Jennifer Rippner’s The American Education Policy Landscape (2016) is a comprehensive summary of how policy is instituted in our nation’s schools, from Pre-K though college. It contains a wealth of statistics and sources, and is a good starting point for anybody who needs to research why our schools are run in often-inexplicable ways. This book was an easy and compelling read, but quickly became frustrating as I became more aware of how inefficient our system is how and disconnected policymakers are from what teachers and administrators are expected to do.
Because of the way America was founded and its rapid expansion across the continent, there is little federal oversight and a disjointed hodgepodge of state educational policies and procedures. Exacerbating this situation is that many decisions are made by politicians and appointees who have little (or no) educational experience, and with no real understanding of the background of why current policies were implemented. This means that the country’s policies are created and implemented a little bit at a time, without a holistic view of what the true goal of education should be, and with no pedagogical rationale.
One of the more obvious examples is the 2002 legislation, the No Child Left Behind Act, which set reading and math standards for states to meet by 2014. The stated goal was to close achievement gaps, and improving reading and math skills are one part of the way to meet this goal, but the federal government was not looking at the situation holistically when this policy was written, so standards were set with no guidance or oversight on how this was to happen. When this policy was enacted at the state level it was up to each state to decide how to implement the policy, and each state had to write its own rules. As Furgol and Helms stated, “Stakeholders must adopt strategies and approaches to rulemaking that reflect the dynamics and realities of the policy environment of the individual state in which they operate” (2012, p. 805). As each state has a different demographic it is important that they had the freedom to create their own rules for implementation and assessment, but in many cases subjects other than reading and math were marginalized, and how will this affect learners’ college readiness preparation?
When looking at the four steps of policymaking, information gathering, policy definition, policy implementation, and policy evaluation, in some sense each of these is taking place for No Child Left Behind. But do reading and math scores tell the whole story about achievement gaps? Probably not, so what could the government have done differently? Hopefully we will be able to learn more about this during the next semester!
Furgol, K. E., & Helms, L. B. (2012). Lessons in leveraging implementation: Rulemaking, growth models, and policy dynamics under NCLB. Educational Policy, 26(6), 777-812.
Rippner, J. (2016). The American education policy landscape. New York, NY: Routledge.
I remember the No Child Left Behind Act as a high school math teacher. There was a lot of talk at our monthly department meetings about standardized tests and the Academic Performance Index. However, I was fortunate to work with a department that supported student success and believed in constructing math understanding and not teaching to the test. Despite NCLB initiating at the federal level and the impact on my high school, it made little change in the classroom.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you, the little federal oversight and disjointed educational policies and procedures were historically formed the American expansion, resulting in a disconnect from high school to higher education. According to Rippner, over the past 20 years, various groups "have brought together state K-12 and higher education teams to work on such issues as defining college and career readiness," (p. 6). There is hope.
Hi Rex! Good job on your blog!
ReplyDeleteIn your second paragraph, you talk about policies being implemented bits at a time. It reminded me of Rippner’s (2016) overview of the five policy theories in the third chapter. It definitely sounded like you were describing incrementalism, in which policy builds gradually over time (Rippner, 2016). When I was reading Rippner, I viewed incrementalism as a positive way to approach policy creation. It sounded similar to how you would build a term paper – start with an outline and keep adding in the “meat” of it. However, your last sentence in that paragraph made me re-think incrementalism. You’re right in that incrementalism may lead to a lack of a holistic view and pedagogical rationale of what a policy actually is or is designed to assist with. I appreciated how you were able to expand my thinking!
I’m a little embarrassed to say that I don’t know much about No Child Left Behind (NCLB)… but reading your post helped me learn a little more. In reviewing the article you referenced in your blog, I found it interesting that “NCLB depends on actors in 50 different states to interpret and apply its requirements” and “much of the expertise and experience in policy delivery is found at state levels” (Furgol & Helms, 2012, p. 793). This reminded me of Rippner’s (2016) comment in chapter two about how many state governors have governor education policy advisors (GEPAs). I would be interested to read more about how GEPAs may have had an impact in the interpretation and application of NCLB at the state level. I imagine that it is a complicated endeavor to rely on 50 different entities, operating under different growth models, to consistently implement policy.
Thanks Rex - happy blogging!
References
Furgol, K.E. & Helms, L.B. (2012). Lessons in leveraging implementation: Rulemaking, growth models, and policy dynamics under NCLB. Educational Policy, 26(6), 777-812.
Rippner, J. (2016). The American education policy landscape. New York, NY: Routledge.