Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Speaker 0]: Giving us some feedback and response to the work that we have been doing. Without further ado, I'm gonna turn it over to our guests. The floor is yours. Thank you.

[Speaker 1]: Good afternoon. For the record, I'm Zoe Saunders, I'm the Secretary of Education. I'm Bill Fritz Crampbell, Deputy Secretary of Education and Chief of Operations. And we are joined I'm always in the short chair, so every time. I'm going to kick Jack. I'm joined today with a couple of our colleagues here on show. Sure. I'm Doctor. Erin Davis. I'm the Chief Academic Officer.

[Speaker 0]: And I'm Torin Ballard. I'm the Director of Policy and Communications.

[Speaker 1]: Great. And we are here today to talk about education transformation. Our agenda is really to center our critique around the why and be clear around the theory of action. So for today, we wanted the opportunity to provide really pointed feedback on the proposal that you are exploring and voice our concerns with the direction, but also identify what we see as a path forward.

[Speaker 0]: You don't need one more. Matt, do we have the feedback? I got them. So it should be on hand. And

[Speaker 1]: so we also want to recognize that as we're going into these conversations that we all share a goal of improving our education system and recognize that this work is incredibly complex and hard. So we want to be very direct in areas where we have concerns about the direction, but also be solution oriented and identifying a path forward so that we can work cooperatively to advancing the goals in Act 73 and elevating the educational opportunities for our students, and in doing so, strengthening our public education system. So we'll begin with reminding ourselves around the why. We know that our current system is unfair. We have proven that our current system is unfair and that over the last several years, we have seen a widening gap between the haves and the have nots. In our current system, depending on the town that they call home, there are wide disparities in resources, opportunities, expectations, and outcomes for our students in the Vermont public education system. And so recognition of this disparity is precisely the reason that Act 73 was passed with bipartisan support. So I want to enumerate some of the disparities that we currently see in our system. We have great differences in terms of per pupil funding. There's also great variation in terms of teacher pay. We have very different expectations for academic rigor and the criteria for a diploma. And so with all of this variability, there's no guarantee that a student in our system will have access to a world class education and opportunities like AP courses, world languages, or CTB. Mainly what we see is there's great variability across our system, depending on the town that a student calls home and largely dependent on the wealth and size of their community. Disparities in inputs are also resulting in uneven outcomes across our state and declining performance. We have seen that average proficiency among students in historically marginalized backgrounds are performing much worse than their peers. So 30 difference on average based on our Vermont cap. We also know that we are having a decline in our graduation rate, and we are not meeting our goals in terms of students successfully completing college and career courses. We have currently a fragmented approach. So we do have an overly complex governance system for the number of students that we serve in Vermont with 119 school districts nested under 52 supervisory means or supervisory districts, that does complicate our ability to fulfill our constitutional obligation to provide a substantially equal education for every student in Vermont. And spending a lot of time on this last session, it all came together to identify that change was needed. And the change is needed in ways that we're really going to improve the system. So the quality objectives of Act 73, these were lifted from the bill to promote equity, to make sure that we're ensuring consistent access to high quality education across Vermont, that we have coherence, that we're creating that alignment of governance funding and our educational delivery. So we are more unified and in doing so, more consistent and equitable opportunities for students. We want to look at opportunity. So this has real impacts on students' experiences. And we hear this directly from students that they want to have opportunities for different programs and deepening their learning or extracurriculars or clubs. And that's not always available to them depending on where they attend school. We recognize that our system continues, the cost continues to increase and has come to a point of being unsustainable. And so we want to ensure that we can really use our significant investment in education more efficiently to prevent the cost curve and also ensure that those dollars are being aligned in ways that are most impactful for quality teaching and learning. And overall, we need to strengthen our accountability system in order to make the changes that we are endeavoring to do. We have to be clear about how we're measuring equality and providing support within that accountability framework. So the theory of action with Act 73 was organized around three policy levers that we've been referring to as a three legged stool. And it's important that these policy levers continue to work in coordination. Quality is first and foremost our priority. Within Act 73, it identifies a movement towards statewide graduation requirements that set a universal standard of excellence. It also has the intent language of expanding access to pre K, career and technical education, and access to high quality teachers. These quality goals are not possible unless we're making changes in how we deliver and fund our education system. And so funding is important to moving towards a foundation formula that will allow us to uniformly allocate resources. This will help the state to ensure that those students that have the same needs benefit from the same resources. That's not currently happening in our system because of how our funding is organized. And then the governance comes into play in terms of how to actually organize those dollars so that they can, within a larger school district, really achieve the quality objectives that are part of Act 73. So we start with quality, we start with a focus on students and the changes to funding and governance will allow us to achieve those quality objectives. So the direction of the current proposals within Senate and House are concerning in that the governance is separated from the quality objectives and also has implications for funding. So each of the proposals that are put forward are not fully benefiting from scale. And we know we need to move to scale. And if we don't, the smaller districts