E-Update for October 30, 2015

News

• On October 29, the House voted to elect Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) as Speaker of the House. Rep. Ryan received 236 House votes. In his acceptance speech, he spoke of his desire to unify the chamber to get work done. Speaker Ryan’s prepared remarks can be found here.
• On October 28, the House voted to pass the bipartisan, $80 billion, two year budget/debt ceiling package by a vote of 266-167. The Senate passed the package on October 30 by vote of 64-35. The deal raises the federal debt ceiling, averting a default that the Treasury had predicted would happen in early November. The deal also provides a $25 billion increase in discretionary funding for FY 2016.
• There has been movement to reauthorize the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act from members in both chambers. Sens. Mike Enzi (R-WY) and Bob Casey (D-PA) have been working with leadership from the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee for the last two weeks to develop policy recommendations for reauthorization. Also, the House Education and the Workforce Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary Education, and Secondary Education held a hearing to discuss ways to improve career and technical education for students. Hearing information is available here.
• On October 30, the Center for American Progress released a report entitled, “Fostering School Success with Standards for Nonacademic Skills.” The report, coauthored by EducationCounsel staff Danielle Ewen and LeighAnn M. Smith, explores the reasons for including standards on social and emotional learning in k-12 standards. Read it here.

U.S Congress

Sen. Alexander Releases Statement on the President’s Remarks on Over-Testing: Chairman Alexander (R-TN) of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee responded to the Department of Education’s release of Principles for Fewer and Smarter Assessments.  The Chairman asserted that while he agrees there are too many tests in schools, the best way to fix over-testing is to get rid of federal mandates that are causing the problem.
October 24, 2015

House Education and Workforce Subcommittee Holds Hearing on Improving CTE: House Education and the Workforce Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary Education, and Secondary Education held a hearing entitled “Improving Career and Technical Education to Help Students Succeed in the Workforce,” in which members of the Subcommittee discussed ways to reform the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act to better meet the needs of students. The Chairman’s statement is available here. Hearing information is available here.
October 27, 2015

Sen. Alexander Calls for Reform in Response to NAEP Results: In response to the results released from the 2015 National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP), Chairman Alexander asserted the best way to improve the disappointing NAEP results is to fix No Child Left Behind and sign into law legislation that restores the responsibility for deciding how to help students to those closest to them—states, school districts, classroom teachers, and parents.
October 28, 2015

U.S Department of Education

USED Encourages and Supports Schools to #GoOpen with Educational Resources: USED launched its #GoOpen campaign to encourage states, districts, and educators to use openly licensed education materials. USED is also proposing a new regulation to require all copyrightable intellectual property created with USED grant funds to have an open license. The pre-publication version of the proposed regulation is available here.
October 29, 2015

USED Releases Testing Action Plan to Reduce and Improve Assessments: USED released a fact sheet entitled, “Testing Action Plan,” which outlines seven broad Principles for Fewer and Smarter Assessments. The plan also describes steps being taken by the Administration to reduce the testing burden, such as providing financial support for states to conduct assessment audits and working with states who wish to amend their ESEA waivers to avoid double-testing students.
October 24, 2015

USED Expands Federal Pell Grants to High School Students Dual Enrolled in College: USED announced the launch of an experiment that will expand access to college coursework for high school students from low-income backgrounds. Next week, USED will release a Federal Register notice inviting applications from postsecondary institutions, in partnership with public secondary schools or local education agencies, to participate in the dual enrollment experiment.
October 30, 2015

USED Announces Two Final Regulations to Protect Students and Help Borrowers: USED announced two final regulations to protect students and help borrowers. One regulation aims to protect students who receive financial aid refunds on college debit and prepaid cards from financial firms. USED also issued a final regulation for the expansion of the Pay as You Earn Plan, allowing five million more Direct Loan borrowers to cap their monthly student loan payment amount at 10 percent of their annual income allocated per month.
October 27, 2015

Administration Announces Performance Partnership Pilots: The Obama Administration announced the nine communities that will receive flexibility under the Performance Partnership Pilots for Disconnected Youth. The program is a collaboration of six federal agencies to address challenges that communities face.
October 29, 2015

Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge States Improve Access to High Quality Programs: USED and HHS released annual performance reports for the 20 Race to the Top – Early Learning Challenge states. The reports showed the progress that states are making in improving early childhood education quality and increasing access to high-quality programs.
October 27, 2015

