Arne Duncan’s speech to the NEA today is an important one and an important moment.    It’s fair but challenging and a pretty clear signal of where the lines are.     Free PR advice for the NEA:  Pretend you love it and are on board and in agreement with the Secretary about the urgency to improve schools, it’s a holiday weekend so maybe nobody will notice the actual content….

Update from Eduwonk sources inside the hall:  They’re ignoring my advice!  They even heartily booed the mention of Green Dot!   These days that’s like hating Santa Claus…some booing at other parts as well, tenure, seniority, and all the talk of data but charters are definitely the big target that almost everyone in the NEA ranks can agree to shoot at.

Update II:  Some reax from LA Times, Politico, Sawchuk, Antonucci.

Update III:  Implicit big winner here:  AFT Pres. Randi Weingarten.

This is depressing…

…in Rhode Island.  Mayor McKee is sort of a low-key guy but he’s really moving the ball here…Background here.

You frequently hear people remark about how different Arne Duncan and Michelle Rhee are.  Perhaps in some ways, but I’m not so sure their circumstances are not more similar than dissimilar and may well ultimately require similar resolve.   Michelle Rhee has pursued an aggressive reform strategy that basically means she has to win on every contested issue or transaction.  It can work, but the risk-reward ratio for that strategy heightens the risk around every clash.   But, as we come into a period of a few months (big calls on Race to the Top, low-performing schools, remaining stimulus funds, FY11 budget request and No Child Left Behind reauthorization groundwork) that will arguably define the Obama first term on education it’s worth asking whether Duncan isn’t now in roughly the same place given his ambitious plans.    There is intense push-back going on around many of his priorities, especially on the Hill where some of the interest groups seem to be preparing to make their stand.  You can sense that at the first sign of weakness the overall politics here, which have been largely favorable for him, could start to change.  In other words, it’s unclear if he can afford to lose a big one either.

WaPo ed board foreshadows Arne Duncan’s big speech tomorrow…

Meanwhile, at ES today and tomorrow we have a group of teachers, former teachers, and a policy expert discussing how the professional work of teaching does or does not mesh with unionism.  It’s off to a good start and as with all of ES’ online discussions you can submit questions for the panelists as well.

Jay Mathews weighed-in on some of this on Monday in the WaPo.

Two reasons to read this new Consortium on Chicago School Research study on teacher mobility in Chicago.  First, it’s well done and an important issue.  Second, the consortium model is expanding so you’ll see more of this style of work in other cities.

So former Arkansas Education Commissioner Ken James has joined America’s Choice.  It’s a catch for them and an interesting move, so I asked James what it means for a state chief to move to a job like this and whether we should take this as a signal on common standards.  His response:

After 36 years in public education and serving in all of the roles from classroom teacher, high school principal, superintendent, and the past five years as Commissioner of Education, I felt it was time to examine and work on the problems and issues facing education from a different perspective and lens. I have been aware of the detailed and extensive standards work by America’s Choice for several years, and the work is really second to none. I also think my extensive instructional background, site, district, state and national leadership experiences can and will provide a new perspective and definite value add to the existing and future work.

In my role as President of CCSSO, I am very proud that I was able to help lead the initial conversations and efforts around state led common standards. I don’t think anyone thought that at the end of the day, we would have 46 states and 3 territories sign on to engage in the exploration of this effort. We are at a pivotal time in this country and never before have we had the “stars” so well aligned (the President, the Secretary of Education, CCSSO, NGA, Council of Great City Schools, AFT, NEA, ACT, College Board and others), ready to move this work forward. We may never have this level of engagement and resources again and we cannot fail to seize this once in a lifetime opportunity. As a country, we must realize and embrace the fact that even those state standards that are touted and perceived to be the highest, fall short of the standards and expectations of the highest performing countries. Our work must focus on developing higher, clearer, and fewer standards that will provide our nation’s students with the skill sets to be functioning members in a global market place. I will remain actively engaged in the state led common standards work as the Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer at America’s Choice.

