June 22, 2007

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Vouching For Vouchers: Parental Satisfaction And ‘Exit’ Counts, When You Want It To Count [Updated]

Filed under: Education Other Topics by Leo Casey @ 11:04 am

Far too often, educational policy debates have the feel of one of the three card monte games one sees on New York City street corners during the summer.

In 2004, the Republican Congress established a voucher program for students in Washington DC public schools. The United States Department of Education just issued the first of the annual studies that are mandated by the law, Evaluation of the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program: Impacts After One Year.

As today’s New York Times reports, the study found that students utilizing the vouchers and attending private schools [two-thirds of which were parochial Catholic schools] “did not show significantly higher math or reading achievement.” The caution offered by some observers, that this is only the first year’s results, seems reasonable enough.

But if ever there was a shell game, it is found in the way voucher advocates seized upon the report’s claim, heralded in the Times headlines, that parents were nonetheless more satisfied with the voucher schools. This is a very interesting metric, since endless amounts of ink have been spilled by voucher advocates on the argument that it matters not at all if parents are satisfied with their district public schools. Terry Moe dedicated an entire book, Schools, Vouchers and the American Public, to the subject. It it, he developed an oxymoronic neologism — “rationally ignorant” — to describe parents who were satisfied with their public schools. Now, the whole mode of analysis is supposed to turn on a dime.

James Forman Jr. is right on target at Extra Credit, when he says that

The dominant view in education policy – enshrined in No Child Left Behind – is that schools will be judged by how students do on reading, math, and science tests. A public school that would otherwise be labeled failing does not get a pass, no matter how satisfied the parents say they are. So if parental satisfaction measures are sufficient to justify a voucher program with mediocre test score results, they should be good enough for a public school. Which would mean re-writing NCLB, among other accountability laws.

If this were not bad enough, consider that the claim of parental satisfaction is highly questionable. The families of close to one-quarter of all the students who took the vouchers — 239 out of 1027 — withdrew from the voucher schools in the first year. Market fundamentalists like Moe argue that ‘exit’ is the be all and end all of parental power and the ultimate test of parent satisfaction, but it is being completely ignored in this context. Indeed, the report treats the exiting students and their parents as if they did not exist: there are no exit interviews or surveys, no assessment of the academic progress of exiting students. Only the parents whose children remained in the program at the end of the first year were surveyed. That is the equivalent of a customer satisfaction survey of all the Verizon wireless customers who have not left for another wireless telephone provider.

Moreover, if one contemplates the reasons why a parent might want to leave the voucher program, such as the failure of his or her child to make academic progress, it becomes clear that using the test scores only of those students who remain in the program at the end of year one artificially inflates the overall scores and overstates academic progress. If all the students were in the pool, the voucher students would, in all likelihood, be doing more poorly than their counterparts in district schools.

UPDATE:

The faith based school of voucher advocacy weighs in here.

3 Comments »

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  • THE NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND WAKE UP CALL
    By Phyllis C. Murray

    “We are told of one stunning educational success after another with ever more children passing the standardized tests. But in reality, the city’s public school students, particularly those students of color in inner city neighborhoods, are receiving a less than quality education.’ EDUCATION PLANNING COUNCIL OF HARLEM/NY July 2006

    “The system still fails to educate its African American and Latino students – to the degree that they are ill-equipped to compete, academically and intellectually, with children of other racial and ethnic groups, attending schools in other neighborhoods. Our children are graduating – at too low a percentage, we can also say – poorly prepared for the challenges of higher education and fulfilling, lucrative new millennium careers.”EDUCATION PLANNING COUNCIL OF HARLEM/NY July 2006

    “Twenty-three schools in Westchester and Rockland counties have not met the federal standard for placing highly qualified teachers in their classrooms, according to a state report provided yesterday to The Journal News.” By DAVID NOVICH July 28, 2006

    The No Child Left Behind Legislation of 2001 (Public Law 107-110), has been a wake up call for many. This United States federal law is the key to a reauthorization of a number of federal programs that aim to improve the performance of America’s primary and secondary schools by increasing the standards of accountability for states, school districts and schools, as well as providing parents more flexibility in choosing which schools their children will attend. Thus, throughout New York City, parents are now given opportunities to decide where to send Johnny. Many parents are turning their backs on the public school system because they feel the city, state and federal governments have also turned their backs on inner-city public schools.

    These parents are looking for vouchers, scholarships, charter schools, private and religious institutions to meet their needs. Far too often this pattern is repeated nationwide. We can even say that the public schools throughout the nation have been pauperized as one hears the cries of overcrowded classrooms, crumbling school buildings, out-of-date libraries, lack of textbooks, low academic standards, student violence, inadequate school safety, and failure to have highly qualified teachers i.e. one who has fulfilled the state’s certification and licensure requirements in every classrooom.

    When education is not a priority, the funding educators seek to implement the NCLB Law is never adequate. What we see is the fact that European and Asian nations are outdistancing the U.S. in the competitive world job market. These nations have reached the goal of educational excellence in their schools. These nations are investing in their greatest resource: their children.

    Martin Luther King was able to forecast this phenomenon in a speech he made to the UFT in 1964. “Education for all Americans has always been inadequate,” King said. “The richest nation on earth has never allocated enough of its abundant resources to build sufficient schools to compensate adequately its teachers. We squander funds on highways and the frenetic pursuit of recreation, on the overabundance of overkill armaments but we pauperize education.”

    It was Dr. King who reminded us that” we are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” Collaboration is the key in all successful negotiations. But that collaboration must embody mutual trust and mutual respect.
    Dr. King spoke, but apparently those in positions of leadership and power in government were not listening. King was assassinated in 1968. His legacy lives on today in those who wish to join teachers and concerned parents in a quest to provide the best education possible for all Americans. Yes, teachers and parents must continue to be the best advocates for children and education in America.

    Phyllis C. Murray, UFT Chapter Leader

    Comment by phyllis c. murray — June 24, 2007 @ 8:05 pm

  • [...] race doesn’t matter,” she said. I think Prof. Amy Stuart Wells is absolutely correct. She doesnVouching For Vouchers: Parental Satisfaction And ‘Exit’ Counts, When You Want It To CountEdwize2007-06-22 11:04:29Far too often, educational policy debates have the feel of one of the three [...]

    Pingback by The Truth Laid Bear — June 25, 2007 @ 8:01 pm

  • [...] schools (big caveat: you cannot, in my view, judge a program based on one year of test scores). Leo Casey and I both argued that if test scores are going to count for public schools, voucher defenders [...]

    Pingback by Florida Voucher Program Criticized–With Good Reason « Extra Credit — June 26, 2007 @ 10:05 am

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