BY STATE EDUCATION COMMISSIONER RICHARD P. MILLS
October 2000
BY STATE EDUCATION COMMISSIONER
RICHARD P. MILLS
The Regents Conference on the Professions will occur on Tuesday, October 3 in New York City. Following the conference, Regents will go to Elmira for the regular monthly meeting.
The theme this month derives from the proposal now before the Regents to strengthen Career and Technical Education. The Regents will visit schools, local area businesses and correctional facilities. Regents will meet with groups of school, business, and other community members. The Regents will also listen to the community at large on Wednesday evening at Southside High School. After brief comments to all, we will invite those attending to participate in one of several Regent-led small group discussions devoted to particular topics: special education, vocational/occupational programs, accountability, school finance, ensuring safe school facilities, teacher recruitment, implementing the standards and testing, leadership, character education and closing the performance gap.
Major issues:
Actions:
"The public will be served by qualified, ethical professionals who remain current with best practice in their fields and reflect the diversity of New York State."
That is the third goal in our strategic plan. The Regents Conference on the Professions is an important occasion to reflect on what we have done in pursuit of that goal, and to rededicate ourselves to the work ahead.
Since the last Regents Conference on the Professions in 1997, we have acted repeatedly to protect the public and support the integrity of the professions. Examples include extensive public information through the Consumers’ Bill of Rights, expanded online license verification, joint effort with the New York State Attorney General to stop illegal practice, and a streamlined complaint resolution process. The Conference materials present the data – service to the public and the professions is faster, better, and at lower cost.
The environment of professional practice is changing fast and becoming even more complex. The Regents, the Office of Professions and members of the 38 licensed professions have faced this reality by identifying 10 horizon issues and have begun policy discussions on half of them.
The bound volume of these papers is a significant contribution to public policy. The issues include corporate practice, telepractice, cross-jurisdictional practice, continuing competence, and effective professional regulation. Each topic abounds in questions without easy answers. And that is why we must engage so many people of vision, commitment, and competence in the Regents Conference on the Professions. As before, this will be a working conference. We expect to leave with more accomplished and a list of challenges to tackle in the years ahead.
The Career and Technical Education proposal is before the Regents for continued discussion. In October, the Board will engage this issue with community members and school leaders. Meanwhile, we are gathering reactions and comments through presentations, mailings, student surveys and group discussions to help the Board prepare for a policy decision. Regents can expect a summary of this material in November.
Here are some of the questions I have heard, and some of the answers I have given. As the time for decision nears, the answers that matter are the ones the Regents will give in their policy decision. Before they do that, the Regents will listen to a great many citizens around the state in the next few months.
Why require all five Regents exams?
The Regents standards embrace all five core subjects. Dropping some of the exams now would be a withdrawal from the standards. Some press the argument further and ask why people preparing for the trades need social studies. But don’t we want all graduates to be ready for the tasks of citizenship? Some would drop algebra and geometry. Our economic competitors don’t do that. And many apprenticeship programs are closed to those without algebra.
Why require an industry certified test of technical skills?
Top quality BOCES programs already do this. And I can think of one such example where the enrollment is rising by 10 percent a year. Why wouldn’t we benchmark against the best?
Why not have "contextualized" Regents exams so students could have a Regents math exam related to their technical curriculum?
No such system of exams exists and it would be costly and time consuming to build. We need change faster than that. And a test that mixed mathematics and technical topics would no longer really be a test of mathematics. A student who understands the technical topic might do well on a test that combines math and technical subjects but still fail to grasp the underlying math concept. But technical skills of today will soon be replaced by newer ones. What then?
There are so many other important questions. The meeting in Elmira will be yet another useful opportunity to engage the public before the Regents decide policy.
The Regents adopt their list of highest priority legislative proposals in November. The Board will look at the proposals as a whole for the first time in October, but all of these ideas have deep roots. We built the foundations together in the Regents Task Force on Leadership, the Regents Commission on Libraries, the Task Force on Teaching, the Task Force on Postsecondary Education and Individuals with Disabilities, and the Regents Subcommittee on State Aid.
A June status report on the Roosevelt Union Free School District documented serious problems behind low student performance at middle and high school levels, including weaknesses in curriculum, leadership, financial planning, and public engagement. In July, I presented options for the 2001-2002 school year should the district fail to meet the performance targets I will set this fall. The District Review Panel and Department staff are supporting the board of education’s revising the Corrective Action Plan. That plan was shared with newly appointed Superintendent Horace Williams, and reviewed by the Roosevelt Board of Education at its meeting on September 25. The Corrective Action Plan will be before the Regents for approval in October and, if approved, implemented during the 2000-2001 school year.
Actions taken by the Board of Regents in July to establish an association library serving the Corning area and in September to dissolve the charter of the former public library in order to transfer its assets to the new library, have paved the way to restoring public library service to the people of the region.
The goal of the trustees of the new library is improved and more responsive service for the community. While the library has been closed, the building has been extensively renovated - both to improve its appearance and utility and to make it more energy efficient. We think the library will quickly become a valuable educational asset when it reopens, probably in November. It is an excellent example of what a community can do when business, education, and government leaders work together.
In the midst of our September Regents meeting the DeWitt Wallace Reader’s Digest Funds awarded New York almost $4 million to implement the plan that resulted from the Regents leadership initiative. The day after the announcement Deputy Commissioner Kadamus and I met leaders from around the nation who are involved with related work. Last week, Deputy Commissioners Patton and Kadamus engaged higher education faculty on the challenges ahead, and I talked with the superintendents at their Fall Conference. The leadership academies are launching this fall.
I talked to superintendents at their fall conference on the subject of "Leading Questions." Local school leaders at every level have built the foundations for higher student achievement over the last several years. The gains in English at elementary and high school have been very strong and I congratulated them.
Many of these gains resulted from careful alignment of standards, curriculum, teaching practice, testing, and spending strategies. That was smart strategy and careful stewardship on their part. But tighter alignment isn’t a strategy that can be repeated year after year for ever-higher achievement.
The problem now is to think deeply, to ask very difficult questions and draw the entire community into thinking through the answers. How can we close the gaps in student achievement? I used several examples of leaders who are doing just this, including some on videotape. For the really difficult leadership assignments, says Ronald Heifetz of Harvard, one leads not by knowing all the answers, but by having the right questions – leading questions.
A monthly publication of the State Education Department
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