Comment by Sally Kilgore
[The Federal Role in Education]
Paul T. Hill has an intimate acquaintance with federal legislation in education--both as a policymaker and as an evaluator. In his paper, he makes masterful use of that knowledge in providing a lively and penetrating analysis of the effects of federal educational legislation.
Hill recounts that federal funding in education was justified, or otherwise rendered constitutional, using the child benefit theory. Federal funds, the theory argues, provide support services to children in a school setting in ways that do not intrude upon a state's rights (or responsibility) to control the shape and mission of schools within its boundaries. The federal legislative initiatives in education sought to remedy inequalities that existed within schools and school districts for certain identifiable classes of students--the economically disadvantaged, those lacking English language skills, those with identifiable physical or mental disabilities, and girls who had been denied the same opportunities as boys, particularly in sports.
Such legislation initially provided funding to identifiable classes of children experiencing inequities in the existing system. In reauthorizations, additional inequities were addressed by new conditions of eligibility for those federal funds. The efforts to equalize opportunities for women, for instance, were achieved almost exclusively through establishing such new eligibility criteria for federal funds. With the passing of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, localities were required to reallocate local and state (not federal) money to address the inequities in educational opportunities for students requiring special services.
As Hill notes, in the early period (1960s and 1970s) legislators and bureaucrats intentionally designed legislation to challenge or redistribute political power within local districts, establishing parent advisory counsels and new channels for grievances. Parents made new claims and [End Page 46] exerted new pressures upon schools and district administrators. Less consciously, federal legislation reconfigured power within district offices with the introduction of what Hill refers to as the "colonialists"; that is, the local and state enforcers of the federal will.
Hill recognizes the profoundly important role played by federal legislation in addressing inequalities of opportunities but claims, appropriately, that the long-term--and unanticipated--consequences for children and schools have been detrimental. Hill provides vivid accounts of colonialists penetrating district offices, schools frozen by the constraints of the colonialists, interest groups clamoring for equity, state education departments living off the dole, and the federal government engineering yet another shift in power within communities.
Lessons learned from these thirty years lead Hill to recommend that future legislation in education should balance the traditional, and rightful, concern for poor and disadvantaged children with an effort to effect general school improvement. Legislation that meets these conditions, Hill suggests, should be built upon these principles:
--Subsidize children, not jurisdictions.
--Attack emergent problems with short-term solutions.
--Make the Department of Education a national resource, not a federal ministry.
--Become school-friendly.
--Define results in terms of student and school performance.
Recent Effects of Federal Legislation
Hill's historical account, in my estimation, understates the effects of shifts in power that emerged with each reauthorization of federal programs in education. Similarly, he fails to emphasize the more perverse incentive systems inherent in federal legislation.
SHIFTING POWER STRUCTURES. The fragmentation of school authority and mission so aptly described by Hill dissipated as increasing numbers of schools were eligible to adopt a schoolwide program and as federal offices permitted the commingling of funds across programs. Commendably, legislators sought to integrate the findings of extensive research into the 1994 reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), all but eliminating a number of the procedural constraints that had created ineffectual and even detrimental instructional practices [End Page 47] such as pullout programs. Broad categories of expenditures were mandated; for example, at least 10 percent of the revenue must be spent on professional development.
Unanticipated by this recent legislation and not addressed by Hill, though, was the substantial shift in the distribution of power within school districts. Eliminating many regulations on the use of federal funds led, I argue, to shifts in power and authority among central office administrators. Superintendents in urban districts have been provided unprecedented opportunities to deploy large sums of federal money to effect changes in classroom practices. Superintendents can and do mobilize millions of federal dollars allotted for professional development to implement priorities formulated in the superintendent's office. On the surface, such empowerment should be a welcomed relief from the reign of colonialists. Under these new conditions the potential for a coherent mission is greater. Long-term stability, however, is compromised, and the adaptability of these initiatives to local school needs is questionable.
School improvement plans required for Title I schoolwide projects must be made at the school level. Yet few school staff can deploy substantial resources in ways that reflect their understanding of the needs of students. Instead, district administrators usually control the particulars in classroom practice: the amount of time teachers devote to certain subjects, the instructional strategies used for certain subjects, which classrooms receive computers, and the specific software used for math and reading tutorials. Such district-level control in urban areas is often broad in scope and detailed in practice. Again, these actions are not inconsistent with research on effective instructional practices showing that, for instance, elementary teachers do not devote much time to mathematics and that they utilize ineffective instructional strategies in science and mathematics. These district actions are, however, inconsistent with research on effective strategies for change in organizational practices.
District officials who exercise such control claim that teachers and principals are unwilling to devote sufficient time to mathematics, are not equipped with the skills and knowledge to improve instructional strategies, and are not, for example, able to make sound decisions about software acquisitions for student learning. Certainly evidence can be marshaled to support their claim.
