FEDERAL EDUCATION LEGISLATION
ENACTED IN 1994:
An Evaluation of Implementation and Impact
Executive Summary

Planning and Evaluation Service
Office of the Under Secretary
U.S. Department of Education
April 8, 1999

Introduction

The education legislation passed in 1994--the Improving America?s School Act which reauthorized the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), the Goals 2000: Educate America Act, and the School to Work Opportunities Act--reflects the Federal government?s traditional role in helping all students, particularly those at risk of school failure, to reach challenging standards and in supporting state and local efforts to provide students with a high quality education. In FY99, Congress appropriated more than $14 billion for programs authorized under the 1994 legislation.

What Was Accomplished in the 1994 Legislation?

The 1994 legislation fundamentally changed the direction of federal education programs. Federal programs shifted to stimulate and support state standards-driven reform. The idea that all children can succeed to high standards replaced the notion that a remedial education was good enough for some children. Flexibility increased and federal program integration with the regular education program improved. A new policy framework designed to propel the country toward reaching the National Education goals informed the development of ESEA, Goals 2000, and the School to Work Act:

• High standards for all children?with the elements of education aligned, so that everything is working together to help all students reach those standards;
• A focus on teaching and learning;
• Flexibility to stimulate local school-based and district initiatives, coupled with responsibility and accountability for student performance; and
• Links among schools, parents, and communities.

Principles for the Federal Role

In elementary and secondary education, the federal government works with states, school systems and communities to support its dual mission of equity and excellence in schooling for all students. Some of its programs are intended to target resources to areas where educational needs are the greatest; others are designed to leverage support for school improvement overall.

Goals 2000 legislation and reauthorization of the ESEA in 1994 introduced a new federal approach built around a framework of state standards-driven reform to promote equity and excellence. It was envisioned that federal resources would help underwrite the development and implementation of challenging state standards for all children. State standards would focus federal, state and local efforts to work in concert on improving teaching and learning. New and reauthorized federal programs would provide support for leadership, resources and assistance to improve schools through professional development of teachers, access to new technology, and resources for a safe climate for learning. Federal programs would provide flexibility and increase public school choice to stimulate local initiatives. Programs would couple increased flexibility with responsibility for student performance.

The Goals 2000 legislation and ESEA reauthorization intended that federal programs support and stimulate state and local reform efforts, consistent with the national purposes of the programs authorized. Some states were at the forefront of reforming their educational systems and farther advanced than federal programs; others had yet to begin. Federally supported efforts were to help underwrite and be well integrated into the reforms of states and local school districts. Distinctions between federal support and the efforts to which they contributed were blurred. At the same time, the passage of the Government Performance and Results Act in 1994 called for heightened attention to analyzing and reporting on individual program impacts.

Analytic Approach

In reauthorization, Congress mandated a national assessment of Title I and an evaluation of the impact of federal programs on state and local reforms in the reauthorization of ESEA. The Department?s Planning and Evaluation Service approached the task of assessing the implementation and impact of the programs legislated in 1994 by grouping programs into the two broad purposes: (1) strengthening the effectiveness and capacity of the elementary and secondary educational system, and (2) improving education for special-need populations. While these twin purposes of excellence and equity are inextricably linked, the Department?s evaluations reported separately on the impact of the legislation in building capacity in (1) all federal programs included in ESEA, Goals 2000, and School to Work legislation, and (2) in Title I specifically. This report on the impact of federal education legislation enacted in 1994 includes Title I among the other federal elementary and secondary programs that it treats. The report on Title I, Promising Results, Continuing Challenges: The Final Report of the National Assessment of Title I focuses in depth on that program and its components. The two reports are complementary analyses, and both benefited from the guidance of a congressionally mandated Independent Review Panel.

This report looks across the various programs which serve the broad educational priorities set forth in the Department of Education?s Strategic Plan. The priority areas in which the federal government works with states, districts, and schools are: (1) enabling young children to enter school ready to learn, (2) adopting high and challenging standards for school-age children, (3) securing skilled teachers, a safe and drug-free environment in which to learn, and advanced technology so that students can achieve those standards, and (4) preparing young adults for the world of work. These broad educational priority areas are also reflected in the Department of Education?s Strategic Plan.

Within these broad priority areas, programs are evaluated in terms of the following three questions:

• How well are federal programs achieving their desired outcomes?
• Are programs being effectively implemented?
• Do programs demonstrate sound performance accountability?

