Welcome to Educ 8003:
Cultivating Learning through Educative and Sustainable Education Policy.
Spring Semester, 2008.

Class meets the following Saturdays from 8:00 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. in 108 Montague Hall

• Saturday 1/26/08
• Saturday 2/9/08
• Saturday 3/8/08
• Saturday 4/12/08 (download .pdf notes)

Instructor:

• Dan Glisczinski, Assistant Professor
• dglisczi@d.umn.edu
• Office: 166B Kirby Plaza
• Office hours: Tuesdays 10 a.m. to noon and Fridays 2:00 to 4:00 pm (or please contact me to arrange an appointment)
• Mailing address: 120 Montague Hall, 10 University Drive, Duluth, MN 55812

Class Moodle site:

• https://archive.moodle.umn.edu/spring08/course/view.php?id=1417

Class alias:

• educ8003-1-s2008@d.umn.edu

Course description:

• Educ 8003: Education Policy inquires into:
  • various modes of educational policy analysis
  • assessment of educational policy in its political, cultural, and economic contexts
  • techniques for effective communication about education policy.

Required course readings:

• Elmore, R. E. (2007). School Reform From The Inside Out: Policy, Practice, and Performance. Cambridge: Harvard.
• Fullan, M. (2005). Leadership & Sustainability: Systems Thinkers In Action. Thousand Oaks: Corwin.
• Hess, F. M. & Petrilli, M. J. (2007). No Child Left Behind. New York: Peter Lang.
• Tyack, D. & Cuban, L. (1995). Tinkering Toward Utopia: A Century of Public School Reform. Cambridge: Harvard.
• (Additional handouts and downloads as noted)

Course outcomes: Learners will

1. Identify salient examples of federal, state, and local education policy
2. Identify groups of stakeholders involved in creating effective education policy
3. Explain the role of history and theory in working toward equitable education policy
4. Articulate present and desirable relationships between stakeholder cultures and education policy
5. Analyze relationships between education policy and underlying public policy challenges and issues
6. Analyze intended and unintended consequences of federal, state, and local education policies
7. Synthesize and apply multiple policy perspectives into a coherent framework for education policy analysis
8. Assess and evaluate federal, state, and district education policy in political, cultural, and economic contexts
9. Assess and evaluate implications of various policies for stakeholder groups
10. Evaluate the extent to which various education policies solve the educational issues they were designed to address
11. Communicate effectively about federal, state, and district education policy

Assessment of learning: Learners will

• I. Collaborate--through face-to-face and online interaction--to foster continued learning community in education policy decision-making. (Demonstrate understanding of outcomes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, and 11.)
  • In contrast to what Fullan (2005) refers to as "coblabberation," our aim is to interact together to construct understandings that we would be unlikely to develop alone (Vygotsky, 1978). This purposive and metacognitive process includes not only offering ideas, but drawing peers in to sharing perspectives through Bloom's (1964) explaining, receiving, reflecting on, responding to, interpreting, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, characterizing, and evaluating education policy concepts. The domains and behaviors below offer further explanation of behaviors that construct a learning a culture of support and critical thinking among learning communities.

    Bloom's (1976) and related Learning Domains:

    	Learning Domains
    	Affective (Bloom, Krathwol, Masia, 1964) PDF download	Cognitive (Bloom, 1976)	Psychomotor (Dave, 1967)
    Increasingly Complex	Characterizing	Evaluating	Naturalizing
    		Synthesizing
    	Organizing	Analyzing	Articulating
    	Valuing	Applying	Demonstrating
    Importantly Foundational	Responding	Comprehending	Manipulating
    	Receiving	Knowing	Imitating

• • Or expressed more integratively by Wiggins and McTighe's Six Facets of Understanding (1998), our real collaborative work in learning calls on us to seek our own as well as peers' thorough and justifiable explanations, interpretations, application in diverse contexts, perspective taking, empathic consideration of diverse perspectives, and expression of self knowledge regarding assumptions, prejudices, and habits of mind that shape and challenge understanding.

