A r c h i v e d  I n f o r m a t i o n

Systemic Reform - October 1996

Systemic Reform Policies

Advocates have suggested that systemic strategies for reform should encompass three key areas: a unifying vision and goals that provide a coherent direction/strategy for education reform throughout the system and that are applied to all students and schools; a coherent system of state policy guidance that promotes these ambitious student outcomes; and a restructured governance system that defines the responsibilities of the various levels of the system in order to ensure that change sought in content and outcomes of education are enacted in the classroom (Smith and O'Day, 1991). Each of our study states has addressed these three areas to varying degrees. In this section, we examine the strategies our sites used to develop a vision of reform, align relevant policies and support restructured governance systems, and the challenges they faced in implementing these strategies.

Developing a Reform Vision

All three states have a general vision of reform that calls for more challenging standards for all students. They differ however, in the substance of that vision and the way it which it is communicated to the public and educators in their state. Regardless of the substance of the vision, all three states have had to face educators, parents and a public who were not convinced of the need to change current practice.

The Vision of Reform

The vision of reform developed by the three states differs on the nature of the desired student outcomes, the disciplinary base of the standards, and the role of the teacher in reform.

In California and Michigan, student outcomes are based on content knowledge in specific disciplines, such as reading, writing, mathematics and science. The content and disciplinary focus of the newest standards build on previous state policies. California, for example, has had subject matter frameworks for many years. Under Honig's leadership, however, the frameworks were revised to reflect more challenging conceptions of the content and more up-to-date conceptions of teaching and learning. The frameworks have also been given more weight as the basis for state assessment, textbook adoptions and other forms of instructional guidance. Similarly, Michigan has defined essential goals and objectives in mathematics and reading since the early 1970s. The current standards have moved away from the basic skills focus of the 1970s and early 1980s to incorporate new directions in the teaching of mathematics and language arts. Both states have, or are developing, separate curriculum frameworks and assessments for each discipline.

Vermont, on the other hand, chose to define its initial set of student outcomes--The Vermont Common Core of Learning (1992)--in terms of 21 generic student skills. Students are expected, for example, to: "listen actively, for a variety of purposes;...ask meaningful questions;...develop a sense of unique worth and personal competence;...[and] learn by serving others, and know the rewards of giving one's energies for a larger good." This approach has allowed the state to stress the interdisciplinary aspects of the curriculum. The Common Core organizes these "vital results" under headings that apply across content areas, the writing of the content standards was organized into three multi-disciplinary teams (mathematics, science and technology, arts and humanities, and history and social sciences) and the writing portfolio assessment requires students to include writing for other content areas (e.g., science, social studies).

In Vermont and California, the vision of reform also casts teachers as professionals, with both the expertise and authority to direct the course of reform. This vision manifests itself in several ways. At a general level, the curriculum frameworks in place in California and in development in Vermont are cast as broad principles, with the expectation that teachers in local districts and schools should be the ones to work out details of scope and sequence. In Michigan, however, the approach has been much more to list the content to be taught at each grade level. More specifically, viewing the teacher as a professional is an explicit principle mentioned in California's reform documents, and lies at the heart of the grade level networks, professional development and emerging teacher credentialing policy. For example, the grade level reform documents and networks are designed to help schools pull together the various threads of reform into a coherent strategy at the school level, and the restructuring initiatives foster and support on-going, school-wide reflection on instruction and student learning. The local recertification boards established in Vermont are composed entirely of teachers, who must pass judgment on their colleagues' plans for their own professional development.

All of the districts in our sample had, or were in the process of, developing a set of student and/or content outcomes in mathematics and language arts. Although their visions varied in scope and depth, in all cases state reforms had influenced the substance of district goals and objectives. The most fully specified vision was found in CA2, which had a history of curricular involvement, initiated in large part by the previous superintendent who had been a strong proponent of a common core curriculum based on the state frameworks. The priorities in that district included a major early literacy campaign, and mathematics improvement. In these and other curricular areas, primary attention was focused on improving the performance of the lowest-achieving students in the district. The two districts in Michigan had established broad student outcomes and were working at the school and district level to set more specific academic outcomes and objectives in several curricular areas and at different grade levels. Both districts had adopted the state's reading objectives and were developing mathematics objectives that reflected both the state core curriculum and the NCTM strands. The two Vermont districts were using the curriculum review process to establish a vision of what students should know and be able to do.

