Year: 2018

The SPOKEie Word

Eduflack Marketing, Media, PR, reform, Woodrow Wilson

I’m honored, humbled (and quite excited) that this week dear ol’ Eduflack was named a winner of the inaugural SPOKEie awards. Recognizing the best spokespeople in the field, DS Simon Media and its crew of expert judges recognized me as the top non-profit education spokesman in the land.

With so many terrific personalities in the education field, it is a true honor, particularly when I think of so many who are far better than I am. But I am proud of the work I’ve been able to do with the Woodrow Wilson Foundation and proud of the continued evolution of the Eduflack platform for a discussion of all things education.

I hope you’ll wish all of this year’s winners a hearty congratulation. Despite how it appears on TV or in the movies, what we do is neither easy nor glamorous. Being a flack is fairly thankless, as you bear responsibility for the challenges and provide the limelight for others when it is time to shine. But it is necessary work and, when done correctly, incredibly valuable.

Congratulations to all my co-winners. And thanks to all of you, and those like you, for helping make communications a noble profession.

Would Betsy DeVos be Welcomed at Your School?

Eduflack BAM, DeVos, reform, TrumpED

It’s easy to attack Betsy DeVos for her remark that she hasn’t spent time visiting failing schools. And it is easier to criticize the EdSec for spending much of her school visit time walking the hallways of charter schools and private schools receiving voucher money.

But even if DeVos were to begin a whistle-stop tour of all sorts of traditional public schools, would she be welcome? From her first try where she was physically barred from originally entering to graduates turning their backs on her at graduation, the education community hasn’t been all too welcoming to Secretary DeVos when she does visit.

Over at the BAM! Radio Network, we explore the good, bad, and ugly truth when it comes to DeVos visits and the general resentment they seem to bring. Give it a listen, and tell me I’m wrong. Would your schoolhouse warmly greet the EdSec?

Transforming Concerned Students Into Powerful Voices of Advocacy

Eduflack accountability, Media, Parents, reform, Social media, Students

We are now seeing students wanting to take a greater role whether it be in elections themselves whether it be in issues like school violence. I think we’re also seeing very slowly but we’re seeing that same thing happen in education itself where we’re seeing that for centuries now whether it be our colleges or K12 systems, schools are built largely around the system, they’re built around the adults who are there to deliver the education. And we’re seeing more and more from students that the learners themselves want to be in control. They want to be the ones that decide what is best for them. It’s why you see the rise of personalized learning in schools. It’s why you see the rise in mastery based education. I think you’re seeing the same thing as students are beginning to talk about the type of atmosphere that they want. You know we’ve we’ve seen it now as students have begun to dip their toes in issues like bullying and cyber bullying. And we’re now seeing it specifically with school violence. I think the challenge to students is we have this belief that today’s students have a shiny object syndrome that they’re focused on this right now and next week they’re going to be focused on something completely different.

From Eduflack’s recent interview with Doug Simon and DS Simon Media on The Power of Social Media Live and the Modern Education System. Come for the transcript, but really just watch the video. It is far more engaging (and it shows that Eduflack doesn’t just stay in his basement)

Like It or Not, DeVos Acts as Promised

Eduflack BAM, charter schools, DeVos, reform, TrumpED

Throughout the education community, we like to offer faux outrage regarding everything that EdSec Betsy DeVos says or does. We are shocked that she isn’t visiting a failing public school. We are dismayed when she goes to see a public charter school or the recipient of voucher dollars. We are apoplectic when she doesn’t march in lockstep with the teachers unions or the AASA.

But should we? From the day she was nominated to be Trump’s education secretary to today, hasn’t DeVos done and said everything that we expected from her? While we may have wanted more, sought a deeper strategic approach, or hoped for a change of heart on issues of importance to us, isn’t the EdSec delivering as promised?

Over on the BAM! Radio Network, we explore this topic, acknowledging that when it comes to the EdSec, what you see is indeed what you’ve gotten. Give it a listen.

When It Comes to Online Info, We Only Have Ourselves to Blame

Eduflack accountability, Media, PR, Social media

Even forgetting all of that, we can’t overlook that Cambridge Analytica was simply mining data (and microtargeting voters) based on the information that we willingly, easily, and freely handed over. While we may not have answered the quiz or clicked on the link to specifically provide voter targeting data to a political campaign, we shouldn’t be surprised when our information is used for that purpose. No, we shouldn’t be surprised to learn there is gambling in Casablanca.