USED Announces Grants for STEM Education in Minority Institutions: USED announced more than $3 million in grants to 13 minority-serving institutions to strengthen education programs in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM).
October 26, 2015

Secretary Duncan Announces Terrel H. Bell Award for Outstanding School Leadership: U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced the 2015 recipients of the Terrel H. Bell Award for Outstanding School Leadership.  Recipients included seven principals from 2015 National Blue Ribbon Schools.
October 28, 2015

Events

On November 2, the Wallace Foundation, the National Association of School Principals, and the National Association of Elementary School Principals will host a panel discussion entitled, “From the Principal’s Office: How Leaders Drive Student Learning,” where four principals will discuss the values, beliefs, and personal dimensions they bring to their role in order to meet the specific needs of their school. Register here.

On November 5, the Regional Educational Laboratory Mid-Atlantic will host a webinar entitled, “Database and Data Quality Concepts: From Input to Use.” School and district personnel who are responsible for data entry, collection, and reporting will explore how the use of standard data management processes can improve data quality and lead to better school and district decisions. Register here.

New Legislation

H.R.3817 : Improving School Nutrition Training Act
Sponsor: Rep Pocan, Mark [WI-2] (introduced 10/23/2015)      Cosponsors (1)
Committees: House Education and the Workforce

H.R.3834 : GEAR UP for Counseling
Sponsor: Rep Lawrence, Brenda L. [MI-14] (introduced 10/27/2015)      Cosponsors (1)
Committees: House Education and the Workforce

H.R.3841 : Security and Financial Empowerment Act of 2015
Sponsor: Rep Roybal-Allard, Lucille [CA-40] (introduced 10/27/2015)      Cosponsors (13)
Committees: House Education and the Workforce; House Financial Services; House Ways and Means; House Judiciary

H.R.3861 : Employer Participation in Student Loan Assistance Act
Sponsor: Rep Davis, Rodney [IL-13] (introduced 10/29/2015)      Cosponsors (8)
Committees: House Ways and Means

H.R.3862 : Community College to Career Fund Act
Sponsor: Rep Duckworth, Tammy [IL-8] (introduced 10/29/2015)      Cosponsors (37)
Committees: House Education and the Workforce

S.2222 : A bill to amend the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act to support community college and industry partnerships, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Sen Franken, Al [MN] (introduced 10/29/2015)      Cosponsors (1)
Committees: Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

S.2224 : A bill to establish in the Administration for Children and Families of the Department of Health and Human Services the Federal Interagency Working Group on Reducing Child Poverty to develop a national strategy to eliminate child poverty in the United States, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Sen Casey, Robert P., Jr. [PA] (introduced 10/29/2015)      Cosponsors (2)
Committees: Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

S.RES.301 : A resolution calling on the Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation to modify the accreditation standards of the Council to prevent the standards from negatively impacting Alaska Native and Native American teacher candidates.
Sponsor: Sen Murkowski, Lisa [AK] (introduced 10/30/2015)      Cosponsors (2)
Committees: Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

Publications

Fostering School Success with Standards for Nonacademic Skills: The Center for American Progress released a report entitled, “Fostering School Success with Standards for Nonacademic Skills.” The report, coauthored by EducationCounsel staff Danielle Ewen and LeighAnn M. Smith, explores the reasons for including standards on social and emotional learning in k-12 standards. The report also details the five domains of learning—cognition, approaches to learning, social and emotional development, physical development, and language development—and how several states have incorporated them into their learning standards.
October 30, 2015

The Nation’s Report Card: 2015 Mathematics and Reading Assessments: Developed by the National Center for Education Statistics, this report presents results from the NAEP 2015 mathematics and reading assessments. The report includes national and state results on the performance of fourth and eighth grade students. Results are presented in terms of average scale scores and as percentages of students performing at the three NAEP achievement levels: Basic, Proficient, and Advanced. In addition to overall scores, results are reported by racial/ethnic groups, by gender, and by type of school.
October 28, 2015

Summary of Research Generated by Striving Readers on the Effectiveness of Interventions for Struggling Adolescent Readers: Developed by the National Center on Education and the Economy, this report summarizes the results of a systematic review of evaluations of the ten different interventions funded by the Striving Readers grant program in 2006 and 2009. Of the 17 evaluations considered, 12 met What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) evidence standards without reservations, three met WWC evidence standards with reservations, and two did not meet WWC evidence standards.
October 27, 2015