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5-8-12 Education and Related Issues in the News
NJSpotlight - Alternative Testing? Not Under Christie’s Change for High School Graduation…Governor's plans for testing will leave out fall-back test, but appeal process will survive

Politickernj - FDU Poll: New Jersey, Chris Christie on the right track

Politickernj –Monmouth Poll: quality of life index up in NJ

Star Ledger - Low test scores outweigh lofty challenges as Trenton charter school faces closure

NJ Spotlight - Alternative Testing? Not Under Christie’s Change for High School Graduation…Governor's plans for testing will leave out fall-back test, but appeal process will survive

By John Mooney, May 8, 2012 in Education|Post a Comment

As the Christie administration launches new high-stakes testing for New Jersey’s high school students, acting Education Commissioner Chris Cerf said yesterday that he intends to continue an appeals process that last year was the last resort for roughly 1,000 students to graduate.

“I do think there should be a safety valve for those who are going through special challenges,” Cerf said in an interview.

But Cerf reiterated that the alternative testing now in place for thousands more students who fail the state’s high school test will be discontinued.

“I don’t believe we should have something that is giving an unrealistic and inaccurate measure of where a child stands,” he said.

The fate of the alternative test and the appeals process has been in question since Gov. Chris Christie last week announced a new system that would require students to pass a battery of end-of-year tests to graduate, starting in 2016.

The new testing in 9th, 10th and 11th grades would replace the current High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA), a comprehensive test given for the past two decades to 11th grade students in language arts and math.

But the question has been what happens to the thousands of students who now do not pass the new tests, even if they complete all the other requirements for graduation.

For those students, they now take an alternative test aptly named the Alternative High School Assessment (AHSA), which provides more time and more performance-based tasks to show one’s proficiency. If they fail that, students can enter an appeals process with the state to prove they are still worthy of a diploma.

Last year, 14.5 percent of all graduating students, or about 13,400, received their diploma by either having passed the AHSA or making it through the appeals process, according to the state.

Having failed that, nearly 2,000 students appealed in math and 840 in language arts, with roughly two-thirds in each category winning those appeals, according to numbers released by the state yesterday. The appeals process for this year’s graduating class is just beginning, state officials announced yesterday, with the applications due by the end of the month.

But state officials stressed that the AHSA will be phased out as the HSPA is ramped down over the next four years. In the meantime, both will continue to be developed and scored through an extension of the contract with Measurement Inc., a North Carolina testing company, officials said.

Cerf said while the appeals process is needed for the most extreme cases, the AHSA is not of a significant rigor to show a student was “college and career ready.” To retain it, “would defeat the purpose of the whole system,” he said.

In new data released over the last week, as many as half of the students in districts like Camden, Pleasantville and Lakewood have needed the alternative testing and appeals to graduate.

A few charter schools have also relied heavily on the AHSA, They include the Emily Fisher Charter School in Trenton, which the state is now seeking to close, and more-praised charter schools such as LEAP Academy Charter Schools in Camden and the Hoboken Charter School.

In contrast, the state’s wealthiest communities dominate the list of schools relying the least on AHSA and appeals, where for instance just 1.6 percent of Millburn High School graduates needed the AHSA or 1.3 percent at North Highlands Regional High Schools in Bergen County.

 

Politickernj - FDU Poll: New Jersey, Chris Christie on the right track

By Politicker Staff | May 8th, 2012 - 5:30am

New Jerseyans, for the second survey in a row, say the state is headed in the right direction, a phenomenon not seen in eleven years of polling by Fairleigh Dickinson University’s PublicMind™. According to the most recent statewide survey, 50% say the state is headed in the right direction, while 41% say it’s on the wrong track. However, public employees do disagree: 50% of public employee households say the state is on the wrong track.

“This spring has not been marred by the same depth of bad feeling about funding schools as in past years,” said Peter Woolley, director of the poll. “Typically, spring means fights over school budgets followed by even more fights over the state’s next budget.”

A majority, 51% of voters, say they have a favorable view of Gov. Chris Christie, including 29% of voters in the opposite party. Only 37% of Garden State voters say their view of him is unfavorable. A year ago in May, Christie’s “favorables” were reversed, 40% favorable and 45 unfavorable.

In fact, 49% say he’s doing a “good” or “excellent” job, including 28% of Democrats who agree. “The good news is obvious,” said Woolley. “The bad news may be that, historically, the only way to go from here is down.”