will be at an inherent disadvantage. So under the foundation formula, those smaller districts will really not benefit. And we're going to continue to see a big disparity in terms of what we call winners and losers. If you look at the districts, you're not able to actually switch and change how we're governed. We know that if we aren't operating at scale, smaller districts will struggle to deliver on these quality objectives we've set forth of really expanding opportunities for different businesses and delivering on many of the promises that have been put forth in prior legislation. We know right now in our current context, many of these demands are really unfunded for unfunded mandates for our districts, because within the limited resources, they're having to cut as opposed to using those dollars to expand just because of the complexity and the inefficiency in how we operate. So to deliver on these quality objectives, so if we do not achieve scale, and we've talked about this, and we move to a foundation formula, would likely be more costly because we would have to invest more significantly in those smaller districts. And even in investing more in the smaller districts, there's no guarantee that they'll be able to deliver on those quality objectives because you simply can't do that unless you're delivering at scale and offering the range of programs. A lot of those cost and the small districts get eaten up by a lot of the compliance requirements that are involved in operating a school. So ultimately, the concern with the current direction is that detaching governance from Act 73 will compromise the two other levers. So what I mean by that is for the governance, it's gonna be hard for us to achieve the quality goals that we've set forth unless we're operating at scale. And it will be very difficult to bend the cost curve because it will end up being more costly without a return in terms of opportunities for students. So specific to the House proposal, the 10 step process that is envisioned is very unlikely to achieve the new larger districts and achieving them in a way that they're demographically equitable and financially sustainable. Also, there's no guarantee that the mergers will take place or that the mergers will result in the scale that was envisioned in the foundation formula. So ultimately, we're not clear on the connection between the CESA proposal and how it will fit in to the foundation formula. The overall process itself is quite arduous and will take a long time to be able to implement and creates great uncertainty within that process and potential off ramps for addressing those systemic inequities. Our critique of Rambasses is largely consistent with what we shared with the redistricting task force and a concern of this adding another layer of bureaucracy, another layer of cost within our overly complex system. We also recognize that the process itself will pull time away for our educators. So instead of our educators being able to focus on improving and supporting improving quality of instruction, their time is being diverted to a lot of the management around having to do additional studies and additional review, and also implementing, I think, some of what was challenging in Act 46, where there's a lot of questions and concerns about communities saying, well, we don't want our kids going to school, kids in another community. We really need to be clear about the objectives of bringing together a system that truly is equitable and truly is accounting for the needs of all communities and really embracing that diversity of supporting students across multiple towns with very different needs. We want to be clear that regional service delivery can be a value add. Even within the original proposal the governor put forward with five districts, we had contemplated the need for regional service delivery, either at a statewide level or at the regional level, for those services that are highly specialized. The concern is bringing regional service delivery on top of our existing structure. So while keeping the existing 119 school districts and 52 supervisor units, districts, that's going to create a challenge. And so there also is a practical question around where that staffing will come from and how that will be paid for to be operating in a way that would be efficient. Within the Senate proposal, our concern again is around the disconnect between the governance and the funding and the quality. The current map that's being reviewed maintains the existing school districts and maintains the SDs and SU structure. We have advocated for a move from supervisory unions to supervisory districts, because we do feel like that's the more efficient structure. It is a way for our superintendents and boards to be fairer and more responsive to the needs of their districts. We recognize now that within the SU structure, there's also differences in terms of staffing contracts and curriculum and the ability to really negotiate that becomes problematic. And so also within this proposal, we see a lot of variation in terms of the size. So when you have a district that's the smallest serving 187 students to one that's over a couple thousand, you can imagine the challenges as you're thinking about operating at scale. And that comes with a choice around reducing programming or adding costs. And at some point, even if you're adding costs, there's a limited return just because you really can't pull your resources enough to be able to provide the array of programming that we would expect for our students to receive. Want to acknowledge what we have heard in your conversation as perceived obstacles to moving forward. We want to name those obstacles and think constructively around ways to overcome them. One obstacle we have heard in concern is loss of local voice, and that under larger districts, local school boards will represent additional constituents, and they'll have a broader array of communities. So we want to talk a little bit ways that there still can be very active and engaged communities within larger districts. Teacher pay has come up as a concern, particularly how we will level up teacher salaries. There is a concern that merging districts with disparity in teacher pay will result in a cost that would not be tenable. So we want to talk with you about some of the strategic choices we think are important to make as you talk about leveling up. And then school choice continues to be a sticking point in moving to larger districts, particularly as we think about combining districts that have historically been non operating with those that are operating. And that has raised questions around just the traditional attendance and feeding patterns. And we think that there are pragmatic and practical solutions to manage that. We'll go one by one terms of some of what we've heard and what we think would be important context. Chair Colin, is that a

