Utah Evolution Bill Dies

The latest attempt to question evolution in Utah has failed. SB96
would have established a state policy that teachers should instruct
science students that not all scientists agree on the origins of life
or the origins of human life. Further, the bill would have mandated the
state not endorse a particular theory in the classrooms.



The debate got a little brutish on Tuesday, "There are
a number of influential legislators who believe you evolved from an
ape," [Sen. Chris] Buttars said following the vote. "I didn't."



Here are a few articles on the topic: Salt Lake Tribune, Deseret News, N.Y. Times, and CNN.

Arlington v. Murphy

Just an update on the action in the latest ed. law case on
the Supreme Court
Docket, Arlington
v. Murphy. Several entities have filed amicus briefs at this point,
including NSBA and
the Department
of Justice.



This case concerns the awarding of expert witness fees as a subset of
attorney's fees* that are awarded under the IDEA, 20
U.S.C. 1415(i)(3)(B). The case generated nearly $30,000 for a single
consultant (Marilyn Arons, pictured), which the prevailing parents requested
the district to cover. The trial court, after some discussion of time keeping
requirements, awarded $8,650. This was affirmed by the Appellate Court.


            
             
                   
                   
                  
             



Just a short comment in preparation for the decision: This Edjurist, at least,
felt the case was rightly decided by the Appellate Court, but fears the Supreme
Court (with its infinite wisdom in special education) will again strike down a
fee shift between the school and the parents. The law is certainly unclear on
this issue and other civil rights laws do not allow for such an award. However,
as the 2nd Circuit indicated in its decision, IDEA is and should continue to
be, different from other civil rights statutes. IDEA itself indicates parents
have, "the right to be accompanied and advised by counsel and by
individuals with special knowledge or training with respect to the problems of
children with disabilities." Finally, policy demands this fee shift. Not
only has the Supreme Court managed to take away most of the decent lawyers in
special education (see Buckhannon below) now they have the chance to
take away most of the decent lay advocates. If they do rule against expert
fees, special education parents will be left even more in the dark when schools
trample on their rights and, ultimately, special education students will be
poorly served.



On a different note, to all you fans of statutory interpretation (myself
included) this will be an excellent case to watch. There is a huge reliance on
legislative history and an earlier case, Casey, found Justice
Scalia relying on legislative history in dicta saying Congress did intend for
IDEA to be different. Probably, the court will pull some "plain
language" malarkey to get rid of the legislative history, but if nothing
else, it will be especially interesting to see how the two new justices deal
with the issue.



*While this is the first case dealing with expert witness costs, it is not the
first case to deal with attorney's fees under the IDEA. See, Buckhannon (audio
here),
T.D. v.
LaGrange, Doe
v. Boston Pub. Sch., and others.

Musical Chairs? 20 kids, 10 chairs.

It seems almost 1/2 the states are intersted in the Department of Ed's
olive branch to allow flexibility in their accountability standards
demanded under NCLB.  The N.Y. Times ran the story on Wednesday.

The states that have applied to make the changes for the current
school year are Alaska, Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, Florida,
Hawaii, Indiana, Iowa, North Carolina, Oregon, South Carolina,
Tennessee and Utah.

Six more — Maryland, Nevada, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania and South Dakota — have asked to apply changes next year.

Perhaps 10 flexibility slots may not be enough as the
pressure on the federal Department of Ed. increases to step back from
their hard line accountability positions. Look for more concessions to
the states in the near future.

Education Spending on the Rise?...But the President's Budget Says...

There may be some good news for education spending. Stateline.org is running a story
today about possible state increases in education spending. It is worth
your time to read and see if your state is listed as on the up draft in
spending. Mike Griffith at ECS (who the Edjurist is forever in debt to
for allowing me to use his office while he was away studying in Europe)
said, “It's looking like it’s going to be an even
better year all around for almost every state, with the exception being
the Gulf Coast and Michigan, which at best will have a flat year in
education funding.” There even seems to be a hint of college tuition reductions. (Like I said, worth your time to read).



Nice to see the states have not abandoned education, as Washington
seems to have done. NCLB has so altered the education landscape that
perhaps, education will fall back into the hands of the rightful
owners.

Indiana Attempts to Prevent Dropouts

The Indianapolis Star is reporting on a bill moving out of the statehouse to the governor's desk for approval. The bill (H.B. 1347) would put more requirements on schools to track and prevent dropouts, including reporting:



        (19) The number of students who have dropped out of school,
including the reasons for dropping out.

        (20) The number of student work permits revoked.

        (21) The number of student driver's licenses revoked.

        (22) The number of students who have not advanced to grade
10 due to a lack of completed credits.

        (23) The number of students suspended for any reason.

        (24) The number of students receiving an international
baccalaureate diploma.