Consider that I can learn a lot from a person based on the websites they link to from their Twitter accounts. Thanks to procedural cop shows, we all should know how easy it is to track criminals through their online search histories. Instagram can be just as reliable as a dark house in telling me if someone is home. And LinkedIn can help my employer know if I am looking to move to a new job.

School House Rock taught us that information is power. We shouldn’t be surprised when people use it to strengthen their positioning. Short of going off the grid entirely (or voting straight Libertarian), there will always be those who gather our information and use it for their own benefit.

From Eduflack’s latest on LinkedIn Pulse, Don’t Blame Facebook Data, It’s Your Fault!

Ed Policy Whiplash

Eduflack accountability, BAM, DeVos, reform, TrumpED

We continue to shift our battle lines when it comes to education policy. Do we let the federal government or the state’s drive the K-12 train? Do we want common standards and expectations? Are the regs laid out by ESSA and other federal laws intended to be the floor or the ceiling when it comes to policy direction?

It’s all enough to give the education community a bad case of policy whiplash.

Over at the BAM! Radio Network, we explore this schizophrenia and look at how we set appropriate expectations – and appropriate outrage – in such a policy context. Give it a listen!

Improving High School, #HighSchool Graduation

Eduflack 21CS, accountability, High School, reform, Students, teachers

Last month, the issues in DC Public Schools brought down its relatively new schools chancellor. This week, The Washington Post is reporting the graduation scandal now poses a clear and present danger for many DC students who have long thought that they would be graduating from high school this spring.

The District of Columbia isn’t the first school district to recognize its path to a high school diploma may indeed be broken. For decades now, we have heard of both dropout factories and those districts that responded by treating diplomas as nothing more than certificates of attendance, recognizing those who stuck with school for 12 or 13 years, 180 days or so each year.

In response, the Fordham Institute has focused its annual #Wonkathon on whether high school graduation requirements need to change to make the diploma more relevant. A number of smart people — including Peter Cunningham, Michael Petrilli, and Peter Greene — have already responded.

Of course, dear ol’ Eduflack couldn’t pass up the chance to suggest we need to a completely different frame for the high school school experience, once that emphasizes mastery of content and an ability to apply what is supposedly learned, rather than just rewarding students for “time served” in the classroom. As I write:

Today, we remain caught up on what is taught and how it is taught, not necessarily what is learned and how it is put to use. The student population today is nowhere close to being as homogenous as it was when the Carnegie Unit was adopted. In any given classroom, we have students of different backgrounds, different language abilities, different learning challenges, different preferred learning styles—different everything. A student adept at Algebra II shouldn’t need to sit through the class for 180 days because others don’t grasp the concepts. A student with a deep understanding of American history shouldn’t be asked to sit through the basics yet again because it is expected in ninth grade. Once a learner is able to demonstrate a mastery of the content and is able to apply that content in an appropriate manner, he or she should be able to move on to the next content area. Mastery-based high school allows us to prioritize the LEARNER in a way most high schools today simply do not.

I hope you will give all the entries a read. It is an important issue that warrants real discussion, disagreement, and action.

 

Schools and Guns

Eduflack BAM, civics, Parents, reform, Students, TrumpED

Across the nation, students are preparing to exercise their First Amendment rights in support of the students in Parkland, Florida and their response to school shootings and gun violence. Just this morning, Eduflack received his notice from his local school district in New Jersey on how my son’s middle school (sixth grade) and daughter’s elementary school (fifth grade) will acknowledge the March 14th National School Walkout. (The edu-son will march, the edu-daughter will engage in age-appropriate activities focused on “kindness and peace.”)

For the past two weeks, I’ve used my platform over on the BAM! Radio Network to talk about the issues of guns, schools, and kids. I hope you’ll give both a listen.

In the first episode, we explore how it is well past time to declare that gun violence is a public health crisis in our schools … and in our communities.

In the second, we look at what a sad commentary it is that we are now talking about financially incentivizing teachers to be armed and weapons-trained in the classroom, particularly after doing away with so many incentives (like National Board certification) that recognized teaching excellence in those same schools.