[Speaker 0]: No, that's not. That's the elevator.

[Speaker 1]: Okay. We're going to keep See that blinking, then talking quickly to provide context, and then we can get into it. So for the local voice, I want to name that participating as a school board member is not the only way to engage with your school and to meaningfully be involved in education. And we would encourage policymakers to consider other ways to strengthen parent and community engagement beyond serving as an elected school board member. The governor's original proposal did envision school advisory councils. The intent of that is to create the structure to meaningfully engage parents and students and community partners and teachers in policymaking that has the most impact on the day to day delivery of education. We also proposed and would ask you to think again about equity based budgeting. When we talk about moving to a foundation formula, there are questions around how do we make sure that there's fairness and how those dollars are applied within the budgeting process. We have some resources to share around fairness formulas that could be helpful, but we also see the school advisory councils as being an important input for that, where actually dollars can be set aside for those local committees to make decisions on what would be in the best interest of those particular schools. So again, that more close, intimate interaction with their school decision making. I want to note too that as we talk about local voice, the reality is that we have received some feedback from US Ed that we don't have enough parental engagement. And particularly, we have a finding that we're not meaningfully involving our parents of students with disabilities. So this is an area where we have another corrective action plan with the US Department of Education to strengthen parent involvement and community involvement that's directly aligned to our emphasis on local voice and local involvement. In terms of teacher salaries, we want to be clear that leveling up teacher salaries is a priority for the agency of education. It is not an unintended consequence. It is a strategic objective for us to achieve teacher pay parity across the state. This is another area beyond the finances where we have a finding from the US Department of Education, where we have inequitable access to quality teachers across Vermont. In terms of some of the root cause, funding does play a role in that. Vermont's average teacher salary, while you see it at face value here, about 69,000, masks the state disparities. We have great differences in terms of teacher pay, and that's playing out in the fact that our teachers in more rural and economically disadvantaged districts offer significantly lower salaries. When we think about our budget being an expression of our priorities, I would ask us to really consider this next next point. Vermont is the second highest spending nationwide, and yet we're seventeenth in average teacher salary. And we are lower in average teacher salary than our peers in New York and Massachusetts and lower than the national average. So when we think about what is the most important input and investment we can make in our education system, it's in our teachers. And despite the fact that we are the highest spending in the country, we're not seeing that we have the highest salaries for teachers. And even in some areas where there might be very competitive salaries, that's not playing out in parts of our state that are more rural disadvantaged, and it's leading to challenges with teacher recruitment and teacher retention. So we want to ensure that competitive and equitable teacher pay is part of the equation. We also want to be clear that we don't want to look at leveling up just to districts. We want to look at leveling up to the state. So that means that even if we have more smaller districts, if you only level up within the districts, you're going to continue to have great differences district by district. So what we have been putting forward is really the strategy is a statewide benchmark to level up so that there's true parity in teacher pay. That does require us again to deliver education differently and to prioritize where our funding will go. In terms of managing choice, I think this has been a really challenging sticking point for both the committee this year, but also in the history of Vermont, every time education reform has been evaluated. So we came forward, the government came forward last year with a choice proposal that ended up being more restrictive than most Vermonters felt comfortable with. And so we've been listening to the conversation. We know that you've already made some very profound decisions within Act 73 already. In Act 73, the legislature has already defined how we need to deliver education to meet our statutory authority. And so what we're coming forward with today is really a neutral policy that is about ensuring we can deliver on our responsibilities as a state, recognizing how we're organized. And so within this policy, we need to make sure that students and communities that rely on approved independent schools or rely on a variety of other public schools continue to attend those schools. And the policy must also require independent schools serving public funded students to operate in partnership with new larger school districts, as is already currently the process, especially as you think about the delivery of special education, and ensuring that that's done as a state within a shared accountability framework. So the opportunity here is to be very practical in a bipartisan approach where we enact districts that reflect the historic tuitioning patterns. So the district map does matter because the district map needs to consider those