Also, students would not be allowed to dropout between 16 and 18 if:



       (3) the withdrawal is due to:

            (A) financial hardship and the individual must be
employed to support the individual's family or a dependent;

            (B) illness; or

            (C) an order by a court that has jurisdiction over the
student.

     (c) A written acknowledgment of withdrawal under subsection
(b) must include a statement that the student and the student's
parent understand that withdrawing from school is likely to:

        (1) reduce the student's future earnings; and

        (2) increase the student's likelihood of being unemployed in
the future.



Not sure what all this would mean yet from the law standpoint.
Obviously, schools are going to have to tighten up their dropout
prevention and tracking and make sure they follow the letter of the law
in the dropout interviews. Just in the back of the Edjurist's mind,
there seems to be a concern about these dropout interviews coming back
to haunt the school. If the school messes up any of these procedural
issues in the dropout interview, could a student sue the school? Could
damages be future earnings? Probably, everything would be covered in
negligence immunity, but still...a little concerning.



 Also contained in the bill is some interesting ideas on high
school graduation credits while at college, including specific
provisions for Ivy Tech. Finally, there seems to be a requirement that
schools add at least two AP and Dual Credit courses to students who
qualify. This would be rough on rural school corporations. As always,
stay tuned. 

Laptops for All?

Interesting idea emerging out of the Illinois Lt. Governor's office.
Pat Quinn is proposing a $50 million dollar proposal that would put a
laptop in the hands of every 7th grade student in the state. Here are
several articles on the subject: The Southern Illinoisan, Education Week (free registeration required),  The St.L. Post-Dispatch, and a couple of posts from Alexander Russo's blogs.



The Edjurist knows there have been mixed results in Maine, where such a
program has already been instituted, but the idea is fantastic. What
better way (besides paying teachers more) is there to show students the
State cares about them than to give them gifts (thousand dollar gifts
that is). Plus, there is the added benefit of a totally computer
literate population (to attract those all too coveted "hi-tech jobs").
Finally, it would put schools on the forefront for once. Sure there
will be problems, but there are always problems when you lead a new
movement. Certainly, the Edjurist is fretting all the legal
implications of student access to the Internet during class. But, the
lesson here is that we can be proactive instead of reactive, doesn't
that sound nice for a change?



The problem, though, is the funding. The current proposal to close
Illinois loopholes is admirable, but shouldn't the big computer
companies being paying for this? 



Here is a little lesson learned in law school (somewhere between torts
and civil procedure). West and Lexis (the two biggest legal research
providers) offer unlimited access to their services for all law
students. The plan is simple, get them hooked and then reap the rewards
when they graduate. While I know there is an underlying sinister
capitalist agenda, the fact is there is no other way to pay for it
other than big tuition increases.



States need to push for similar plans as laptops enter the K-12
mainstream. Undoubtedly, there will need to be tax increases otherwise
and that could slow the technological integration for decades. Teaming
with businesses on this one is a win-win.

A Commission to Study NCLB

The USA Today ran a story
on Monday about a new bi-partisan, independent commission that is being
formed to study NCLB. There is little detail at this point, but it
looks like at least some of the funding is coming from the Aspen Institute and Roy Barnes of Georgia and Tommy Thompson of Wisconsin will chair it. Stay tuned.

ELA Presentation Deadline

Just a reminder, the Education Law Association
Conference 2006 presentation submission deadline is Monday, Feb. 20.
The conference will be in the Bahamas this year, so provide yourself
plenty of time to hang out on the beach.

New Harvard Civil Rights Project Report ... and Responses

Gail L. Sunderman, a researcher at the Harvard Civil
Rights Project, has released a
new report from her continuing study of how NCLB is influencing change.
This study particularly looks at how federal and state negotiations are
changing the law. There are a couple interesting things about this study.



First, the issue that is getting the most play around the eduniverse is how the
negotiated NCLB is benefiting white middle-class students over minority and
poorer students. (See the CNN article here.)



While who is benefited most by the law is an interesting issue, the Edjurist is
most interested in the issue of negotiated policy between the federal
government and the states. This negotiation is happening more and more between
the states and the federal government, in some cases, to the extent that the
final result is often totally different from what the federal law and
regulations demand.



As the report suggests, NCLB is a monumental failure as a law. First, most laws
are passed, or at least should be passed, with major input from all players.
While NCLB was passed with bipartisan majorities, much of education itself was
not at the table. Thus, many of the current problems with implementation were
not predicted and accounted for initially at passage. This is not where the
law's failures end, however. Even when implementation problems crop up, they
can be accounted for by an active Congress or Department. Amendments can be
passed and regulations rewritten.  This has not occurred with NCLB, and
what has resulted is national unrest and negotiated settlements to keep states
from throwing away the federal dollars altogether. 