    Wiggins and McTighe's (1998) Six Facets of Understanding:

• 	Six Facets of Understanding
  	Wiggins & McTighe (1998)
  Increasingly Complex	Demonstrate self-knowledge	Communicate the personal style, prejudices, projections, and habits of mind that both shape and impede own understanding; being aware of what do not understand and why understanding is so hard
  	Empathize	Express value in what others might find odd, alien, or implausible; perceive sensitively on the basis of prior indirect experience
  	Demonstrate perspective	See and hear points of view through critical eyes and ears; see the big picture
  	Apply	Effectively use and adapt what you know in diverse contexts.
  Importantly Foundational	Interpret	Tell meaningful stories, offer apt translations, provide a revealing historical or personal dimension to ideas and events; make subjects personal or accessible through images, anecdotes, analogies, and models
  	Explain	Provide thorough and justifiable accounts of phenomena, facts, and data

  
  
• II. Construct and present a theory of action (further explanation of elements in a theory of action) for the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act. (Demonstrate understanding of outcomes 1, 2, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, and 11.)
  • Scenario: You, Drs. Teaching and Learning, have been commissioned by an education organization (e.g. an international school, a non-public school, a local Parent-Teacher-Association (PTA), a group of educators, etc.) to educate the organization about the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act. You have agreed to provide a visual model illustrating an "aerial view from 10,000 feet" (avoiding both tedious detail and unsupported generalizations) of NCLB's theory of action, including the law's major objectives, methods of assessment, indicators of change, and related salient features to this group of education stakeholders. You also have agreed to explain your model, suggest recommendations for improving the quality of NCLB policy, and facilitate a focused NCLB question and answer session based on your model. Please see assessment rubric.
    • Recommended process:
      • Develop a partnership.
      • Read Hess & Petrilli (2007).
      • Read theory of action links (below)
      • Read Elmore (2007) chapter 5: Unwarranted Intrusion.
      • Read any related NCLB links that intrigue you
        • NCLB links :
          • Elmore: Chapter 5. Unwarranted Intrusion
          • U.S. Department of Education NCLB site
          • President Bush Discusses No Child Left Behind Reauthorization
          • NCLB Action Briefs via Public Education Network
          • NEA stance on reauthorization of NCLB
          • Education Next on NCLB
            • Howell & Peterson: New National Survey Shows Majority of Americans Support Reauthorization of No Child Left Behind
            • Piché: Basically A Good Model
            • Finn: The Bad and the Good
            • Petrilli: A Beautiful Disappointment
        • Theory of action links:
          • According to Schon and Argris (2007) a theory of action is a design of action intended to achieve desired results.
          • A theory of action, according to Krueger (2007) is a "causal chain of events that begins with the status quo and ends with an intended outcome."
          • A theory of action makes overt the often-times subtle and implicit assumptions about institutional practices. What results does a particular education policy intend to achieve?
          • Analyze an education policy (such as the behemoth NCLB) and
          • Weisburd & Sniad (2007) suggest that a theory of action "maps out a specific pathway in for desired change, an organization's role with respect to achieving that change, based on an assessment of how it can add to most value to the change process."
          • Common steps in a theory of action:
            • Identifying desired outcomes
            • Identifying a focused set of activities
            • Identifying indicators of change
            • Uncovering complexities of evaluating impact
            • Communicate key components in focused, illustrative, and descriptive form
          • Theory of action examples: positive action | job enrichment | social and gender analysis
      • Sketch, annotate NCLB theory of action: identify the key actions involved in attempting to achieve desired education results
      • Compare notes.
      • Select a roles (research lead, recorder/illustrator, critical friend, presentation lead, etc)
      • Synthesize information and models: identify the key actions involved in attempting to achieve desired education results
      • Practice presenting, explaining, recommending.
      • Practice facilitating Q and A.
        

• III. Construct and communicate an education policy brief on a selected education policy (ideally in relationship to your research interests) to classmates (acting as federal, state, local policy makers and stakeholders). (Demonstrate understanding of outcomes 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, and 11.)
  • Scenario: In your work as a local school board member, you've accepted an ad hoc committee role in exploring and studying education reform which will enrich learning for all students. You select an education reform or innovation and prepare a policy brief to share with the school board as a whole, in order to inform and advocate for optimal school board understanding and informed action on the issue, which is on the agenda for discussion and a vote (of support or no support) in the next school board meeting. Please see assessment rubric.
    • The policy brief, according to Young & Quinn's (2007) policy brief overview (PDF download) is a document which "outlines the rationale for choosing a particular policy alternative or course of action in a current policy debate."
    • While policy briefs vary in form, many commonly contain:
      • A concise and compelling title
      • Introduction featuring data that necessitate action
      • Context and importance of the problem
      • Professional critique of policy options
      • Evidence-based policy recommendations
      • Other elements that serve the brief's purposes
      • References
    • Policy briefs often make strategic use of form (intentional layout) to increase effectiveness of function (message communication)
    • Sample policy briefs here: Sample Literacy Brief 1, Sample Literacy Brief 2 (PDF downloads)
      