It just can’t be a very good sign that when someone raises serious questions about one of the liveliest and controversial issues in our field those questions are ignored or distorted and caricatured. I’ve heard Checker Finn’s new book on pre-kindergarten education referred to as an anti-pre-k book (it’s not), an intemperate attack on the pre-k movement (it’s critical, sure, but let’s assume they’re not as vulnerable as the kids they serve), or dismissed as simply too conservative to be taken seriously by the field (again it’s not).

That doesn’t mean it’s a flawless book.   Sara Mead has engaged with it and points out some problems with the analysis (in particular Finn overstates current participation levels - especially from a quality standpoint - and that’s no small thing given his underlying point) and she also rounds up the other writing on it.  But in general there hasn’t been a lot of discussion of Reroute the Preschool Juggernaut’s points about current program coordination, costs and how to think about costs, quality, and universality. These are not small matters; they cut to the heart of what is likely to be a massive public investment in an important strategy to improve outcomes for economically disadvantaged youngsters.

I support a more robust governmental role in ensuring access to good pre-k programs and the idea of a Mead-like federal-state partnership to help get us there - although I’d also favor something bolder to create a fuller 0-5 initiative.  Regardless, various issues of program design are hardly obvious or settled, so more debate about the questions Finn raises and his contention that targeted pre-k is more the way to go seems a good thing for the issue in the long run.

National Journal just launched a new education group blog today.  Lisa Caruso plays ringmaster to what looks like it’ll be quite a circus.  This week’s issue is the Recovery Act and education.  My take on that, especially the “Race to the Top” here.

Also, over at US News I review the new HBO documentary “Shouting Fire,” which debuts tonight.   It’s a free speech film but not surprisngly has some education angles to it, including the Debbie Almonstaser and Chase Harper cases.

Two thoughts on today’s WaPo look at peer review for teachers.  First, great lede, more cowbell is exactly what this field needs…Second, is it not a little odd that at a time when we’re clamoring for third party regulation in most other fields education is romanticizing an idea that runs the other way?  Peer review has a role, but unless it’s coupled with much more rigorous standards and engagement with data and some managerial discretion it’s insufficient.  Toledo is an interesting and important model but when you unpack the numbers and the evaluations there is less there than meets the eye…

MDRC does a real service with this policy brief on the late Reading First program (pdf).

We’ve seen this story too many times…promising Southern conservative governor inexplicably does something self-destructive, not in his own political interest, not in the interest of his state, and potentially damages lives in the process…I refer, of course, to Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal’s embrace of a bill that will lower standards in Louisiana and work at cross-purposes with the goal of preparing all students for some sort of post-secondary experience.   Reformers in Louisiana and nationally opposed the bill…

You should follow Charlie Barone on Twitter, he’s got the goods in 140 characters or less….

Free range AFTie Joan Baratz-Snowden turns in a must-read comprehensive paper on teacher tenure.

Dem moderates in the Senate weigh-in on the Obama education agenda with a letter to the President (pdf).  Depending on how all this goes down they could prove to be a key voting block for reform.  

In New York the United Federation of Teachers and Green Dot Public Schools reached a contract agreement that’s bound to be something of a touchstone in the ongoing national conversation about teachers’ contracts.  Gotham Schools rounds it up for you and has the document.

TBD:  Big winner Randi Weingarten who can now sport a new reform cred?  Or will the precedents in this contract become pressure points elsewhere as James Merriman gives voice to in this NY Post story and cause headaches within the teachers’ union ranks?  And what’s the ricochet effect on the D.C. negotiations?

Update:  UFT EdWize blog has a long post up on this as well.

The Supreme Court ruled in the Forest Grove School District v. T.A.case (pdf) today.   Bad news for school districts.  Background here.  First thought, look for action on the Hill on this…Second thought, taking rights away never easy…Third thought, except when it involves school choice! 

It’s on in DC….

