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July 20, 2005
By CECILIA LE and MIKE CHALMERS
Debates over Delaware education policy usually take place at Legislative Hall in Dover. But for two foggy days in early January, the conversation swirled around high leather chairs and fine china in the Hotel du Pont, where countless business deals have been made or broken in the Wilmington landmark's 92-year history.
The Rodel Charitable Foundation of Delaware, established six years ago by a pair of entrepreneur brothers, had summoned more than 30 national education experts, state leaders and researchers. Their job: Critique Rodel's draft report assessing the successes and failures of education in Delaware.
"It was a typical Noah's Ark kind of gathering, which is to say they were people from all different perspectives," said Chester Finn, one of the participants and president of the conservative, education-focused Fordham Foundation in Washington, D.C. The meeting was one step in a 14-month, $100,000-plus process that culminates this morning, when Rodel publicly releases "Opportunity Knocks: Assessing Delaware's Education System."
The report examines student performance and other measures such as teacher quality and school leadership. Among the findings:
Delaware has a wide range of options for school choice, including open enrollment, charter schools and dual enrollment in college and high school.
Per-student spending of $9,072 is the seventh highest in the nation, but principals lack the flexibility to spend the money where it is most needed.
Less than two-thirds of students graduate from high school in four years, which is among the lowest rates in the nation. Also, average SAT scores are low.
About a quarter of eighth-graders meet national math standards and fewer than a third are proficient in reading.
Paul Herdman, Rodel's president and a former teacher, said he hopes the report, which draws on several national studies including the National Assessment of Educational Progress, serves as a starting point for the next wave of education reform in Delaware. The foundation's primary goal is creating one of the nation's best school systems by 2012.
"If we're successful here, we can be the example for the rest of the country," Herdman said. "If any state can become internationally competitive over the next decade, we can, and we almost have an obligation to do it."
No recommendations yet
The report does not include a list of recommendations, Herdman said, because Rodel wanted reformers to have a common starting point.
The foundation, though, is looking to spend $1 million over the next five years on programs and personnel in one school district that is already performing well. The idea, he said, is to create a model educational system that all schools could emulate.
The foundation, which has not chosen a district yet, could add a few other districts in later years, he said.
"We need some places that are really pulling all these things together and producing nationally recognized results," Herdman said. "If we can get a couple of districts performing at an extremely high level, we can bring the whole state up."
Rodel is planning a series of community forums where the public can make suggestions for change. The foundation also will organize what it calls "affinity groups" that will allow districts to share their best ideas.
Such an assessment is vital to any serious reform effort, Finn said.
"I wish more states had organizations that would put themselves through this," he said. "But it leaves you wondering: Now what?"
The report warns that if the state fails to fundamentally change the way it educates its young people, Delaware will face a host of social and economic troubles. By 2010, the Rodel report says, Delaware will have 170,000 job openings but only 55,000 workers to fill them. Two-thirds of the jobs will require at least some higher education, but currently, only one in three Delaware high school graduates pursues post-secondary education, the report states, citing a national study by the nonprofit Education Commission of the States, which comprises governors and education leaders.
The numbers are much more grim for black and Hispanic students. While 35 percent of white eighth-graders in Delaware meet national math standards, only 8 percent of black students can say the same. A poorly educated work force creates a worker shortage, high crime rates and overcrowded prisons, say the experts Rodel selected to review its findings.
The report contains no surprises for anyone who closely follows Delaware's education system, said Bob Sutton, who works on education issues with the Delaware Roundtable, a group of business leaders.
But it provides a comprehensive, objective look at the state of affairs that can be used as a benchmark for educators, politicians, business leaders and others seeking change, he said.
"The timing of Rodel is perfect because everyone is looking at what we can do to make changes," Sutton said. "There are so many people open to the reform process. I don't see people saying, ÔThis can't be done.' "
Next generation of workers
A growing chorus of educators and business leaders are saying reform is critical to success.
"If you don't take care of your kids and make them competitive, they're not going to succeed in the business world," said James A. Wolfe, president of the Delaware State Chamber of Commerce. "They're our next employees."
Valerie Woodruff, Delaware's education secretary, says the report shows where schools are making progress and where they must improve.
"The way I see it, we have an obligation to give a superior education to every student who lives in Delaware," Woodruff said. "Then if other people come to our state looking for work, Delaware's students ought to be the first in line for those jobs. They have to be absolutely prepared."