feeding patterns, because those feeding patterns of where students attend are representative of where they need to deliver access to their public education. And it's our responsibility as a state to make sure they can have high quality public education. And also to make sure that within this approach, all districts are establishing attendance zones and an inter district choice policy that would be tailored to reflect the needs of local communities. So when we talk about choice, I want to name that there's often a lot of different interpretations of what we mean by choice. And really what we're putting forward is a neutral approach to choice, which is recognizing the ways in which choice already operates within our system. And so there's four primary ways that the state of Vermont works with choice. One is a public high school choice, where students can apply to attend a public high school in another district. Within this proposal, that would be maintained. The difference, as we think about its context within Act 73, is that this policy would apply to multiple high schools within the same district, and that the foundation formula would follow the student. Intra district choice also exists within our system, where students choose between public schools within the same district. This would also continue within the larger districts. And what would need to be established is a model policy based on the common supervisory district practices. Because it already happens within our supervisory districts. Another element of choice is to ensure that there are student specific arrangements. Sometimes this is referred to as hardship, where a student might need a placement to meet a unique educational need or that there's an extenuating circumstance for the family. So, this would also be maintained within larger districts. And what would need to happen is to establish a model policy. And again, this would be based on common district practices that are already in place. And the final way we will get choices to have tuition payments for students in certain towns and non operating districts that have long attended approved independent schools or public schools because of geography. Again, these dollars go to schools to ensure that children can access what is their right to a high quality public education. So this would continue within larger districts. But what is important is that we're considering drawing those lines to encompass those historical attendance patterns to the schools, both approved and amended schools and to public schools, because that's what they need to access in order to achieve, receive their education. And instead of calling this tuition, we really don't have a tuition construct anymore when we're moving to a foundation formula, it's a foundation formula that would be following the student. So, we share this because it's important just to bring forward a very practical, pragmatic approach to managing choice through policy. We want to also note that for the policy to work, we need to have intentionality around how we actually draw the district lines. Because ultimately what we're trying to achieve is delivering on our statutory obligation. And our obligation is to ensure as a state that every student can access a substantially equal education. And we know that in our current system, that's not happening. We have proven that that's not happening. So we need to make changes in order to rectify that and deliver on our promise to students. And that does require us tackling a lot of these sticking points and coming up with very practical and pragmatic solutions. So with that, we want to look at this choice policy and also some of these other metrics in the context of some proposed maps that we think would be viable. What we have done is we've taken maps that have already been out in the open and have been debated, and we've made some revisions to those based on the input that we have received, based on what we understand is important, both to our lawmakers and to constituents, and suggest that these be a place where we build upon and look at in relation to the choice policy. This particular map we have shared before. Can I pause for a sec? So I think what's really important, you all have experienced this already, right? So as we're bringing these maps back to you, you will have seen them and they'll look familiar with some revisions, you already know there's no such thing as a perfect map. And so again, I want to encourage you, and I think you all have lived this probably more than anybody else in this building and maybe anybody in the state at this point. You know that you can go in and adjust these lines and say, oh, you know what? Actually, this district, you're not understanding something about this experience right here. This needs to be adjusted. You've heard from us for as long as we've been doing this work. Let's do that. Let's hunker down and adjust so that the choice policy and the map can work together. So this is revisions based on, we've been listening to the testimony we've received. We've been out in the communities as well and talking to folks. These revisions and tweaks that we've made are representative of those conversations. But there's always more tweaks to be made. And you might also contemplate something in law that would allow for a revision period so that if there are any additional adjustments that need to be made based on the foundation formula recommendations that are made, that there would be an opportunity to make those adjustments. So I'm asking folks that you take the same approach you've taken with each other, which is knowing that there might be adjustments that need to be made. But these maps are meant to work with the choice polls. That is the important part.

