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Has it really been more than six whole months since the Hollywood movie Won’t Back Down hit the Denver and national scene. While not a blockbuster success, the parent power-themed, feature-length film certainly raised the profile of K-12 education reform. Two moms took charge and took on the bureaucracy and union opposition to change the trajectory of a failing school. At that same time last fall, the Center for Education Reform released the first-ever Parent Power Index. Colorado ranked 14th in the measurement of parent access to school choice, vibrant charter school and online learning options, quality classroom teachers, and transparent information.

More than two-and-a-half years ago, the Colorado State Board of Education adopted the Common Core standards. Just this last December the State Board took another careful look at the decision, as this School Reform News article by my Education Policy Center friend notes. For a number of reasons, the issue has gained greater national notoriety of late. I could link to a number of articles, but two very recent commentaries in the debate present a worthy read. School Reform News editor Joy Pullmann and Heritage Foundation analyst Lindsey Burke raise serious questions that need to be addressed.

Let’s go over it again: Standardized tests are far from the be-all and end-all of education. But if we’re not going to put money in student backpacks and make schools directly accountable to parents, how can such assessments NOT be used as a key component of measuring student progress, teacher effectiveness, and school quality? If the test is broken, fix it or find a new one. Nevertheless, the predictable overreactions return as more news this week filters out of Atlanta that shows the city’s terrible cheating scandal was bigger and more systemic than previously reported. I had thought of the comparison to students cheating on tests before, but a national expert picks an even better analogy: Abandoning testing would “be equivalent to saying ‘O.K., because there are some players that cheated in Major League Baseball, we should stop keeping score, because that only encourages people to take steroids,’ ” said Thomas J. Kane, director of the Center for Education Policy Research at Harvard University, who has received funding from the Gates Foundation. Now my faithful readers know I’m not a naysaying, “we ain’t never done it that way before” curmudgeon. If we find a better way to assess student learning, […]

Take your hats off to those teachers union officials, they sure know how to plan ahead sometimes. The Education Intelligence Agency’s Mike Antonucci brings our attention to a PBS Newshour clip in which NEA president Dennis Van Roekel tried to respond to a question about why private educational choice works at the college level but should be rejected for K-12 students: I think post-secondary education, college and university, I think you have to put that into a different category than K-12 education, because then you’re choosing between a career or college and specialized training. That definitely makes sense. But for young children, they shouldn’t have to be bussed somewhere. It should be in their neighborhood. Huh? Giving a voucher or tax credit is bad because a kid might have to ride a bus? Antonucci presumes Van Roekel meant to say something else. Perhaps his analysis is correct. I’m not sure the Friedman Foundation will need to add this argument to its list of anti-school choice myths that need to be rebutted.

In case you haven’t been following me on Twitter (which raises the question: Why not?), you may not have noticed that the big education bill of the 2013 Colorado legislative session has made its way through the State Senate. As a new Ed News Colorado story by Todd Engdahl highlights, Senate Bill 213 has advanced as a purely partisan piece of legislation: The Senate approved Senate Bill 13-213 on a 20-15 preliminary vote, which is expected to be the same party-line total when a final vote is taken later. That final vote occurred earlier today by the same 20-15 margin. And thus the 174-page legislation motors on over to the House now. Still not really much choice or backpack funding at all. Changing from a single count date to average daily membership is great, but not worth a billion smackeroos. As the Education Reform Bulletin proclaims about SB 213, raising taxes trumps reform.

It’s been several days since I’ve had a chance to write here. The end of my spring break provided a lot of time for reflection on some issues that really have been bothering me. Now that I’ve had time to re-evaluate my well-known positions on some key education issues, I feel it is my obligation to share with you the following: When it comes to education, I’ve come to agree with Diane Ravitch that parents don’t really know what is best for kids. They should leave it all up to the experts in the classroom and the school district administration building. (I would also like to apply this logic to the question of eating vegetables, an area in which I’m now considered an expert.) As a result, I now believe this whole idea of school choice is really overblown, and actually undermines the great work professional educators do on our behalf every day. Instead of celebrating the recent Indiana Supreme Court decision, we all should be sobbing our hearts out right along with the Hoosiers fans, whose team went down hard in the Sweet 16. I’ve also made a resolution to stop spending nearly so much time praising the innovative, […]

How many education programs do you know that make Frank Sinatra songs pop into your head? At least that’s what some of the big people I know tell me. (H/T Ed News Colorado) Well, the Colorado Springs Gazette‘s Carol McGraw today featured such an online program from the Widefield School District that is tailored to families looking for options: D3 My Way, unlike some programs, allows students to take nine-week blocks, so not as many courses have to be taken at once. It’s been a boon for military families, athletes in training, older students who must work, children with medical issues, those needing a personal learning environment, and others who find the flexible schedules and studying at their pace ideal.

Update, 3/27: For more perspective on the magnitude of yesterday’s court victory, read this redefinED commentary by Institute for Justice attorney Bert Gall, who argued the Indiana case. I’m feeling just a little jealous of Indiana today. Just a little now–this is Colorado after all. I’m not talking about the fact that the Hoosiers made it to the NCAA Tournament’s Sweet 16, while neither the CU Buffaloes or CSU Rams made it past their second March Madness contest. Although the results on the basketball court haven’t helped, it’s actually news from a different kind of court that gives me extra smiles today: The Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice hailed today’s ruling from the Indiana Supreme Court, which declared the state’s school voucher program constitutional. The announcement ends a nearly two-year-long review of the nation’s largest voucher initiative, for which more than half of the state’s student population qualifies. The Indiana Supreme Court upheld the program by a vote of 5-0, ruling “the voucher program expenditures do not directly benefit religious schools but rather directly benefit lower-income families with school-children by providing an opportunity for such children to attend non-public schools if desired.”

While the big school finance reform legislation at the Colorado State Capitol explores reshuffling the dollars in a 20th century system — and dashing my youthful hopes along the way — other states continue to plow ahead with the idea of course choice. Students are enabled to customize their education by choosing courses regardless of school and district boundaries, mainly through the use of digital technology. Well, count Florida among the states seriously looking at revamping a system to promote flexibility and reward student mastery, rather than just continue to fund learning based on seat time. With Utah and Louisiana already pioneering in this area, it’s great to hear redefinED’s Ron Matus talk with national blended learning guru Michael Horn about the new world where the change might lead us and speculate how it might unfold:

It’s time to send Colorado home with another report card (figuratively, I mean — not sure how you would do that literally). Back in January I pointed out the release of 3 national education policy report cards. Colorado got a C from Student First for some key teacher and choice policies, a B from the Center for Education Reform for the quality of our charter school law, and a D from the National Council on Teacher Quality for our educator preparation system. Not to be outdone, yesterday Digital Learning Now released the 2012 Digital Learning Report Card. As usual, with this sort of thing, there are two kinds of news to share. Since we’re heading into the weekend, let’s end with the good news and go with the bad news first: Colorado earned a D-plus. Some of our state’s key shortcomings?