Michigan’s kids are going back to class. This fall, more than 1 million students will step through the schoolhouse door. Some are stepping into the spotlight.
This year, all eyes are on the third grade. A controversial law requires all third graders who do not achieve proficiency on the English language arts section of next spring’s M-STEP to be held back.
Over the next five years, researchers at Michigan State University will use a federal grant to study the effectiveness of the state’s “Read By Grade Three” law.
Joshua Cowen, co-director of the Education Policy Innovation Collaborative (EPIC) at Michigan State University, outlines the project.
COWEN:
We don't know a whole lot about how the law is going to be rolled out and what its impacts are in Michigan public schools. So, this is a well-funded and long opportunity to learn more.
LAVERY:
Michigan State University published a study in July that came to a pretty stunning conclusion. It said that if the third grade reading law were in effect right now, today, between 2,000 and 5,000 Michigan students would have to repeat the third grade. Where do we get that finding from?
COWEN:
Yeah, so at the end of the spring, the Michigan Department of Education released what amounts to the “cut points” on the M-STEP that will determine these retention designations, as well as designations for other support services.
What we did in our team was calculate simply the percentage of Michigan third graders who would have been retained under the law under those cut scores. The law wrote a number of parameters in place, most important of which was that students who were a grade below proficiency had to be retained, with the exception of students who received a number of good cause exemptions under the law.
So this range that we gave, there's about 100,000 to 102,000 third graders and Michigan's public schools. So two to five percent corresponds to 2,000 to 5,000 students, depending on which exemptions are applied in which districts. That’s where that range comes from.
LAVERY:
You just mentioned a very key element: “good cause exemptions.” If a student is failing English language arts by the end of this school year, parents do have some recourse under the law to seek one of these exemptions to prevent their child from having to repeat the third grade. What are these exemptions about?
COWEN:
There are several. The law is going to differently apply depending on students who have pre-identified learning disabilities, students who have different English language learning status, students who have been in a school for less than two years, as well as a fair amount of local discretion. In fact, I would say that the discretion of each district superintendent is really the key part here. The way that these exemptions are going to be rolled out is there are a number of potential exemptions that the law provides for, but who makes the decision as to which of those applies for which kids in each district…that ultimately is the superintendent's decision.
LAVERY:
What concerns do you have about the equity among families? Some may be able to advocate for their children to not be retained and some may not have that ability, depending upon the background of the family.
COWEN:
Yes…and again, that's something that we're going to be paying attention to. It is true that parent advocacy, parent information, the extent to which districts are active partners in working with parents, that is going to help determine who gets retained. For example, our estimates show that far more students of color would be retained under the law. Far more students in some of our state's most struggling schools would be retained or at least flagged for retention.
LAVERY:
And why exactly is that?
COWEN:
This is just where higher numbers of third graders who are already below the cut point are. You know, it's not for me to say as an evaluator, as a researcher what parents should be doing to advocate for their kids. But, we are going to be studying what parents are doing to advocate for their kids, and looking for where differences in the way this law is rolled out exist in Michigan school districts.
LAVERY:
Many people in Michigan, including Governor Gretchen Whitmer, see this law as draconian and would rather not see it in effect; they believe its destructive. So I'm wondering if the possibility exists that the law might be repealed before your grant is finished?
COWEN:
Whatever happens down the line, we're going to be studying what has happened so far, what is happening this upcoming year and what happens in the future. If the governor’s office and the legislature decide at some point to change the law or to modify it in some way, we hope that research evidence helps drive some of those decisions.
We do believe that there's a scientific component to help inform some of these answers. So, from our perspective, if the law does change, we would hope that it changes in a way that, again, is data driven and ultimately works for the best interest of Michigan's kids.