[Speaker 0]: We have this document. Those are clickable links.

[Speaker 1]: They are, right. And you can pull the reports from them. You've played with these tools before. You can see the enrollment, the ADM. You can see all of those different reports, the grand list, all that good stuff where you can data note it out. And I just want to, again, reinforce, we're coming here to be in partnership with you. So we're reflecting back what we have heard are the perceived challenges of moving forward with Act 73. And we recognize that school choice is the main factor and the main barrier. So we want to bring forward a policy to look at that is practical and can be reviewed in context of a map. So this truly is being able to engage in that conversation. It does not represent the governor's proposal. It represents building off of maps that we think are meeting the criteria that 73 can be further refined. So Chair Conlon, you'll be happy to know that I have labeled this house map not as the Conlon version two, but as the house, we actually have house version four. So, we took the map that was introduced in this committee and we have gone through several iterations to arrive at this map to have a point of conversation. And those iterations have been done by listening to what some of the challenges were with the original map, along with meeting with many of you to try to understand what needs to be accomplished within the map in order to achieve our goals. And then the hybrid map is building off of the work of the redistricting task force. The redistricting task force asked us to create a map related to regional high schools, and we looked at that map in relation to the Vermont School Boards Association map, which was a default last year, And we made some adjustments, which really combined the best of both worlds of those maps to arrive at this hybrid version. So for our purpose of today's conversation, we just wanted one to reflect back what we are hearing or some of the obstacles to further validate that with you, and then to bring something practical forward that we can work with in order to advance Act 73 and move us to larger districts, which will allow us to deliver on our quality objectives and also allow the funding to work. So our hope is that in today's conversation, we can take note of your questions and be responsive to them next week and coming back with some additional information or responsive to inform your policymaking. And if there are certain barriers that we haven't noted that are important for us to be aware of, this would also be a big time to share this with us so that we can be a thought partner with you in advancing the deliverables for accident three. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: If only it were as simple as all of this. Appreciate you making the effort and continuing to sort of remind us of the goals of of Act 73. You know, we if if choice were the only thing that was out there as as a barrier, And I would say, we might even be able to get over that in some way. However, there are many other barriers that are not policy related. They're political landscape related that is the world we have to operate in. So, you know, it's it's it's a lot of everything, most of which has to do with democracy and people's history and where they are in their education world and all of that and what is a viable path forward from a house and senate and public procedure. I do have just kind of an off the wall specific question. In a world of a foundation formula in which certain parts of the state continue to need to send students to out of state public schools, what happens when that public school says, yeah, this isn't enough?

[Speaker 1]: Getting the funding that Vermont has for?

[Speaker 0]: In other words, they're not going to say, we'll take whatever random foundation formula is attached to this kid. They're going say, here's our tuition.

[Speaker 1]: I think in that instance, the state would have to evaluate our ability to deliver substantially equal education if that's occurring and where that's occurring and what the mechanisms are to address that. So we do have parts of our state where we have an interstate compact. We have other parts of our state where we could look at other homes for students. So, as we're talking about this work, we have to make sure that every student in our state has a home or homes that they go to for school. So that would need to be addressed. Think there's probably very finite areas in our state where that may be an issue. And so we would need to look at that and evaluate it, see if there are exceptions that are needed or if there's another plan to be able to deliver and meet the students' educational needs. So I think what we've continued to say with all of the policy recommendations is we need to think statewide around how to establish policy, not for the exceptions, but for the state, and then recognizing that there may be exceptions. And we need to analyze and evaluate those exceptions and make the adjustments or the changes that would be needed for that. You can give an example. Yeah, Robert, I heard this come up before. We actually talked about this last year in this room and that we said exactly this, that we are talking about a very, very small number.