Research evidence, however, suggests that enduring change in practice originates from those persons required to carry out the change. Even if [End Page 48] that evidence were not available, the folly remains. Increased district control leads to greater instability and insensitivity to varying needs across schools.
Increasing the authority with the most vulnerable part of any urban school system, its superintendent, leads to abandoned projects, cynical teachers, and weary administrators. The average shelf life of an urban school superintendent is 2.5 years. As is the way with transitions in bureaucratic or political leadership, new superintendents announce their presence by moving the organization in a new direction; if it was headed south, it must now go north. With such a short shelf life, teachers can (and perhaps should) ignore the new priorities and practices whenever possible. Changes in school practice implemented in one regime seldom endure, if they ever were practiced.
Certainly the experience in one urban school district illustrates this process. An innovative, committed, and intelligent school superintendent brought to a sleepy and lackluster district the press to be the best--to improve achievement levels of students, not within the decade, but within a year. The district adopted one of the most rigorous math programs available and required teachers to pursue lengthy training, at considerable expenditure of Title I funds. Elementary teachers were expected to devote ninety minutes a day to mathematics lessons, and pacing charts kept teachers moving from one topic to another.
Such fast-paced and relatively chaotic change was not well received. The school board bought out the superintendent's contract two years after the mathematics program had been adopted. Within four months of the departure of the superintendent, the mathematics program, its textbooks, and supporting materials were officially abandoned. No doubt some teachers acquired some skills and understandings as a result of that initiative, but in great measure, the effort--well intentioned as it was--sent millions of dollars down the proverbial drain.
The inability of district-level mandates to be equally relevant or useful to all schools is easily evident. For instance, instituting rules about mathematics instruction assumes that each school has the same instructional weaknesses. Such commonality is rarely accurate. Some schools, some grade levels, may have much greater need for improved read- ing instructional practices than for a new mathematics program. Well-intentioned superintendents have been known to mandate counselors for every elementary school, even when one or more schools have such [End Page 49] services provided by a community agency housed within a school. Such mismatches are inevitable when strategies for change rely upon uniform mandates. Teacher cynicism and frustration inevitably emerge.
Earlier legislation, then, that concentrated authority with local and state colonialists had a long shelf life; practices endured in schools and classrooms well beyond legislation requiring them. The problem was that the endorsed practices did little to enhance achievement. Now, new conditions exist: Federal funds vacillate from one inspired vision to another with little possibility of penetrating the daily practices within the classroom and often failing to address a school's specific needs.
INCENTIVE SYSTEMS. Hill notes, but fails to develop, an argument about the perverse incentive structures that are inherent in much of the federal legislation. For districts, the amount of federal funds available varies directly with the proportion of students who possess some condition--economically disadvantaged, lacking proficiency in English, and so forth. Rationally, any savvy administrator would seek to maximize the number of students who meet such criteria.
Parents, too, have perverse incentives. Students with certain disabilities are entitled to more advantageous testing conditions (no time limits) and special tutors or services. As Hill notes, several investigations have uncovered the growing number of children with disabilities in upper-class suburban areas. Again, rational parents who seek to maximize the opportunities and advantages available to their children would (and should) seek to have them classified in ways that afford their children these special opportunities. The question for legislators, then, is how they can frame legislation that secures remedies but does not generate perverse incentives.
Some remedies can be achieved through changes in local practice. Others require reconstructing the particulars in legislation. For district-level incentives, the remedies seem fairly obvious: When districts are able to manipulate the amount of money flowing to them, the opportunity to undermine the original intent is great. Contrast Title I funds with bilingual education funding. Title I funds are distributed among districts according to census data collected by the Department of Commerce. The district has little capacity to manipulate the outcome. However, classifying children as lacking proficiency in English is almost exclusively within the purview of school officials. Thus, the regulatory structure of funding for bilingual programs creates more perverse incentives than that of Title I. [End Page 50]
Remedies for undesirable incentives for students can, in part, be managed at the school or classroom level. For example, lifting time constraints for all students in state assessments, as well as classroom exams, eliminates one of the advantages associated with certain disabilities without curtailing the rights associated with that condition. Administratively, the change has some complications. Different types of assessments should be used under these conditions. Allocation of school time must be done differently under these conditions.
Misplaced Optimism?
It would be a mistake to take Hill's work as an exhaustive account of federal actions that impinged upon the school life of children and teachers in the last thirty years. Hill's scope appropriately focuses on the effects of legislation. That said, excluding the activities of state and federal courts overlooks the extraordinary confluence of events--both legislative initiatives and judicial decisions--that reconstituted the relations schools could and did have with students and their parents. Both branches established new avenues for conflict and grievances. Legislative actions also realigned local power structures, and judicial decisions introduced new procedural requirements that had, de facto, the same impact.
Identifying this confluence of legislative and judicial action is important for this discussion only if the judicial requirements undermine the anticipated effects of legislative changes. Thus, the ability of future legislation to mend the fractured relations between parents and schools is limited given all the judicial decisions that established due process for students, and so on. However, one can maintain optimism that legislative actions can affect the coherence of instruction experienced by children.
