There's more than miles between us and a new set of graduation standards

 (the above is an adaptation of a line from Lil' Abner that I cannot now find anywhere online)

As a blogger who started writing out of sheer frustration with local school district governance coverage, I have a certain amount of weary understanding of the misses that happen. This is particularly true given the undercutting of the Fourth Estate and the seemingly endless churn of local reporters (when we have them at all!) for local news coverage. 

I nonetheless was puzzled by coverage of the October 8 Worcester School Committee meeting, which appeared to take as given that the graduation report from last year was moving forward into implementation.

As we have discussed here before, more than once, this is not the case. The Department does not have the authority to create new required graduation standards. The authority to determine what a student needs to graduate remains with local school committees. The competency determination, as bound by the amended law under Question 2, is within the Department's authority, and districts now all have policies that align to that. That is, though, the full extend of the authority of the Department.

Now, I'm pretty sure--I think?--that those running things here in Worcester know that, but I remain concerned that some writing for the Department might not. Recently, every superintendent received a communication from DESE that gave a deadline of late November for a report on where individual high schools were on their graduation requirements relating to the graduation report. It referred to this Companion Guide for information. 

And nowhere in any of this was there any mention of the fact that the Department cannot simply implement the graduation report, lacking utterly the authority to do so. It takes the graduation report as something that is being implemented, and this, despite the report itself--though only v-e-r-y subtly!--noting that the Legislature would need to act for implementation.

And if you think the Legislature is simply going to pass the graduation report as issued into legislation, well, I wouldn't advise putting money on that. 

While I have come to expect this sort of confusion of local reporters who often just got there, I am troubled to see it from the regulatory agency. 

we need districts to stop giving away their students' FERPA rights

 You may already have heard of Nikki Anderson, the mom in South Carolina whose six-year-old daughter came home from school with an AI-generated photo of the little girl as what she wanted to be when she grew up; it's now been covered in both USA Today and People, though I recommend reading Anderson's own posts over in Instagram. 

In an update today, she notes that the district, in responding to USA Today, speaks of no longer having such assignments and adopting policies and procedures, including one that has an "parental release" for AI (whatever that is), but she can find no such release within the district handbooks.

What is feeling rather deja vu to me about this is the district being able to share student information without the permission of parents is something that was being raised by many of us 13 years ago in connection to InBloom*.  Changes to FERPA during the Obama administration allowed school districts to share information about students to third parties in ways that previously had not been allowed. In 2016, this--along with more straightforward concerns about actual data breaches--were flagged in a petition to then-U.S. Secretary of Education John King:

The petition, sent to U.S. Education Secretary John King, says changes made to the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, known as FERPA, over the past several years have allowed education agencies and organizations to share student data with third parties without permission from students or their parents.

Now, of course, districts are signing agreements with all sorts of tech companies all of the time, and, by their very nature, those companies have access to all sorts of data about the students in the district. 

I think it's time to bring back up those concerns about the FERPA changes.**

_______________________________ 

 *alas for links that have since died...

**You know you're getting old when you've been through the whole pendulum swing on something in education...

There is a Board of Ed meeting on Tuesday

 And you can find the agenda here.

The out-of-the-ordinary part of the piece of this is that they are meeting in Williamsburg at the Anne T. Dunphy School. For those not familiar, Williamsburg is northwest of Northampton, and it is quite lovely! I recommend visiting sometime, 'though perhaps not for a Board of Ed meeting; don't miss the general store. 

The meeting will start at 9:30, presumably so those making their way west can find it (I will observe here that the heavy traffic actually goes east, and yet, somehow, those are the meetings that start at 9).

In any case...the State Student Advisory Council is sharing their goals for the year, one assumes via student member Sara Khan, who is president of the group. Also on the agenda is the Commissioner's evaluation, and the proposed regulations on literacy.

There is also "K–12 Statewide Graduation Standards: Foundational Coursework and Postsecondary Planning" as an item. I will be interested to see if that notes that the graduation report is a proposal that requires legislative action to move forward--more on that this weekend--and not a done deal, as it has been framed by the Commissioner to date.

None of the above has any backups (which is unusual at least for the regulations, such that I wonder if that is an oversight) as of Friday evening at 6 PM. 

These are Worcester trees,
but I imagine we'll get to enjoy some pretty trees on the drive to Williamsburg.

And while we're talking about technology in the classroom

 ...don't miss the NBC News look at what videos students are watching on their school-issued devices. 

And don't miss Matt Barnum's coverage of the Trump administration official who likened ed tech to tobacco. The problem there is that its being used as an argument against continuing Erate (pendulum again...).

Hey, how about we don't do this

 5 'good' AI use cases that are bad for students

...and frankly, this is still too positive about possible uses. We need students to develop these skills, which they manifestly are not doing if they're outsourcing it! 

Some recommended reading about next year's school budgets

Some recent useful reporting on this coming year--and in some cases, even this year, and in all cases, beyond next year's--school budgets:

I've added "geopolitical forces" to my "impacts on future budgets" slide for school district presentations. While this was always true, oil prices show up multiple places in school budgets (not just the buses!), and I'm glad the Boston Globe captured that.

“The bottom line is there’s no wiggle room on municipal budgets almost across the board,” he added. “Any time there is a cost driver that exceeds the rate of revenue growth, yeah, it’s very concerning.”

This lengthy piece by Sam Drysdale at State House News (sharing there via WWLP 22) takes a hard look at declining enrollment and what the means for the state. 

On paper, declining enrollment should mean less state aid. In practice, Massachusetts’ funding formula cushions districts from those losses.

Overall Chapter 70 aid increased to $7.66 billion in fiscal 2027, up 4.03%, even as enrollment fell.

No district receives less Chapter 70 aid than it received the previous year, and every district is guaranteed at least its prior-year aid plus $160 per pupil in fiscal 2027. As a result, only 62 districts are receiving aid driven directly by the formula’s enrollment and need calculations; most are receiving hold-harmless funding plus minimum aid.

Lewis said that is itself evidence the formula needs attention.

“The high number of communities in held harmless is actually one of the clear signs that we need to be reviewing our funding formula again,” he said. “The formula is basically broken for many communities.”

Yet there is a fundamental question about what the formula can realistically accomplish.

Howgate said the state cannot simply create a funding formula that pays districts for having fewer students.

“I don’t think we’re going to be able to come up with a formula to give districts money for fewer kids,” he said.

(and cheers to Sam for correctly capturing hold harmless there!) 

speaking of Alpha Schools: update from Springfield

 I'd missed this from Springfield last week: 

Springfield Empowerment Zone Co-Executive Director Matthew Brunell clarified that the pilot was paused due to the cyberattack on Springfield Public Schools that occurred in the beginning of September. He said the pilot will likely not be in use this school year.