At the same time, 56% of voters say they approve of the job the governor is doing, a new high for PublicMind polling of the governor’s performance: 33% disapprove. A year ago in May, the governor only broke even, with 44% approving and 44% disapproving.

Women approve by a margin of 9 points (48-39), and men by the much more robust margin of 37 points (64-27). Public employees disapprove of the governor (35-52), but non-public employees approve by a 2-to-1 margin (60-29).

The Fairleigh Dickinson University poll of 797 registered voters statewide was conducted by telephone with both landline and cell phones from April 30 through May 6, 2012, and has a margin of error of +/-3.5 percentage points.

PolitickernjMonmouth Poll: quality of life index up in NJ

By Politicker Staff | May 7th, 2012 - 10:08am

Today's Monmouth University Poll finds that the current Garden State Quality of Life Index has jumped to +31, from +25 in February, the third consecutive increase in the index and the highest score since the index debuted in December 2010 at +21.

“Upward movement in the Garden State Quality of Life Index seems to have accelerated in the past few months, with the biggest factor being more positive views of New Jersey as a whole,” said Patrick Murray, director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute.

Currently, 7-in-10 residents rate the state of New Jersey as either an excellent (20%) or good (50%) place to live. This 70% positive rating is the highest recorded since May 2003 when it stood at 72%, and a marked improvement over the 30-year low of 57% recorded less than one year ago in August 2011. The state evaluation contributes half of the total Garden State Quality of Life Index score. The other half is comprised of ratings of various local aspects of New Jersey life. These ratings have remained fairly steady, including positive ratings of one’s town as a place to live (76%), the local environment (75%), local schools (63%) and neighborhood safety (64%).

Compared to February, the Garden State Quality of Life Index has seen significant increases among New Jersey men – from +20 two months ago to +33 now. The score among state women was more stable – from +30 to +28 now.

The index score among older residents also jumped. New Jerseyans age 55 and over now score +37 on the index – up from +26 in February – and give higher ratings than those age 35 to 54 (+30) or 18 to 34 (+25). The Garden State Quality of Life Index score among urban residents nearly doubled from +11 in February to +20 now, but still trails the score of suburban residents (+36).

The Garden State Quality of Life Index was created by the Monmouth University Polling Institute to serve as a resident-based indicator of the quality of life offered by the state of New Jersey. The index is based on five separate poll questions: overall opinion of the state as a place to live – which contributes half the index score – and ratings of one’s hometown, the performance of local schools, the quality of the local environment, and feelings of safety in one’s own neighborhood. The index can potentially range from -100 to +100.

 

Star Ledger - Low test scores outweigh lofty challenges as Trenton charter school faces closure

Published: Monday, May 07, 2012, 9:30 AM Updated: Monday, May 07, 2012, 9:33 AM  By Jeanette Rundquist/The Star-LedgerThe Star-Ledger

High school senior Jabari Alvarango has had a difficult life. His father was deported when he was five. His mother died of cancer when he was 14.

Jabari, 17, said he was "kicked out" of three schools before sixth grade because he argued with teachers, threw tantrums and, in his words, had "real bad anger problems."

But when he painted a self-portrait of his life in art class at Emily Fisher Charter School of Advanced Studies in Trenton, recently, instead of turmoil or anger he painted a scene of green parkland, a cheerful garden and a peaceful blue stream. He said that’s how he pictures his life moving forward.

Emily Fisher opened 14 years ago and serves some of the state’s toughest-to-educate children. Almost all of the nearly 400 students are poor and about 40 percent have special education needs. Many failed in other schools: The mission statement includes reaching out to "disruptive" students. There are kids who were incarcerated, and several dozen have children of their own.

But next month, the school is expected to close. The state Department of Education this spring denied a renewal of Emily Fisher’s charter, due in large part to low test scores, citing a "culture of low expectations" and "little evidence of learning taking place." If the school closes, students will "transition" back to regular Trenton schools.

Emily Fisher is appealing saying the state cited incorrect data in its non-renewal.

Acting Education Commissioner Christopher Cerf maintains the state’s data and analyses are correct, and denied requests for reconsideration. The school is seeking a stay in state Appeals Court and a decision may be announced as early as today.

School officials say part of the reason the state may want the closure is that DOE wants access to its facilities — several former parochial schools — for another charter school. G. Dallas Dixon last week wrote to Cerf, saying he learned that the acting director of the state’s charter school office reached out to the Diocese of Trenton, attempting to "broker" a deal to lease the facilities to a new charter.

