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Give choice a chance

By Jim Waters

The Bluegrass Institute is very concerned that Kentuckians do not have a complete and accurate picture of our state’s public education system.

This was apparent in a letter the institute received recently from Cindy Heine, associate executive director of the Prichard Committee. In her letter, Heine questions the validity and information contained in “Ten great reasons why Kentucky children deserve school choice,” recently published by the Bluegrass Institute.

The list brings attention to issues in the arena of public education not adequately covered by most media and public-interest sources. Our answers to Heine’s questions reaffirm the failures of a government-monopolized education system and the importance of offering school choice to Kentucky families.

Heine’s questions, comments and the section of the publication “Ten great reasons why Kentucky children deserve school choice” to which she refers are in bold type with our response following. (Note: Heine’s questions and comments have been edited for clarity and to reflect the Associated Press style, which is the institute’s standard for all publications.)

In reference to Reason No. 1: “Wouldn’t it be better to report changes in education investments adjusted for inflation using the Consumer Price Index (CPI) as most researchers do? For instance, the Seeking Excellence in Education in Kentucky (SEEK) base – adjusted for inflation – shows a small decline in state funding from $2,350 per pupil in 1991 to a projected amount of $2,212 in 2006. This is not the dramatic increase you mention.”

This type of data is frequently reported both in that year’s dollars and adjusted formats. For example, our format is used in many issues of “Annual Reports” from the Kentucky Office of Education Accountability (OEA).

Presenting expenditures in adjusted figures tends to hide the magnitude of spending decisions from the majority of Kentuckians. Most taxpayers are too busy to be more than casual observers to the process determining how their hard-earned dollars are spent. Of course, one can always make the conversion of the data in our table to adjusted figures.

By any reasonable measure, total education funding in Kentucky has increased at nationally leading rates since 1990. However, the large funding hikes have not resulted in corresponding increases in improvement of ACT scores.

You mistakenly imply that a narrow focus on SEEK funding would fairly relate to the ACT scores presented in our publication.

However, the ACT is a measure of the final outcome of Kentucky’s entire educational process, which makes a connection to total funding the only fair comparison. Associating with a single sub-element of total funding – such as considering only the SEEK base – would be misleading.

Also in reference to Reason No. 1: “Regarding ACT scores, we cannot confirm with ACT officials what you say about the ‘Composite Score for districts.’ The ACT’s published report for Kentucky shows a statewide score of 19.9 in 1990 and 20.3 in 2004. It also indicates an increase in the number of high-school students who took the test – from 62 percent in 1990 to 65 percent in 2004. This is different from what you report.”

The ACT does not directly release disaggregated data for individual public- or private-school systems, which explains why you could not obtain such information. However, the ACT has assembled data for each of Kentucky’s public schools for many years. Those data files allow us to determine the average ACT Composite Score for the state’s public-school districts.

We are surprised and disappointed that the districts’ average ACT Composite Score has remained nearly flat over such a long period of time. Aren’t you?

Overall, ACT scores for individual public-school students did rise – but only slightly. We suspect this minor improvement is more the result of parental pressure in some districts to make improvements rather than the result of the over-hyped impact of the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA).

More of Kentucky’s nonpublic-school students are taking the ACT, which explains a significant part of the overall increase in participation. However, the Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) continues to offer the misleading perception that much of the increase in ACT participation is a result of KERA’s success.

About the only connection between the increase in the number of test takers and KERA appears to be that many of the nonpublic-school students participating in the ACT may have left Kentucky’s government-run schools because they were failing to get a quality education.

Your comments indicate considerable misunderstanding about the data that is released to the public by ACT. That information averages the performance for all students from both public and private schools and offers few meaningful conclusions about the true performance of Kentucky’s public schools.

Nevertheless, the KDE consistently uses the aggregated data in misleading ways, essentially hijacking credit for improvements in ACT scores that have nothing to do with KERA, but rather are a result of more participation by nonpublic-school students.

A final reference to Reason No. 1: “I am also curious why you choose to use the ACT, which is generally not employed by researchers for this purpose. Most researchers use National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) scores.”

There are no state-level NAEP scores available in any subject beyond the eighth grade. However, our educational system does not end with the eighth grade. Using NAEP scores guarantees that the performance of 100 percent of Kentucky’s public high-school seniors will be ignored.

The NAEP also is encountering increasing challenges to its validity, which is fueled in no small measure by unacceptable trends that began in Kentucky.

