Support education, support jobs

This from David Adkisson in C-J:

Congress is scheduled to renew the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. As chairman of the U.S. Chamber's Education Committee, I will join Chamber President Tom Donahue and former U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings this week in Washington to meet with congressional leaders and release the U.S. Chamber's recommendations for reform....

• High academic standards and assessments for all students. Each state should hold all students to the same challenging, relevant academic standards. States must continue annual assessments of every child in reading and math.
• Rigorous accountability for all schools. To ensure college and career readiness, we must maintain a strong accountability system that sets annual targets, a deadline for producing results, disaggregates results of different types of students and includes all students in all schools.
• Clear information and real choices for parents and students. Meaningful options, including charter schools, and clear information should be provided to all families, particularly those whose children are trapped in persistently low-performing schools.
• Recognize and reward effective teachers and principals. States should create systems to identify, develop and retain effective faculty who produce real gains in student achievement and in closing the achievement gap. These systems should determine decisions about tenure, compensation, rewards, equitable access to effective teachers and dismissal.
• Tenure policies often hamstring local officials' ability to ensure that students have access to the most effective teachers. Federal law should encourage, not inhibit, state and local efforts to make changes in these policies to quickly and fairly remove ineffective teachers who fail to improve.
• Taxpayer accountability and information. Federal education policy should encourage innovation and promote what works to improve student performance and ensure that taxpayer dollars are spent wisely. This includes supporting data systems that inform decision-making at all levels by providing timely and accurate information to educators, parents, taxpayers and the public, and by supporting analysis and use of that data.
  

Ky. chamber proposes new plan to pay tuition

This from the C-J:

Student, family, state, school to split cost

The Kentucky Chamber of Commerce is proposing a new way to help Kentucky students pay for college.

The Guaranteed Affordability Program, or GAP, is designed to split the cost of college among students, families, schools and the government. Chamber President Dave Adkisson presented the plan to a legislative subcommittee yesterday.

The plan calls for the following:

Students must contribute to their tuition an amount equal to what they could earn from a 40-hour work week during the summer and 10 to 15 hours per week during the school year at a minimum wage job. That contribution could come from private scholarships, as well as such state funding as a Kentucky Educational Excellence Scholarship.

Families must contribute an amount determined by federal financial aid guidelines.

Scholarships or other funding given by the college or university must be applied to tuition costs.

The state must make up the difference between the above sums and the cost of attending a public university or community and technical college.

The state Council on Postsecondary Education would determine the cost of attending a public institution, and students attending independent colleges and universities would be eligible to receive that public "cost of attendance" to apply toward their education costs.

The chamber did not release any estimates of what the plan would cost the state.

"Until you study our current resources, and the eligibility requirements, you could not put a price tag on it," Adkisson said. "We assume it would require extra dollars, but we also assume the economy will eventually improve." ...

Senate panel mulls replacing CATS tests

This from the Courier-Journal:

FRANKFORT — The Senate Education Committee heard testimony today from both supporters and opponents of a bill that would replace Kentucky’s student-testing system with nationally standardized tests.

There was no action taken on Senate Bill 1, which would eliminate the Commonwealth Accountability Testing System, or CATS — the linchpin of the 18-year-old Kentucky Education Reform Act. The bill would also eliminate multiple-choice testing from CATS in the areas of arts and humanities, and would no longer judge schools based on student-writing portfolios.

Supporters who spoke in favor of the bill included David Adkisson, president and chief executive officer of the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce, who said he is concerned over the lack of alignment of CATS with the expectations for postsecondary-level study...

...Opponents of the bill included Bob Sexton, president of the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence, a school advocacy group based in Lexington, who said he doesn’t believe the bill will help improve student achievement.

The meeting was contentious at times, particularly when some of those who spoke in opposition of the bill were asked to make their comments brief, while those who supported it were not...

...Sen. Tim Shaughnessy, D- Louisville, said afterward that he was disappointed with the way the meeting was handled.“There is no question that this was an orchestrated meeting,” he said.“I have never seen a committee meeting where members were prohibited from asking questions during or following testimony, except of course, if you happen to be the Senate floor leader.”

Shaughnessy also questioned why Draud and Mountjoy were not asked to testify.“If they had been invited they would have been here, and the reason why they were not invited is because the Republicans don’t want to hear what they have to say,” he said.

Draud said in a telephone interview this afternoon that he would have testified if he had been asked.“I had an entire document prepared and sent it to all the legislators and educators in the state so that they would be familiar with all of the issues,” Draud said.

C-J audio: Tim Shaughnessy airs his frustrations with the committee and David Williams responds.

Kentucky Long-Term Policy Research Center Conference 2007

Making Money Matter:

Maximizing Student Achievement

with Our Investments in Education

In any discussion of wise investments for Kentucky’s future, increasing spending on education is at the top of many policymakers’ priority lists. But how exactly should education funds be targeted in order to have the greatest impact? What specific expenditures will best help boost students’ academic achievement?

The Kentucky Long-Term Policy Research Center attempted to answer these questions and more at their recent conference. Now, thanks to KET, you can attend anytime (except real time) via the web.