This is an untenable situation. While the state response should not be
criticized too harshly because of their primary role as providers of education
in this country, the federal role should be examined. If federal statutes are
going to be written as broad, unachievable mandates then absolutely this
negotiated, untenable situation will continue. Why can't the federal government
still control broad general goals by controlling the purse strings? Is the
mandate necessary at all? Just direct the massive federal allotment toward
research and programs that support the general goals. Granted, there will still
be unrest, but this perverse situation where the law is negotiated between the
state and federal government would be eliminated.



Here is an excerpt that is on point:

What is a law? A political scientist or lawyer could
spend a semester discussing


that question but a rough definition might be
something like this: a rule of general


application established by and enforced by
governmental power. A lawful policy is one


that operates within the principles established by the
law. Is NCLB being administered in


a lawful manner? One vital part of enforcing a law is
that it is intelligible and


predictable. In other words, those subject to
enforcement that is backed by public


sanctions need to know what the law requires, that the
requirements are consistent with


the law itself, that they have reliable information
about what they must or must not do,


and what the consequences may be.





By this standard, some of the most important policies currently being enforced


under NCLB are not lawful. They are not rules of
general application and they are not


consistent from state to state. Sometimes even
individual districts have been allowed to


ignore the policy requirements. Exceptions available
in some places are not publicized or


made available in others. There is no certainty in the
law and no way to know what it


will be in the future. This means that the policy is
essentially a product of negotiation, of


power and discretion, not law.





Since NCLB concentrates serious power and sanctions around demands that


turned out to be unattainable and, sometimes,
irrational, school officials and the public


face the contradiction between explicit and very harsh
policies and a patchwork of


policies that have been compromised in an inconsistent
and unpredictable pattern. These


compromises constitute the real policy, and, since
they are applied differently to different


regions of the country, there is no single, national
policy.

Expect More at ExpectMore?

The Department of Education's blog provided a link to the Office of Management and Budget's expectmore.gov. Ideally this site is supposed to provide federal taxpayers easy to understand assessments of federal program effectiveness.



Clicking through, I was not very impressed and a little uncomfortable.
Many of the education programs were not provided a rating at all. Where
a rating was provided, there was not an adequate explaination of why
the rating was either good or bad. Apparently, it is based on a 25 question survey.
The questions are relevant but not sufficient. Most of the questions
focus on whether the program self-evaluates and whether those
evaluations are tied to manager accountability. The problem is, of
course, important policy decisions will be made based on this
inadequate assessment. How can one compare NASA's Mars Program, the
National Park's glacier preservation, Agriculture's rural housing, and
Ed's vocational education with merely 25 questions? This is a clear
example of effeciency outstripping intelligence.



Here is a couple of examples. NCES was rated as "effective." Perkins Grants and Vocational Education were rated as  "ineffective." See if you feel comfortable with these classifications.



Perhaps we should be expecting a little more from expectmore.gov.

Podcasts

I stumbled across this tech podcast that is worth listing on the podcast list. (Wait, what...you do not know what a podcast is...check here for Wikipedia's definition - don't know what Wikipedia is, click here). Anyway, start with the Larry Sanger interviews to get the flavor.



There are not a lot of education podcasts out there yet, see the link here
for a semi-complete current list. There are certainly not any out there
on education policy. Law is somewhat further along the technology line,
check out their list here (for instance Georgetown podcasts the speeches that are given at the law school).



A great way to get started in podcasting, is to download Apple's iTunes
(which may already be on your computer if you have downloaded Quicktime
- they package them of course) and check out the podcast directory.
There are a couple of padcasts I listen to everyday, such as the NY
Times Front page and Washington report, NPR's topical reports, The
Onion's fake news (for a laugh), and Jim Lehrer's stories and
interviews from the night before. Also available are the President's
weekely radio address and Barak Obama's weekly podcast. Have fun
checking these out and know you are at the edge of the technological
frontier.

More on Higher Ed. Standardized Testing

Can you feel it? The rumbling under your feet? Yes, it is true. The
vast mechanisms of the higher education policy apparatus are starting
to move on the threat of standardized testing. Claudio Sanchez this
morning on NPR ran a story on the action that is worth your time.



David Warren, from the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities (a group of private colleges), rejects the notion, but invoked the market as the accountability mechanism. Scary,
but also not a bad argument. It would mean that conservatives, such as
the present administration and Department of Education, would have to
reject their traditional notions on market regulation in favor of a
more hands on, pro-big government policy. To get a sufficient number of
conservatives to sign on to such legislation authorizing standardized
testing would be a stretch. The administration would be forced to cross
the aisle and negotiate a compromise plan with the Democrats, which
again is an unlikely occurrence.