In 1996, Kentucky’s rate of excluding students with learning disabilities from reported NAEP scores began to increase to the point that made the validity of our state’s results questionable. The commonwealth’s NAEP exclusion rates for learning-disabled students in reading continue well above today’s national average.

These exclusion rates have become even more problematic since the NAEP’s unscientific introduction of testing accommodations in 2001. Kentucky’s rates of accommodating learning-disabled students on NAEP testing are above the national average.

All of these problems present validity issues for Kentucky’s NAEP scores that far too complicated to address here. Further information is available in “An Agenda for NAEP Validity Research,’ a report by the NAEP Validity Studies Panel (NSVP). It can be accessed at www.air.org.

The NSVP, which was formed by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) in the mid-1990s, outlines many problems concerning NAEP’s validity that have not been adequately researched. The NSVP report states: “NAEP is a large-scale survey rather than a tightly controlled research study; therefore, NAEP results cannot be used directly to establish the cause of improvements or decrements in student performance.”

The “OEA Panel Report of 1995” is one of the most important studies ever conducted on Kentucky’s public-school assessment program. The OEA study specifically analyzes our state’s performance on the ACT because the experts who authored the report believe that the ACT is important.

The ACT is taken by more than half of Kentucky’s public-school graduates. No responsible person would want to ignore such a large and important sample.

In reference to Reason No. 2: “I wonder why the data on your chart is different than the information in the sources that you cite, including the Prichard Committee’s report. Is this just a typo? A report by the Manhattan Institute shows Kentucky with a 71-percent graduation rate, which is identical to the national average and ranks 30th in the nation.

The Bluegrass Institute’s calculation is determined by using the classical graduation rate, which is the ratio of graduates to the fall enrollment numbers when they were ninth-graders four years earlier.

Solid data required to determine the classical graduation rate is readily available for a large number of past years, making this the fairest way to represent Kentucky graduation trends since KERA began.

Our rates do closely align with those calculated by Manhattan Institute researcher Jay Greene. However, Greene’s calculations do not account for the uniqueness of Kentucky’s situation. For example, a significant number of our state’s private schools contain only kindergarten through eighth-grade classes with students transferring to public schools in the ninth grade.

The Prichard Committee’s report, which was performed by Prof. Thomas G. Mortenson, uses older figures and relies on estimates from the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education. To calculate the national graduation rate, we use more accurate ninth-grade enrollment and graduation figures found in the “Digest for Education Statistics.” (Better enrollment figures are now available for most school years. Except for the two most recent years, available average national data uses no estimates.)

Our Kentucky graduation calculations are derived from several state sources and consist completely of hard – not estimated – data used to compute Kentucky’s graduation rates on the graph.

Older graduation and enrollment figures come from hard-copy records at the state’s education department. More recent graduation data is reported each year as part of the “transition to adult life section” in the KDE’s “Nonacademic Data Report.” The latest enrollment data is found in the KDE’s “Fall Growth Factor/Ethnic Reports.”

In reference to Reason No. 3: “The accountability scoring changed in 1998 as a result of reforms in the Kentucky Instructional Results Information System (KIRIS). These changes were supported by the Bluegrass Institute associate Richard Innes, who now criticizes those changes. We’re curious about whether Innes has changed his mind; at least some explanation here would help.”

You are greatly confused about Bluegrass Institute education analyst Richard Innes’ position on scoring changes.

“I never supported the scales that were adopted,” Innes said. “In fact, I found them to be quite inflated from the outset and issued several highly critical statements at the time the changes were being discussed.”

While resetting the CATS scoring scale in 2000, Kentucky education officials were presented with three options. The final result chosen for each subject was almost invariably the most inflated number from the three methods.

This created an instant conflict with the scoring trends from the old KIRIS. Suddenly, the claimed rates of student proficiency jumped dramatically upward, sometimes to double the rates formerly reported in KIRIS.

A close examination of our graph that is part of the third reason to support school choice shows the impact of the scoring change on Kentucky’s middle schools. The sudden jump in the Accountability Index between 1998 and 1999 equals three times the total improvement the middle schools ever demonstrated between 1992 and KIRIS’ demise in 1998. Middle-school performance on KIRIS became flat after 1995 yet mysteriously began to show progress again on CATS.

These disparities offer clear evidence that the CATS scoring standard became seriously watered down once the resetting occurred.

A divide is also found when CATS’ proficiency rates are compared to NAEP scores. After CATS was rescaled, the difference in the CATS and NAEP proficiency rates – particularly in elementary schools – diverged very sharply. CATS reported much higher rates.

While many researchers – including Innes – don’t have a great deal of faith in those NAEP proficiency rates, they have even less confidence in the CATS data.

