Call to Order and Roll Call
The 2nd meeting of the Interim Joint Committee on Education was held on Monday, July 13, 2015, at<MeetTime> 1:00 p.m., in Room 154 of the Capitol Annex. Representative Derrick Graham, Chair, called the meeting to order, and the secretary called the roll.
Present were:
Members: Senator Mike Wilson, Co-Chair; Representative Derrick Graham, Co-Chair; Senators Julie Raque Adams, Danny Carroll, Jimmy Higdon, Reginald Thomas, Johnny Ray Turner, Stephen West, and Max Wise; Representatives Linda Belcher, Regina Bunch, John Carney, Hubert Collins, Jim DeCesare, Jeffery Donohue, Kelly Flood, Cluster Howard, James Kay, Brian Linder, Mary Lou Marzian, Donna Mayfield, Reginald Meeks, Charles Miller, Rick G. Nelson, Ruth Ann Palumbo, Marie Rader, Jody Richards, Tom Riner, Bart Rowland, Rita Smart, Wilson Stone, Addia Wuchner, and Jill York.
Legislative Guest: Representative Arnold Simpson
Guests: Barbara Teague, Kentucky Department for Libraries and Archives (KDLA); Wayne Onkst, KDLA; Clay Combs, Education and Workforce Development Cabinet; Ann Marie Stevens, Scott County Schools and Hope Street Group (HSG); Cassie Reding, HSG; Beth Lovett, HSG; Shannon Jett, Department for Juvenile Justice; Bridgette Ramsey, Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence; Delvin Azofeifa, citizen; Dave Adkisson, Kentucky Chamber of Commerce; Roy Woods, United Way of the Bluegrass (UWBG); Bill Farmer, UWBG; Erin Klarer, Kentucky Higher Education Assistance Authority (KHEAA); and Clyde Caudill, Kentucky Association of School Administrators.
LRC Staff: Jo Carole Ellis, Ben Boggs, Joshua Collins, Janet Stevens, Amy Tolliver, and Daniel Clark.
Approval of Minutes of the June 8, 2015, Meeting
Upon motion from Representative Miller and a second by Representative Collins, the minutes were approved by voice vote.
Reports from Subcommittees
Representative Meeks reported that the Subcommittee on Postsecondary Education met to hear an update on Commonwealth College from the Council on Postsecondary Education (CPE). Senator Carroll reported that the Subcommittee on Elementary and Secondary Education was given an overview of Kentucky’s Alternate Assessment program presented by Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) staff. A complete set of minutes for each subcommittee is located in the Legislative Research Commission (LRC) library.
Presentation: Kentucky Rising
Dale Winkler, Associate Commissioner, Office of Career and Technical Education, KDE, stated that Kentucky Rising is an effort to increase Kentucky’s global competitiveness in the high-value international trade of goods and services by exploring what it would take to achieve student outcomes comparable to the highest performing states and nations. The primary strategy will be setting new standards for high school diplomas that are rigorous, performance based, built on academic core standards, and incorporate global literacy.
Mr. Winkler stated that the National Center for Education and the Economy (NCEE) has identified nine building blocks for a world-class education system which include: strong early childhood development; more resources for at-risk students than for others; coherent instructional systems; clear gateways set to global standards; competent teachers; incentives and support for teacher performance; leadership development; and a governance system for developing and implementing coherent, powerful policies.
CPE President Bob King stated that in order to determine which of the nine building blocks to pursue, Kentucky Rising will use the results of a gap analysis performed by NCEE which compares Kentucky to the four top performing countries and states. The analysis is two-thirds complete and has been shared with the two groups driving the work of Kentucky Rising; a working group comprised of teachers and administrators in K-12 and higher education and a steering committee made up of six to seven members of the business community, college presidents, KDE departments heads, State Representative Graham and Senator Wilson, and representatives from the Prichard Committee, Kentucky Association of School Superintendents (KASS), Kentucky Education Association (KEA) and Education Professional Standards Board and several others. President King said the working groups are ready to begin building out strategies to implement in the areas of career and technical education (CTE), early childhood education, and teacher preparation.
David Adkisson, Kentucky Chamber of Commerce President, expressed that the Chamber’s top strategic priority is to improve education in Kentucky. Kentucky is nationally known for education reform, and cooperation and collaboration between higher education and K-12. Kentucky Rising takes this success to another level. Mr. Adkisson said that the steering committee business community representatives are privileged to be at the table thinking about the education system and providing input.
Bridgette Ramsey, Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence, stated that the Prichard Committee has a strong interest in the outcomes of Kentucky Rising. In 2010 the committee released the Top 20 by 2020 report, identifying 20 indicators of academic performance to track Kentucky’s education progress toward the goal of being among the top 20 states in the nation in student achievement. Even though Kentucky is now in the middle tier nationally, the United States now ranks in the middle with all countries, so making it to the top 20 by 2020 does not equate to being globally competitive.