[Speaker 0]: Well, so then I will change my question and say, what happens if our four historic academies say, you know, we're just not getting enough out of the foundation formulas?

[Speaker 1]: Foundation formulas is the foundation. I mean, I

[Speaker 0]: Yeah, I've got to guess what happens when we run into a game of chicken, where they say it's not covering the costs that we feel are necessary to provide the education to the students.

[Speaker 1]: So I think this is I a realize this is a hypercatatrix. Not something true. I think this better. More puzzled? We think this is actually distracting. So as moving towards the foundation, so this could be something that a school district says, we're not getting sufficient dollars as well. So part of moving to a foundation formula is really, the state needs to ensure that with this amount of funding, you can provide the educational goals that we've established. And we've really moved beyond calling this an adequacy model because what we're talking about is a very significant investment. The funding that's built into Act 73 represents the largest per pupil and base funding amount compared to any other state in the country. And so what we're talking about is needing to evaluate how those dollars are invested and how they get into schools and supporting teachers. As part of a foundation formula, we need to be evaluating on a regular basis if that funding is meeting the needs of our state. And so that is contemplated within Act 73, that there is an evaluation on, I think, a five year time frame. Again, the most important thing is that we're really clear about establishing the goals and establishing what that funding is intended to deliver. And then the state needs to review that on a regular basis if adjustments are made. And if we're really clear about our goals, those adjustments can be adjustments that are more precise. So if we find for and in many of these studies, if you look at them in other states, they're really clear not just you're going to increase the dollars, increase the dollars to do this thing. Or may need to make some different choices around how those dollars are invested to best meet the needs of your students based on evolving goals of the state. And so I think the question about the students going to different public schools, I have yet to see the data that would support that concern. I think there's value The US says it doesn't exist,

[Speaker 0]: because we aren't there yet.

[Speaker 1]: Yeah. Well, we would have that data. So we should be able to say, this student currently attends this public school in Adams, Massachusetts or one of the New Hampshire border districts. This is what they pay based on that student's characteristics. This is what our ACT 73 foundation formula would generate. So it's a concern that I don't know has been evaluated based on actual data. And again, it may be a very, very, very small number of students that need to have a practical response. But as you've heard us say many, many times, we need to build the system for the system, and then we need to address the exceptions, not build the system for the exceptions. What do you break? Oh, no, you didn't. I was like, you can't go ahead. I'm just wondering, where's the money going to come from in terms of level of net salaries? Had Brian here not too long ago, it's like 5 and a half billion just to put together three districts under one. So where does the funding come from? So we're going to be delivering education differently, So there will not be as many, there's not going to be as much administrative overhead as we have now. Those dollars are reinvested in teacher salaries. We have done budgeting with all of these models to share how we can make strategic choices around those dollars to achieve these goals. Those goals can't be met with the current funding in the way we're currently governed. Because we a very top heavy system, we have a lot of complexity, and that is diverting dollars to getting to expanding CTE, expanding pre K, and increasing teacher salaries. And is that the same place where we find the money to put together regional, middle, and high schools? In terms of school construction aid? Yes. So what we have talked about consistently is a need to move towards larger districts. Those larger districts will be evaluating the opportunities or the needs to do the consolidation, or if there are building needs. And that needs to be a step two of this process to ensure that the dollars invested in school construction are going into the buildings that are really going to offer and be needed to deliver education. So there right now, the state has not identified additional school construction aid dollars. And all of these questions come back to how are we going to fund our system? There is not an amount of dollars, and we will need to make choices for how those dollars are spent. What we've consistently put forward are very clear goals, and we've shown budgets that can achieve those goals because the funding contemplates the specific resources, the specific staffing models, how you would fund programs. All of that is part of what we've put forward and documented as being viable solutions.

[Speaker 0]: Brady?