      
• IV. Develop and present a literature-based conceptual framework of what meaningful and effective education policy develops, constructs, and is intentional about. (Demonstrate understanding of outcomes 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, and 11.)
  • Scenario: In your work as a (insert your desired professional role here) you find yourself (at times reluctantly) involved in analyzing, reviving, redesigning, or creating education policies that affect stakeholders at a variety of levels. While many of your colleagues and professional peers are deeply informed in important fields, few (if any) have studied the literature on education policy to the degree that you have (lucky you). As your policy insights prove increasingly useful, a colleague requests that you share your present understandings of the essentials of effective education policy. Rather than simply sharing lengthy readings (which you perhaps do anyhow), you share a single, unified, synthesized conceptual framework for policy thinking that reflects the best of what you have come to understand about effective policy. This is your conceptual framework for education policy (copyright you--and your collaborators if you so choose). Please see assessment rubric.
    • Based on readings and collaboration with peers, construct an evidence-based conceptual framework or visual model by which to assess and evaluate the merits of a variety of reforms and policies.
    • A conceptual framework contains a converged set of guiding principles used in to organize, visualize, concretize, and communicate your process and approach to understanding an issue
    • A conceptual framework is a diagram that depicts variables in and the relationship among them
    • A conceptual framework is:
      • "a set of coherent ideas or concepts organized in a manner that makes them easy to communicate to others
      • the basis for thinking about what we do and what it means, influenced by the ideas and research of others
      • an overview of the ideas and practices that that shape the way meaningful work is done in a project
      • a set of assumptions, values, and definitions under which [people] work together" (Mujer Sana--Communidad Sana, 2007).
    • Steps for developing a conceptual framework (see "The Steps)
    • Conceptual framework explanation and examples (see "Example Land)
  
  

Assessment rubric: (competency in all domains must be demonstrated for course credit)

Course grades: Grades will reflect the preponderance of evidence based on the above rubric.

Course schedule in brief:

• Week One: 1/26/08. First face to face meeting 1/26. Unit 1: Introduction to education policy. Please complete week one readings in advance of this meeting.
• Week Two: 1/28-2/3/08. Unit 2: National policy
• Week Three: 2/4-2/10/08. Second face to face meeting 2/9. Unit 2: National policy. NCLB theory of action due (in draft form) for presentation and feedback.
• Week Four: 2/11-17/08. Unit 2: National policy
• Week Five: 2/18-2/24/08. Unit 2: National policy. Revised theory of action due.
• Week Six: 2/25-3/2/08. Unit 3: State policy.
• Week Seven: 3/3-3/9/08. Third face to face meeting 3/8. Unit 3: State policy. Nothing due.
• Week Eight: 3/10-3/16/08. Unit 3: State policy
• Week Nine: 3/24-3/30/08. Unit 3: State policy
• Week Ten: 3/31-4/6/08. Unit 4: Local policy
• Week Eleven: 4/7-4/13/08. Fourth face to face meeting 4/12. Unit 4: Local policy. Policy brief due for presentation and feedback.
• Week Twelve: 4/14-4/20/08. Unit 4: Local policy. Revised policy brief due.
• Week Thirteen: 4/21-4/27/08. Unit 5: Conceptual frameworks
• Week Fourteen: 4/28-5/4/08. Unit 5: Conceptual frameworks
• Week Fifteen: 5/5-5/11/08. Unit 5: Conceptual frameworks due for electronic sharing and feedback.
• Week Sixteen: 5/12-5/18/08. Unit 5: Conceptual frameworks

Course schedule and timeline:

Week One: The Core, Capacity, Improvement, and Policy

• Readings: (please read and be prepared to analyze for first face to face meeting: Saturday 1/26/08)
  
  
  • Elmore: School Reform From The Inside Out. Introduction
    • Essential Question: Why reform school from the inside out?

• Elmore: Chapter 6. Change and Improvement in Educational Reform
  • Essential Question: Why reform school from the inside out?
    
    
• Fullan: Leadership & Sustainability. Preface
  • Essential Question: What is the relationship between sustainability and important education policy?
    

• Tyack & Cuban: Tinkering Toward Utopia: Prologue
• Essential Question: What are the implications of tinkering toward educational utopia?
  
  
• Theory of Action readings (more information in assessment description)
  • Putnam, Schon & Argris (2007)
  • Weisburd & Sniad (2007)
  • Krueger (2007)
    

Week Two: National Education Policy and No Child Left Behind

• Readings:
  
  
  • Hess & Petrilli. No Child Left Behind. All chapters.
    • Essential Questions: What does NCLB's theory of action look like? Why? What logic drives this landmark essential policy? To what extent does it serve teaching and learning well? Why?
      