Ms. Ramsey added that Kentucky Rising will not be a new reform. If done well, it will be a strategic initiative to properly resource and strengthen Kentucky’s education system and continuously improve it for years to come, putting Kentucky in the top of the national and global economy.
In response to Representative Flood’s question about the Picus Odden report, commissioned by the Council for Better Education, Ms. Ramsey said that the report gives Kentucky Rising information as to how to properly resource and strengthen Kentucky’s education system.
Representative Flood suggested that as we focus on developing a workforce, we remember the importance of developing an informed citizenship. Representative Flood stated that she sees assuring an abundant supply of competent teachers as the most critical building block. She added that Kentucky should continue to produce excellent data collection work for use in creating effective public policy.
In response to Senator Wilson’s questions regarding identifying the education degrees and building the capacity needed to fill the skills gap and meet the demand, Mr. Winkler stated that Kentucky Rising is carefully looking at how to align programs of studies and pathways to leading Kentucky industry sectors and how to insure students are getting the skill sets needed by those industry sectors. Mr. Winkler added that the gap analysis for building block number seven, relating to effective CTE, provides interesting information about what other countries are doing to move CTE forward.
President King added that the CPE is considering a new policy that assures every high school in the state has available for its students a minimum of three college-level CTE courses and three college-level general education courses.
In response to Senator Higdon’s question about recommendations from the Southern Regional Educational Board (SREB) report, Mr. Winkler explained that the recommendations implemented thus far have resulted in intensive training provided for CTE teachers on project-based learning and a financial study of CTE that has been shared with the CTE advisory committee and the Kentucky Board of Education. Mr. Winkler added that this study can be shared with the Interim Joint Committee on Education at an upcoming meeting.
In response to Representative Kay’s question about the role early childhood education plays in meeting the goals of Kentucky Rising, Ms. Ramsey stated that early childhood development is a critical precursor to all the other building blocks in the Kentucky Rising framework, and therefore, is one of the first three targeted areas of work. Ms. Ramsey added that Kentucky Rising is in prime position to move forward with early childhood development work as a result of the General Assembly’s support of early childhood investments such as the allocation of one-quarter of the tobacco settlement investment to early childhood education, restoration of childcare assistance program funds, and increasing access to preschool.
In response to Representative Miller’s question regarding increasing the number of high performing students entering the teaching profession, President King explained that the challenge is to make admission into our teacher preparation programs more selective, provide higher salaries comparable to other professions, build a career pathway for teachers, and deploy our teachers in creative ways that are more effective and efficient.
Representative Flood said that, as we move toward greater selectivity in teaching admission in an already predominantly Caucasian female staff system, the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce should use its best wisdom to help determine how to increase salaries and reconfigure a profession that is typically underpaid.
In response to Representative Flood’s comment, President King stated that part of the solution may be to actively recruit high-performing, minority students from the Advance Kentucky program into the teaching corps. Advance Kentucky currently serves around 17,000 students in schools with high proportions of low-income and minority students. The program encourages students to take advance placement courses and exams. President King said that the number of Kentucky’s minority students scoring a three or above on the AP exam is 150 to 200 percent above the national average.
In response to questions from Senator Raque Adams regarding funds for and the current phase of the gap analysis, President King stated that the gap analysis was paid for by the NCEE and that six of the nine areas have been completed, with the remaining three to be completed in two weeks. President King said at that point the building blocks will be prioritized and a decade-long plan will be mapped out as a starting point.
Senator Raque Adams said that as a mother of a child with learning differences, she places priority on being vigilant about building block number two, which refers to providing more resources for at-risk students than for others.
In response to Senator Raque Adams question about implementation ideas for addressing building block number nine, which refers to instituting a governance system for developing and implementing coherent policies, President King explained that the task will be to collectively evaluate our current governance system and make adjustments to strike the right balance between the KDE, local districts, and site-based decision making councils.
In response to Senator Carroll’s question about CTE emerging as a priority for moving forward due to the urgency in the workforce, President King affirmed that CTE is one of the three areas to move on right away as well as early childhood education and teacher preparation.
In response to Senator West’s questions regarding the NCEE, President King stated that the NCEE, located in Washington, D.C., was created 25 years ago. The NCEE is funded by competitive grants, income from their National Institute on School Leadership training program, and from an endowment that was created from income generated by the sale of a program called America’s Promise to Pearson, a large textbook company. President King added that he serves on the board of NCEE.
Presentation: Kentucky’s Plan to Close Achievement Gaps
Amanda Ellis, Associate Commissioner of Education, Office of Next Generation Learners, KDE, stated that the Education Trust analyzed Kentucky’s data and identified achievement gap issues by subpopulation. Among students in grades 3-5, 6-8, and high school English II, during the 2013-14 school year, 80,097 were novice in reading and 62,450 in math.