In reviewing the evaluation results, it is important to remember that the federal effort in elementary and secondary education contributes to and is influenced by broader reforms in which it plays a small but strategic part. As has been shown in earlier evaluations, federal programs do not and should not operate in isolation. The state and local investment in education is much larger than that of the federal government. The 1994 legislation recognized the fundamental responsibility of states and local school systems to provide a quality education to all children, by calling for a partnership in which the federal government contributed resources, leadership, and assistance. For these reasons, it is not possible to disentangle the impact of federal programs from the impact of the state and local reform efforts that the federal programs are designed to support.

Key Findings

Based on available evidence from evaluations of the programs included in the 1994 ESEA Improving America?s Schools Act, Goals 2000, and School to Work legislation, this report finds that:

Reform is headed in the right direction, but states are still in the process of implementing reforms. The rapid development of statewide academic standards is unprecedented in the United States, and awareness of the need to change practice to support standards is strong across states, districts, and schools. Federal programs have been a major force in supporting and stimulating state-based reform. However, implementing standards-driven reform at the school and classroom level is a much more difficult and long-term effort.

States made significant progress in developing content standards, but progress is considerably slower with respect to developing performance standards and aligned assessments. Variability in the rigor of standards is a concern, given the lack of evidence when states have benchmarked standards against outside criteria, including NAEP.

The impact of standards-based reform is only beginning to be seen, as evidenced by the findings presented in various chapters of this report.

How Well Are Students Doing? Are Key Outcomes Improving?

The reforms begun under ESEA, Goals 2000, and the School to Work Act, have begun to produce changes in the nation?s classrooms. Data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) and two international assessments provide some clear indication that these changes are working in some subject areas.

Overall, our nation?s students have made significant progress since the 1994 reauthorization. The percentage of all students performing at or above the basic achievement level has improved for most grade levels in reading and mathematics. However, in comparison with their international counterparts, U.S. students? standing in core subjects declines from among the highest in the world at the 4th grade to among the lowest at the 12th grade. Exhibit 2.1 provides U.S. students? National Report Card on progress in core subjects since 1994 (or in some cases 1992, if that was the most recent assessment).

Reading:A long-term view of reading achievement shows that scores on the trend National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) have improved slightly over the past two decades for 9- and 13-year olds, and remained stable for 17-year olds. In the short term, the percentage of 4^th graders scoring at or above the basic achievement level on main NAEP remained stable between 1994 and 1998, while 8th and 12th graders? scores increased.

In addition to examining scores for all students, it is also important to examine the progress of those students most at risk of school failure, the target population for Title I. Exhibit 2.6 shows that the reading scores of fourth-grade students who scored in the lowest percentiles have improved significantly since 1994, after dropping between 1992 and 1994.

Mathematics: A long-term view of mathematics achievement shows that 9, 13, and 17-year olds? scores on the trend NAEP assessment have improved over the past two decades, with 9 year-olds making the largest improvements. In the short term, the percentage of 8th graders scoring at or above the basic achievement level on main NAEP increased between the two most recent assessments (1992 and 1996).

Course-aking: Students are taking more rigorous courses, and the percentage of high school students taking challenging math and science courses such as geometry, calculus, and chemistry has increased throughout the decade for all racial and ethnic groups. Since 1990, an increasing proportion of 11th and 12th grade students have been taking Advanced Placement courses and successfully passing them.

High School Completion: There has been some small progress in increasing the high school completion rates in the last two decades. The high school completion rate of 18-24 year-olds wavered around 84 percent between 1972 and 1983 and then in 1994 increased to 86 percent where it has remained since.

Drug Use: Drug use is declining but remains a concern. In 1998, after six years of steady increases in the use of illicit drugs, use among secondary school students is down, as shown in Exhibit 2.16. This downturn represents the second year of decreases for 8th graders and the first for 10th and 12th graders since their low points early in the decade.

Are Federal Education Programs Helping to Prepare Children for School?

Progress to date. Administered through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Head Start program represents the Federal government?s largest investment in early childhood services, serving almost 800,000 children in 1998. Serving about 260,000 preschool-age children, Title I, Part A, is the largest of the Department?s early childhood efforts, yet little data exist on the quality of preschool services funded under the program or program performance. Data are available on the progress of the Even Start Family Literacy Program. Evaluations of the Even Start program indicate that this program is enhancing children?s language development and readiness for school. Findings from these evaluations include:

Options for strengthening the programs.

• Clarify the objectives of the programs by helping to define school readiness. Determining whether or not preschool programs are meeting their objectives as well as attempts to hold programs accountable are complicated by the fact that there are no consistent standards on school readiness at the national or state levels. Legislation could help define school readiness.