DOE spokesman Justin Barra said the department spoke with a broker for the Diocese but did not discuss Emily Fisher’s facility. While two new charters are approved for Trenton, Barra said both requested another "planning year," and won’t open in September.

Diocese spokeswoman Rayanne Bennett said "Emily Fisher Charter School faces revocation of its charter, and that would mean that its lease ... would be terminated."

"I am very upset. I don’t think the children can basically adapt to the outside," said Sumatra McQueen, a Trenton mom who placed her two sons in Emily Fisher after she said they were hanging around with the "wrong kids" in the regular public schools.

Jabari, the student who painted the picture, said he wants the school to stay open to help younger kids.

"At Fisher, the teachers never gave up on me. They seen that I had something in me," he said. The teen graduates next month and plans to attend an Ohio technical college.

Emily Fisher was opened in 1998 by Dixon, a former attorney, probation officer and one-time Assembly candidate, who changed careers to teaching. He called it "invigorating" to see kids grow and improve through Fisher. The school is named after his grandmother.

"Our mission is to keep the door open for kids that most school systems don’t really encourage to be part of their family," he said.

The school’s main building is a former parochial school within sight of the gold dome of New Jersey’s statehouse; a second campus is located in Trenton’s Chambersburg neighborhood. The school takes kids from grades 5-12.

Its test scores, however, are among the state’s lowest. The latest high school graduation rate, for students graduating in four years, was 40.3 percent. The school’s data specialist, Steve Zelem, ranked all New Jersey charter schools, according to test scores. Emily Fisher was the lowest among the state’s 12 charter high schools, and its fifth- though eighth-graders ranked sixth from the bottom.

But Emily Fisher officials said data also shows a trend of growth. From 2008-09 to 2010-11, they say scores rose. The percentage of kids who passed math went from 13 to 33, according to the data. The percentage passing language arts rose from 22 to 42.

The state disagrees, however. While state officials declined to comment, citing pending litigation, Cerf’s letters to the school said test scores place it in the lowest-performing 3 percent. Its graduation rate is the lowest of any New Jersey charter school. And compared to the 21 elementary and middle schools in Trenton, he said, Emily Fisher’s test scores are 7th lowest.

"We cannot conclude that the school has met its mission to provide all students with a quality education," he wrote.

The school was placed on probation in 2006-07, and the state this year raised many of the same issues — curricular problems, leadership capacity, attendance, behavioral incidents.

While Dixon said he does not want Emily Fisher students judged by a different standard, he points out that 40 percent are special ed kids.

He said members of the current senior class have been accepted to Penn State University, Kean University, Bloomfield College and other places.

"What we like to talk about is not so much how they are when they come in, but how they are when they leave," he said.

As charter schools expand, often one criticism is that they discourage special needs kids from applying. Many say Emily Fisher is unique in that it does the opposite.

Trenton interim School Superintendent Raymond Broach said Emily Fisher officials have told his district that they want students "that might have needs." "I usually don’t find schools with their hand raised to take the more challenging student," Broach said. "I think it (Emily Fisher) fulfills a need that some schools districts cannot fill ... I’m sorry to see them close."

Some experts say the issue facing schools like Emily Fisher is how to hold them accountable.

Kevin G. Welner, a professor of education at the University of Colorado Boulder and director of the National Education Policy Center, said so-called "last chance" or "alternative" schools that enroll at-risk students almost never show high test scores or even strong test score growth, "so it makes little sense to hold them accountable using that standard."

But to make sure kids are well-served, he said charter school authorizers must look at whether the schools are well-staffed and teachers get the resources they need; if students are academically challenged and supported; and whether attendance is strong..

Michelle Fine, a professor of psychology at City University of New York and author of "Charter Schools and the Corporate Makeover of Public Education: What’s at Stake?" said she does not believe test scores are adequate to judge a school — or base a school-closing decision on.

"There is absolutely no evidence that school closing is a school improvement strategy," Fine said. "In the event this is a charter school that needs to improve itself, one would think the DOE would attempt to support that, rather than to close and reopen a set of charter schools unlikely to enroll the same students."

She said the charter movement began with "social justice" charter schools started by grass roots community members, but that is now changing.

"We’re seeing social justice charter schools being eaten by more exclusive, and more selective and better politically connected charter schools," she said. "It’s like the charter school movement starting to eat its own."