[Speaker 1]: Do we have, and we're trying, if I'm totally, I'm not sure if I'm completely following the question, do we have the data on the weighted count currently for tuition students, like the characteristics and which weights might be applied to our currently tuition students? Are you saying, do we have the demographic data for our students who are publicly tuition? Yes. They're part of our normal data collections. Yes. So is there a follow-up question to that question? No, my understanding was that that was possibly not data that we have. That's Those students are part of ADM counts. The way that our system contemplates those students is that they are publicly funded students who attend an independent school as the mechanism by which they receive their education, they're part of our ADM count, and we always collect their information. It's part of our overall reporting structure. Because those are, for all intents and purposes, public students. Representative Long. Following, I'm on slide 12. And I'm looking at about managing choice through policy. And I'm looking at the second bullet. And given the fact that we have this is about independent schools serving publicly funded students, given that we have two separate rules, approved independent schools and rules for public schools, You have a statement in here saying I just want you to explain this a little more. The policy must also require independent schools serving publicly funded students to operate in partnership with new larger school districts makes sense within a shared accountability framework? Expand on shared accountability framework, given the fact

[Speaker 0]: that we have separate schools.

[Speaker 1]: So the agency has consistently put forward this concept of shared accountability in every context in which we oversee education from prepay all the way through career and technical education and inclusive of small public schools and inclusive of independent schools. So what we are talking about is strengthening Vermont's accountability framework to make sure that we are investing our dollars and they're really supporting high quality students. So I would say in Vermont, we haven't focused as much on accountability. And we're talking about ensuring that we have very clear measures of school quality and that that be applied in all settings where we are delivering education. And so that's what you're seeing from the agency. We take our role of accountability very seriously. When I took on as secretary, we had a backlog in independent school approvals, and we're addressing that backlog to make sure that we can do the proper review. And it's also important for independent schools to get that input for continuous improvement. And then on the public school side, we've put forward a number of amendments to our ESSA state plan because we were out of compliance in many areas for our current accountability system. Many of our small public schools have not been part of our accountability system. That is out of compliance with federal law. And we have a plan that we already put forward to strengthen accountability. We very early identified the need to change our methodology for how we do accountability, including a growth metric that's really an accountability, that's really a proficiency metric disguised as growth. Looking at also methodology for how we evaluate equity designations, college and career readiness. So what you're hearing from the agency is a recognition that in the state of Vermont, we haven't been focusing on accountability, and we need to focus on accountability. And in every area where the agency exercises oversight, we are strengthening that and ensuring that there is that quality and clarity around both expectations and how all schools and programs are measured up, coupled with the right support from the agency of education. So if I can just I'll just expand and give a quick example because it just popped into my head while you were talking about I'm really focused on the shared accountability. I hear all of what you're saying. We've certainly heard that coming from the agencies before. Applaud that. But because there's different rules, one example is EQS. Approved independent schools aren't required to follow EQS and public schools are. So how do we pull those together in a shared accountability? So I think accountability is a whole other area that we could discuss, and I would love to come back and talk about that because I also, see some challenges too with our schools being able to implement education quality standards in the public setting. So what we're talking about and within our reorganization, we've established a whole other area that's focused on strategy and accountability because we actually have a lot accountability and monitoring requirements. And that's not just looking at independent schools compared to public schools. We actually are just we don't right now have a coherent way of measuring quality and aligning all of the different federal and state compliance requirements in a way that's meaningful and is driving continuous improvement. So we actually I would argue that when we talk about accountability, it's actually much broader than talking about accountability between independent and public schools. And it's also looking at all of the different ways that we're establishing quality and making sure that there is that coherent approach to evaluating it. And so I'd love to come in and talk more about the work that we're doing in that area. But I think what you can really hear from the agency is we're very much focused on school quality, and we're very much focused on those dollars really going to supporting outcomes for students. And, Rev Long, I think what you're hearing, because Zoe is living this every single day right now, is trying to strengthen the entire accountability system. So I think what you're hearing is right now, and this is an area of strategic focus for us, we're actually trying to define the entire framework for accountability across the entire system. That includes EQS. It includes DQS. It includes our SSA plan. It includes resource allocation review. It includes the 2,200 series in the state board rule. It includes the entire system. We don't have a coherent framework yet. That's the work that needs to be done with independent schools. And I just want to belabor this. I'm just talking about a policy. No, that's right. We're seeing It's narrowed down to something here, which is a policy within a shared accountability framework. So I really appreciate your feedback. Thank you. Yeah. And so what we're trying to signal there is we recognize that there needs to be a shared accountability framework for students, publicly tuition students attending any setting. And that the state of Vermont needs to have stronger accountability. Can we redefine what that is? Let me look at other states that have been able to really elevate outcomes because they were clear on the expectations, they monitored progress towards those expectations, and they provided the right level of support. I would argue we've taken our ball a little bit off of accountability over the last several years, and that's why we're really focusing in on that. And we're seeing the agency be really intentional about working with the field to develop a shared understanding of our accountability because accountability can come with some baggage. And certainly, I think came with some baggage after no child left behind where those accountability metrics felt punitive and unworkable. But we need to make sure that we are accountable. So ultimately, that's every one of us is accountable to students and to ensuring that our students are getting an exceptional education. And we do need to continue to focus and strengthen accountability. It's an area that I'm very much focused on, and I'm happy to expand more of the specific processes in place now at the agency to move us in that direction. On a similar point, are we talking about a common accountability framework if you, within one district, you use some policy solution to get two different operating systems now are existing within one district. Do they have shared accountability, as in they both have some accountability but it's different? Or do they have the same accountability? Let me make sure I'm understanding how you're defining system. Are you defining system as like a system of data collection or a system of a district? If you have public schools and independent schools potentially operating now in one new larger district, do they have the same, each of those schools have the same accountability system? So we've always talked about accountability in terms of outcomes to make sure that they're achieving the same performance. I'm still not clear on the answer. Do they have the same accountability system? Do they have the same requirements, the same testing, the same public data releases, same Is it the same A to Z accountability system? So I'm going to just name for you in answering that question that not all of our public schools have the same accountability system. So in other words, when you develop an accountability framework and you're offering different grade levels, you're going to be evaluated measures of school quality differently if you're a K-two versus a K-five versus a K-twelve, right? So I think answering that, what we're talking about is when we think about accountability, we want to make sure that we're having consistent outcomes for our students, regardless of the setting where they're receiving their education. And what you're hearing from us is we need to have clarity across the entire system and ensuring that the expectations are very clear and that there's a way to monitor them to ensure that we're achieving that quality across the whole system. For public, independent, small schools, large schools, we do need to make sure that we have a handle on quality because it's our responsibility as an agency to proactively identify where there may be some challenges so that we can differentiate the support that we provide as an agency to help with continuous improvement. And I think to really have this conversation, we do need to ground it in an understanding of the way our accountability system currently works and make sure that there's clarity around that. Because difference doesn't always mean that it's worse or better, but as long as we're achieving outcomes. So I think it's hard to have this conversation without grounding it in understanding of how our current accountability works. And the reality that our accountability system, even within public schools, is quite fragmented right now, and that's an area that we're trying to make some enhancements.