      
  • Elmore: Chapter 5. Unwarranted Intrusion.
    • Essential questions: What assumptions about teaching and learning does NCLB reveal? What alternative perspectives might challenge these assumptions? What concomitant actions might alternative accompany such alternative perspectives on teaching and learning?
      
      
  • Any related NCLB links that intrigue you
    • NCLB links :
      • Elmore: Chapter 5. Unwarranted Intrusion
      • U.S. Department of Education NCLB site
      • President Bush Discusses No Child Left Behind Reauthorization
      • NCLB Action Briefs via Public Education Network
      • NEA stance on reauthorization of NCLB
      • Education Next on NCLB
        • Howell & Peterson: New National Survey Shows Majority of Americans Support Reauthorization of No Child Left Behind
        • Piché: Basically A Good Model
        • Finn: The Bad and the Good
        • Petrilli: A Beautiful Disappointment
          
          
  • Theory of action links:
    • According to Schon and Argris (2007) a theory of action is a design of action intended to achieve desired results.
    • A theory of action, according to Krueger (2007) is a "causal chain of events that begins with the status quo and ends with an intended outcome."
    • A theory of action makes overt the often-times subtle and implicit assumptions about institutional practices. What results does a particular education policy intend to achieve?
    • Analyze an education policy (such as the behemoth NCLB) and
    • Weisburd & Sniad (2007) suggest that a theory of action "maps out a specific pathway in for desired change, an organization's role with respect to achieving that change, based on an assessment of how it can add to most value to the change process."
      
      
  • Concept mapping links:
    • Microsoft Office Software: Search flow charts in help menu (options vary according to version and application (Word, PowerPoint, Excel)
    • Microsoft Office drawing toolbars and formatting palettes of your word processing (e.g. Microsoft Word) and presentation software (e.g. Microsoft Powerpoint)
    • Inspiration Software (free 30 day download) (consider saving and exporting your work in multiple formats such as .isf (modifiable ) .html, .doc, .pdf and so forth (exchangeable but not modifiable)
    • NovaMind Software (free 30 day trail download) see notes above regarding saving your work
    • Other options as you prefer
      

Weeks Three, Four, and Five: National Policy Leadership and Getting to Scale with Good Educational Practice

• Readings:
  
  
  • Elmore: Chapter 1. Getting to Scale with Good Educational Practice
    • Essential Question: What is likely to happen if instructional improvement were developed to scale in classrooms? Why might this matter for education reform and policy?
      
      
  • Elmore. Chapter 2. Building a New Structure for School Leadership
    • Essential Question: What would effective school leadership structures look like, and how will they relate with education policy reform?
      
      
  • Tyack & Cuban: Chapter 1: Progress or Regress?
    • Essential Question: What is your response to the authors' assertion that schools, while schools need to do a better job in teaching people to think, education in general, has remained one of the most stable and effective institutions given the social pathologies in society? Why? How might this inform the discussion of education reform and policy?
      
      
  • Rauch (2007) This Is Not Charity. (From Atlantic Monthly.)
    • Essential Question: Is this systems thinking? Change core? Otherwise? Theory of action?

Weeks Six, Seven, Eight, and Nine: Sustainable State Policy Leadership amid Cycles and Trends

• Readings:
  
  
  • Karp (2003) Money, Schools, and Justice (handout from Rethinking Schools) Regarding funding formulas, standards, etc.
    • Essential question: How does public education get funded? To what extent does this do justice to learners?
      
      
  • Education funding documents
    • MN K-12 Education Funding Overview--General (PDF download)
    • MN K-12 Education Funding Overview Suburb of Eden Prairie (PDF download)
    • MN Funding Equity and Equalization Concepts (PDF download)
    • Duluth Public Schools Per Pupil Funding
      • Essential question: How does public education get funded? To what extent does this do justice to learners?
        
        
  • Tyack & Cuban: Chapter 2. Policy Cycles and Institutional Trends
    • Essential question: "Under the decentralized system of governance in the United States, in which there is no national ministry of education to establish national agendas, and adopt national policies, policy talk and policy action have taken place mostly at the state and local level" (p. 43). What policy gifts and burdens proceed from this arrangement?
      
      
  • Fullan: Chapter 2. The Intriguing Nature of Sustainability
    • Essential question: In what ways may Fullan's eight elements of sustainability inform education and education policy?
      
      
  • Fullan: Chapter 4. The New Work of Leaders
    • Essential question: To what extent does education policy favor technical versus adaptive solutions to education problems? Why? What evidence supports your assertion?
      

