EDUCATION OVERSIGHT BOARD MEETING MINUTES (9/18/2002)

EDUCATION OVERSIGHT BOARD MEETING MINUTES September 18, 2002 9:00 A.M. Oklahoma State Capitol Building Conference Room 412B Oklahoma City, OK 73105
BOARD MEMBERS PRESENT:	Ed Long, Kenneth Bridges, Gerald Dickerson, Ron Dryden, Don McCorkell, Karen Yarbrough, Sen. Penny Williams
BOARD MEMBERS ABSENT:	Pete Churchwell, Rep. Larry Roberts
OTHER REGULAR ATTENDEES:	Secretary of Education Dr. Floyd Coppedge Office of Accountability Staff: Robert Buswell, Matt Hesser, Jerry Hsieh
VISITORS:	None
Call to Order and Roll Call: Mr. Long called the meeting to order and declared a quorum present. Mr. Long also took the opportunity to welcomed Gerald Dickerson to the board. Mr. Dickerson has been in education in Oklahoma for over 30 years and was appointed by the Governor to replace John Rex.
Approval of Minutes: Minutes of the May 15, 2002 meeting were approved as submitted.
Report of FY 2002 End-of-Year Expenditures: A report was distributed to board members, with discussion from Mr. Buswell. The Office of Accountability's Educational Indicators Program closed the year with roughly $4,000.00 carryover. The amount was not exact because the State Department of Education was not scheduled to release the exact carryover amount until October. The meeting proceeded to the budget for Oklahoma School Performance Review. Discussions included the problems involved with getting the program started and with hiring a staff member to design, implement, and oversee the program. It was explained by Dr. Coppedge that because of legislation passed last session, no schools would be required to receive a school performance review based upon administration costs being over established limits and indicated that it might be difficult to get any schools to volunteer for reviews due to the budget shortfalls this year. McCorkell suggested the idea of approaching major foundations in the state to cover the 25% cost to schools that volunteer for a performance review. He then made a two-part motion. The first part authorized staff to immediately proceed with either hiring personnel to fill the staff position of Contracting Coordinator, or to select a consultant to provide those services. The second part of the motion authorized staff to prepare a presentation to foundations across the state to encourage them to cover the 25% cost to any schools that would volunteer to be reviewed. The two-part motion passed unanimously.
Proposed Revisions to FY 2003 Budget: A two-page report was distributed to board members with discussion from Mr. Buswell. Both the Educational Indicators program and the Oklahoma School Performance Review had been subject to a 4.75% cut. This worked out to roughly a $13,000 cut to the indicators program and a $22,860 cut to OSPR. The new budgeted amounts were approximately $262,000 for Indicators and $485,394 for OSPR. The new budgeted amounts were approved unanimously.
Budget request for FY 2004: Report was distributed to board members. A requested budget of $897,840 (a combined amount for the indicators program and OSPR) was approved unanimously by the board.
Report on Oklahoma School Performance Review Program: It was decided that the school performance review had been adequately covered during previous agenda items and the meeting proceeded.
