PDF

The early stages of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) initiative were largely occupied with debates over the merits of the standards and the feasibility of their adoption by the states. As the movement has matured, the focus of attention has shifted toward issues related to practical implementation, such as the readiness of teachers to actually enact the new standards in the classroom. To gauge state progress toward implementing the CCSS, Education First and the Editorial Projects in Education Research Center surveyed state education agency officials to gain their insights on the status of transition planning efforts. Recognizing that the movement toward a new set of standards could constitute a dramatic shift for many educators, administrators, and policymakers, our survey sought to examine how state leaders are preparing for this change, by collecting information on the steps involved in developing the capacity of their school systems to face challenges in several key areas.

The experience of childhood is increasingly urban. Over half the world’s people – including more than a
billion children – now live in cities and towns. Many children enjoy the advantages of urban life, including
access to educational, medical and recreational facilities. Too many, however, are denied such essentials as
electricity, clean water and health care – even though they may live close to these services. Too many are
forced into dangerous and exploitative work instead of being able to attend school. And too many face a
constant threat of eviction, even though they live under the most challenging conditions – in ramshackle
dwellings and overcrowded settlements that are acutely vulnerable to disease and disaster.

The hardships endured by children in poor communities are often concealed – and thus perpetuated – by the
statistical averages on which decisions about resource allocation are based. Because averages lump everyone
together, the poverty of some is obscured by the wealth of others. One consequence of this is that
children already deprived remain excluded from essential services.

Increasing numbers of children are growing up in urban areas. They must be afforded the amenities and
opportunities they need to realize their rights and potential. Urgent action must be taken to:

• Better understand the scale and nature of poverty and exclusion affecting children in urban areas.
• Identify and remove the barriers to inclusion.
• Ensure that urban planning, infrastructure development, service delivery and broader efforts to
reduce poverty and inequality meet the particular needs and priorities of children.
• Promote partnership between all levels of government and the urban poor – especially children
and young people.
• Pool the resources and energies of international, national, municipal and community actors in
support of efforts to ensure that marginalized and impoverished children enjoy their full rights.

These actions are not goals but means to an end: fairer, more nurturing cities and societies for all people –
starting with children.

The world's centre of high performance in school education is now East Asia. Four of the five top-performing systems are Hong Kong, Korea, Shanghai and Singapore, according to OECD's 2009 PISA assessments. In recent years, Australia and many OECD countries have substantially increased education expenditure, often with disappointing results. Grattan Institute's new report, Catching up: learning from the best school systems in East Asia, shows how studying the strengths of these systems can improve our children's lives.

Are teachers' impacts on students' test scores ("value-added") a good measure of their quality? This question has sparked debate largely because of disagreement about (1) whether value-added (VA) provides unbiased estimates of teachers' impacts on student achievement and (2) whether high-VA teachers improve students' long-term outcomes. We address these two issues by analyzing school district data from grades 3-8 for 2.5 million children linked to tax records on parent characteristics and adult outcomes. We find no evidence of bias in VA estimates using previously unobserved parent characteristics and a quasi-experimental research design based on changes in teaching staff. Students assigned to high-VA teachers are more likely to attend college, attend higher-ranked colleges, earn higher salaries, live in higher SES neighborhoods, and save more for retirement. They are also less likely to have children as teenagers. Teachers have large impacts in all grades from 4 to 8. On average, a one standard deviation improvement in teacher VA in a single grade raises earnings by about 1% at age 28. Replacing a teacher whose VA is in the bottom 5% with an average teacher would increase the present value of students' lifetime income by more than $250,000 for the average classroom in our sample. We conclude that good teachers create substantial economic value and that test score impacts are helpful in identifying such teachers.