ELQIS data meeting

Off to the ELQIS data meeting this morning. Hope to see you there. I have high hopes for this group.

Update: Well that was a disappointment. I got an email from our local office of education a few days ago inviting me to my usual video conference site, since I was on their list from before, but when I got there, it wasn't a video conference at all but video streaming. We could watch them on TV together, but we couldn't participate. I didn't bother. I went to the conflicting meeting I had been going to miss, where at least I could participate.

I've read the interim report, and I'll read what comes out of today, but I can watch them on TV in the privacy of my own office, where the coffee is better, the chair softer, the bathroom closer, and I can put it on pause when I need to leave the room.

The whole idea of replacing video conferencing with video streaming is a big disappointment and will reduce participation. What are they thinking? It must be a budget decision. Otherwise it's dumb.

ELQIS interim report

The latest draft of the ELQIS interim report is posted. It includes a few decisions made and lists a bunch of decisions to be made. There are few decisions:

• There will be 5 tiers.
• Environmental ratings scales will be used; 
• "(A)ll tiers include an adequate measure of teacher child interaction."*
  
• First 2 tiers will self-report ECERS-R; after that, independent assessments will be required.

Beyond that, it's lists of questions with some principles on how to answer them. It looks like a good set of questions.

I'm in general impressed by the committee. I frankly expected meetings like the ones I attend at work, but all the ones of these I've attended have all been very productive. You hope people in positions to influence policy will understand issues and be intellectually open to discussion, but it don't always happen, do it? In ELQIS, it seems to be happening. I still have some fears about workforce development, and I haven't paid any attention at all to finance, but design and data are going along swimmingly.

*Actually that's a "members want" rather than a "we have decided," but if I list it as decided, maybe it will be. Magical realism works for Sarah Palin; maybe it will for me.

ELQIS meeting Wednesday

I'll only be able to follow on the web, but the ELQIS meeting Wednesday, 9 to 4, should be interesting. (Agenda) They're going to present decisions on some of the main issues. I have fairly high hopes for design and fairly low expectations for workforce development. I was going to put a link to the website streaming video, but I can't find it. I wonder if there won't be one.

ELQIS data meeting

You can stream today's ELQIS data subcommittee meeting (agenda) or attend.

9:45 Somebody asked whether anybody had thought about connecting the data silos. They danced around an answer. The answer should have been that what they call data buckets are tables in a relational database. Of course they communicate. The way you do it is to write a query.

They don't seem to think it is important to distinguish different classrooms in a facility or sessions in a program. I think it is. Except for those lacunae, I think they got the tables right.

10:30 The CDE data guy explaining CalPADS thinks it's okay to plan for different identifiers for Pre-K, K-12, and college. Why in the world would you want to do that?

10:35 They MAY start having unique identifiers in non-LEA centers. May? May? Why would you throw away data?

10:45 How about having the R&R issue SSIDs for non-LEAs?

Done. All in all, I see reason for hope. They seemed to be taking people's suggestions seriously, and there were no extreme positions being pushed, although a number of folks had strong feelings about details. It was all in a spirit of figuring out how to do this.

I like that Nancy Remley skipped discussion of whether a unique identifier was important and got right into how to make it work. You can't have a data system like this without unique identifiers, so there's no sense discussing whether to have them.

ELQIS on YouTube

I just discovered that somebody named WendyRCL is posting clips from ELQIS meetings onYouTube. Good for her. Here's Dennis Vicars on the design subcommittee:


Cliff Marcussen on the finance subcommittee:



I'm glad these guys are there.

ELQIS design committee November meeting

I spent the day watching the ELQIS design subcommittee, and I'm spent, too. In general, although there were disputes about this and that, I didn't see the stark divides I saw in the workforce committee. There wasn't by any means uniformity of opinion, but the differences were relatively minor, at least as far as I could hear.

There was a presentation about PARS, PITC's program assessment rating scale, which sometimes seemed to be a cross between ECERS and CLASS (I'm assuming if you're reading a blog post about the ELQIS design subcommittee that you know what ECERS and CLASS are; if not, email me, and I'll start putting in more explanatory links), but sometimes the presenter (I didn't catch her name but she was definitely not Peter Mangioni, who the agenda said would present) indicated that PARS was just to fill holes that other assessment tools didn't cover. I wonder if they're thinking of it as a way not to have to pay Thelma Harms. I'd vote for that.

They still hadn't fixed the errors in toddler ratios and group sizes in their PowerPoint. I know for a fact that people on that committee know Title 22, so it's not from ignorance of licensing ratios on the committee, but the PowerPoints are still wrong, and it's frustrating for people to have to keep correcting them. Both San Diego and the Sacramento ratios group got after them for not getting that basic stuff right. (But then the Sacramento speaker proposed a 10:1 ratio and a group size of 24 for some tier (it was hard to hear her). That's 2.4 teachers per classroom. I think you need either two or three; they don't come in point fours.)

