Still a nation at risk

David Driscoll, Thomas Payzant, and Harry Spence are backing an explosive new report that calls for building a radically different, ultramodern American education system.

The report's premise: schools aren't teaching students what they need to know to thrive in a racing global economy. Among its key recommendations: teachers who are far better trained and rewarded; funding and collective bargaining on a statewide basis; and universal preschool.

"There will be no success for the country unless we are among the top two in technology in every industry in which we hope to be a major player," the report warns. To do this, workers will need to be exceptionally creative and innovative. If there is no change, global competition will depress the nation's wages overall, and its standard of living.

"I'm worried about my grandchildren," says Payzant, the former superintendent of the Boston Public Schools.

"It's a heck of a thing to say we presided over something that was absolutely untenable, but that's the case," Driscoll says, a startling admission from the state's retiring commissioner of education.

"The American elite can remain dominant," if no change occurs, says Spence, commissioner of the state's Department of Social Services. "But what about the rest of Americans? Do we care about their wages?"

The three men were part of a 26-member commission on workforce skills that produced the report, "Tough Choices or Tough Times," for the National Center on Education and the Economy , a nonprofit organization in Washington. Other members included two former federal education secretaries, Roderick Paige and Richard Riley , business and nonprofit leaders, educators, and a past teacher's union president.

The report is a bold call for a future where exceptionally skilled teachers help students obtain world-class knowledge. Its spine is a 10-step plan that stretches from universal preschool through modernized grade schools to adult education.

There's something for everyone to hate, warn Driscoll, Payzant, and Spence.

One vital and controversial proposal concerns teacher quality. Too many US teachers are recruited from "the bottom third of the high school students going on to college," the report says. A solution is to raise salaries to averages as high as $110,000 for teachers willing to work for more hours.

But rocks will no doubt be thrown at recommendations to base teacher pay on performance and other measures -- not seniority -- and to have states take over public education, replacing local communities for funding schools, recruiting teachers, and collective bargaining. One dissenting voice belongs to Dal Lawrence , a commission member and past president of the Toledo Federation of Teachers . Although he signed the report, he says state control seems unlikely to foster innovation. He prefers regional control.

Another controversial call: Schools would be "operated by independent contractors, many of them limited-liability corporations owned and run by teachers." School districts would write the contracts and monitor schools' operations. It's a version of charter schools that might catch on in Massachusetts, where charters have had success, but not in places such as Ohio, where, Lawrence says, charters have a more dubious record.

In this new system, the MCAS test would seem like a relic. Merely passing a test would give way to qualifying examinations, tests where students would have to show mastery in order to move on to college or vocational schools. Driscoll says that rather than having repeated chances to scramble over a low bar, students would have repeated chances to excel. A student might ace the exams at age 16, skip the last two years of high school, and move on to higher education.

Disadvantaged children would get more money and services, everything from eyeglasses to tutors to help with dyslexia, "so that for the first time in the history of the United States," there would be "an equitable means of funding our schools."

Each baby would get a personal competitiveness account, with an initial government investment of $500 and added contributions until the child turned 16.

The money could be used to pay for the continuing education that workers will need over the years to keep their skills fresh and economically relevant.

There's a lot of quicksand in this report, individual ideas that will enrage or trap people. But the vision of a new, modern system is sound and essential to planning for an economically bright future.

As it exists, the education system loses too many students who drop out along the way. Too many of the nation's high school graduates do not earn four-year college degrees. Pumping more money into this system without having a larger plan is unlikely to yield enough change as quickly as is needed.

How can the report be used? For the moment, as a spark for public debate that leads states to devise their own comparable visions. Massachusetts, after 13 years of education reform, has high average test scores but many struggling districts. It is well positioned to build a 21st century education system.

Monumental change may take many years, and require nuclear-powered political will. But this state is already taking far-reaching first steps on universal early education that could dramatically change students, making them more school-ready, and paving the way for other fundamental changes.

This kind of progress could add up to sweeping reform, if it is done well and urgently.

India, China, Singapore, and much of the world are racing ahead. American schools have to catch up and become competitive front-runners.