• Improve the intensity and retention in Even Start through the use of common indicators. Although earlier evaluations of Even Start provided evidence that more intense programs led to greater educational gains for children and their parents, few projects offer an amount of service that might be expected to produce large literacy gains for most in need families. Projects face a tradeoff between the number of families they can serve and the intensity of service they can offer to each family. In addition, only 41 percent of families who enrolled in 1995-96 remained in Even Start programs for more than a year (although almost 10 percent of families reported meeting their goals or moving as the reason for their departure). States could be required to assess the intensity of services and efforts to retain families through the use of common indicators.

• Strengthen accountability by requiring preschool programs to report on a common core set of results-based indicators. While Even Start?s national evaluation provides adequate performance data, it is unclear how the states use performance information to hold projects accountable. States could use the results-based indicators of quality they are required to develop under recent amendments to the program to hold projects accountable. Title I preschool has no performance accountability. More information is needed on the quality and outcomes of preschool programs funded under Title I, Part A. Title I preschool programs could report on the same results-based indicators required of Even Start programs. These could include child-based indicators (such as reading readiness), and where appropriate, adult-based indicators (such as receipt of a high school diploma or GED).

Are Federal Programs Helping States Develop and Implement Standards?

Progress to date. ESEA and Goals 2000 have been essential in spurring standards-based reform in local schools and communities. Almost half of all school districts nationwide and more than 80 percent of poor districts reported that Title I is "driving standards-based reform in the district as a whole." A recent study by the General Accounting Office (GAO) finds that states report that Goals 2000 has been a significant factor in promoting their education reform efforts. States have made substantial progress developing state content standards. Currently, 48 states, Puerto Rico, and the District of Columbia have completed the development of state content standards.

• Twenty states and Puerto Rico have completed the development of student performance standards in at least reading/language arts and mathematics.

• Six states have policies that link or align teacher professional development to state content standards and 11 states are developing such policies.

Although there has been significant progress in the development of content standards, a number of states did not meet the 1997-98 deadline for completion of content and performance standards outlined in the 1994 legislation. In many cases, the reason for this delay is that states are developing their performance standards in tandem with their final assessment. Many states are now operating under a waiver from the U.S. Department of Education. All states have adopted a timeline that will produce assessments aligned with content and performance standards by 2000-01.

Options for strengthening the programs. Federal efforts to support standards-based reform need to be strengthened in at least four key areas:

• Ensure the rigor of state standards. Independent studies have revealed different and sometimes contradictory findings on the quality and rigor of state standards. Differences in student achievement on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) and student performance on state assessments suggest wide variation in the challenge of state standards.

• Ensure alignment of standards and assessments. States report needing "a great deal" more assistance in the development of aligned assessments and linking those assessments to accountability systems.

• Include all students, particularly limited-English proficient and special education students in assessments. Guidelines and criteria for the inclusion of LEP students are inconsistent across and within states.

• Align all aspects of educational systems with standards. Standards-based reform requires systemic change including retraining teachers, aligning curriculum and classroom practices with standards, involving families, and developing effective systems of holding schools and districts accountable for performance.

Are Federal Programs Supporting Effective Professional Development for Teachers?

Progress to date. Under the 1994 ESEA reauthorization and Goals 2000, Congress explicitly provided for programs intended to enhance teacher competence. The Eisenhower Program is the largest of these efforts. Professional development is an allowable activity under Titles I, VI, and VII, and varying portions of these funds are used to support professional development. However, little is known about the quality of the professional development activities supported by these programs, or about their outcomes or impact on teacher practice. Effective professional development is critical to helping the nation move toward the full implementation of standards in the classroom.

• A national survey of teachers shows that most do not yet think that they are fully equipped to implement standards. During the 1997-98 school year, only 36 percent of teachers of the core academic subjects said that they felt "very well prepared" to implement state or district standards.

• The Eisenhower activities sponsored by institutions of higher education (IHEs) and non-profit organizations (NPOs) are producing results comparable to exemplary professional development programs. Seventy-five percent of the participants in the Eisenhower activities sponsored by IHEs and NPOs reported that the activities deepened their content knowledge in mathematics and science.

• The goal of providing extended, in-depth learning for teachers as part of district-provided Eisenhower professional development has not yet been achieved. Results are more positive for professional development provided by institutions of higher education and non-profit organizations.

• Eisenhower professional development activities are not especially targeted on teachers from high-poverty schools.

• The 1994 reauthorization required states to develop performance indicators for professional development. Thus far, only 30 states have done so for the Eisenhower program. The quality of these indicators is uneven.

Options for strengthening the programs. Federal efforts to improve the quality of our nation?s teachers could consider the following options:

• Emphasize professional development that focuses on subject matter content and how to teach it. This professional development could be provided in extended, intensive, collaborative, active learning opportunities.

• Federal professional development programs could place a much greater emphasis on serving teachers who work in high-poverty schools and teachers who would not necessarily volunteer to participate in professional development.

