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THREAT OF FEDERAL CONTROL

Mr. FOGARTY. Would you like to comment on the need for this and to what extent it poses a threat of Federal control?

Mr. Howe. I would argue this is just the opposite of Federal control in a sense; that really what we are trying to do with these funds is to build up the strength of State administration and State organization for planning purposes in the States for taking responsibility for education in the States as opposed to the Federal level, so it seems to me what you have here is an effort to use Federal energy to develop the partnership we talk about.

Mr. CARDWELL. A point on that would be a number of the elementary and secondary innovations introduced by last year's legislation require a higher degree of participation by the State organization in educational affairs within the State.

I think there is a need to strengthen the State government's ability to deal with these new programs at every level within the State.

Mr. Howe. Title I of the Elementary Secondary Act is a good example which farms out the power of decision of where the money shall go to the State, and calls forth a good deal of work from the State in making those decisions, and therefore, providing the State with funds to do some of this makes sense.

THE COMPACT FOR EDUCATION

Mr. FOGARTY. I have a newspaper clipping here headed:

Education pact by States hailed. Rockefeller joins Wagner in backing cooperative bid.

A proposed cooperative effort among States to improve education received the support yesterday of Governor Rockefeller and Mayor Wagner.

This is December 1965.

Mr. Howe. This is the so-called compact.

Mr. FOGARTY. What is it?

However, they had barely given their backing when fears were expressed of political influence on educational policy.

The plan, known as the compact for education, was discussed at the first meeting of its interim planning, development and steering committee at the St. Regis Hotel. More than 100 educators and State officials, including 5 Governors, discussed the compact, which must be adopted by at least 10 State legislatures.

First proposed by James B. Conant, president emeritus of Harvard University, the compact would study education ideas and stimulate State educational programs.

What is this compact for education?

Mr. Howe. It is a plan which was developed by ex-Governor Sanford, of North Carolina, and a small staff he has since leaving the governorship, with funds provided for that planning process by the Ford Foundation and the Carnegie Corp.

Mr. FOGARTY. This article says "First proposed by James B. Conant of Harvard University."

Mr. Howe. Conant wrote a book called "Policy Planning in Education," and I think this is why they drew the proposal from Conant.

Mr. FOGARTY. I am not trying to take anything away from Sanford. I was just reading from the article.

Mr. Howe. It is a voluntary association of States. The idea is to ultimately have it financed by contributions from each State. It will develop a central office at some place, probably in the Middle West, and act as a fact-gathering agency for States, act as a recommending agency for States in the sense of helping them develop policies related to education, and particularly related to educational planning at the

State level.

Mr. FOGARTY. How about lobbying activities?

Mr. Howe. It is not intended to engage in lobbying activities, yet it is to be seen, if that is the case.

Mr. FOGARTY. I do not say there is anything wrong with that.

COMMISSIONER'S POSITION ON COMPACT FOR EDUCATION

Mr. Howe. I have been asked whether I support it or not, and publicly said I did.

It seemed to me than anything that tends to strengthen State administration of education is a good thing. You will find that some of the university presidents do not regard it as highly as some other people.

Mr. FOGARTY. The article says:

But Dr. Elvis Stahr, president of Indiana University, said the compact's constitution as it was now drafted might not withstand political influence. Dr. Stahr held that if legislatures were to provide the financial backing, which is now provided by the Carnegie Corp. and the Danforth Foundation, it would bring "politics and education closer together." He said he did not think Governors and legislators should formulate education policy.

Former Governor Terry Sanford of North Carolina, a leading developer of the compact idea, said Dr. Stahr's fears were groundless. He said the compact would not make policy, but through its advisers, would give guidance to those who set policy in the States. He agreed with Dr. Stahr that there should be special councils in the compact with experts representing higher education and elementary and secondary school education.

Do you support this sort of thing? Is it getting off the ground? Mr. Howe. They have yet to get a chief executive, but it is beginning to move. They have hired a man from California who will get it started, but he is not to be the chief of it.

NATIONAL ASSESSMENT PROGRAM

Mr. FOGARTY. I have another newspaper article which reads: "English teachers urged to fight national tests."

A spokesman for the Nation's English teachers says they should fight tooth and nail to prevent a proposed plan to measure the quality of American education from developing into a national testing program.

Richard Corbin, president of the National Council of Teachers of English, added that a national testing program would lead to the national curriculumtaking control of the school out of the local districts.

Corbin told the anual convention of the council last night that three nationally known testing agencies are preparing the materials to be used in measuring education in the United States. The assessment program is a project of the U.S. Office of Education with administrative assistance from the Carnegie Corp. of New York, a philanthropic foundation.

Corbin said, "The plan, tentatively, is to measure the competence or knowledge of Americans at the ages of 9, 13, 17, 21, and 30 to 35 years in eight or more major areas of educational concern."

Corbin, chairman of the English department of Hunter College High School in New York, said:

"We must watch carefully the unfolding of this new design for mass measurement."

What do you think about that?

NATIONAL TESTING

Mr. Howe. If you go back to one of the earlier sentences in there which said the English teachers wanted to prevent this plan from developing into a national testing program, I would agree to that. That does not mean that I am opposed to a national assessment program done on a sampling basis.

Mr. FOGARTY. Rickover does not believe the same way as you on that. Mr. Howe. I have not had a chance to consult him about it. He might want to go further. He might want a national testing program which would be used to control curriculum and to set standards for every child in every grade. I think this would be carrying the thing too far.

In my view, though, we need to find a way to describe where we are now so that 3 years from now we can decide whether we can do it any better.

This national assessment program is really designed for that purpose.

Mr. FOGARTY. A high school diploma does not mean the same thing in Smithville, State "X", as it does in Providence, R.I.

