The writers of Boston Legal are at it again. A few months ago, the plot line went after NCLB. This week’s episode (thank you, DVR) centers its attack on the American high school. Now, we have a mother suing her late daughter’s high school, alleging that the rigors of high school were responsible for her daughter’s “driving while drowsy” death.
Like the NCLB episode, we have a Boston high school full of overachievers. This time, lawyers are attacking the high school experience because kids are working too hard. They are taking too many AP courses. They are involved in too many extracurriculars. They all want to be tops in their class, and they all want to attend Harvard.
While I still want to find this Boston high school that seems to be all white with a 100% graduation rate and every kid moving onto postsecondary education, I just have to let it go. But there was one line that was truly disturbing.
In attacking the rigor of the high school, the mother’s lawyer asks why do we need to offer AP courses at all? Those are college courses, she says, they should be offered in college and not in high school. Of course, the school’s principal agrees, and placed the blame on the students. If we didn’t offer all those AP classes, the principal says, kids would just go to a different high school that would meet their needs.
Eduflack doesn’t know which is more ridiculous, the cavalier notion of school choice or the disdain for AP courses. Let’s leave the former alone, knowing it is an absurd statement without any ground in reality. The latter is just as frustrating, seeking to place blame on a solution, rather than a problem.
Just last week, we saw that more students are taking AP classes than ever before. Whether they secure a four or five on the exam is irrelevant. These students are able to experience college-level instruction before they get to college. They get to learn if they are up to the rigors of a college-level exam. They get to explore new subjects. And they get the opportunity to earn college credits or exemptions from college requirements.
No one is saying a high school junior or senior should be taking five or seven AP courses each semester. But if they have the interest and the ability, they should be allowed to push themselves and see what they are capable of. They should be given the opportunity to succeed, rather than given the an excuse to fail.
Many can say we are where we are in public education because of low expectations. A decade or two ago, students were lucky if they could take two or three AP courses during high school. Today, schools can offer dozens of such courses. That’s a good thing, not a reason to attack well-meaning high schools.
Maybe the writers for Boston Legal should go in and take a real tour of real Boston’s public schools before they use them for another plot line or as a punchline to another joke. Those TV junkies will remember a great little Fox drama called Boston Public, set in a Beantown public high school. If memory serves, those writers seemed to get what public education was all about. Maybe they can offer a little primer to James Spader and company. Or we could just keep education on the news pagers, instead of the TV reviews.
High School
Let’s Make Dropping Out Illegal!
By now, the numbers are ingrained on the souls of most education reformers. Nearly a third of all ninth graders will not earn a high school diploma. In our African-American and Hispanic communities, that number statistic rises to nearly 50 percent. Imagine, a 50/50 chance of earning a high school diploma of you are a student of color. The statistic is so staggering, there must be something we can do.
In today’s USA Today, we have the dueling editorials on a potential solutions — raising the drop-out age. The line of thinking here is that if we raise the age a student must be in order to drop out of high school to 18, we can turn this crisis around. Think of it. Require, by law, every kid to stay in school until they are 18, and the drop-out rates will dramatically shrink.
Of course, 17 states already have such compulsory school attendance laws, with one more going online next summer. Do we believe that those states — which include California, Louisiana, Ohio, and Texas — are not struggling with dropouts? Are grad rates not an issue in LAUSD or New Orleans or Cleveland or Houston? Of course not. Those cities are facing the realities of drop-out factories, just like most major urban centers, even if drop-outs need to be 18 to officially leave school.
If we know anything about teenagers, it should be that mandates don’t change behavior. A 17-year requirement doesn’t keep the average 10th grader from seeing an R-rated movie. A 21-year age requirement doesn’t keep seniors from taking a sip of beer or a slug of Boone’s Farm. We have underage driving. We have illegal drug use. Kids will go after what they want, regardless of the prohibitions or the consequences. The challenge — and the opportunity — is to convince them to make a good decision. We don’t chain them to their high school desks, we need to demonstrate to them that they want to stay and they need to stay.