• Strengthen state and local performance indicator reporting systems through technical assistance and increased resources. The requirement that states and districts develop indicators has resulted in more and higher quality indicators than other federal programs, but these indicators are still uneven.

• Grantees could be required to use performance indicator data from their programs for both continuous improvement and accountability.

Is the Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act Supporting Effective School Drug and Violence Prevention?

Progress to date. The Safe and Drug Free Schools and Communities Program is the primary source of federal funds to support school-based education to prevent drug use and violence. Annual surveys show that drug use among 8th, 10th, and 12th graders is declining after rising steadily in the early 1990?s. Drug use in schools remains much lower than use in other locations.

• Crime in schools has also declined in recent years, and the rate of students experiencing serious violent crime remains much lower in schools than out of school.

• Progress under the Safe and Drug Free Communities and Schools Act has been harder to measure. A review of state goals and objectives for the program found that these goals were sometimes poorly articulated or they lacked a data source or methodology for assessing outcomes.

• The Department recently established Principles of Effectiveness for the program that require districts to establish measurable goals and objectives, implement research-based programs, and evaluate programs regularly. An evaluation of state and local implementation of these principles will be completed in the spring of 1999.

• To target a greater percentage of program funds on high-quality programs in areas of significant need, the Department will expand National Programs activities in Fiscal Year 1999 by investing more than $95 million in competitive grants designed to meet that goal. In this way, the Department seeks to focus limited resources on high-quality programs and enlarge the available pool of strategies of demonstrated effectiveness.

Options for strengthening the programs. Federal policy makers might consider balancing the flexibility of the SDFSCA with accountability for implementing strong programs and accountability for results.

• Incorporate the Principles of Effectiveness. This would require grant recipients to use research-based prevention approaches, engage in coordinated, comprehensive planning, and use evaluation data for program planning and development.

• Explore ways to target funds more effectively. This would support high-need areas and high-quality programming.

• Encourage states and districts to move towards outcomes-based performance measurement and improved performance reporting.

• Increase coordination within states between the SEA and Governors? programs.

Is Federal Support Strengthening Access to and Use of Technology to Support Learning?

Progress to date. Access to modern computers and the Internet is growing rapidly. The ratio of students to modern multimedia computers in the nation's classrooms was cut by almost half between 1997 and 1998.

• More than half of all public school classrooms have access to the Internet, compared with almost none in 1994.

• The "digital divide" between students in high- and low-poverty schools has been nearly eliminated in terms of access to instructional computers. Gaps remain in classroom access to modern multimedia computers, Internet access, and in access outside of school. For example, 76 percent of households earning over $75,000,000 in 1997 owned a computer, compared with less than 17 percent of households earning less than $20,000. However, these gaps are closing.

• Federal funds paid for a quarter of all computers received by schools last year. Federal funds paid for half of all new computers in high-poverty schools, and they paid for more computers in high-poverty schools than in low-poverty schools.

• Districts report that long-term district plans, such as the education technology plans required by the Technology Literacy Challenge Fund, are important factors in influencing their educational technology activities.

• States and subgrantees vary widely in their allocation of the Technology Literacy Challenge Funds to high-need areas. Star Schools and Technology Innovation Challenge Grant programs are demonstrating effective uses of educational technology, but are not providing a clear focus for federal leadership in developing the knowledge base.

• Many states and other grantees have not devoted sufficient effort to evaluating the effectiveness of their programs. They also collect very different data, makin it difficult to monitor performance and impact across districts and sites.

Options for strengthening the programs. Since the pioneering creation of the Star Schools program to provide national leadership in educational technology a decade ago, the context for federal policy in educational technology has changed in fundamental ways. This includes rapidly growing and widespread access to computers and the emergence of the Internet, the E-rate and a growing understanding of how these technologies can be used to improve teaching and learning. The following options could help ensure that this investment in technology works to increase equity and excellence in our nation's schools:

• Focus the Technology Literacy Challenge Fund on professional development. Given the rapid rate of growth in computers, overall, increasing access through education programs is no longer as important as strengthening teachers? ability to effectively use these technologies for improved teaching and learning.

• Target Technology Literacy Challenge Fund resources to ensure that, in combination with state and local resources, high poverty and high need schools receive adequate resources to effectively use educational technology.

• Clarify the purposes of the Technology Innovation Challenge Grants as to whether it is simply a funding source for educational technology, or is focused on developing the knowledge base and demonstrating strategies for effective use of educational technology. With the tremendous growth in technology access, the Department could launch rigorous evaluations of strategies that could optimize technology's potential to improve teaching and learning.