In reference to Reason No. 4: “I think there is a math error in this table. The number of students in private schools increased by 10.4 percent (from 65,990 in 1991 to 72,819 in 2001), not the 36 percent you claim. According to these figures, Kentucky ranks 22nd – not first – in the nation in the percentage of parents who have been removing their children from public schools. The state’s percentage of students who are in private schools basically remained flat – from 9.27 percent in 1991 to 9.86 percent in 2001. These figures are below the 2001 national private-school enrollment of 10.17 percent.”

There is no requirement for parents to report students not in public schools to the Kentucky Department of Education. As a result, the KDE cannot offer a clear picture of nonpublic enrollment. Because your numbers are based on unreliable KDE figures, they are inaccurate.

Even KDE statisticians share the Bluegrass Institute’s concerns that erratic reporting has made the department’s private-school enrollment data unreliable.

The Bluegrass Institute’s analysis is based on 1990 and 2000 Census data, which is the most reliable information about home-schooling and private-school enrollment in Kentucky.

Census figures showing the percentage of nonpublic-school students to the total is posted on our table. The change during the decade is 11.72 percent minus 8.62 percent for an increase of 3.1 percent. Divide 3.1 by 8.62 and you get a rate change of 35.96 percent.

The math is straightforward. Of course, credible data – something the institute expends considerable effort obtaining – must be used.

In reference to Reason No. 6: “I’m confused about what you mean by a cause-and-effect relationship between ‘KERA … and youth unemployment rates.’ What do you claim is the connection between these factors?”

As the impact of KERA began to be felt, youth unemployment rose dramatically in Kentucky compared to the average jobless rate for young workers in the seven neighboring states. The beginning of this unfavorable trend also began right after the inception of accountability testing in Kentucky.

If this is a coincidence, it is a most remarkable one. During this period that saw a rise in economic performance and employment rates nationwide – including in Kentucky – unemployment numbers for our state’s youth climbed rapidly compared to youngsters in our neighboring states.

Taken by itself, this unemployment data might not be directly attributed to KERA. However, numerous reports from Kentucky employers indicate that youngsters continue to arrive in their workplaces with inadequate preparation.

There is abundant evidence that an insufficient education is a significant contributor to youth unemployment in the commonwealth.

In reference to Reason No. 7: “I wonder why you didn’t mention that the Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT) is highly suspect – even with the Defense Department, which publishes the assessment. We were advised by Maj. Angela Giddings at the U.S. Department of Defense that it does not recommend using AFQT results for state comparisons as you have done.”

The AFQT is worth examining because it is a uniform test given throughout the entire country.

Taken by itself, the AFQT is not necessarily the best indicator of Kentucky’s education progress. Nevertheless, we believe that AFQT scores deserve to see the light of day because they provide the only data available for a group of recent graduates who do not go to college.

While the AFQT samples are obviously not a random sample, there is no reason to believe that the group is unfavorably biased against our state. Considering Kentucky’s high youth unemployment rate, it would even be reasonable to expect our military applicants to be better prepared than those of other states where there are more employment opportunities for better-educated civilians.

While such bias should favor Kentucky, our state has not fared well on the AFQT in recent years. This unfavorable trend began the same year as KIRIS testing, which seems more than a coincidence.

In reference to Reason No. 8: “While it’s true that Kentucky’s ratio of teachers to total school staff is low, it should also be noted that our state ranks high in the percentage of other adults in schools who work directly with children. Parents and others should know that Kentucky’s teacher/student ratio ranks 15th in the nation and is above the national average.”

Our teacher/staff ratio isn’t just “low.” It ranks dead last in the country – a clear indication that the system is malfunctioning.

While we have reservations about the reports that researcher Lawrence Picus performed for the KDE on the department’s funding approach, he did point to research that teacher aides do not increase student performance. Picus did not include aides in his recommended model for school improvement.

If, as you allege, Kentucky’s student-teacher ratio is good now, then we should examine the cost and benefit of all the additional school personnel not required in other states with better academic systems. Education officials should particularly consider those states that significantly outperform Kentucky.

Savings gained by eliminating unproductive staff would free the resources needed to award our best teachers with handsome raises. Will you join the Bluegrass Institute in persuading policymakers to identify and remove the “fat” in Kentucky’s public education system?

In reference to Reason No. 10: “You might want to check these numbers again. The racial gap is appalling, but the 2004 data shows that these gaps are decreasing in some subjects. Kentucky’s gaps are among the smallest in the nation.”

The numbers we posted are for 2003 and are accurate.

