An educated ruling
THE STATE'S highest court bolstered education policy-makers and elected officials yesterday, voting 5-2 to reject an earlier finding that Massachusetts has been failing to meet its constitutional duty to educate all of its children. It's a sensible decision in that it recognizes the billions of dollars and prodigious efforts underway to make classrooms work for students across the state. But it could be dangerous if it lessens the sense of urgency that has characterized education reform in Massachusetts for more than a decade.
The suit -- Hancock v. Commissioner of Education -- argued that school districts in Brockton, Lowell, and other low-income communities still suffer from a lack of funding and focus despite the education reform initiatives introduced in 1993. Last spring, Superior Court Judge Margot Botsford agreed and recommended that state education officials determine the cost of educational equity and how to achieve it.
It is not entirely surprising that the equity argument did not resonate with the Supreme Judicial Court. Massachusetts already enjoys a good reputation for targeting substantially more state aid to school districts with high percentages of low-income and minority students than it does to wealthier school districts. Chief Justice Margaret Marshall cited both the legislative and executive branches for having "embarked on a long-term, measurable, orderly, and comprehensive process of reform." That effort, and a growing awareness about the importance of the home environment in student achievement, argue that it will take more than adjustments to the state education funding formula to improve failing schools.
With the high court stepping away from the education reform debate, it is all the more important that the Legislature and governor step up. Botsford's earlier findings focused on the need for preschool, better training for special education teachers, aggressive remediation for students who fail the high-stakes Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System exams, and reductions in class sizes. The SJC says it will not mandate solutions to such education policy challenges, but the problems remain. And the responsibility to address them now rests squarely on the legislative and executive branches.
The court could and should return with a vengeance if state officials don't fulfill their duties. Marshall made clear that serious classroom inadequacies persist. And there is nothing in the court order that should be interpreted as an invitation to retreat to the pre-1993 days, when struggling cities and towns failed miserably at educating their youngsters by relying heavily on weak property tax bases. Marshall also alluded in her decision to the possibility of another lawsuit, one that might be based more on the adequacy of classroom education than on equity. If, for example, state education officials want to raise the MCAS grade needed to graduate or add a science component to the test, they must be prepared to provide the kind of remedial help and laboratory support necessary to ensure that students can meet the new standards.
Paul Reville, executive director of the Rennie Center for Education Research & Policy at the Massachusetts Institute for a New Commonwealth, or MassINC, had viewed the suit as an opportunity for the Legislature to focus on a decade of educational data and how to apply it during future funding debates. Like other observers, he expressed some surprise that the court did not take an opportunity to accelerate education reform and some relief that the court did not try to apply the brakes, either.
Education Commissioner David Driscoll is wisely choosing to focus on the tasks ahead rather than crow about a victory in court. He understands both the political and pedagogical aspects of the field. Within recent months, the Education Department was lauded by the Education Trust, a national research group, for its generous spending formulas for districts with high minority enrollment, but then was cited by the education research arm of the Manhattan Institute for the state's dismally low graduation rate for Hispanic students.
Tough tests await in the next round of education reform in Massachusetts. The need to bring all students to the proficiency benchmark established for the MCAS tests ranks high, as does the need to close the achievement gap between white and minority students. Additional resources need to be part of the mix. The court should be ready to muscle in if the will of the legislative and executive branches begins to weaken. 