• Adopt a uniform set of core performance indicators in the legislation for states to use in preparing their technology performance reports for the Technology Literacy Challenge Fund, the Technology Innovation Challenge Grants, Star Schools and other relevant programs.

Are Federal Programs Contributing to Greater Choice in Public Schools?

Progress to date. The federal government has promoted public school choice primarily by supporting the development and expansion of charter schools and magnet schools. On balance, both the PCSP and the MSAP support the public school choice standards described in the report.

Charter Schools:

• The Public Charter Schools Program (PCSP) has supported nearly three-fourths of the roughly 1,100 charter schools currently operating, and an even larger proportion of charter schools in the planning stages. PCSP funds represent about 6 percent of the total costs incurred by these schools.

• There are 31 states plus the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico that received grants in 1998.

• A lack of access to start-up funds continues to be the largest single barrier to the successful implementation of charter schools.

• Charter schools serve a demographic profile of students similar to those in public schools, although national averages mask significant state-by-state variability.

• It is too early to tell if student achievement is improving in charter schools, both because the research base is limited and the schools are young. State and district-level evaluations are another source of information about the achievement of students enrolled in charter schools, but so far, preliminary conclusions are mixed. These evaluations of the impact of charter schools on student achievement reveal the difficulties in collecting uniform, comparable student achievement data across schools.

• A 1996 evaluation found that about half of districts that received 1991-93 grants met their desegregation targets. Progress in achieving desegregation objectives is still unknown for the 1998 grantees; however, preliminary data shows that these grantees have a greater ability to specify their desegregation objectives than the 1991-93 grantees.

Options for strengthening the programs.

Charter Schools:

While the 1998 reauthorization of the PCSP did address such important issues as flexibility and accountability, there are still several ways the PCSP can be strengthened through administrative means.

• Increase federal PCSP support for states that target disadvantaged students. While the PCSP does currently consider how states target educationally disadvantaged students when determining the grant awards, the PCSP may want to direct more funds to those states.

• Ensure that charter schools receive equitable and sufficient funds. A logical federal role may be to direct PCSP funds to those states that ensure that charter schools receive funding that is comparable to other public schools in the district or state.

Magnet Schools

Although information on the effectiveness of the MSAP is limited, the information in this report suggests several options for federal policy makers:

• Clarify the kind of diversity the MSAP should address. Clarification is needed about if and how the purpose of the MSAP could be expanded to include reducing isolation of students from different ethnic and economic backgrounds (in addition to different racial backgrounds) in order to adapt to the context within which magnet schools are operating.

• Improve the targeting of MSAP funds. Consider a district?s level or degree of minority group isolation as a selection criteria for MSAP grants.

• Clarify Congressional intent regarding the MSAP statute in regards to whether the MSAP should impact districtwide desegregation, in addition to impacting individual magnet schools.

• Clarify the role of innovative programs. Congress may wish to consider ending this authority or using it as a research and development set-aside in which the new approaches to promoting diversity can be designed, evaluated, and emulated when appropriate.

• Implement an information management system that could provide data regarding the overall progress of the MSAP grantees. The MSAP should consider developing a system that could aggregate the progress reports of grantees and provide data on the Program as a whole.

Is the School-To-Work Opportunities Act Helping Graduates Leave School Ready to Begin Careers or to Continue Their Studies?

Progress to date. The School to Work Opportunities Act (STWOA) provided venture capital to states and localities to help underwrite the initial costs of planning and establishing statewide systems for helping young people make more effective transitions between high school and careers or further education. To promote local experimentation, Congress gave states and localities significant discretion to design and implement school-to-work systems. The law was designed to end in 2001.

There is little existing research on the long-term effects of federal school-to-work programs. There is, however, a growing body of evidence of some positive early results.

• Participation in well-designed STW programs appears to increase students' academic focus and motivation. Studies have found that students in quality STW programs enroll in more college prep courses than their peers in the general curriculum, particularly in advanced math and science courses.

• An independent evaluation found evidence of increasing collaboration between employers and schools has been a particularly successful aspect of STW implementation. Employer involvement has increased steadily since the Act was passed.

• Participation in school-to-work activities is as common among high school seniors enrolled in college-preparatory curricula as among those who are not.

• Students give high marks to the STW activities, particularly those that afford them workplace experiences and academic classes related to their career goals.

• One study of four programs found an increase in college attendance rates among those students initially identified as "non-college-bound."

• Students in high-quality STW programs enroll in more college prep courses than their peers in the general curriculum.

