In this issue...

2008 Quality Education Conference

The Education Adequacy Movement

Equity Forum: Emergent Bilinguals

NM Cost Study Calls for a 14.5 Percent Increase

Report Says “Watch the Gap” in Education Funding

Save the Dates!
8th Annual Quality Education Conference: June 11-12, 2008, Washington D.C

The Education Adequacy Movement – The Only Game in Town

“When it comes to advancing equal educational opportunity through the courts, the adequacy movement is the only game in town,” states Michael A. Rebell, executive director of the National Access Network and of the Campaign for Educational Equity, Teachers College, Columbia University, in two important articles that were published this month. In the first of these pieces, “Sleepless After Seattle? There’s Still Hope for Equal Educational Opportunity," published in Education Week on February 13, Rebell surveys the education reform landscape in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in the Seattle and Louisville cases. In light of this decision, which severely constrains school districts’ abilities to promote voluntary racial integration, Rebell stresses the importance of the state court education adequacy cases in promoting educational equity. The second article, “Equal Opportunity and the Courts,” which appears in the February issue of Phi Delta Kappan, defends the adequacy movement from critics’ charges that adequacy suits have not resulted in improvement in student performance and that the state courts’ have overstepped their proper constitutional boundaries in these cases. Read Full Story

Emergent Bilinguals: How Policy Has Misunderstood a National Resource

English language learners are making scant progress in overcoming the achievement gap, not only because of inadequate funding, but also because federal and state educational policy actually create stumbling blocks by prohibiting or discouraging the use of the educational practices that research has clearly shown to be most effective for their needs. This was the basic message that Ofelia Garcia, Professor of Bilingual Education at Teachers College, Columbia University delivered to a standing room only audience on January 30, 2008. Garcia’s talk was the first of a series of forums being convened by the Campaign for Educational Equity at Teachers College. Her remarks were drawn from an extensive study of the research in this area entitled “From English Language Learners to Emergent Bilinguals” which she co-authored with Professor Jo Anne Kleifgen, and Lorraine Falchi. Read Full Story

New Mexico Cost Study Calls for a 14.5 Percent Increase in School Funding

New Mexico’s current school funding system does not provide adequate learning opportunities for all students, and an increase of 14.5 percent, or $334.7 million, is needed to achieve an equitable level of “sufficiency” for public school education, concludes a study by the American Institutes for Research (AIR) that hopes to revamp the state’s 30 year old school funding formula. “An Independent Comprehensive Study of the New Mexico Public School Funding Formula,” commissioned by the Funding Formula Task Force and issued in January 2008, included an extensive public engagement process and introduced a new link between state funding and accountability in New Mexico schools. Read Full Story

Report Warns to “Watch the Gap” in Education Funding

The United States “consistently spends fewer dollars educating students in its highest-poverty and highest-minority school districts than it does districts with fewer of such students,” concludes The Education Trust in its annual The Funding Gap report, which was issued in January 2008. Emphasizing success stories from states like Arkansas, Maryland and New York, the report suggests that persistent funding gaps in other states reflect a problem of “political will” rather than “technical know-how.” Read Full Story