Why Should Delaware Care?
As the leader of the Delaware Department of Education, it is the Delaware Secretary of Education’s role to set policy and funding initiatives for the state’s 19 school districts and 26 charter schools. Cindy Marten, currently two years into her tenure at the helm of DDOE, has worked to combat disappointing test scores, including through a controversial new proposal, while also pushing forward a new public education funding formula.
As Delaware schools continue to be bogged down by low standardized test scores and high rates of chronic absenteeism, Education Secretary Cindy Marten — two years into her tenure as the state’s top education official — has unveiled an ambitious and controversial plan to breathe new life into the state’s struggling educational landscape.
But Marten’s plan to create a five-tiered system to identify, support and, in some cases, take over low-performing schools has already drawn criticism from some educators and lawmakers.
The proposal, meant to improve standardized testing scores and improve educational outcomes, also comes amid a host of other sweeping reforms that will change the way Delaware schools are funded and could see districts begin the process of consolidation.
And while the ultimate impact of these reforms, if fully implemented, remains unclear, the slate of initiatives could represent a monumental turning point for both Marten’s tenure and for K-12 education in Delaware.
“We have a real shot to get this right, but only if this stops being my plan and becomes our collective work,” Marten said.
Spotlight Delaware sat down with Marten one week after she unveiled the draft framework of her tiered accountability system to discuss the plan, the criticism surrounding it and other major changes that could be coming to Delaware’s classrooms.
Proposing an accountability framework
Earlier this month, Marten released a draft of a tiered system that she says answers questions about how Delaware will move forward to improve test scores.
Marten’s draft consists of five tiers, ranging in support and accountability measures for district schools and charter schools. The universal expectation is for schools to be in tier one, which has the lowest level of intervention.
Additional support is introduced at tiers two and three. State intervention begins at tier four and is carried into tier five, where the Delaware Department of Education would take over the operation of a school and appoint new leadership until conditions improve.
Schools with little to no progress that are placed into tier four would see “state-directed instructional and operational actions, leadership or staffing supports and decisions [that] need to be made when they’re needed,” Marten said during a Sept. 17 State Board of Education meeting.
If none of those state-implemented supports work, the school would be placed into tier five, the Department of Education receivership.
Separately, Marten also announced the possibility of holding back third-grade students who cannot read at grade level, a tactic that Mississippi has used to dramatically increase proficiency scores but also has come under criticism as a manipulation of its test scores.
Holding students back would be a last resort, Marten said. The state must first focus on early intervention screenings to address learning disabilities and monitor students’ progress over time.
If students are not improving after receiving individualized support, then whether they should begin fourth grade will be evaluated based on individual data, she added.
Although Marten’s goal for the Sept. 17 state board meeting was to present a concrete draft, there are still elements that need to be finalized.
The department must determine how long a school can remain in a specific tier and establish criteria for where schools should initially be placed if the framework is implemented, among other details.
Marten also said “some” of the framework would require legislative action before it could be implemented. She plans to have draft legislation ready for the start of the new General Assembly in January.
Marten said her philosophy behind the accountability framework is that the plan should not just be created by her — it is the entire state’s responsibility to contribute.
“This isn’t the secretary’s plan, [who] sits in an office and writes something or hires a consultant to come and do,” she said.
But some education advocates and state lawmakers have already begun expressing concerns.
Lawmakers, leaders react
Delaware education leaders have shown mixed reactions to Marten’s draft framework in the days since it was released.
Sen. Laura Sturgeon (D-Brandywine Hundred), a retired teacher and the chair of the Senate Education Committee, who has been a champion for education reform throughout her tenure in the legislature, said she feared the framework could create “unintended harm” for educators.
“This proposal signals a disconnect between the Department of Education and the realities our teachers face, echoing top-down policies of past eras … that demoralized educators, stressed students, and drained the joy from teaching and learning,” she said.
Marten said she agreed with many of Sturgeon’s remarks, but said she did not hear sentiments about educators feeling unheard or undervalued as a result of the draft announcement.
Tameka Mays, president of the Delaware State Education Association, wrote in a statement to Spotlight Delaware earlier this month that the state’s educators’ union is committed to having conversations with government leaders about plans for improving student academic performance.
But Mays said she and her organization have mixed feelings about Marten’s plan.
“There are aspects we favor, such as additional instructional support for struggling students, and aspects that raise serious concern for our members and our communities, including the process leading up to a possible state takeover of our local schools and the potential for 8- and 9-year-olds to be held back a grade,” Mays said in her statement.
When asked last week if he agreed with Marten’s plan, Gov. Matt Meyer said there must be “some dramatic action taken in those small numbers of schools that are well-funded, that are well-resourced, that are not producing the outcomes that kids and families need.”
Meyer also told Spotlight Delaware he believes it is “generally true” that if a student is not proficient according to their grade-level standards, they should not move on to the next grade. Though he noted there are “other factors that come into play,” without elaborating specifically on those other factors.