[Speaker 0]: I'm sorry to report to the committee that we have plenty of floor debate still awaiting us. We're at the landlord tenant bill at the moment with a few amendments to that. So if there aren't further questions, I'm gonna encourage us to get back to that. But I just want to appreciate the continued communication. I hope you also appreciate that the world we are trying to maneuver and move around in is not just policy, it is also politics. Is Vermonters sort of right at the heart of what they had, what they want, what they don't want. It can be different everywhere. And it's difficult set of rapids to navigate and that's really what we are trying to do. I would say we may not look the same in what we would like to see happen, I would say, among the members of this committee, not everybody is on the same page. But I hope we are all focused on the end result, whatever that may be, which is to provide a better education system for our state. What I hear from all of you at the AAU is that it's absolutely your goal. I just want you to be rest assured, We also are trying that as well. Thank you for your time this afternoon on Friday. Appreciate it.

[Speaker 1]: How can we help you in terms of next steps?

[Speaker 0]: Right. We will. It's we're all a little burned out. It's been a long week. It's Friday at 04:00. Follow-up with

[Speaker 1]: you on Tuesday. Okay, so hopefully we've given you some food for thought because we really, again, we offer this as an opportunity to partner. We want to be able to be productive in making revisions so that we get to a place where we can achieve the goals that we all share.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you.