Mr. Howe. And it does not mean the same thing in Providence, R.I. between one kid and the other.

Mr. FOGARTY. As far as getting into colleges are concerned, some are accepted without question whereas diplomas from other areas may not carry much weight.

Why should there not be some sort of standards developed?

Mr. Howe. I think I would respond to that with the observation we really need to develop standards in terms of individual children rather than a standard point at which a child should be because he is of a certain age. There is no basis in my view for arguing that a child, because he is 10 years of age, should have reached a certain standard. All you do if you argue that way is to say a certain proportion of children shall be caused to fail.

NONACCREDITED SCHOOLS IN THE SOUTH

Mr. FOGARTY. This morning when we were hearing the Department of Labor, the people in charge of the Federal Contracts Division made the statement that many of the Negro schools in the South were still teaching their boys and girls to be teachers and social workers but after they graduated they couldn't get jobs because the schools were not accredited. So it is about 4 years of wasted time.

Mr. Flood made the point about training them for technical jobs and they can get a job tomorrow regardless of their color.

What is the situation as far as the Negro schools in the South are concerned, and what, if anything, have you done about it, or think you might do about it?

Do you think it is good to have these schools exist down there, and have them graduate as a teacher when they cannot get a job because the schools are not accredited?

Mr. Howe. Well, I would question some of the assumptions in this. I do not know the context of the conversation entirely.

Teaching and social work have been professions that have been open to Negroes over the years. This is the main reason that they have tended to go into them, whereas there have been a good many other areas where they were not accepted. This has changed rapidly in very recent years, and Negroes now have much more access to the whole spectrum of economic opportunity and professional opportunity than in the past, but to go to your question of what is to happen to these institutions

Mr. FOGARTY. They made it very clear. They made the flat statement that they are going to schools that are not accredited and graduate as teachers but cannot get a job.

Mr. Howe. There are certainly these things going on. I am not disagreeing with this. I am just saying the teaching profession and social work professions have been more open to Negroes than other professions. A good many Negroes have moved into professional activity by being teachers and social workers. It has not been a closed-door situation.

DEVELOPING INSTITUTIONS PROGRAM

You are also quite right that a good many Negroes have been graduated from substandard institutions. This is the result of the total process of separate and what has been called equal, but what has really been unequal education. Persons flowing through the educational system which was manned by people trained by third-rate institutions have not gotten the education that they were capable of receiving. So, we have a tremendous job of lifting these people up by the bootstraps. This is one of the reasons for the developing institutions aspect of the higher education bill, title III of the Higher Education Act, which will apply directly to many of that kind of institutions. I would say over the long haul the Negro institutions should become non-Negro institutions.

Mr. FOGARTY. I think we all agree on that, but for the time being what are you going to do about it? Under title III are not those funds given directly to the State?

Mr. HowE. Under title III, funds are given directly to the institution. This should be some help to these kinds of institutions, but we are not going to change them tomorrow. We have a long job.

Mr. FOGARTY. A lot of them do not admit they are substandard. Mr. Howe. I think this is one of the problems.

COMMISSIONER'S APPROACH TO THE NONACCREDITED COLLEGE PROBLEM

Mr. FOGARTY. What do you think ought to be done about it?

Mr. Howe. Again I come back to the desegregation of these institutions, because I think this is part of the solution. I come back to the need to provide ways to retrain some of their faculty members and to desegregate their faculties in the process. It seems to me these are all procedures that will be helpful to those institutions. I think they have a certain momentum in their mediocrity, and we are not going to turn this off all at once.

Mr. FOGARTY. I thought you might have some ideas other than what you have stated here this afternoon about these problems. After listening to these people this morning, I thought this was one of the biggest problems in education in the country.

Mr. Howe. The problem of the Negro college?

Mr. FOGARTY. Yes.

Mr. Howe. It is a big problem. In terms of numbers, it may not be the biggest problem; but for a segment of the people, it is a big problem.

Mr. FOGARTY. What do you consider a bigger problem than that?

ROLE OF "HEADSTART"

Mr. Howe. It seems to me the real place where the problem we are talking about will be influenced is back in the earlier years where youngsters get started in school, with the kind of focus we have provided in title I of the Elementary and Secondary Act, if it is continued and increased, and the kind of focus provided by Headstart and OEO. This may be a more constructive definition of the problem, and also in whole scope a bigger problem, because this includes all the people, not just the people who go to college. It would seem to me that in the policy position which the Congress has taken in the allocation of funds, they have identified a bigger problem in that area, and I would agree with that.

Mr. FOGARTY. Are you speaking for Mr. Shriver now, or the Office of Education?

Mr. Howe. No, sir. It just seems to me he has a piece of this puzzle,

too.

Mr. FOGARTY. Would you push it off onto him?

Mr. Howe. No, but he has been responsible for administering, as I understand it, the Operation Headstart, and I think it has had some

success.

Mr. FOGARTY. I think Headstart is one of the best parts of the antipoverty program, but that does not solve the problems of these kids in college today.

Mr. Howe. That is right. We have a tendency, I think, to believe that we can solve these problems which have developed over 100 years, in a year and a half, and we cannot. We can get to work on them and we can do a lot of constructive things, but we have a tremendous backlog to work against and, therefore, the time perspective in which a real solution will come is probably a long term. It does not mean that constructive work will not be done and advances will not be made. Mr. FOGARTY. Mr. Shriver.

Mr. SHRIVER. I am not the Shriver you were referring to a moment

ago.

TEACHERS FOR THE HANDICAPPED

On page 5 of your statement you say to meet the critical shortage in this particular area relative to the Teachers Corps, 5,000 teachers began training in September of 1965, 6,500 are scheduled in 1966, and 9,100 in September 1967. Is this the Teachers Corps you are talking about?

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