National Governors Association

This entry describes the education reform initiatives undertaken by the National Governors Association (NGA). Education has long been a top priority of governors, and in recent decades, states have led the way in improving the quality of education in the United States. The NGA advocates for governors on national education reform issues and, through its Center for Best Practices (NGA Center), supports them in their efforts to implement policies to improve schools and boost student achievement.

Following publication of the 1983 report A Nation at Risk, governors took the lead on education reform. In 1985–1986, NGA chair, Governor Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, focused his chair's initiative on improving education. As part of the initiative, NGA issued Time for Results: The[Page 636]Governors' 1991 Report on Education (1986), which recommended actions states needed to take over a 5-year period to address critical areas in education, such as teaching, school readiness, and accountability for results.

NGA partnered with President George H. W. Bush in convening the historic Charlottesville Education Summit in September 1989, which brought the president together with governors to work toward a consensus on the direction of education reform. Following the summit, the White House and NGA issued a joint communiqué calling for setting national education goals and annual progress reports. The next year the president and NGA announced six goals to be accomplished by the year 2000 addressing school readiness, high school graduation rates, the assessment of student progress, science and math excellence, adult literacy, and drugs and violence.

Concerned about U.S. international competitiveness, NGA and business leaders held a second National Education Summit in 1996, which led to the formation of Achieve, Inc., a partnership between governors and business leaders that provides expertise and support to states in their efforts to establish rigorous standards and accountability in education.

Subsequently, NGA and Achieve, Inc., in partnership with the Business Roundtable, the James B. Hunt Institute, and the Education Commission of the States, held National Education Summits in 1999, 2001, and 2005. These summits included educators and addressed a variety of issues, from raising standards and achievement in schools to improving teacher quality to providing supports for struggling students.

The 2005 National Education Summit on High Schools was convened as part of Virginia governor Mark Warner's NGA chair's initiative, Redesigning the American High School. During the summit, Warner and NGA released a five-point state action agenda aimed at restoring value to the high school diploma through improved teacher quality, clear identification of goals and measurement of progress, and increased accountability for high schools. At this summit many states committed to join the American Diploma Project Network and raise high school graduation standards to match requirements for success in college and the workplace.

Also in 2005, the nation's governors made a commitment to a more accurate and consistent measure for calculating state high school graduation rates. Governors of all 50 states signed the NGA Graduation Counts Compact to implement a common formula for calculating their state's high school graduation rate. A 2008 report by the NGA Center showed states are on track to publicly report their high school graduation rates using the formula by 2012.

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