Box Canyon? Doesn’t the Washington Teachers’ Union have something of a dilemma here? If they contest every firing of a veteran teacher, as is the general practice, that will illustrate Michelle Rhee’s point that the tenure policy in Washington D.C. is an obstacle to teacher quality. And if they don’t contest all of them doesn’t it make her point that there are some tenured teachers in the system who shouldn’t be teaching?

So there is a new ranking Republican member on the House Education and Labor Committee in Congress, John Kline (MN).   He replaces Buck McKeon (CA) who departs for Armed Services.   Word is that the Republicans were concerned that any replacement for McKeon be able to take on Chairman Miller (D-CA) on labor issues, which helped Kline’s case over some others considered too moderate on labor issues.  If so, that actually bodes well for education.  In recent years whether Democrats or Republicans were in charge the committee has accomplished a lot on education when the big partisan debates have been over labor policy.  It gave them something to fight about and increased the pressure to get something done on the other side of the ledger.  When John Boehner (R-OH) was chairman, for instance, he worked closely with Miller to pass No Child Left Behind and was much more partisan on labor policy than education policy.  In fact, he went from caring little about education to being quite invested in parts of the No Child law.

Also, this Politico story on the discontent some rural legislators are feeling with regard to the Obama agenda and whether it’s too urbanized or cosmopolitan in its orientation is worth reading.  The story doesn’t have an education angle but there is one.  You’re also hearing grumbling on our space that the urban tail is wagging the entire public school dog right now.  That’s not a new complaint, obviously, but it perhaps has more salience right now.   One place it could rear its head is in debates over accountability for post-secondary preparation and where and how career and technical education fits in to that.

At the DLC’s policy forum this morning White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel made a point of mentioning the President’s support for innovating with pay-for-performance for teachers as part of a lively talk on the imperative of fixing health care and education.  Keep hearing how Obama doesn’t really mean pay for performance but sure seems he does…

And TNR’s Darby turns in a interesting  and pretty thorough look at where the national standards issue is right now.  But it was buried too quickly by other content on TNR’s blog, check it out.

Today must have been an especially busy news day because so far there is surprisingly little interest in a new CEP analysis showing some good news for the No Child Left Behind policy…  Is it too cynical to think it would be bigger news if it went the other way?  And hard to make the case that CEP is in the tank for the last administration, in fact the opposite case has been made…  Ed Week does pick it up here.

In the Des Moines Register Hawkeye Chad Aldeman calls for more charter schools in Iowa.    In U.S. News Richard Whitmire and I call for closing the lousy charters but helping the good ones grow via Arne Duncan’s third way move on the issue.  And in Tennessee the Democratic leadership in the legislature just released Democrats to vote however they want on the charter school bill there, now it’s on the move.  Don’t believe the face-saving, it’s apparently pretty much the same bill the Senate passed.

New CREDO study on charter schools (pdf), mentioned in the USN piece, like other studies mixed news, more on that later.

Update:  Three thoughts on the CREDO study (which was produced by an ES board member, Macke Raymond).

First, it confirms other studies:  The performance variance among “charters” is high, to the point where it’s becoming unproductive to lump charters together since some have so little in common with others besides sharing charter enabling legislation.   Second, there are two buried ledes in the report that didn’t get a lot of attention:  High schools don’t do as well as other charter schools and the results look a lot different (and better) after students are in charter schools for multiple years.   I suspect as analysts digest the report those issues will get some attention.  Third, I’d hazard guess that the finding about multiple authorizers being inversely related to school quality will turn out to be more complicated as time goes on and states improve their charter school policies.   Many of the states in the sample with multiple authorizers also had other aspects of their charter oversight that were problematic.  The report highlights a prime one, authorizer “shopping” that allows weak schools to seek out weak authorizers.  Those elements, rather than the presence of multiple authorizers per se seems a more likely culprit.  The best authorizers in the country have turned out the be the “professional” authorizers.

When former Democratic Hill aides are teeing up the teachers’ unions like New America Foundation’s Mary Ellen McGuire does here in USN, could it mean the zeitgeist is irreparably against them?