Weeks Ten, Eleven, and Twelve: Reconsidering Local Policy and Communicating Briefly

• Readings:
  
  
  • Fullan: Chapter 3. Leadership to the Fore
  • Essential question: In what ways do the systems we've created or subscribed to facilitate and complicate important education policy?
    
    
  • Fullan: Chapter 5. Leadership at the School Level
    • Essential question: In what ways might systems thinking assist in developing sustainable stakeholder efforts in support of meaningful education and policy?
      
      
  • Fullan: Chapter 6. Leadership at the District Level
  • Essential question: What might elevate systems thinking into systems decisionmaking? What does this look like in terms of education policy action?
    
    
  • Tyack & Cuban: Chapter 3 pp. 60-64 and 76-84: How Schools Change Reforms (Should we give up or try harder?)
    • Essential question: In what ways do prior reforms affect subsequent reforms?
      
      
  • Tyack & Cuban: Chapter 5: Reinventing schooling. (perhaps begin semester with this reading? week one, two, or three?)
    • Essential question: What larger impressions do you have from this chapter's discussions that shape ideas about what and how meaningful policy develops?
      
      
  • Tyack & Cuban: Epilogue: Looking toward the future
    • Essential question: In light of the following assertion, what is the proper role of education policy in improving education? "To bring about improvement at the heart of education--classroom instruction, shaped by that grammar--has proven to be the most difficult kind of reform, and it will result in the future more from internal changes created by the knowledge and expertise of teachers than from the decisions of external policymakers" (pp. 134-35).
      
      
  • Policy brief readings:
    
    • Perspectives on writing policy briefs: Writing a Brief 1(PDF Download) | Writing a Brief 2 (PDF Download)
      • Sample briefs: Literacy Brief 1 (PDF Download) | Literacy Brief 2 (PDF Download)
      • Sample briefs (from Education Next): Vouchers | Teach For America | Retention and Social Promotion
        • Essential Questions:
          • What in the world is a policy brief? Of what use are these?
          • What are the components of effective education policy briefs?
          • Which issues are important enough to us to construct policy briefs?
          • What effect might these have on decisionmakers?
            

Weeks Thirteen, Fourteen, and Fifteen: Conceptual frameworks Informed by Doing, Knowing, and the Right Things

• Readings
  
  
  • Elmore Chapter 3: conclusion pp. 125-132
    • Essential question: What might effective policy focus on in light of Elmore's findings on the three things that improve education? Why?
      
      
  • Elmore: Chapter 4: conclusion pp. 192-199
    • Essential question: What might policy makers consider regarding Elmore's findings on the relationship between external accountability systems and conceptions of individual responsibility and collective expectations within schools? Why?
    
    
  • Elmore: Chapter Seven. Doing the Right Thing, Knowing the Right Thing to Do.
    • Essential question: To what extent is Elmore's Tolstoy quote about happy families and unhappy families informative in the contexts of ostensibly succeeding and failing schools? Why?
      
      
  • Tyack & Cuban: Chapter 4. Chapter Reflections pp. 107-09. Why the Grammar of Schooling Persists:
    • Essential question: Why have schools remained remarkably durable institutions? To what learning effects?
  • Questions:
    • "The establishment that has held grammar of schooling in place is not so much a conscious conservatism as it is unexamined institutional habits and widespread cultural beliefs about what constitutes a real school" (p. 88). Why?
    • Explain the role of history and theory in working toward equitable education policy
    • Articulate present and desirable relationships between stakeholder cultures and education policy
    • Analyze relationships between education policy and underlying public policy challenges and issues
      
      
  • Tyack & Cuban: Chapter 5 pp. 126-133. Reinventing Schooling
    • Essential question: How might historical reinventions of schooling inform current education policy? How might this affect the instructional core of learning?
      
      
  • Fullan: Chapter 7. Leadership at the System Level
    • Essential question: In what ways might leadership reading and thinking shape education policy thinking?
      

Week Sixteen: Critiquing Conceptual Frameworks for Cultivating Meaningful and Sustainable Education Policy

• Readings:
  
  
  • Classmates' conceptual frameworks
    • Essential question: To what extent might these cultivate learning through educative and sustainable education policy that develops core instructional capacity and relationships between teachers, learners, and subject matter? What evidence informs our thinking and action?

Attendance:

Attendance is expected at all sessions--except in the case of an emergency.

Academic integrity:

This course will adhere to UMD's Student Academic Integrity Policy, which can be found at www.d.umn.edu/assl/conduct/integrity. 

Important:

I invite any students who may have any disability--either permanent or temporary--or any other special circumstances which might affect ability to perform in this class to inform me, so that together we can adapt methods, materials, or assignments as needed to provide equitable participation in this course.