Guest columnists
Education reform's on the ballot in superintendent's tussle

By Booth Gardner and Chuck Collins
Special to The Times

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THE race in the Nov. 2 general election for state superintendent of public instruction is an unusual one. The contest features the current education chief, Terry Bergeson, against the former head, Judith Billings. On its face, nothing is wrong with that — two experienced candidates.

The bad news is the race has developed into a referendum on whether to continue Washington's decade-long effort to reform K-12 education. That is unfortunate.

Education reform was initiated in the early 1990s when the state assembled a committee of education and business leaders to assess the adequacy of Washington's K-12 system.

The assessment was in-depth and it was sobering. The committee concluded that large numbers of high-school graduates did not possess the basic math, reading, writing and science skills to succeed in a changing and demanding economy.

Vast numbers of traditional good-wage but low-skill jobs had disappeared; and in their place had appeared the high-skill jobs of the emerging knowledge industries. The change was irreversible and unforgiving. Too many current graduates would simply lose out.

In a vigorous, bipartisan effort, the state Legislature passed a landmark set of laws that established a new Commission on Student Learning charged with defining, first, precise student learning objectives in math, reading, writing and science; and second, developing assessments to test how well students were learning and were able to apply these new learning standards.

These assessments have come to be known as the WASL — the Washington Assessment of Student Learning.

The effort took six years. It involved thousands of teachers, parents, business and community leaders and interested citizens. They met literally hundreds of times and over those six years crafted a set of learning objectives and standards that defined the skills high-school students would need to succeed in the 21st-century economy.

The new standards are high, not because they were set arbitrarily, but because the requirements demanded by our democracy and new jobs are themselves high. The improvement in effort required of students, teachers and parents is massive. But no standard or test question was approved unless the educators and others involved reached a consensus that it was both appropriate and feasible for students.

We are now five years into the new standards and assessments. In all subjects, at all grade levels, the progress has been steady, significant and impressive. The progress, in fact, is unprecedented. There is simply no other period in our state's history that so much verifiable improvement in student learning has been accomplished. The praise goes not only to Bergeson; it also goes to the countless teachers whose commitment, professionalism and just plain hard work have made the progress possible. We owe them a great deal; they deserve our unwavering thanks.

All this has not been accomplished without controversy. The change required is great and change of this magnitude always drives out some who have stakes in the status quo, some who just resist change. November's election for superintendent of public instruction gives them an opportunity, perhaps the last, to derail education reform and the progress to date.

The WASL is under attack. The old education jargon, like "true reform" and "authentic assessment," is back, and that is not good. Vague words and ambiguity may gloss over student failure, but they are death to improved student learning.

Part of the controversy is fueled by a relatively new requirement that in 2008 high-school seniors will have to meet the new standards to graduate. Informed, thoughtful disagreement is possible over this requirement. There are understandable concerns that the 2008 deadline does not adequately consider either the magnitude of the change or the limited funding the Legislature has been able to provide. The high-school graduation requirement should be debated.

But it would be a great mistake to confuse the graduation requirement with education reform and the WASL. The graduation requirement is only a tactic in a much broader and more important strategy of learning improvement.

If this election is to be a referendum, it should not be a decision about high-school graduation, but rather a decision on the worth of higher K-12 standards.

None of this is easy. Much is being attempted, and realizing high standards will take years. It is a long march, a very long march. This November, we will not only be voting on two personalities, Bergeson and Billings; we will be voting on whether to continue the long march of education reform.

Booth Gardner, left, is a former governor and was the first chairman of the Commission on Student Learning. Chuck Collins, right, is a former chairman of the state's Higher Education Coordinating Board and was the second chairman of the Commission on Student Learning.