In general, I was pleased with the way things went. In the workforce committee, I see K-12 pushing elementary school down one grade, but the design committee is run by ECE people instead of K-12 people, so the arguments were pretty much all about details, and where along a continuum to put down tier divides, rather than co-constructivists versus curriculumists, ECE vs elementary school. Design was much less frustrating than workforce, and it's less likely to end up recommending something I hate.

ELQIS design committe meets tomorrow

The ELQIS design subcommittee meets tomorrow. Agenda here. Streaming instructions here.

So far this group seems to know more about child care in California than the workforce subcommittee. I'm cautiously optimistic. They seem to understand that the quality of teacher-child interaction is more important than the things that can be measured more easily.

ELQIS workforce meeting - 2

I see two big divides in the ECE community. One is ECE vs elementary school, and the other is community colleges vs CSUs. They were both out in force at Thursday's ELQIS workforce subcommittee meeting.*

My favorite part was when Joel Gordon, of Santa Rosa JC, and Marianne Ann Jones, of CSU Fresno were asked about CC ECE courses counting for a CSU major or just toward a BA. Joel said they should count toward a major, and Marianne stepped on him, "Not major." She said classes taught at CSUs as upper division are more advanced than those at CCs, so the courses taught at CCs were only good enough for general ed, not a major.

This is simply false. I think she is just unaware of how advanced the content of the CC classes is and how appropriate it is for preschool teachers. I am personally aware of several teachers who have taught the same course at a local CC and a local CSU. Same text, same teacher, same syllabus, same class. One is upper division, one lower.

I will claim as facts that:

• People with an AA in ECE from Cabrillo, or American River, or Grossmont, to name just three with really good programs, will on average be better preschool teachers than those with a BA in ECE from any CSU. 
• Preschool teachers with an AA from the average CC are as good as  as those with a BA from the average CSU. 
•  Preschool teachers with 24 units of ECE and an AA are more qualified than those with a BA in liberal arts or elementary ed and 12 units of ECE. The extra 60 upper division units might make you a more interesting person, and it might raise your salary, but they won't make you a better preschool teacher.
  

ELQIS workforce meeting

I'll be spending the middle of the day today at the ELQIS workforce committee meeting. I'm so looking forward to hearing David Gordon characterize the interim report. I wonder if they have WiFi there. Worth a try.

ELQIS workforce development recommendations

Four things about yesterday's ELQIS meeting, stuck out to me:

• While the design subcommittee sees 5 steps of education in five tiers (12 units, to 24, to an AA in ECE, a BA in ECE, and an ECE credential), the workforce subcommittee sees two (12 units for tier 1 and ECE credential for lead teacher for tier 5). They don't see any value in any steps between 12 units an an ECE credential. They don't think an AA or BA in ECE is worth noticing. This is bizarre. At first I hoped it was a typo, but no, that's what they intended to say.    
  
• As I said before, this David Gordon guy really doesn't like community colleges, and he doesn't seem to like process much, either. When he was going through the 3 components to define "qualified teacher," he kept changing the powerpoint in a way that seemed to go against the agreements the committee came to.
  
  
  
  Meets standards of formal education (units earned)? "Ah, let's just make that 'meets standards of formal education.'"
  
  
  Demonstrates competence through supervised practical experience? "Let's drop the supervised practical experience."
  
  
  Continues to meet professional growth  requirements over time, including mentoring and advisement? "Just continues to meet professional growth requirements."
  
  
  

All this just seemed to me as though he was winging it, and doing it in a way to lower standards. I wonder what the other committee members said to each other when they chatted afterward. I wonder what kind of relationship Gordon has with the unions in his school district.

• The third thing is early learning seems to have come to mean Pre-K through third grade, i.e., 4-8  instead of 0-5. I fear this is just a way to get third grade teachers teaching preschool, or at least it will result in the elementary schoolization of preschool.
  
• Finally, this group seems to have national credentials but not know much about California law, such as Title 22. They proposed tier 1 and 2 ratios for toddlers of 12:1 and group size of 24. Somebody from Licensing was on the committee. Didn't they read the damned proposal? Worse, didn't the licensing person know? Obviously nobody else on the committee did. Yesteray's meeting was full of PITC folks, but none of them seemed to notice, either; at least none of them mentioned it. Somebody at one of the video sites did though.

ELQIS draft report posted

The ELQIS committee (or, as CDE prefers, CAEL QIS) is meeting today to discuss their draft interim report, due at the end of the year. See you there, or you can read the draft report here. The subcommittee workplans are here. The Design committee workplan is here. It consists of 50 interesting questions that have been or will be addressed at design subcommittee meetings. The first few are:

• How will structural and process characteristics of quality be included?
• What are the needed elements for licensing and rating programs in health, safety, and early learning?
• How will global measures of quality (ERS, CLASS, PAS) be included?
• What is the role of accreditation in the QRIS?

