Given the high stakes that are placed today on student achievement and testing outcomes, it might be assumed that major changes in educational policy can only result from careful debate in public forums informed by full consideration of research-based approaches for enhancing classroom instruction. But such is decidedly not the case in Pennsylvania where the formal qualifications for a critical academic position were changed in early November by means of a single sentence buried at the very end of a routine two-page email update from the Department of Education’s (PDE) Division of Professional Education and Teacher Quality.

Careful readers of the PDE email of November 5, 2014 discovered to their utter astonishment that the education department is apparently doing a complete about-face on the qualifications for becoming a reading specialist in the state. The full text of the single-sentence blurb states that “Reading Specialist is a content area that can be added to an instructional certificate by testing.” This terse announcement, hardly a model of administrative clarity, has been published as an ipse dixit: it is not accompanied by any background information, explanatory comment, or practical guidance.

PA Acting Secretary of Ed Carolyn Dumaresq

Unfortunately for the Acting Secretary of Education, Carolyn Dumaresq, Pennsylvania’s literacy educators are not at all docile and know an end run when they see one. The PDE’s reticence on this matter is noteworthy. Apparently PDE is not unduly concerned by the impression created of an attempt to sneak something through. Moreover, it is surprising that a state education department would consider lessening requirements for certification at a time when teacher education generally has come under attack by groups like the National Council on Teacher Quality and others.

What Happened in 2003

Just how bizarre is all of this? A good way to answer that question is to go back to 2003 when a similar change was attempted by the state’s education department. At that time educators across the state voiced strong opposition to the attempted elimination of rigorous coursework for this important role, which involves many discrete skill sets, specific knowledge, and mentored experience. Leading the way was the Keystone State Reading Association (KSRA), an affiliate of the International Reading Association (IRA), a membership association of literacy professionals. KSRA mounted a vigorous advocacy campaign, directed by its former Governmental Relations Chair, Jesse Moore.

Moore testified at hearings on the issue, a process with no parallel as yet in the current situation. He pointed out that granting reading specialist certification based on a two-hour multiple choice test contradicted the IRA Standards for Reading Professionals, which are used by the National Council for the Accreditation for Teacher Education (NCATE). He emphasized that NCATE had always considered reading specialist certification to be an advanced degree program. Moore and the KSRA leadership also invited the education secretary to a state board meeting where exchanges with members and other concerned educators was enough to eventually prompt a change of mind and get the test-only pathway to reading specialist certification revoked.

This past history makes the single-sentence policy reversal by Dr. Dumaresq all the more baffling, coming, as it does, in the interregnum between Pennsylvania’s outgoing and incoming gubernatorial administrations. One wonders just who pushed for this change at this time, whom it is intended to serve, and how such an ill-conceived disclosure process could possibly foster compliance, let alone produce a beneficial result. The department of education now has a fight on its hands, and the charge is being led once again by the KSRA.

KSRA’s New Call to Action

Julie B. Wise, KSRA’s current president, wasted no time calling attention to Dr. Dumaresq’s action, informing her members in an email that the PDEis trying to employ a shortcut to an academic certification program that requires specialized education. “We are concerned about the abrupt decision by PDE to provide an alternative option for certifying reading specialists instead of training reading specialists through graduate courses,” which, she noted, “provide intensive academic and field work to prepare competent K-12 reading specialists.”  

Julie B. Wise

As KSRA sees it, school districts hire teachers who complete graduate reading programs because of the strong foundational knowledge of strategic teaching, diagnostic abilities, and professional support they aptly provide to students and general education teachers. Rita Bean of KSRA, a former IRA board member,puts the issue this way: “What happened to rigor? We talk about quality teaching—and high level standards—and improving teacher performance. Yet the state is willing, on the basis of one test, to grant reading specialist certification to individuals with initial teaching certification?” KSRA’s message to Harrisburg is that PDE needs “to rescind the hasty decision,” and “reinforce the appropriate route for earning a quality K-12 reading specialist certification.”

Wise and KSRA’s Governmental Relations Chair, Millie Henning, are mobilizing college education school deans, school districts, and local literacy associations across the state to communicate their opposition to the test-only certification idea. They are also planning to request a meeting with PDE. Their advocacy strategy is spelled out in full on the landing page of the KSRA website. As Wise points out, the issue affects graduate education students as well: “If educators decide to take the test-only certification approach, will districts hire them when they lack preparation that includes strong fieldwork?”

Going Forward

It remains to be seen whether Dr. Dumaresq can be prevailed upon to change course, and if not, whether the appointment of a new secretary under the incoming governor will make a difference. Meanwhile KSRA has been joined in its advocacy effort by the leadership of IRA.

Jill Lewis-Spector, IRA’s current president, believes test-only certification will have serious ramifications: “The solution for having more and well-prepared teachers who can address the literacy achievement gap is for teachers to pursue additional preparation for teaching literacy from nationally accredited programs.”

IRA Executive Director Marcie Craig Post concurs: “There is no short cut or substitute for graduate level training when it comes to setting qualifications for the reading specialist certificate.” Post has pledged IRA’s assistance in KSRA’s campaign to drive this point home to PDE.

Dan Mangan is the Director of Public Affairs at the International Reading Association, dmangan@/.