The Education Commission of the States (ECS), a national, nonpartisan education organization, has released a report detailing the issues the Commission believes will be center stage in education policy debates this year. The report is not intended to be an exhaustive list of all pertinent education issues, but rather aims to “stimulate thinking around how best to craft the next steps of powerful education policy across the country.” Each issue is discussed in a “challenges/successes” format and written by an expert in the field. The issues are:
1. Pre-K: Expanding the focus to P-3 to increase likelihood of proficiency in reading by the end of grade 3.
2. K-12 Finance: Creating and maintaining efficiency and financial accountability without lowering expectations.
3. Blended learning: Increasing the use of face-to-face and online instruction to make learning more efficient in all areas.
4. Common Core State Standards: Going from talking to doing.
5. Developing civic engagement in PK-12: States need to fund civic education and engagement opportunities in the absence of federal funding.
6. Teaching quality: Building the will, capacity and accountability for evaluators; providing high-quality professional development for all educators to improve their practice; and finding the right balance of the “weights” of different measurements that add up to a teacher’s evaluation.
7. Rural: Enhancing the potential of education in rural America.
8. Data: Access to what teachers and leaders need to improve student outcomes, and the skills to use it.
9. Individualized instruction: Can serve the needs of all students, can include blended learning or proficiency-based credits, and can increase the motivation and engagement of students at all proficiency levels.
10. Performance funding: These models could help align state goals and strategies with funding, address achievement gaps, help spur innovation, and provide a more systemic view of how well the postsecondary system is meeting state goals and strategies.
11. Remedial education: The current system is not working; therefore, developing alternative ways of delivering remedial education and scaling it statewide could increase student success and make it a focal point of state education policy by including it in performance funding, accountability and continuous improvement systems.
12. Credentials of value: There is a need to increase the alignment between postsecondary capacity and workforce demand.
To read the full report, please visit http://www.ecs.org/clearinghouse/01/00/28/10028.pdf