Report on the Oklahoma Educational Indicators Program: Mr. Buswell began with a wrap-up of Profiles 2001. He reported that although there had been data flow problems early on, the reports were released well before the end of school and received good press coverage statewide due to two separate press releases, one for the State Report and one for the School Report Cards. Buswell said that several newspaper articles showed that communities are starting to use the reports for their intended purpose; local data-based decision-making. The presentation continued with Mr. Hsieh reporting on the use of the Office of Accountability's web site. A packet of information was distributed which showed that the use of the web site has increased steadily since its inception in June of 1998. There was an average of 8,100 individual report pages downloaded per month during the first 8 months of 2002, with a few months coming in around 10,000. Parents made up the bulk of Internet users, at 42%, followed by researchers, with 23% of users. Fifty-one percent (51%) of downloads took place during non-office hours and an increasing number of users are from out-of-state. The board requested that the office send copies of this report to both education committees of the state legislature. Mr. Buswell next reported progress on Profiles 2002. Data was reported to be flowing nicely this year. All requested data had already been received from the Oklahoma Department of Career and Technology Education and the Office of Juvenile Affairs. A schedule of delivery, as requested, had been received from the Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education. The State Department of Education was starting to deliver data although no schedule of delivery had been provided. Mr. Buswell was directed to send a letter to Superintendent Garrett requesting that the State Department of Education provide all requested data no later than November 1, 2002. If the agency is unable to meet the new deadline than a schedule of delivery should be provided to the Office of Accountability along with explanations for any delays. The meeting continued with a look at test results for the 2002 school year. Mr. Hesser began with a presentation of the state's core curriculum test results. A packet of information was distributed that illustrated how the scores at the state level fluctuated from one year to the next. The board expressed concern when comparing testing data on a year-to-year basis and indicated that there seemed to be stability problems in the state's testing program. Hesser reminded the board of the statement that the board added to the previous year's State Report which called for the creation of a freestanding body that would oversee the future development, administration, growth, and cost of the Oklahoma School Testing Program. Mr. Hesser next distributed a packet to the board covering the ACT and PLAN results for the class of 2002. Oklahoma's composite score on the ACT had remained unchanged from the previous year, while the national score had dropped two-tenths of a standard score. Oklahoma, however, still lagged behind the nation due to low math scores. It was also illustrated that minority students under-perform white students in Oklahoma, but outperform their racial counterparts nationally. Oklahoma's white students on the other hand do not score as well on the ACT as white students nationally but still substantially outperform minority students. Next, SAT and AP scores were presented to the board. A packet was distributed which noted the Verbal portion of the SAT had increased 5 points while the Math score remained unchanged. Roughly 8% of Oklahoma students take the SAT. Hesser then presented statistics relating to the AP program. He stated that there had been a 220% increase in the number of schools participating in AP. However, Oklahoma did not have as many students scoring 3 or above as would be expected when compared to national trends. Considerable discussion by the board followed. Mr. Long suggested that Dr. Coppedge write a letter to the Foundation for Excellence encouraging them to pay for the cost of the AP test for students who complete an AP course but do not meet the financial hardship guidelines established by the College Board.
Report on New Legislation: The meeting progressed to a discussion of HR-1, the No Child Left Behind Act. It was noted by several present that all of the money attached to HR-1 moved directly from the US Department of Education (USDE) to each state's department of education, which made things hard for states like Oklahoma where the certain functions of common education had been decentralized. For example, money allocated for teacher training was not going to be forwarded to the Oklahoma Commission for Teacher Preparation. Frustration was also expressed over the fact that the state's HR-1 plan had already been submitted to the USDE, was said to have been approved, and yet no one outside of the SDE has been allowed to see the document. It was reported that the National Governors Association and the National Council of State Legislatures had also objected to state plans passing directly to the USDE without any signoff from Governors or state legislators. It was then explained that HR-1 would also require states to establish comprehensive testing programs for grades 3 through 8 and use the results of the tests to gauge whether each school, grade, ethnic group, income level, etc. was achieving "adequate yearly progress." The board again voiced concern over the instability of the state's testing program and whether usable data could be generated if the already unstable testing program were expanded due to HR-1. The board then directed the Office of Accountability to draft a letter to the state legislature's Interim Study Committee on HR-1; the No Child Left Behind Act outlining the board's concerns over the testing program. The letter is to be reviewed at the next board meeting prior to it being sent.
New Business: Mr. Long asked that a resolution of appreciation be developed for John Rex for his service on the board. Karen Yarbrough expressed that she would like to continue to be a member of the board, but had not yet been re-appointed by the Speaker of the House.
Announcements: None
Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned at approximately 11:45 a.m.
The minutes of the September 18, 2002 Meeting of the Education Oversight Board were approved (as submitted) or (with corrections) on October 16, 2002.