And one that particularly interests me,

• How will research-based curriculum be addressed?

I'm more cautiously optimistic than I was a few days ago, before I read the draft report. I like the fact that the design section says they should "Emphasize quality components in rating system that show stronger links to child outcomes, such as Process Components." Teacher-child interaction is a much better indicator of child outcomes than group size or ratios. I like the way they're approaching their recommendations.


The committee wants input by November 9 at caelqisdraftrpt@cde.ca.gov. Saddle up and ride, cowgirl.

The agenda also includes a link to an excellent discussion of the differences between ECE and K-12 teachers and classes.

The elementary schoolization of preschool through approved curriculum

As I said before, my greatest fear (except for brown widow spiders) is that, in order to get effective preschool for the kids who need it most, politically the program will have to be given to K-12 as a new grade Pre-K. The problem with this is that it will be run by K-12 people, who mostly don’t understand that little kids are different, and they will push their teaching methods downward. At its worst, school readiness will come to mean knowing how to bubble in a scantron.

ELQIS and grade Pre-K

David Gordon is superintendent of schools in Sacramento. He is also chair of the ELQIS workforce subcommittee. He's been on this and that committee and board.

Mr. Gordon has a masters in educational administration from Harvard. He has received many honors and is esteemed by people I admire, as well as by the governor.

For all his deserved acclaim, Mr. Gordon has one fault, and it's a big one: He believes that anyone with an elementary credential is qualified to teach preschool, and therefore we have no need for community colleges in developing the child care workforce, because apparently you need a BA to teach preschoolers, but it doesn't have to be in ECE. Imagine: The guy in charge of the workforce committee thinks that if you know how to teach elementary school kids, you can effectively teach preschoolers, but if you have an AA in ECE, you can't.

This is silly, and it's dangerous, because of what I talked about a couple of weeks ago, that preschool will become grade Pre-K in the P-12 system, and they'll just push the elementary school curriculum down a year.

I don't have time this minute to look up the research, but I'm pretty sure I remember studies showing that, while a BA is better than nothing in affecting child outcomes, it is not better than an AA in ECE. I hope somebody reminds me to find it and post it (or grovel, if I'm misremembering), because if that's true, requiring a BA is a waste of time and public money and a waste of people with an AA in ECE.

The workforce committee's next meeting is November 12 at two sites:

Sacramento County Office of Education
10474 Mather Boulevard, Mather Room
Sacramento, CA 95655

and

San Diego County Office of Education
6401 Linda Vista Road, Learning Lab 4
San Diego, CA 92111

The website doesn't give a time, and the agenda isn't posted yet, but previous meetings were 10 to 2:30.

My greatest fear for child development

My greatest fear in child development is that. because the groups lobbying for universal preschool believe people will vote to raise money for schools but not for "child care," it will be voted in as part of the K-12 system, so the curriculum (and everything else) will decided by people trained for K-12 rather than trained in ECE. I fear preschool will become just a new grade Pre-K in the K-12 system, with the curriculum being kindergarten lite, or maybe not even lite. They may push everything down a year. I can't wait to see 4 year olds bubbling in standardized tests.

This is a view put out in Standardized Childhood: The Political and Cultural Struggle over Early Education by Bruce Fuller, which is a fine book but depressing.

As you may guess, I come down strong on the ECE side. Kindergarten teachers I have met have different expectations and requirements of little kids differently than teachers at, say, a Reggio school. In my kid's kindergarten classroom, there were no blocks. 

But there are lots of cases where what is best for one person wouldn't work for a whole society. It may be possible for any one person to get a job, but it may at the same time not be possible for everyone to get a job. It may be best for a home gardener to grow tomatoes without chemicals, but it is not clear we can feed 6 billion people that way. Likewise, where it may be best for any particular kid to be in a Title 5 program rather than grade Pre-K, for most kids in universal preschool, the alternative to grade Pre-K is at best a Title 22 program, which range in quality from very good to horrendous, or staying home with mom, which is great if mom is talking to the kid all the time, but there are lots of moms from whom grade Pre-K is a great improvement. 


And then there is the idea of universal preschool. It seems clear from the research that good preschool helps poor kids a great deal more than rich kids. The incremental value of a Title 5 program to an average rich preschooler compared with what they have now is probably close to zero. So the logical public policy is spend our money on programs for poor kids. But if it's school, it has to be everybody, and it has to be everybody to get funded. So we're going to waste a third or half of our expenditures on universal preschool in order to be allowed to spend the 2/3 or half that is really important.

So I guess what I want to do is raise taxes enough to pay for Title 5 child care for about a quarter to half the kids in the state. And the dish ran away with the spoon.