July 1996
Report to the State Board of Regents

BY STATE EDUCATION COMMISSIONER RICHARD P. MILLS


At last, a budget

Education got most of the essentials in the 1997 budget. State aid increased by $225 million, the State Education Department will not have to lay off more staff, and the Regents retained their leadership role in higher education and the professions. VESID received a million dollars to forestall selection criteria that would have prevented thousands of citizens from receiving the support they need and qualify for. We achieved significant reform in preschool special education, a major professions bill, and funds to support the new testing systems. Many needs go to the top of the agenda for the next session, including the Electronic Doorway Library services, and the Regents technology proposals. But in general, it was a good result.

I am grateful for the support along the way from the Governor, Speaker Silver, Majority Leader Bruno, and the Director of the Budget. Legislative and executive branch staff worked hard with us. The Regents were a real presence in the legislative process, both during the Regents meetings and in countless other contacts. Many thanks to colleagues in the schools, the BOCES, and the professional associations who stood with us.

I am especially proud of my colleagues in the Department of Education for their conduct during the long struggle. Many worked every day under the expectation of layoffs, and yet they kept their focus. To Richard Cate, Ruth Henahan, Claudia Alexander, and all the others who represented us during the long watches of the night: Well done.

Our budget preparation for next year is well underway. Department budget presentations will occur in August. This year, our budget proposal will reflect our new strategic plan.

Standards for schools

This month, the Board of Regents will vote on much higher standards for schools. It is a vote about accountability for all schools and specific improvement in performance where needed. The Regents action will change the public discussion about school performance. It will no longer be about schools far distant from most New Yorkers, but about a school close at hand. Now, schools must show that 65 percent of the students meet minimally acceptable performance in reading at the third grade, for example. The proposal would require 90 percent to achieve at that level.

While school accountability discussions over the last year have concerned a few low performing schools -- "Schools Under Registration Review" -- now the attention will expand to approximately a thousand or more schools in the middle. These are schools performing below the expected level, but not under registration review.

The schools farthest from the 90 percent standard will go on the list for registration review and will have three years to improve performance. If they don't, they face closure or reorganization. We will work hard with them to gain the needed improvements. The registration review list will get longer. We may add 300 or more schools over the next five years.

Schools in the middle -- those with scores not low enough to go on the registration review list but not yet achieving the 90 percent level -- will produce school improvement plans. These plans will include specific performance targets, resources, and schedules for action. These schools will publicize their plans and report results each year in the School Report Card.

New York City Schools Under Registration Review

In June, I approved redesign plans submitted by Chancellor Crew for 13 New York City schools that had been placed under corrective action. Approval was contingent upon the New York City Board of Education taking the following actions:

Chancellor Crew and his staff are meeting these conditions. New principals, whose appointments became effective July 1, have been appointed to eight of these schools and, in two cases, recently hired principals have been retained. At three schools, veteran administrators are overseeing the implementation of the redesign plans during the summer as the process for the appointment of new principals moves forward expeditiously. Chancellor Crew has informed me that the Board of Education is on schedule with the selection of assistant principals and school staff.

The Board of Education, in collaboration with such organizations as the United Federation of Teachers and the New York City Partnership and Chamber of Commerce Inc., has developed a series of summer professional development activities for administrators and staff at these redesigned schools. A two-week Principals' Institute will occur from August 5-19, in-school staff development will occur the week of August 26, and additional professional development activities will take place throughout the summer.

Much remains to be done. Associate Commissioner Shelia Evans-Tranumn and her staff will continue to work with the Board of Education to ensure a smooth opening of school in September of these new schools. In addition, staff will be on-site during the first two weeks of school and throughout the school year to help ensure that the redesign plans I approved are implemented effectively and that these schools meet the challenges of being good places for children to learn.

Academic standards -- the end of the beginning

In the matter of setting high academic standards for students we are, in Churchill's phrase, not at the end or even the beginning of the end, but at least we have come to the end of the beginning. It has been a long effort to define what students need to know and be able to do. Nevertheless, we must add the details necessary to make the standards work for students and teachers.

Months ago we agreed on a schedule for creating resource guides. These materials will include specific information on the content of the curriculum, and many more examples of student work at different levels of performance. The guides will show how particular topics and skills related to each standard can be arranged across the grades. We also must produce specific outlines of the content and skills to be measured on the tests, scoring rubrics with clear criteria for acceptable performance, and benchmark papers for each scoring level. And finally, we turn to the tests themselves.

Innovation slashes processing time

The Office of the Professions provides services to more than 600,000 licensed professionals in New York State. This Office is in the midst of reforms to improve services to the public, and one has produced startling results. Reregistration of professionals used to take three to six weeks. Now it takes three days, and soon that will drop to one day.

Acting Associate Commissioner Johanna Duncan-Poitier reports that 20,000 reregistrations are processed a month now with a new system of scanning technology, streamlined forms and procedures.

Management accountability in the State Education Department

The second set of quarterly management team reviews are going on now. Since the last quarter, there has been a dramatic increase in the use of performance data to show results, and the reviews are now tightly linked to our strategic plan. One gratifying result of the last quarter's work has been the systematic elimination of less important work and process. For example, the Division of College and University Evaluation produced an impressive list of simplified reporting, transferred functions, and eliminated functions not required by law or regulation. The team also has an assertive program of work redesign efforts underway concerning approval of new collegiate programs, master plan amendments, and periodic institutional reviews.

Cultural Education also redesigned a great many functions, and produced data on the services curtailed or eliminated for financial reasons. These data will help the Regents as well as the Administration and Legislature deal with hard choices in the next budget.

Teaching to the standards

Both the Regents and the State Education Department are considering changes in policy on teacher licensing and preparation. Many likely strategies would take years to put in place, but others might be accomplished quickly. Many ideas will come to mind, but we need not act on all of them. The central idea is to act now so that we have the teaching force we need to enable every child to meet the standards. It might help to think about a three-part strategy to get rapid early payoff while building a solid foundation for the future:

Phase 1: Use the systems we have vigorously for maximum effect. For example, we could change regulations now to end the use of substandard licenses. More than 7,000 such license holders will be teaching this fall. We could also focus the hundreds of millions of dollars available now in professional development, and get results even during the coming school year, with major results next summer.

Phase 2: Build or buy basic systems improvements for the mid- term. For example, national organizations build standards for teacher preparation institutions and others create tests for teacher candidates. We do this also. The time has come to decide whether it is better for the State of New York to create these tools or to buy into the national efforts. We should make these decisions this year.

Phase 3: Look far ahead, discover the gaps in policy and practice, and fill them. Building really new systems takes a lot of time and money. We should embark on this course only of necessity, and wherever possible, with partners.


A monthly publication of the State Education Department


NYSED Logo