Leadership in Articulating the Reform Vision

The three states also differed in how their vision was articulated to teachers, school districts and the public. In California and Vermont, the chief state school officers (and their departments) communicated a consistent reform message that provided a common focal point around which to align multiple education policies. In Vermont, for example, the Common Core serves as the touchstone for education reform in the state. Mills and his staff travel the state promoting the importance of the Common Core orientation for the future of Vermont, and equally important, they try to help people at the local level see how the various reform activities fit together. In California, access for all students to a rich and rigorous core curriculum has been the center of that state's reform efforts. But beyond that, a "constructivist" model of learning pervades the words and actions of state education staff and the major education reform documents, like the frameworks and grade level documents. Then, as described in the preceding chapter, the two states aligned other education policies with these reform visions.

In contrast, the education reform agenda of Michigan, which was set by the governor and legislature, largely responds to the concerns of the business community which supports accountability and the concept of a centrally-defined core curriculum. Because state policymakers have focused on the process of reform (e.g., greater accountability measures for schools, school districts and student), rather than on the specific content of reform, Michigan lacks a clear and shared vision of reform, or a leader to promote a vision. Expectations of what students should know and be able to do are communicated indirectly through the state assessment system, and training sessions designed to familiarize teachers with the latest assessment items in the different disciplines. Because the assessments of different subjects are changed at different times, teachers do not receive a clear message about any common, underlying constructs, such as "constructivist learning," or a common set of skills or knowledge that all students should learn.

The Tension Between Current and Desired Practice

New ideas about what students should know and be able to do and about how students should be taught require the development of new curricula, instructional materials and assessments, and extensive teacher professional development. These new ideas also challenge the conceptions of student learning and teaching that all actors in the education system students, parents, educators, policy makers and the public--hold dear. Even those who support the new directions of reform, such as many of our teacher respondents, expressed the need to balance old and new ways of teaching reading, writing and mathematics. (See Chapter 5.) Moreover, many are not sold on the need or desirability of changing the ways we currently educate our children.

In general, the public neither understands nor accepts the current reform agenda. A recent survey by the Public Agenda Foundation found that the education reform agenda is out of sync with the general public's top concerns about safe and orderly schools and effective teaching of the basics. Most respondents agreed that schools should set very clear guidelines on what students should learn and teachers should teach, and they support setting higher academic standards for students. But they are uncomfortable with using calculators to teach computation, teaching composition without teaching spelling and grammar, and grouping students of different abilities together. And only a bare majority of the public agrees with educators that multiple choice exams should be replaced with essays (Johnson and Immerwahr, 1994). In California, a failure of the professional community to build broad public support for its reform efforts left it unable to counter attacks by the religious right on the CLAS test.

Recognizing the importance of public support for his reform agenda, and a lack of public understanding of the need to reform the state's public education system, the Vermont Commissioner of Education made public engagement a major component of his reform strategy. This state's Common Core of Learning emerged from a two-year long interaction between the Vermont State Department of Education and the public, including 67 local meetings where Vermont citizens were asked to define what they thought were the most important education goals for the state. The SDE also involved the business community in goal definition and portfolio design. The SDE has continued its public engagement campaign through the wide and frequent dissemination of information about the condition of education in the state, explicitly linked to the state's goals for education. People generally agree that Mills is doing a lot to try to get out information on Vermont's education reforms, but opinions vary about the success of this effort. Although many people are aware that changes are being attempted, fewer are conversant with the specific curriculum changes being promoted. Support from the business community has been strong, but some local school board members remain cautious. There has not been, however, any strong, overt opposition to the education reforms, and they appear to be on track in Vermont.

Districts undertaking education reform also recognize the need to educate, involve and bring along their publics. In one of our study sites (MI2), the superintendent initiated his reform efforts with the creation of a district Visioning Committee composed of community members and district teachers and administrators. This group, which was initially charged with envisioning what schools should look like in the 21st century, has been retained as an oversight committee that reviews and responds to proposed plans for restructuring education in the district. The committee serves as a major vehicle for community input, and its recommendations are rarely rejected by the elected local board of education. This process has enabled the district to make some controversial changes, such as freeing Monday afternoons for teacher professional development, detracking the high school curriculum, and implementing learner-centered classrooms.


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[The Context of Reform] [Table of Contents] [Struggling for Policy Coherence]