Lake Forest Superintendent Steven Lucas, who is also the president of the Delaware Chief School Officer’s Association, said in a statement to Spotlight Delaware that his organization looks forward to working with Marten’s department to ensure the accountability framework “accurately assesses the needs and output of the public school districts, supports the work of our public school teachers, and helps to increase the college and career readiness of our graduates.”
Criticisms linking back to past plans
Some Delawareans on social media have linked the proposed accountability tiers to distrust between educators and the state’s Department of Education that dates back to more than a decade ago.
Tensions were heightened between late 2014 and early 2015 when the Department of Education announced a “Priority Schools Plan” to improve six high-poverty schools in Wilmington, which had some of the state’s lowest test scores, according to reporting by The News Journal.
At the time, the Department of Education called for the Christina and Red Clay Consolidated school districts to fire the schools’ principals and make all teachers reapply for their jobs.
In December 2014, the Red Clay Consolidated Board of Education voted to move forward with then-Gov. Jack Markell’s Priority Schools push while rejecting some of the state’s requirements, such as having every teacher reapply for their job.
Christina also fought back against the requirements, and the district recommended the then-principals of Bayard Middle School and Bancroft and Stubbs Elementary schools stay after what it called a “thorough and professional vetting process.”
Tension between educators and the Department of Education ultimately resulted in the Delaware State Education Association voting “no confidence” in then-Delaware Secretary of Education Mark Murphy. He announced his resignation just five months later.
Marten told Spotlight Delaware she was aware of that history when she presented the draft framework.
“People are trying to give me a history lesson right now because they think I don’t know the pain, the trauma, the heartbreak, what didn’t work,” Marten said. “I’m not asking anybody to forget 2014.”
The argument that her framework feels like 2014 is a “legitimate starting point” for conversations, she said. But that does not mean the discussion surrounding the plan can end there.
Marten also said there are key differences between the 2014 plan and her current draft. The current proposal does not call for educator dismissals or entire staffs to reapply for their jobs.
She deliberately presented a draft that was “something concrete and real,” she said, so the community could provide meaningful feedback.
The Delaware Department of Education will also continue to seek feedback from stakeholders in the coming months.
Other changes coming to Delaware’s classrooms
The drafted framework could be implemented alongside other major changes to Delaware’s classrooms.
Earlier this month, the Department of Education announced the state was awarded a five-year, $16 million federal grant to expand access to charter school options and promote accountability.
At least 90% of the award will fund “competitive subgrants for the planning, implementation, replication, and expansion of charter schools,” while addressing student and community needs, according to the department’s announcement. The awardees supported by the grant have a five-year target of increasing statewide charter enrollment capacity by 10%.
Kendall Massett, executive director of the Charter School Network, a nonprofit advocacy organization for Delaware’s charter schools, said the grant application leaned into work-based learning, career and technical education, educational opportunities in rural areas, among other programs.
According to the announcement, Delaware applied for the funding “as one part of its broader work to expand educational opportunities and improve outcomes across the state’s public education system.”
Neither Lucas, head of the superintendents’ association, nor Mays, president of the state’s educators’ union, commented on the charter school grant award. The growth of Delaware’s charter schools over the past 30 years has been a point of contention within the public school system though.
Marten said in a statement that “Delaware should organize public education around what students need, not around protecting one model of schooling over another.”
She also said she understands districts’ concerns that charter schools may pull potential students — and therefore funding, resources and tax dollars — from their districts.
Delaware’s public education funding currently follows what officials call a unit-count system, which distributes money to districts based on the number of students enrolled.
When students attend charter schools rather than their local district school, school district leaders are obligated to pass tax revenues on to the charter school to cover their costs. That allocation is based on the number of students enrolled in the charter school.
Still, Marten said the $16 million federal charter grant does not answer broader questions about the relationship between shifting enrollment and its impact on costs for buildings, transportation, and staffing.
But changes coming to the state’s public education funding formula could help level the playing field.
Delaware’s Public Education Funding Commission — a group tasked with recommending reforms to the state’s 85-year-old school funding system — unanimously recommended that lawmakers approve their hybrid funding framework last year, which would shift education spending away from a per-student basis to one that directs more dollars toward students with higher needs.
This past summer, two bills that would lay the groundwork for Delaware to begin implementing that new funding system were signed into law by Meyer.
On top of these impending funding changes, a state task force charged with drawing plans to redistrict Wilmington schools recommended combining Delaware’s four northernmost school districts last winter, which would represent a seismic shift in Delaware’s public education ecosystem, if ultimately approved.
The affected districts would include the Brandywine, Christina, Colonial, and Red Clay Consolidated school districts. Those consolidation plans, however, are far from set in stone. They would need to be approved by state lawmakers and would take years to implement.
But Marten, who sits at the helm of the state agency that would ultimately undertake these generational reforms, is confident the Department of Education is up for the task.
“It needs to be connected, otherwise, people are going to experience continued fragmentation of a system that is all chasing the same problem, but they’re all running down different tracks,” Marten said.
Cristal Sanchez contributed to this report.