The issue may drop off the front pages to make room for other, sexier political stories, but until the laws change — and until school shooters aren’t turned into cults of personality by the media — the issues will keep coming back.

Let’s see what comes from the National School Walkout. Perhaps these kids can lead in a way their elected leaders cannot.

 

“Will the last teacher to leave West Virginia please turn out the lights?”

Eduflack AFT, NEA, Parents, reform, teachers

“Will the last teacher to leave West Virginia please turn out the lights?”

Nearly 30 years ago, one of my teachers held that very handwritten sign. She, along with my mother and dozens of other educators from my high school were picketing in Shenandoah Junction, West Virginia as part of a statewide teachers strike. The sign became iconic, running on the front page of newspapers across the state and the nation.

In 1990, those teachers were striking because of poor teacher benefits and worse pay. West Virginia was paying its public school educators less than 48 other states. The situation became so bad that unions in all 55 counties in the state organized a work stoppage. After two weeks, a true-blue legislature and a Democratic governor finally saw things the way those teachers wanted them to. Benefits were improved, and West Virginia committed to raising teacher salaries to the middle of the pack when it came to state averages.

Fast forward to 2018, and we are seeing the same scenario play out in a state that has largely become a microcosm for America. The state is gripped by opioids. The jobs of the old, industrial economy are drying up. West Virginia’s legislature is now shockingly red. The state is now led by a Republican governor (though one who was just elected as a Democrat in 2016). But again, West Virginia’s teachers are almost the lowest paid in the nation.

Currently, the minimum salary for a public school teacher in West Virginia is $26,000. To put more simply, if one accounts just for student days – overlooking required teacher work days, evenings, weekends, summers, and all of the other times teachers actually work – the minimum teacher salary is about $14 an hour. Or about what teachers in the Northern Panhandle would make in Pittsburgh or those in the Eastern Panhandle would make in the DC suburbs if they gave up teaching and became baristas at Starbuck’s.

During the 1990 strike, I was all too aware that teachers in my high school needed to hold second jobs in order to make ends meet. It was a frequent sight to see a teacher working as a bartender or waiter at a local restaurant or as a desk clerk at one of the nearby motels. During the strike, it would have been very easy for these teachers to turn to their second jobs, pick up additional hours, and ensure that they would make the rent or car payments that week. But they didn’t. Each and every day, they were out there on the picket lines. They were marching for their profession. And they were ensuring the entire community saw them.

That year, those teachers won because they had public support. Yes, the closure of schools is always an inconvenience for families in the community. But each day, parents and children brought the teachers water and soda and food. Neighbors honked their car horns in support. And even when the handful of teachers who refused to strike told students their records would be noted and student activities would be pulled if we failed to cross the picket line, not one student went into the schools during those weeks.

Fast forward to 2018, and we see a different story. The state legislature is now advancing a package for teachers that would boost teacher pay by about 4 percent over the next several years, far from the jump their fellow educators saw three decades ago. Public support for union strikes, even in strong union states like West Virginia, is not nearly as strong as it once was. And with the Supreme Court now considering the Janus case, labor unions and their memberships are likely to be weakened even more.

It’s quite sad that, at a time when we all recognize that a strong education is key to success in the digital, information economy, we still have to fight to ensure that educators are paid like the high-stakes professionals that they are. It is sadder that we, as a nation, are now talking about bonuses to teachers who come into the classroom armed, but still can’t pay many of them a living wage. And it is even sadder when teachers need to technically break the law and engage in a statewide work stoppage to gain the respect and recognition that they well deserve.

As a child, I romanticized my grandfather and his Teamsters jacket. I imagined he received it as a reward for backing Jimmy Hoffa and his agenda to play rough with short-haul trucking companies. To me, the Teamsters were a true union’s union.

Then I watched my mom and many of my high school teachers walk the picket lines, putting their livelihoods on the line. I saw them walking for what they believed in. And I saw the community stand behind them. I saw that light. So did many others.

Today is school day number four of the 2018 West Virginia teachers strike, and the request asked 28 years ago may still be pertinent. WV Gov. Jim Justice and the legislature will see that light too, and show teachers across the state the respect they deserve.  Otherwise, they may indeed be turning off the lights for West Virginia’s students.