Ah, the wheels are beginning to spin and we here at Edjurist are
certainly excited to see where they take us (although we have the
sneaking suspicion we will end up not too far from where we are right
now).

Great Policy Debate Forming on NCLB Tutoring

A new debate is forming in response to a NY Times Sunday front page story about the under usage of NCLB's tutoring provisions. For analysis see Rotherham and Russo.



The Edjurist would just like to applaud the efforts of the NY Times for
bringing this issue to the fore. Whether or not it is a good policy (of
course there is not enough actual dollars, let alone federal dollars,
to fund this program), it is contained in the law and students, by
right, should be entitled to these services. Double kudos to the Times
for putting this issue on the front page, where it might actually
garner some attention and generate a policy debate about the merits of private tutoring (which is what we really need).

Higher Education Standardized Testing???

A recent New York Times article reported on the activities of Secretary Spelling's Commission on the Future of Higher Education.
According to the article, the Commission is seriously considering
introducing some form of standardized testing to higher education. Here
is an excerpt:

In an interview, Mr. Miller [Charles Miller - a businessman
and the Chairman of the Commission] said he was not envisioning a
higher
education version of the No Child Left Behind Act, which requires
standardizing testing in public schools and penalizes schools whose
students do not improve. "There is no way you can mandate a single set
of tests, to have a federalist higher education system," he said.

But
he said public reporting of collegiate learning as measured through
testing "would be greatly beneficial to the students, parents,
taxpayers and employers" and that he would like to create a national
database that includes measures of learning. "It would be a shame for
the academy to say, 'We can't tell you what it is; you have to trust
us,' " Mr. Miller said.

Higher education is no stranger to standardized testing, with almost
every university requiring some form of standardized test to gain
entry. However, once students gain admission it is very rare for a
student to be subjected to a standardized test.



More than anything else, this represents a loss of trust in the
academy. Higher education must do a better job of presenting itself to
the general public as a practical and reliable institution for training
our next generations. This should ring as loud as a smoke alarm to our
nations universities: either regain our nations trust or face the same
fate as our K-12 schools.



For more analysis see Andy Rotherham's blog here.

Evolution Remains on the Hot Seat

A recent NY Times article has highlighted a bill
in Utah that would require science teachers to add the disclaimer "not
all scientists agree on the origins of life" to lessons about
evolution. The bill has passed the Utah Senate and is moving toward the
House. The article also highlights some of the other states that are
considering evolution instruction policies. For views on either side
see (1) The Discovery Institute, and (2) The National Center for Science Education.

Edublog Carnival

A new Edublog Carnival is posted, this week at The Education Wonks.
This weekly event highlights the best of the education related blogs
and posts them all in one site. It is a good place to get started in
edublogging.

Blogs Entering Mainstream

New evidence of the rise of the blog. Senator Clinton cited The Education Gadfly
(from the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation) in a Senate Education
Subcommittee hearing today on Global Competitiveness. The blog Senator
Clinton referenced, written by Checker Finn and Mike Petrilli, can be
found here. 



In response Secretary Spellings stated, 'Senator, I have not seen that
particular blog, but I disagree with it." Perhaps Secretary Spellings
and her staff at the Department of Ed. should get up to speed a bit.
Being that they cut so many programs in the latest budget, they should
have plenty of time to keep up with the blogs.



Besides the blog reference, the Senate Education Committee Hearing did
not yield much of interest. Secretary Spellings continued to push the
President's Math and Science AP plan, admitting that it will be quite a
challenge to get the necessary AP teachers. The Democrats on the
Committee continued to take their swings at the latest budget, noting
all the programs that will find themselves in the dark.



A video file of the hearing will be available here.     

2007 Presidential Budget Request

The President's budget has been released to the ravages of Congress. There are some interesting implications for education. For starters, there is over 3 billion in cuts
(see the chart below). There are a few programs that will see their
funding increased. First, the math and science instruction the
president called for in the State of the Union will be funded at 380 million. Further, the High School Reform program will see an additional 1.5 billion.

 

While it is far to early in the budget process to run screaming in
terror, the cuts do reflect the administration's outlook on education.
Senator Specter, perhaps, sums it up best ..."it is scandalous."

Edjurist Online

Today marks the first entry by the Edjurists. The edjurists are a
collection of education law specialists having obtained at least some
of their training at Indiana University - Bloomington. This blog will
report on education law and policy related topics. This blog will seek
to be objective and forthright in the information presented. However,
we make no guarentees that positions taken will not generate
disagreement among readers. Please respond when you disagree and
convince us otherwise. If we know nothing else about law and policy, we
know that it is based on the arguments of individuals. This collection
of individuals, the edjurists, will seek to inform those arguments by
providing free information and analysis on present day education
topics. Enjoy.