Are We Really Gaining Ground?
Without Grading the Success or Failure of Education Reforms, We’ll Never Know

Recently, the spillway was opened and the muddy Mississippi River flowed into Lake Pontchartrain. The state announced that it would compare the lake waters, before and after the spillway opening, to see if there were changes. Here we are, nearly three years into the spillway of “education experiments” flowing into our schools. And, we are not yet measuring the results of the experiments on the lives of our children and youth. Surely, their lives are more important than the lake waters.

Charter schools, the state takeover, and high-stakes testing are all experimental practices designed to improve education, specifically, for at-risk students. Title 1 of the No Child Left Behind Act, whose purpose is to improve education for the disadvantaged and reduce the achievement gap, funds the majority of the experimental practices.

To measure whether the experimental practices are working, complete and accurate student data must be collected and assessed. The 2006-07 school year was to be the first full year of data collection following Katrina. Yet, researchers, including myself, have received student data files from the State Department of Education (DOE), with so much information missing, that the files are useless. While we have received much cooperation from the DOE, the fact is that there is no reliable student data for 2006-07.

When charter schools were authorized, the Louisiana legislature stated that it was their “over-riding consideration” and their intention “that charter schools serve the best interests of at-risk pupils.” The legislation specifically defined an “at-risk” student as meeting one of several criteria:

(1) Is eligible to participate in the federal free or reduced lunch program.
(2) Is under the age of twenty and has been withdrawn from school prior to graduation.
(3) Is under the age of twenty and has failed to achieve the required score on the graduation exit exam.
(4) Is in the eighth grade or below and is reading two or more grades below grade level.
(5) Has been identified as an exceptional child, excluding gifted and talented.
(6) Is the mother or father of a child.” (La.R.S. 17:3972-17:3973)

Data are not available in all of the categories above. Without data, it is impossible to determine if charter schools are serving those intended. Since at least seven charter schools have admission requirements, it is obvious that these charter schools are not serving drop-outs or failing students.

Todd Ziebarth, with the Nation Alliance for Public Charter Schools, recognizes that charter schools with admission requirements create problems, as the federal law requires charter schools to have open admissions. Some charter schools do have open admissions, but then remove students, who experience discipline or academic problems. This data, also, is not collected. Further, many charter schools with open admission policies are not open on a school-wide basis but are open on a grade-level basis. This, again, defies the concept of open admission.

With or without admission requirements, charter schools have served some important purposes in New Orleans. When the Orleans Parish School Board declared that it would not open schools following Katrina, charter school boards came to the rescue and opened several schools. Since charter school boards were in control, the donations and support from private and nonprofit sectors were bountiful. These sectors were mainly unresponsive to public schools pre-Katrina because there were so many reports of widespread fiscal mismanagement by the pre-Katrina public school board.

Yet, because charter schools are allowed to have admission requirements, there are questions as to whether they serve the at-risk students so intended. To answer this, researchers need access to student data, which is currently lacking.

The other initiatives that require accurate data to determine if they are working are high-stakes testing and the state takeover. Many questions need to be answered: Has the high-stakes testing policy resulted in higher achievement for the students who failed, or have these students simply dropped out to avoid further testing? Has the state takeover resulted in better school performance scores for those failing schools under their jurisdiction?

It is understandable that there was no data for the 2005-06 Katrina school year. But, it is difficult to understand the lack of data for the 2006-07 school year. Without such data, New Orleans most vulnerable children and youth continue to be the subjects of an education experiment that might not even be working.

Written by Dr. Barbara Ferguson, who divides her time between the University of New Orleans and practicing law. Dr. Ferguson can be reached at bferguso@uno.edu