Also, some must-read Willingham on choice.   And, Matt Ladner and some colleagues game out a teacher pay scheme to give high-performers six figures.

The WaPo editorial board calls for more transparency in the D.C. school contract negotiations.    And why not?  This is a step that Jane Hannaway and I called for a few years ago as a general reform to today’s bargaining process and in general more transparency around policymaking is better.  Yet while opening up negotiations more is perceived as not in interest of the teachers’ unions, I’m not sure that’s entirely true at all.   Contrary to popular belief, everything they ask for, even around key sticking points, isn’t indefensible.  

No…not this, though it’s nice.  But rather this positive Mayor Menino shift on charter schools in Boston.   Impossible to know the exact cause but suspects are (a) politics, the voters want change in the schools (b) frustration with the teachers’ union there and the constant chorus of “no” (c) a desire to innovate more or (d) the dark horse, is Arne Duncan’s regular hammering away on this having an effect on how the issue is perceived by Democrats?  Clinton’s support during the 1990s helped and is Duncan providing cover now and moving the debate? 

Update:  More from Globe columnist Scott Leigh.   I forgot to mention the recent study on Boston charters in my list of suspects, he does.

The new Carnegie report on math and science education that is moving this morning with a big Washington event is well-worth checking out.  It’s timely in relation to the ongoing standards debate and also for its related focus on universality rather than how to just incentivize a few more kids to choose math and science careers than otherwise would today.   It’s ambitious but many of the recommended actions are also pretty actionable relative to how these things usually go. 

There is a lot of complaining right now that the new proposed national standards are being developed out of sight, by unnamed experts, etc…and education’s alphabet soup of interest groups is starting to stir in response.  There is now a public forum planned for the 17th in D.C. and clearly the pressure is starting to increase…Unless managed carefully disaster this way lies…

A popular education policy parlor game right now is trying to discern how many states the Department of Education will have to include in the “Race to the Top” funds to make the initiative politically palatable without spreading the money like “peanut butter” across the states.    The concern about spreading federal education money around too much is an old one, but the specific “peanut butter” meme is one of those things you wake up one day and suddenly everyone is saying.    Now, Jonathan Alter takes peanut butter national in a Newsweek column on the innovation funds.

Update:  PB spreads.

In human terms, here’s why, courtesy of Bob Herbert, you should support charter schools and more dynamism more generally in the public education sector.  What’s happening today simply isn’t working, so why is the political bar so high for those who want to change it?  A.O. Hirschman points out that reactionaries resisting change always point to perverse consequences as a reason to oppose various reforms.  True.  But, in this context, and even accounting for the deeply conservative nature of public education, at what point do today’s outcomes become so manifestly perverse as to make that argument — at least politically — silly on its face?

Items to wrap up the week:

On the school choice front, overall the new changes to the voucher program in Milwaukee make sense (yes, requiring teachers to have a bachelor’s degree is an “input” but the input v. output debate can quickly become reductio ad absurdum, a B.A. is hardly an unreasonable standard for teachers.  Howard Fuller’s comments on all of it are pretty telling (some backstory on all that here).   And, Mike Petrilli notes some interesting data from the new Condition of Education.

On higher education this David Frum column is worth reading and this Kevin Carey. Rick Hess, Mark Schneider, and Andrew Kelly paper (pdf) is must-reading.  It’s also sparking a lot of buzz along this whole leaky pipeline issue.

Common Core has a new report looking at other countries and curriculum, relevant right now with all the standards activity.

Here’s a good achievement gap op-ed from MI with more evidence that the further you get from vested interests, the more in demand Teach For America teachers are…And in a HuffPo op-ed former Secretary of Education Richard Riley previews the big Carnegie report on math and sciecne that is moving next week.

This June 9th AEI event on courts and school reform looks like it could be very lively.   And the Young Education Professionals are having a happy hour on June 16th with DC City Council Chairman Gray.   You can join their Google Group here, or email the organizer here.

The UN’s World Food Programme has new resources for students and teachers.

And looking for an edujob?  The Education Trust needs a legislative director.