Guiding Principles for Future Legislation
If one takes these caveats and adjustments to Hill's account as valid, what are the ramifications for Hill's proposed principles to guide future legislation? The adjusted account requires that these principles acquire greater specificity to reduce the probability that unstable leadership or perverse incentives undermine the federal intent.
SUBSIDIZE CHILDREN, NOT JURISDICTIONS. Does the proposal to subsidize children, not jurisdictions, address the power or incentive problems with current practice? Only if the revenue transfers to parents instead of [End Page 51] states. Cash does not have to move through a parent's bank account; a redeemable coupon or its equivalent could be used.
If new federal legislation subsidizes children and uses a public entity (even the school instead of the district and state offices), the likelihood is that federal auditors will require yet another trail of evidence linking each child with the expenditure of federal funds. A coupon transaction between the parent and school mitigates the need for such practices.
Suppose schools were eligible to receive coupons from parents if their practices and mission (1) accommodate the specified special needs within their regular program, (2) provide supplementary services before or after school that meet those needs, or (3) provide alternative services at the school site for those students requiring a separate program.
Other organizations could be certified to provide supplementary services with the understanding that they are sufficient accommodation and support for the student. Such a system would ensure that auditors would lack an oversight role on the procedural aspects of education and provide parents with meaningful options to meet their child's special needs. All changes introduce new problems. This change would be no exception. The new problem is: What institution, following what procedures, will determine which children are eligible to receive such coupons? Working through existing institutions--federal or state--would appear to provide the most cost-effective strategy.
ATTACK EMERGENT PROBLEMS WITH SHORT-TERM SOLUTIONS. Does this principle address the problems identified above? Relying more on short-term solutions can limit the likelihood that perverse incentives will be created with new streams of federal funding. But this principle is not sufficient to reduce the likelihood that local districts will exploit funding opportunities. To the degree feasible, identifying categories of children eligible to receive funding should be done by government agencies indifferent to the outcome, such as the Bureau of the Census. The greatest challenge to this principle will be bilingual funding, where many of the potential beneficiaries do everything they can to obscure their presence to government agencies.
STRENGTHEN SCHOOLS OVER PROGRAMS. Hill's emphasis on strengthening schools over programs is perhaps the most important principle for, in part, strategies that realize it will, of necessity, accord greater discretion at the school level and allow (but not ensure) more coherent and stable school policies to emerge. [End Page 52]
With authority accorded to schools, a course of action could be sustained that is adapted to the specific needs of students at that school and to the particular resources in that neighborhood. However, some school systems in urban areas, for example, within New York and New Jersey, experience as much instability in school leadership as they do in district-level leadership.
In a sense then, this principle meets the Hippocratic test: Honoring it likely will move the federal role in education from harmful to not harmful. But taken by itself, devolving authority to schools will not lead to school improvement.
For school improvement to become more likely, building the capacity of principals and teachers should be part of the federal initiative. The current Title I funds set aside for professional development could serve as a model.
SERVICE, NOT A MINISTRY. Building the capacity of principals and teachers should be the first task, if the federal role in education is to become one more of service than of ministry--through research, support for discipline-based institutes, and long-term professional development programs at schools. Information, though, of another sort is needed by schools. Regarding any legislative or judicial action, who knows what the document says or means in practice? Part of the colonialists' power arose from their ability to be the sole interpreter of federal regulatory requirements. School lawyers presumably provide competing or alternative interpretations. But large pockets of relevant folks, especially principals, were unable to challenge the interpretations imposed by the colonialists.
As a secondary challenge, then, to becoming a resource instead of a ministry, federal offices must aggressively seek out ways to ensure that all parties have equal access to regulatory information in intelligible form. Democratizing access to such information should be an integral component of the role of a national resource.
What is evident from this evaluation of Hill's guiding principles for new legislation is that legislators who pick and choose among these principles, as if to suggest that Hill has offered them a buffet of policy options, will not get the federal role out of the box. Choosing to subsidize children, but disregarding the need to become school-friendly, could create more adverse circumstances for children than those they currently encounter.
DEFINE RESULTS IN TERMS OF STUDENT AND SCHOOL PERFORMANCE. Focusing on results when evaluating the effects of federal programs is [End Page 53] essential--even fundamental. Lurking in the shadows, though, is the use of student or school performance as a condition of eligibility.
Legislators have been wise to avoid such criteria. The proposal, however, to require states to provide for reconstituting a school with persistently low performance is sound. Current Title I legislation requires that the effects of program initiatives be evaluated using the same assessment as that used for other students or schools. In the long run, this requirement may be the most positive change in the last reauthorization. Perverse incentives would inevitably arise with more intrusive directives than those exercised to date.
One best solution does not exist, but one best priority does: Maximize the likelihood that legislation encourages (or does not undermine) the development of coherent and effective instruction.
