September 14, 2004

Lansing – Michigan schools are being urged to engage their students and communities to become involved in the democratic process this election year.

The State Board of Education unanimously approved a resolution today urging every adult to register and vote, and every public school to encourage their 18-year-old students to register to vote by October 4 at their local clerk’s office.

The Resolution states, “Americans will have the opportunity on November 2, 2004 to exercise their democratic freedom to vote for the President of the United States, as well their representatives to Congress, state and local officials, and on a variety of statewide and local ballot initiatives.”

The State Board says one of the roles of every public school in Michigan is to educate, engage, and motivate students to know, understand, and actively participate in the democratic process; and to preserve and strengthen our democracy.

State Board of Education President Kathleen N. Straus noted that the role of educators should be expanded to the 4 R’s – Reading, ‘Riting, ‘Rithmatic, and Responsibility. 

“Every student needs to learn the importance of our democracy, what it took to gain our liberties and freedom, and how we need to take that responsibility seriously,” she said.

In other action: the State Board of Education unanimously approved a modification to the state’s system of determining Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), as required for compliance with the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act.  The modification creates a technical mathematical adjustment called a “sliding confidence interval” that will allow small and rural schools in Michigan to receive an AYP status.  Prior to this modification, small and rural schools could not receive an AYP status under the existing system because they had too few students to be statistically calculated.

Michigan’s new sliding confidence interval is more stringent than the traditional confidence interval system used by other states that the State Board of Education felt gave too wide a variance to make AYP .

“I appreciate this conservative approach to do something constructive for smaller schools,” said Board member John C. Austin.

The State Board of Education also unanimously approved a Resolution honoring former Michigan Congressman William Ford, who died August 14, 2004.  Ford, who served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1962-1995, served as Chairman of the House Committee on Education and Labor.

The Resolution noted that Congressman Ford had a special interest in programs serving students from migrant farm working families, was a champion of federal compensatory education programs to serve educationally disadvantaged children, and was an original sponsor of the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965.  In 1994, the Federal Direct Student Loan Program was named for him in recognition of his efforts to expand post-secondary educational opportunities for students and to lower the cost of a college education for them.

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