project of the Arkansas Board of Education, the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation and the Walton Family Foundation, is moving toward its late spring/early summer release of a plan for improving public schools so all students are prepared for college and careers.
Project manager Jared Henderson told the Arkansas Board of Education on Friday that the initiative's work is centered on several focus areas: increasing access to quality pre-kindergarten programs, supporting quality classroom instruction, supporting students outside the classroom, developing a strong teacher pipeline, improving the effectiveness of leadership in education and turning around distressed schools and districts.
Work groups made up of members of the initiative's 31-member steering committee and experts in the different fields have been formed for each of the focus areas. The steering committee is made up of well-known Arkansas educators, business leaders, lawmakers and civic leaders.
The work has included setting some five- and 25-year goals for improvement in the areas of kindergarten readiness, fourth- and eighth-grade achievement on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, exam scores on the ACT college entrance, and two- and four-year graduation rates.
The goals are being set by identifying the fastest-growing states in each category and then taking the rate of growth for the third-fastest-growing state in an area and applying that to Arkansas, Henderson said.
In the area of ACT scores, for example, Arkansas ranks 19th of the 28 states in which the majority of students take the test.
By applying a .125 percent rate of annual growth, Arkansas could be ranked 10th of 28 states in 2021 and fifth of 28 in 2041.
The same kind of process would be used for moving Arkansas from its 42nd ranking on eighth-grade performance on the National Assessment Exam to the five-year goal of 30th and 25-year goal of being fifth in the country.
Board of Education hears exam update
Debbie Jones, the Arkansas Department of Education's assistant commissioner for learning services, reported Friday that the recent administration of the online Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers test "went remarkably well."
Arkansas administered 525,067 of the PARCC exams that are based on a common set of math and English/language arts standards that have been adopted by most states. Another round of PARCC exams -- the end-of-year exams -- will begin in a few weeks.
Jones told the state Board of Education that she anticipates there will be changes in the PARCC exams in future years.
Right now the testing system includes the performance-based tests given after 75 percent of instruction is completed for a school year and the end-of-year assessment after 90 percent of the instruction is given. Leaders in the states using the PARCC tests have indicated that they want only one testing period per year, not two, Jones said.
Metro on 04/13/2015