It's not enough, Herdman said, merely to better educate the students already here. Delaware needs to improve the reputation of its school system to attract workers and businesses to the state.
"Wouldn't it be great," he said, "if when you drive over the state line, rather than Ôthe land of tax-free shopping,' it said you were entering the state with the best-performing education system?"
That's a difficult task when Delaware has 17 percent of its students - 22 percent in New Castle County - enrolled in private schools.
"There are a lot of middle-class parents here who feel uncomfortable putting their kids in public schools," Herdman said. "They would add a lot of value to the system."
Delaware's education reform effort began in the mid-1990s, when business interests complained students were unprepared for entry-level jobs and pressured the state to establish education standards. The state decided what students need to know in certain grades and created a system of standardized testing.
Now, the conversation centers on high school reform, statewide and around the nation. A state-commissioned report by the business-backed group Achieve Inc. said in January that Delaware's graduation requirements aren't rigorous enough to get students ready for college or work.
"A lot of the industries in Delaware are exactly the kind that can move elsewhere if labor becomes cheaper," said Andrew Rotherham, an education expert at the Progressive Policy Institute, a Washington, D.C., think tank affiliated with the nonprofit Democratic Leadership Council. He helped critique Rodel's draft report.
"The future for a state like Delaware is knowledge-based jobs," Rotherham said.
A school system that prepared a third of its students for college was adequate when other students could work in agriculture or get a stable, good-paying manufacturing job, said Kevin Hall, a Delaware native and now chief operating officer of the Broad Foundation, a Los Angeles-based group that focuses on improving urban public education.
"That world is long gone," said Hall, who also reviewed Rodel's report. "We really need a system where it's more like 70 [percent] or 80 percent or more go on to higher education."
Family support
While schools must focus on meeting the needs of labor, they can't make it their driving force, warned Howard Weinberg, executive director of the Delaware State Education Association.
"Certainly that is not the sole responsibility of public education," Weinberg said. "Sometimes in our zealous energy in needing to improve education, we lose sight of the fact that educating children is complex and multi-faceted."
The Rodel report points out the need for more parent and community involvement, a factor harder to quantify than test scores or school spending. But Frances Livingston, a mother of two high-schoolers, says it's one of the most important.
Urban youths need more after-school programs and role models, said Livingston, a counselor at Thomas Edison Charter School in Wilmington.
"Some kids when they go home there's no one home," she said. "All they have is their video games and TV and the people on the street. It's hard to get consistency in their lives. Families need support beyond the school in order to help kids be successful."
Appoquinimink School District Superintendent Tony Marchio suggested secondary schools need to emulate the approach of elementary schools, which tend to focus on a child's emotional needs. Middle and high schools, he said, often abandon that approach.
"At the elementary level, we've always been more concerned with teaching the student," he said. "As we get into the higher grades, we turn our focus more toward teaching subjects. There needs to be a big shift in how we teach, and I think secondary schools are recognizing that and moving in that direction."
That kind of fundamental change is what Rodel is trying to promote, Herdman said. And the foundation wants to make sure its work survives the inevitable turnover of superintendents, legislators and business leaders, he said.
Herdman brushes aside the question of what he'll do if Rodel doesn't meet its goal of helping Delaware become one of the best school systems in the nation by 2012.
"I haven't contemplated it," Herdman said. "But will we have a dramatically improved system by 2012? Definitely."
Rodel Charitable Foundation of Delaware
HISTORY: William and Donald Budinger launched Rodel in their Wilmington garage in 1969. Their first product was the Hickey Picker, a synthetic roller for printing presses, but the company grew to make pads, textiles and other materials used to polish computer chips. After selling the company to Rohm and Haas Co. in the 1990s, the Budingers set aside about $40 million, about a third of the proceeds, to create the foundation.
MISSION: The foundation works to "help Delaware create one of the finest public school systems in the nation by 2012."
BUDGET: The foundation spends about 5 percent of its endowment, or $2 million to $3 million, annually to study ways to improve education.
Sources: (1) Urban Institute, (2) National Assessment of Educational Progress, (3) National Institute for Early Education Research, (4) Education Week's "Quality Counts" report, January 2005, (5) Heritage Foundation's "School Choice Programs in the States"
Copyright (c) The News Journal.
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