Options for strengthening the programs. Federal funding for School-to-Work ends in 2001. In the relatively short period since School-to-Work began, however, obstacles to implementing effective STW programs have included: (1) the complexity of the reforms and the limited and short-term nature of federal funding, (2) confusion about the definition of the target population, (3) lack of coordination with academic reforms, and (4) a trade-off between breadth and depth in programs. As the end of federal funding for STW nears, federal policymakers might consider ways to promote and sustain the following promising activities in the reauthorization of ESEA or through other legislative vehicles:

• Promotion of linkages between the academic standards movement and STW efforts, through curricula that combine academic rigor with greater relevance to students? future plans

• Support for professional development that can help teachers become more adept and comfortable with contextual teaching methods that strengthen the links between school and outside resources and

• Continued support for community level partnerships and institutions that connect young people with experiences outside the classroom.

Is the Department of Education Providing High-Quality Help and Guidance?

Progress to date. The 1994 legislation authorized four major field-based technical assistance programs, each designed for a slightly different audience and issue area: (1) Comprehensive Regional Assistance Centers; (2) Eisenhower Regional Mathematics and Science Consortia; (3) Regional Technology in Education Consortia; and (4) Parent Information and Resource Centers. In addition, Title I established a system of state- and district-level school support teams designed to provide assistance to Title I schools.

• Evaluation and program performance data currently available show that technical assistance providers have reached a significant number of families, schools, and districts in their regions.

• Customer surveys suggest that ED?s technical assistance programs are providing valuable services to the field. Most direct recipients of technical assistance services report that they are satisfied with the quality and the usefulness of the assistance.

• General surveys of states and district administrators suggest, however, that ED?s technical assistance services do not address all customers? needs and purposes and that state and district staff often turn to other, more accessible, sources for help in implementing programs.

Options for strengthening the programs. ED?s current technical assistance programs could be integrated into a more coherent system with the following characteristics:

• Focus the federal technical assistance system on those areas where providers offer unique expertise and where they can add most value. These areas include: (1) the implementation of federal programs, (2) the development and implementation of performance indicator systems and continuous progress models, and (3) neutral assessment of research-based comprehensive school reform models.

• Integrate the Comprehensive Centers, Eisenhower Consortia, R*TEC, and PIRCs into a system of regionally-based comprehensive centers, complemented by national specialty centers.

• In one or two pilot regions, test a range of options for integrating the Department?s technical assistance programs. These approaches include: (1) Allowing individual technical assistance providers or a consortium of providers to submit a consolidated application to operate the Comprehensive Center, the Eisenhower Consortium, the R*TEC, and the PIRCs that serve the region; (2) Providing some additional funding to support the development of new models for collaboration; and (3) Consolidating existing programs into a single omnibus center providing all services to the entire pilot region.

• Create an electronic network that would disseminate products and information electronically on behalf of all federal technical assistance programs. Modeled on, or embedded in, the ERIC system, this electronic network would provide users with access to products and materials developed by all of the Department?s technical assistance providers, from a single point of entry.

• Create a national dissemination system that would promote the adoption of high-quality, research-based comprehensive school reform models.

• Deploy federal technical assistance services to complement existing state-level systems. Federal technical assistance providers would: (1) train state-level technical assistance providers in their particular areas of expertise; (2) train Title I school support teams and support their work with schools; and (3) provide consultation and expertise in evaluation, analysis of student performance data, and continuous improvement.

• Target direct assistance to schools and districts to those with the highest numbers and percentages of children in poverty, and to areas where state capacity is low.

Are Federal Laws Promoting Flexibility and Accountability for Results?

Progress to date. States, districts and schools have begun to take advantage of the increased flexibility in the legislation to create learning environments that can help all students reach challenging academic standards. Several sources indicate that more?and probably sufficient?flexibility is now available and being used. Comparisons of Goals 2000 and ESEA Title VI underscore the importance of providing direction for the use of Federal funds in conjunction with flexibility.

• The implementation of federal education programs ranging from Goals 2000 to the Technology Literacy Challenge Fund is being tied to state and local reform efforts; consolidated planning by states and districts is fostering better coordination with federal education programs.

• Relatively few waivers of federal requirements have been requested, even though waivers are available to states and districts through the Department or the Ed-Flex program. This finding suggests that Federal education programs are sufficiently flexible.

• Only three of the programs authorized in 1994 require the use of performance measures for accountability. States have made considerable progress in implementing state content and performance standards required by ESEA Title I, though state accountability systems will remain incomplete until aligned assessments, which are required by 2000-2001, are implemented. In general, accountability in the ESEA remains weak.

Options for strengthening the programs. Although the evidence suggests that significant flexibility is available to and being taken advantage of by educators, the intended exchange of increased flexibility for increased accountability has not yet been fulfilled:

• States and districts need to further develop their capacity for innovation in order to take full advantage of available flexibility. The Department and states should try to insure that the technical assistance needed by schools and districts to develop this capacity is available.