Conference Sessions

Welcome/Setting the Context (24:58)

Brad Cowgill, President, Council on Postsecondary Education; Chair, Kentucky Long-Term Policy Research Center
Dr. Bob Sexton, Executive Director, Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence
David Adkisson, President and Chief Executive Officer, Kentucky Chamber of Commerce

The Dynamic Global Labor Market (57:03)

Dr. Marc Tucker, President and CEO, National Center on Education and the Economy

Educational Progress in Kentucky (29:30)

Dr. Amy Watts, Policy Analyst, Kentucky Long-Term Policy Research Center

The Effects and Cost-Effectiveness of Educational Investments (41:50)

Michael T. Childress, Executive Director, Kentucky Long-Term Policy Research Center

2007 Hellard Award/Keynote Address (49:53)

Hellard Award recipient: John R. Hall, civic leader, philanthropist, and former CEO of Ashland Inc.
Keynote address: Doug Mesecar, Acting Assistant Secretary for Planning Evaluation and Policy Development, U.S. Department of Education

Early Childhood Development (46:10)

Dr. M. Rebecca Kilburn, RAND
Rick Hulefeld, Children Inc.
Dr. Kim Townley, University of Kentucky

The Achievement Gap (48:37)

Ross Wiener, The Education Trust
Claude W. Christian, Kentucky Department of Education
Stu Silberman, Superintendent, Fayette County Schools

Teacher Compensation (52:20)

Dr. Patrick J. Schuermann, Vanderbilt University
Mary Ann Blankenship, Kentucky Education Association
Dr. Allyson Hughes Handley, Council on Postsecondary Education

Wrap-Up (5:01)

Kentucky's schools: a new reality

Former Owensboro Mayor and current President and CEO of the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce Dave Adkisson has an Op-Ed in the Courier-Journal supporting the idea that Kentucky has indeed made progress as measured by the recent Kentucky Long-Term Policy Research Center study.

For the past two years, I've traveled the state and talked to hundreds of business, education, political and community leaders, and I've tried to get a handle on whether we've made progress in education and, if so, how much. That has proved to be a difficult task. I have concluded that, as average Kentuckians, we simply don't know.

A conversation about educational progress (or lack thereof) can quickly become a mind-numbing discussion of test scores, which test scores, funding, spending, accountability, governance and other matters. For the 99.9 percent of us who are not professional educators, our eyes quickly glaze over, and we end up bewildered, not knowing whether we've made progress or not.

One news story about ACT scores sounds pretty good, and then we hear how few Kentucky workers have a bachelor's or associate degree. We don't know whether to feel good or feel bad.

The recent release of a study by the Kentucky Long-Term Policy Research Center sheds a bright light on the question of progress and, more important, offers reason for hope and optimism.

The LTPRC took 11 major national rankings that are widely accepted as important measures of student achievement, combined them into a single index and charted them from the early 1990s through 2005, the latest year for which the rankings
are available.

Dramatic findings

What the combined index reveals is dramatic. Kentucky has made impressive progress in education, and we have clearly moved out of the bottom tier and toward the middle of the pack of all states. Overall, we moved from 43rd in 1992 to 34th in 2005. The move is even more impressive when we look at what happened to some other states, especially those who shared the basement with Kentucky in 1992: Alabama moved from 48th to 46th.

Mississippi moved from 50th to 48th.

North Carolina -- often cited as an example of what Kentucky should try to be -- began in 42nd place and moved up to 35th, one slot below Kentucky.

Other recent reports support the positive conclusions about Kentucky: Our fourth and eighth graders are performing above the national average in science and reading on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, often called the nation's report card. Education Week's Quality Counts 2007 Achievement Index ranks Kentucky at 34th, and the Morgan Quitno 2006-07 Smartest State Index ranks Kentucky at 31st.

This is huge!

Kentucky's schools have made major gains in less than one generation. And we have proved that with a concentrated and sustained public effort to help all students learn at high levels, our schools can -- and do -- improve.

The gains are even more impressive when considered against the backdrop of Kentucky's high poverty level, the influx into our public schools of thousands of immigrants (many of whom are still learning English) and the low education levels of our adult population. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce recently gave Kentucky a "B" in its national report card for "return on investment."

In other words, for the tax dollars we're investing into education, we're getting a good dividend in student achievement.

Are there areas that still need attention?

Absolutely. I don't think many of us are going to rush out and paste "We're No. 34!" bumper stickers on our cars to celebrate our new rankings.

New high in Kentucky's college degree awards

LOUISVILLE - The state's public universities and colleges reached a record recently, handing out more than 43,900 degrees and credentials during the last academic year, officials said.

The 43,902 degrees and credentials issued during the 2006-07 school year marked a 3.3 percent increase from the previous year, state officials said Friday. It also continues a trend that started in 1997, when Kentucky lawmakers passed legislation aimed at boosting higher education for citizens.

"This is excellent news," said Charles McGrew, director of information and research for the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education. "It just continues to go up every year."

The Kentucky Community and Technical College System accounted for more than half of the awards last year that were either diplomas, certificates and associate's degrees. Meanwhile, state schools awarded more than 14,700 bachelor's degrees.

David Adkisson, president and chief executive of the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce, said the numbers were good news. "Business people are increasingly interested in a skilled work force because that's the only way to remain competitive in an information-driven society," he said.

The University of Louisville had the largest growth among state schools. U of L increased the number of bachelor's degrees it awarded by 3.3 percent to 2,328. Meanwhile, the University of Kentucky conferred 3,613 bachelor's degrees, the most in state history.

Kentucky's goal is to double the number of adults with bachelor's degrees to 791,000 by 2020.

This from the Cincinnati Post.