Kelly Foster, Associate Commissioner, Office of Next Generation Schools and Districts, KDE, stated that a 40-member cross-agency team is working to close the achievement gap through novice reduction by impacting daily instruction. Eight key core work processes have been identified within the agency around which KDE will align resources so that schools in all districts are equipped to eliminate the achievement gap. These core work processes were further distilled into four basic building blocks for strengthening daily instruction which include curriculum, instruction, assessment, and learning environment.
Ms. Foster explained that KDE has taken three major action steps to support the identified key core work processes. An interactive novice reduction website has been developed as a resource for schools and districts. It will be up and running by September. Additionally, KDE now has a novice reduction coordinator and five regional novice reduction coaches who will help district and school leadership to identify their novice students and utilize KDE’s resources, internally aligned specifically for closing the gap through novice reduction. Lastly, Ms. Foster explained that KDE is currently piloting the novice reduction plan in Fayette County, and next month regional coaches will be targeting other districts across the state to start with novice reduction.
In response to Representative Graham’s questions about Senate Bill (SB) 168, Ms. Foster explained that the provisions of SB 168 are among 44 different statutes and regulations that the novice reduction plan seeks to incorporate. SB 168 mandates that each school submit a novice reduction plan to KDE annually. KDE monitors the process to insure that plans are submitted, but does not have the capacity to ensure their implementation; therefore, it is the responsibility of the principal, superintendent, and local board to ensure the implementation of the plan. Ms. Foster said that SB 168 also provides measures for reallocation of resources directed at low-performing schools. Additionally, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) flexibility waiver allows some flexibility in funding federal dollars to meet the achievement gap.
Senator Thomas said he feels that the achievement gap begins on the first day of kindergarten. He shared that a study performed by the American Federation of Teachers found that low-income students enter kindergarten with a reading vocabulary of 317, while higher-income students enter with 4000 words. Senator Thomas added that evidence shows that these low-income students never catch up.
In response to Senator Thomas’s comments about closing the achievement gap by requiring mandatory early childhood education, Ms. Ellis stated that early childhood education is essential, pivotal, and ideal, but there are still other ways to successfully address the gap all the way through. As children get older, addressing the gap becomes more challenging, but is doable by improving the quality of classroom level, core instruction that has the essential components of curriculum, instruction, assessment, and learning environment in place daily.
In response to Senator Thomas’s comments about closing the achievement gap by requiring mandatory parent involvement, Ms. Foster stated that parental participation is being addressed by key core work process number six, which seeks to establish a learning culture and environment through parent and community involvement.
Representative Graham suggested working with the medical community to educate young and low-income mothers about the importance of preparing their children for education by reading to and interacting with them.
Representative Flood said that health care programs like the Health Access Nurturing Development Services (HANDS) programs that support parents and the development of children, are also integral in addressing gap reduction. Representative Flood also stressed the importance of expressing to local officials and business leaders the message that today’s education achievement gaps are the economic gaps of tomorrow.
In response to Representative Wuchner’s question about the difference between novice reduction coaches and education recovery staff, Ms. Ellis explained that education recovery staff work directly in the bottom 5 percent of schools building sustainable systems to turn the schools around, while the novice reduction coaches will work on a higher level with district and school leadership teams to help them determine, based on their novice data, which of the aligned resources will best support the schools’ or districts’ needs.
In response to Senator Wilson’s question about utilizing summer learning programs to address the gap, Ms. Ellis said that the work of 21st Century and Summer Learning Programs is identified in key core work process number 5, which is design, align, and deliver support processes.
Representative Palumbo thanked the presenters for their presentations and talked about the importance of basic modeling of proper grammar in instructional material.
Representative Flood thanked the presenters and expressed her appreciation for the call for a moral imperative in addressing the achievement gap.
In response to Representative Carney’s question about identifying what is working well in districts with low gap and novice numbers, such as Hart County, Ms. Ellis said that part of the job of the regional novice reduction coaches, hired out of the districts they are serving, will be to identify what is working in their areas and use those strategies to build capacity within their regional area.
In response to Representative Belcher’s request for data on the numbers of regular students and special education students scoring novice by county, Ms. Ellis assured that KDE will gladly provide that information.
In response to Representative Graham’s question regarding the qualifications and selection of the novice reduction coaches, Ms. Foster explained that the coaches have a wide range of background experience in closing the achievement gap. Ms. Foster stated that the coaches were chosen by a selection committee within KDE and will officially begin August 1. Ms. Ellis added that KDE can provide a list of the coaches names, the levels they serve, and their backgrounds.
Representative Graham thanked the presenters and stated that he sees the achievement gap as an economic gap affecting all students across the state and closing it a necessary investment for the students and for Kentucky’s economy.
Review of Administrative Regulations
There was no action taken on 725 KAR 1:061 and 13 KAR 2:045 & E.
Review of Executive Order 2015-353
There was no action taken on the executive order.
With no further business before the committee, the meeting adjourned at 3:03 p.m.