• The establishment of better accountability systems is critical so that progress toward Federal program goals can be measured and inform decision-making at all levels.

• Accountability under Title I remains incomplete due to the transition period ? until 2000-01 -- allowed by ESEA Title I for states to fully develop aligned accountability systems. Some states are still in the process of defining adequate yearly progress for districts and schools and variation in definitions across states makes it difficult to hold districts and schools accountable for progress made using federal funds.

Conclusions

The concluding chapter considers the implication of the findings drawn from the preceding chapters according to the three organizing principles used throughout the report:

• How well are federal programs achieving their desired outcomes?

• Are programs being effectively implemented with respect to such issues as targeting to the populations who need it most, delivery of high-quality services, and coordination of services across programs?

• Do programs demonstrate sound performance accountability?

Implication of Findings on How Well Programs are Achieving their Desired Outcomes.

• Continue to support and accelerate the pace of standards-driven reform that states and local school districts are implementing. The findings suggest that standards-driven reform should be given a chance to fully take hold while the nation continues to assess progress in student performance. At the same time, the pace of reform must accelerate if significant reductions in the achievement gap are to be realized for those students most at risk of school failure.

• Reorient program implementation to focus more on results. Many ESEA programs are demonstrating improvements in certain performance areas consistent with standards-driven reform, but continued improvements in performance are required if federal programs are to contribute to greater results.

• Clarify current program objectives. Some programs lack clarity of purpose concerning the expected outcomes of program resources which hinders their ability to effectively focus on achieving clear outcomes.

Implication of Findings for the Quality of Program Implementation

• Improve effective targeting of federal resources. The federal government has an historic responsibility to help ensure adequate educational opportunities to students in highest- poverty communities and schools and racial/ethnic population groups. Title I is the major program to reach these communities and populations, but a case can be made for other programs to also give priority to the neediest populations.
  Options for Consideration

  • Clarify provisions to target federal programs within states to the neediest populations, including high-poverty schools. Decide whether to give states discretion over program participation with appropriate performance accountability and reporting, or , instead, to target funds on federal priority populations.

  • Call on states to report publicly on how they distribute federal funds to schools serving high concentrations of low income and other federally targeted students.

  • Offer "Catch-up Consolidated Grants" focused on performance in high poverty schools.

• Effectively implement federal program services. Programs that are not applying the best knowledge of promising and effective practices to their own projects are wasting taxpayer monies and short-changing participants. While we have seen some clear progress in improving the quality of ESEA services, serious implementation weaknesses remain.

  Options for Consideration

  • Adopt "Principles of Effectiveness" as an explicit legislative provision across all major federally-funded programs. This could help focus limited resources on high-quality programs and enlarge the available pool of strategies of demonstrated effectiveness.

  • Introduce competitive awards. To the degree that recipients of federal funds are assured automatic funding based solely on need, the incentives for high project quality are diminished. Competitive awards based on projects coming forth with proposals and judgements made on the basis of quality could enhance competition and the chances of obtaining better quality proposals. To help ensure that competitively-awarded funds reach high-need areas, funds might also be set aside for separate competitions for high-need areas, or contingency funding of projects in which continuations depend upon demonstrated progress.

• Modernize the System of Technical Assistance. Although the 1994 ESEA reauthorization consolidated some technical assistance authorities, the seamless network of support initially envisioned has yet to develop. Federal assistance providers often remain isolated from each other and from the direct delivery of technical assistance by state or locally funded providers. However, new tools such as the internet have been developed which could make such a network possible.

  Options for Consideration

  • Support an integrated national electronic education network. A federally supported network would serve as an electronic resource center for sound education information. Specialty area clearinghouses, built around a state-of-the-art ERIC system, could support the provision of information electronically. The network could provide schools and school systems with productivity-enhancing tools. The network might also make it easier for the collaboration and information sharing that now happens within state electronic systems among universities, school administrators, teachers, and parents to occur nationally and regionally.

  • Better integrate the Comprehensive Centers, the Eisenhower Consortia, and the R*TECS into a seamless system of regionally based comprehensive centers, complemented by national specialty centers linked to state and community providers. Reauthorization would emphasize that federal technical assistance centers emphasize "training the trainer" models and work through state or local assistance collaboratives rather than directly provide assistance themselves. Further, the Comprehensive Centers should focus directly on issues of federal program implementation, including performance measurement to support continuous progress, a core program component which is universally weak among most programs. Specialty Centers, designed to disseminate research-based instructional materials and reform models in priority areas such as mathematics and science, reading, and the uses of technology in instruction, would work nationally, including electronically, with one to two centers serving the entire country on a topical area.