In addition, we offer Table 1 (below), which tracks changes since 1999 in the achievement gap in reading, math and science between Kentucky’s black and white students.

In the majority of subjects, black students lost ground. It’s hardly a performance worth bragging about.

Three of the four categories where blacks closed the gap with white students were in reading. But even these supposed improvements are suspect because Kentucky still uses the “oral presentation” accommodation on its reading assessments for learning-disabled students. The “reading” assessment is actually being read to nearly one out of 10 elementary school students across the commonwealth.

Even the NAEP refuses to stoop this low, which explains why our state’s reading exclusion rates on that assessment are far above the national average. (The fact that CATS reports do not indicate how many – or even if – blacks receive accommodations above the state average represents another of the assessment’s many deficiencies.)

The gaps in NAEP scores between Kentucky’s black and white students also look smaller than in some other states because our white students seriously under-perform whites elsewhere. Our state’s whites scored last in the nation on NAEP’s fourth-grade math portion in 2003, which naturally makes it easier for blacks to close the racial academic achievement gap.

Should we be impressed? Closing gaps because whites are poorly served is not the Bluegrass Institute’s idea of successful school reform. Surely the Prichard Committee, which claims to strive for academic excellence, is not satisfied with such a performance.

A final general question: “Your document is entitled ‘Ten great reasons why Kentucky children deserve school choice.’ What is the connection between the 10 items and funding private schools and school choice? I’m not sure the relationship is clear.”

Our publication clearly indicates that we are for “school choice” in general and not just in the form of private schools.

The Bluegrass Institute supports several public-school choice efforts across the commonwealth, including those being promoted by parents in the Jackson and Murray independent school systems.

State education officials should be ashamed of themselves for not supporting the citizens in these communities who have requested – with dignity – that they be allowed to choose which district their children attend. So far, the Prichard Committee, which claims to seek more parental input into Kentucky’s public education system, also hinders the parents’ efforts by remaining silent on the issue.

The Bluegrass Institute also is working to secure more options for students in poorly performing schools who have a right to transfer according to the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law. Not a dime of private-school support money is involved in that choice effort either.

Conclusion

After nearly 15 years of KERA and generous funding increases, Kentuckians have the right to expect better results. Instead, our state continues to have high rates of testing exclusions and accommodations along with rising college-freshman remediation rates.

Northern Kentucky University President James Votruba recently stated that the remediation rate among freshmen at his school has now reached 50 percent. While the remediation rate drops to near 40 percent when considering all of Kentucky’s four-year colleges, it climbs to 64 percent at the state’s two-year and technical schools. This is inexcusable!

If Kentucky’s public education system has significantly improved, we now propose a couple of questions for Heine: “Why do our state’s universities continue to graduate only a small portion of each entering class? And why does it take so long to graduate those few students who do manage to finish their coursework?”

We disagree with the oft-repeated assumption that Kentucky’s education system lacks proper funding. The “Digest of Education Statistics” reported that our state’s school funding ranked 30th in the nation in 2000. Yet the same year’s Census indicates the commonwealth was only 42nd in family income.

Greater stress is now being applied on Kentucky’s families to cover the costs of a bloated (think staff-to-teacher ratio) and poorly performing public-education system.

Like other states, Kentucky struggles to deliver a quality education to a large base of children living in families with incomes below the poverty level. But our state also has dramatically increased funding for education since KERA began.

Education spending has more than doubled since 1989, when legislators approved $2 billion in spending for the state’s public schools. Why hasn’t this massive increase in money resulted in better classroom performance by all students?

If our state’s education professionals will look outside Kentucky for reasonable reform efforts that are producing better results, they will find that competition is a reasonable option worth exploring.

For example, the graduation rate in Cleveland’s school system has doubled since vouchers were first used in 1996. While the city’s education system still has a long way to go, we need to see if the choice answer is one that could work for Kentucky.

Our state already has tried many experimental tactics without significant progress. It’s time to give school choice a chance.

Frankly, Kentuckians can no longer afford to continue spending taxpayers’ hard-earned dollars on an education program that offers mediocre results at best. A growing resistance to tax increases and bond issues across the commonwealth sends a clear message that more funding isn’t going to happen without exceptional improvement.

We hope that the admirable resources of the Prichard Committee will become clearly focused on making meaningful changes that help improve our children’s future through an excellent public-education system.

The Bluegrass Institute would be pleased to assist efforts toward that end.

– Jim Waters is Director of Policy and Communications for the Bluegrass Institute, Kentucky’s free-market think tank.

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