The federal No Child Left Behind Act has placed the issue of educational accountability at the forefront of public policy discourse. Terms such as highly-qualified teachers, adequate yearly progress, and high-stakes testing have become part and parcel of the national vocabulary as America shines a probing spotlight upon its public schools.

Speakers (shown in accompanying photo from left to right) included: CAPSO President Robert A. Teegarden; Lance T. Izumi, Director of Education Studies, Pacific Research Institute; Raneene Belisle, General Counsel, Sacramento County Office of Education; Joe McTighe, Executive Director, Council for American Private Education, and John E. "Jack" Coons, Professor of Law, Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley. Read Speaker Bios

The current focus on accountability also poses a challenge to the nation's private schools, as parents, policy makers, elected officials and members of the press inevitably seek comparisons between the public and private sectors. Critics of private education are quick to suggest that private schools are lacking for standards, state-credentialed teachers and uniform instrumentation to assess student achievement. When repeated with sufficient regularity, such allegations produce a distorted picture of private school accountability in the eyes of the public.

In truth, nowhere is educational accountability greater than in America's K-12 private schools, where every student is enrolled by choice, where a free alternative exists just down the street or around the corner in the form of a local public school, and where schools that fail, cease to exist. Every private school leader is cognizant of these realities. But, in today's climate, private school leaders must be equipped to answer questions from an ever-more-demanding public concerning curriculum, personnel, and assessment, with clarity, sophistication and conviction. It is to this end that CAPSO's Colloquium on Private School Accountability was conducted.

Keynote Address

In his keynote remarks, CAPE Executive Director Joe McTighe addressed the following questions:

• Should the state hold private schools accountable? If so, for what?

• Does the state have a legitimate role in ensuring that a private school's curriculum reflects democratic principles and society's core values?

• Does the state have an expanded oversight responsibility when public funds are involved?

• Might the state's interest in defending core values clash with the First Amendment rights of citizens?

Drawing upon the work of Boston University Professor Charles Glenn, Mr. McTighe identified a list of "regulatory non-negotiables" which private schools must safeguard in order to preserve their identity and independence. These include control over employment of staff, the composition of the student body, curriculum, and the organization of the instructional program. It is of the utmost importance that private schools protect their distinctive characters, visions and missions while avoiding standardization. The only way to protect the pluralism so valued by Americans, is to protect and preserve institutions reflecting "distinctive viewpoints."

If the preservation of distinctive identity is of primary concern, private school leaders would do well to address the right of the state to reasonably regulate private schools. To this end, Mr. McTighe called upon the private school community to engage in a discussion regarding what "reasonable regulation" might entail, and offered several suggestions of his own, including a preference for assessment based upon outcomes rather than inputs (e.g. teacher credentialing or adherence to a standardized curriculum).

In closing, Mr. McTighe challenged private school leaders to seize the initiative by defining what it means for private schools to be accountable, and to do so apart from any discussion of government financial assistance.

Curricular Standards—John E. "Jack" Coons

How might private school leaders best respond to the charge that their schools fail to follow a common curriculum designed to achieve state-mandated standards? From Professor Coons' perspective, the question turns upon an unsubstantiated premise, and to unpack its premise is to answer the question.

At its heart, argues Professor Coons, education revolves around the transmission of values and beliefs, and public education is a value laden enterprise. In any public school classroom, teachers are likely to convey messages reflecting value positions that either support or oppose nearly every major social issue of the day: use of condoms, gun control, deforestation, homosexual marriage, affirmative action, global warming, redistribution of wealth, etc.

Needless to say, the value orientations underpinning responses to these issues are addressed in private schools, the difference being that private schools don't make the pretense of being value free. To the contrary, the majority of private schools are voluntary communities whose members share a core body of highly visible values. Professor Coons observes that value diversity is more likely to exist among private schools, and within public schools. Parents of private school students stand a far better chance of knowing the underlying beliefs to which their children will be exposed, whereas children attending public schools are subject to what Professor Coons labeled a "bingo curriculum."

Teacher Qualifications—Raneene Belisle

Rae Belisle views public school accountability to government as a surrogate for the direct accountability to students and parents typically found in private schools. Moreover, certain features commonly associated with public accountability are likely to produce effects that are more harmful than helpful to student growth and achievement.

As an example, Ms. Belisle cited current research that identifies subject matter competence, a high degree of verbal skill and strong intellectual competence as stronger correlates of teacher quality (as measured by impact on student achievement) than the possession of state-issued teaching credentials. In light of such findings, state accountability systems tend to measure for the presence of the wrong things.

Ms. Belisle regards the ability of private schools to compensate teachers on the basis of performance, or merit, as a major component of a meaningful accountability system. In public schools, where teacher salaries are governed by collective bargaining agreements, the best and worst teachers are subject to "wage compression." That is to say, in a system in which compensation is a function of years of service and degrees attained, the best teachers tend to be paid less than they would command in a market environment, and the worst teachers tend to be paid more. Exactly how a system that punishes great teachers while rewarding those who are sub-par promotes accountability is anyone's guess.

While Ms. Belisle believes that the best thing the government can do for private schools is to steer clear, she underscored Joe McTighe's admonition: "If private schools don't produce evidence of their achievements, they are likely to have unwanted accountability requirements foisted upon them."

Pupil Assessment—Lance Izumi

According to Lance Izumi, standardized achievement tests are here to stay. Their alignment with state standards, reliability, and the broad comparability of results they permit, commend them for utilization by public schools. These very features, however, become problematic in a private school universe characterized by curricular and instructional diversity, in which one size cannot fit all.

While it is true that most private schools employ standardized tests as one means of assessing student achievement, a wide variety of tests are used, making the comparability of results difficult. Reliance upon "authentic assessment" methods (such as the evaluation of portfolios of student work), while useful in individual school settings, is similarly non-conducive to the enablement of systemic comparisons.

Be that as it may, Mr. Izumi opined that in an increasingly test-driven environment, private school leaders must not only be prepared to answer the question, "How does your particular school compare?" but must devote serious thought to developing means of enabling comparisons both among and between private and public schools.