Legislative Principles

8. While Federal funds should be distributed in greater amounts to low-income areas, states should be encouraged to develop their own programs of technical assistance for program improvement, including the possibility of targeting funds on high-performing programs.

Federal legislation should continue to direct funds to communities with the greatest levels of need as measured by income, but should resist targeting funds on specific groups of students. This does not prevent such programs from spending resources specifically on high-need students--for example, for enriched instruction if certain students lack the writing or math competencies necessary for advanced occupational clusters. The Federal funds should be used to assure that programs simultaneously achieve high quality and allow all students access.

With the 1990 Amendments to the Carl Perkins Act, Federal policy seems to have found a reasonably effective strategy for controlling how states distribute Federal dollars (Klein et al., 1994). However, several funding-related issues merit further attention. First, because Federal funds largely bypass the state, there is insufficient state-level capacity to support major Federal priorities. Yet there is evidence that reforms have been more substantial in states with strong technical assistance for local schools and colleges (NAVE, 1994, Vol. I). Issues that are probably best addressed at the state level include curriculum development, teacher education, staff development, assessment and program improvement, and secondary/postsecondary articulation (including attention to college admission requirements and other postsecondary policies). New Federal legislation should therefore allow states to spend higher proportions of state allocations for technical assistance, as long as such spending is carefully connected to the program improvement efforts specified in Federal legislation.

It may also be desirable to allow states to concentrate Federal funds more than is now possible. For example, states could use Federal funds to support a few well-developed and carefully evaluated schools and colleges, or schools-within-schools such as career academies and clusters, rather than provide small amounts of funding insufficient to support substantial reforms. Also, some funds might be awarded to districts on a competitive basis.

However, new legislation permitting states greater authority to develop appropriate state activities, while promoting program improvement, should also streamline the application and approval process. The current process has become unwieldy; it focuses on developing lengthy state plans without the appropriate emphasis on reform and improvement, and absorbs resources that would be better spent on advancing career-related education.