Spellings

U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings met with political, education and business leaders in Olympia Wednesday, hearing about the state’s efforts to raise student achievement and its concerns regarding the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

Hosted by Gov. Chris Gregoire, Spellings participated in a one-hour roundtable discussion that included state Superintendent of Public Instruction Terry Bergeson, state legislators, business sector representatives, and leaders of the state’s major K-12 education organizations and agencies.

Washington is the third state visited by Spellings as she tours the country to promote reauthorization of NCLB, which is currently stalled in Congress. Spellings told the group that the Bush Administration would like to see the act reauthorized "to establish some stability and keep moving forward over the next six years and beyond."

If the act is not reauthorized, she said, "the new president is not going to show up and start working on George Bush’s No. 1 domestic achievement first day on the job."

WSSDA President Ted Thomas makes a point to U.S. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings during a roundtable discussion at Roosevelt Elementary in Olympia.  Looking on is  Superintendent  Terry Bergeson. (Click to enlarge.)

Spellings said the law can and should be improved, and the administration is pushing for several changes as part of the reauthorization. Those proposals include:

• Establishing better ways to track student achievement based on the performance of student cohorts on a year-to-year basis.
• Developing "differentiated consequences" for schools that are chronically underperforming and those that are just short of making progress targets.
• Improving early intervention strategies for students who are not prepared as they enter the beginning grade levels.
• Focusing on high schools, particularly in math and science education and in dropout prevention.
• Finding ways to encourage the most skilled teachers to work in "the most challenging educational settings."

Gregoire, who chairs the education committee of the National Governors Association, cited Washington state’s efforts to invest in student learning at all levels of the system, from early learning to K-12 to higher education. She said the state is making progress in improving student achievement, but is also facing a number of challenges.

Gregoire cited several concerns with NCLB that were echoed during the roundtable discussions. She said the law is tilted toward punishing underperforming schools rather than rewarding and encouraging those that are making progress, and that it does not provide enough flexibility in measuring student progress, especially for ESL (English as a Second Language) and special education students.

"And despite how much money we’ve put into the system, the system does not have enough money to do what it takes to make a world-class education system," she said.

WSSDA President Ted Thomas (Longview) told Spellings that one struggle for local school boards is investing in training to ensure their teachers are equipped to meet the demands that flow from education reform requirements at the state and national levels.

"We do a good, concerted effort to invest in training new teachers through the colleges," he said. "But it’s like re-tooling an industry — you wouldn’t move a major industry forward without going back and making that reinvestment in the staff that you have."