Middle-class blues
A new federal education law is finding failing schools in a surprising place: the suburbs
HOPKINS, MINN.--"We're live," yells Eli, a lanky sixth grader with a striking case of bed head who serves as the digital cameraman for Eisenhower Elementary School's weekly TV broadcast. Lexi, 11, begins reading the school news, leading with the science fair to be held in the cafeteria that night. Next, a fifth grader who serves as the school weatherman launches into a discussion of how mountains of melting snow will affect neighborhood septic systems.
The student news report--beamed directly into every homeroom and later broadcast on the local public-access TV station--is a fixture at Eisenhower and at every elementary school in the Hopkins district. And it is just one sign among many of the 8,300-student school system's innovation and educational quality. The affluent suburb west of Minneapolis is home to the 2001 Minnesota Teacher of the Year and boasts four schools that have won the sought-after U.S. Department of Education Blue Ribbon award. Hopkins High School (which has both a cross-country and a downhill ski team) is tied with two other schools for the highest number of National Merit Scholar semifinalists in the state. "It's one of the best districts in the metro area," said Kevin Luker, who teaches in a nearby district, as he picked up his two children from school on a recent afternoon.
Bad grades. But in the next few months, as the provisions of a new federal education law kick in, many Hopkins schools may get a new label: failing. The district expects six of its seven elementary schools to be so named under the No Child Left Behind Act championed by President Bush and signed into law last year. The legislation requires states to test all pupils in grades three to eight and to identify schools as "in need of improvement" if students in certain subgroups (racial minority, economic level, English fluency, and special education) do not either reach minimum standards or show improvement over time. And Hopkins is not alone. While most state accountability plans are still awaiting Department of Education approval, Susan Sclafani, counselor to the secretary of education, expects that "thousands of suburban schools will be labeled" as underperforming. That means not only public embarrassment but also a range of potential sanctions, including school restructuring or even state takeover.
While states have long targeted low-performing urban schools for improvement, suburban schools with high overall test scores and pockets of racial and economic diversity are only now coming under the reform microscope. And the early readings in many cases are not impressive. At Eisenhower, above-average test scores mask some troubling disparities between the school's middle-class majority and a growing minority of low-income kids. Only 28 percent of Eisenhower's 25 low-income third graders passed last year's state reading test, for instance, compared with 76 percent of the third grade's 86 nonpoverty students. Similarly large achievement gaps haunt many suburban schools nationwide. At Highland Park High School outside Chicago, for example, 82 percent of white students met the state math standards last year, compared with just 5 percent of Hispanic pupils.
Hopkins Superintendent Michael Kremer says he's all for closing the achievement gap, but he believes his schools are being unjustly targeted. For one thing, he points out that a school's label is based on the scores of all students--even those who have been with the school for as little as a year. For another, a school can also be tagged as low performing if it fails to test at least 95 percent of students in any subgroup. Worst of all, Kremer complains, the new law is severely underfunded. "The dollars are just not there for the laserlike work necessary to take care of all children."
U.S. Education Secretary Rod Paige has little patience for such talk. "Nothing else matters if we don't believe all kids can learn," he says. "The people who are yelling about more money need to be asked about the results of the money spent before." If the 2004 federal education budget passes, he adds, federal spending on schools will have increased significantly from 2001. But state education officials say the new federal dollars aren't enough to cover the recent accountability mandates, particularly when state budgets have been slashed. Minnesota, for instance, is projecting a $4.23 billion deficit.
The hand they're dealt. Even with ample resources, some educators are unsure how successful they can be with children from disadvantaged backgrounds. Case in point, says Eisenhower Principal Rosemary Lawrence: a newly arrived Mexican immigrant who started kindergarten this year not understanding a word of English. "We want all kids to learn," she says. "We just don't control all the cards for success."
But reform advocates say suburban schools that don't measure up shouldn't blame their low-income and minority students. There's a growing body of evidence that high expectations and focused efforts can help those kids, whether in the cities or the suburbs, ace state tests. The Education Trust, a nonprofit group that works to raise student achievement, recently identified over 2,000 high-poverty or high-minority schools nationwide that performed in the top third on both their state math and reading tests. Mount Royal Elementary/Middle School in Baltimore, for instance, is almost entirely African-American and more than 80 percent of its students are in poverty, but it scored in the top 10 percent on the state's fifth-grade math exam last year. Such schools are clear about what they want kids to do, organize teachers methodically around those subjects, and test frequently, says Education Trust Director Kati Haycock.
That approach is sorely needed, she says, even--perhaps especially--in districts like Hopkins. "Historically, we've judged our schools primarily on how their top kids did," she adds. "But this law says you are no longer successful if you are not successful with every group of kids." That's a lesson all schools are now learning.
Getting Tough
The No Child Left Behind Act phases in a range of sanctions for struggling schools:
FIRST AND SECOND YEARS:
Parents can opt for a new school or request tutoring.
FOURTH YEAR:
Schools that fail to shape up must replace staff, revamp the curriculum, or hire an outside expert.
SIXTH YEAR:
If a school continues to lag, the district or state must take it over or convert it to a charter school.
This story appears in the April 28, 2003 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.