  • Support "Grants for Evaluating Model Effectiveness." Rigorous independent evaluations of models would provide objective information that would be disseminated through the electronic network and Comprehensive Centers. Competitive awards could be made to support independent testing of model approaches using evaluations that meet rigorous standards of quality.

• Improve Coordination Across Programs. Legislation that is acceptable when looked at in isolation may not be optimal when all parts are combined and the aggregate effects are considered. Administrative burden accumulates, and the sheer number of pieces of legislation may unintentionally diffuse efforts, confuse purposes, and fragment service delivery. Legislation may be improved by clarifying objectives and criteria for effective services.

  Options for Consideration

  • Programs that provide major support for professional development, including Eisenhower Professional Development, Goals 2000, and Innovative Educational Program Strategies (Title VI-A), all provide relatively broad assistance. In addition, the Technology Literacy Challenge Fund and Title VII professional development programs support professional development in areas of high need.

  • Information technology programs, including four major elementary and secondary programs (the Technology Literacy Challenge Fund, Technology Innovation Challenge Grants, Star Schools and the E-rate) along with seven other smaller authorities all support the expansion of technology in schools.

  • Technical assistance is supported through various authorities with different foci, including assistance to parents, technology, math, and science.

• Strengthen across-program coherence. A number of programs with different purposes have common program components that would benefit from being made more coherent across programs. Two program components in particular should be reviewed:

  Options for Consideration

  • Professional development provisions that could be made similar through incorporating common language that is consistent with high-quality practices, including professional development provided through programs, such as Title I and Title VII.

  • Parent involvement provisions to incorporate a common set of policies and requirements for schools to develop one single set of parent policies and compacts to cover all ESEA programs with now distinct parent involvement provisions.

Implications of Findings for Encouraging Programs To Demonstrate Sound Performance Accountability: Creating an Integrated Performance and Benchmarking System

Efforts are underway in several program offices of the Department of Education to consolidate data collections and to bring them on-line electronically. In addition, most states already provide the public with information about their public schools in the form of "school profiles," or "report cards," however this information is rarely comparable from state to state. Several states are already developing statewide integrated data collection systems for their administration of federal and state programs, in such a way that schools and districts can compare and benchmark themselves to each other. Many are working toward the goal of a better-integrated performance and benchmarking data system. Such an Integrated Performance and Benchmarking System (IBPS) could enhance federal and state efforts by developing a set of mutually-needed core measures and performance indicators and increase the compatibility of the data collection systems. The goals of an IPBS would be to:

• Make federal education data more coherent, timely, and comparable across units and over time.

• Increase the usefulness of federal data to states, districts, and the general public.

• Facilitate the development of annual school, state, and district report cards, which allow comparison and benchmarking between states and districts.

• Reduce the burden of federally required program data collections and surveys.

  Options for Consideration

  The Department of Education could work together with states and districts on a long-term project to develop an IPBS. Such a system could be developed over the next five years, to replace the currently overlapping and antiquated federal-state education program reporting system by the year 2004. It could:

  • Be based on a core set of program performance indicators incorporated in ESEA reauthorization legislation, as well as in state program performance reports.

  • Utilize the core set of indicators as a basis for streamlining other duplicative and inconsistent program data collections.

  • Facilitate standardization of measures for program performance indicators across states, similar to the Common Core of Data.

  • Make possible aggregation across schools, districts, and states, to provide national estimates, as well as comparable benchmarking between sites.

  • Use modern electronic reporting methods, by having schools and districts sign on to an Internet site and report the data needed for the performance indicators.

  • Include data quality standards for collection, aggregation, and reporting of data.

  • Include grants and technical assistance to states to develop or improve their performance data reporting systems to be able to participate in IPBS.

  • Be designed to ensure the complete confidentiality of student information.

  The IPBS would be designed in partnership with various states and state education organizations, and piloted as a demonstration project in a few partner states, then revised and gradually expanded to all states.

A Final Note

The Department?s evaluations of Goals 2000, Title I, and other Elementary and Secondary Education Act programs have shown that federal programs have contributed to the nation?s progress in implementing standards-based reform. Many of the key elements for achieving the democratic ideal of excellence and equity for all are just being put in place. Other reform elements need to be strengthened if challenging standards are to reach all classrooms and help all children reach high expectations. Evaluations have documented how federal programs can stimulate and work in tandem with the best efforts of states and local school systems to improve education for our nation?s children and for our future. They have also shown where federal programs, and education in general, must address shortcomings in delivering on the promise of high-quality schooling for all students. Educational improvement is a work in progress and benefits from a careful analysis of its implementation and early impact.

Please send questions or comments to frank.forman@ed.gov

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