So how do we do that? Last month, I made reference to some focus groups I did with students on the value and need for high school. Robert Pondiscio and the folks over at the Core Knowledge Blog (http://www.coreknowledge.org/blog/) hoped they would soon learn a little more about Eduflack’s experiences. So here goes.
Back in the fall, I spent weeks meeting with eight, ninth, and 10th graders from a state that is pretty representative of the United States. Strong and not-so-strong urban centers, along with booming suburbs, and struggling rural areas. A strong commitment to K-16 education, yet major industry leaving the cities and towns that have long depended on it. Educators and business leaders committed to improvement, yet students not sure what opportunity would be available to them.
My goal was to learn what low-income students thought of their high school offerings and their opportunities for the future. I didn’t spend my time in the suburbs or with the honors or college prep students. I met with poor urban students, and I met with poor rural students. Most came from families where college had never been an option. And all came from homes with a very real fear that this generation may not be as successful as the generation before it.
I planned for the worst. I expected students to justify, or even respect, dropping out. How good union jobs could be found without a high school diploma or how gangs and other outside influences made school a lesser priority. But what I heard during this experience gave me hope, and made it clear we can improve high school graduation rates simply by boosting relevance, interest, and access.
What did I hear? In general:
* Students understand and appreciate the link between high school and “good” careers.
* For virtually all students, dropping out is not a productive option. For many, they don’t even think you can get a fast food job today without that diploma.
* Students know relevant courses such as those found in STEM programs are key to obtaining meaningful employment after school.
* They are eager to pursue postsecondary opportunities while in high school. They may not know anyone who has taken an AP or dual enrollment course, but they know it has value.
* Students want more career and technical education offerings. They know these are relevant courses that link directly to future jobs.
And what more did Eduflack learn? The greatest obstacle we face is awareness. This isn’t about requiring kids to stay in school. This is about opening opportunities and helping them see the choices and the pathways available to them. Today’s high schools are not one-size-fits-all. And that’s OK. Today’s students want to know what’s available to them and what aligns with their aptitudes and their interests. They want a consumer-based educational experience.
Parents still play a key role in this little dance, as does the business community. Students expect their parents to push and guide them. They may not always listen, but students know they need their parents with them as they head down those pathways. With businesses, students just want to learn about the opportunities. What is needed to become a physician assistant or a manager at the local manufacturing plant or a graphic designer. Today’s students do have career aspirations, but most of them have never met someone who holds that job nor do they know what is needed to achieve such a position. Now is the time for businesses to educate their future workforce.
I’ve done similar focus groups across the nation over the last decade, and the findings have been remarkably similar. Students have a far better sense for their futures than we give them credit for. They know it will be hard. They know they’ll need help. But they know there are multiple pathways available to them. They just need their teachers and parents and priests and community leaders to see it to.
These kids aren’t dropping out of high school because it is too hard or because they are finally old enough that they can stop going to school and stay at home and watch TV all day. They leave because they don’t see the relevance. They don’t see how the classes they are taking crosswalk to their career or life goals. They don’t believe postsecondary education may be possible for them. They don’t believe they have the ability to gain access to those multiple pathways.
Raising the drop-out age won’t change that. If we want more students to stay in high school, earn their diplomas, and pursue postsecondary education, we need to inspire and motivate them. We need to give them hope. We need to demonstrate that high school is the first step toward a happy and successful life. It needs to be relevant. It needs to be interesting and engaging. And it needs to lift up all students, not talk down to them with mandates and lowered expectations.
Every Teacher a Reader?
In fights over teacher quality, we often ask what makes a good teacher. NCLB’s HQT provisions called on teachers to have a degree in the subject and be certified. Leaders such as the NCLB Commission have sought to strengthen the provision, adding a measure of teacher effectiveness to the requirements. Has anyone thought that a classroom teacher should be functionally literate? Does a teacher need basic reading and writing skills to teach?
If we look at the story out of 10 News in San Diego, apparently not. They tell the tell of John Corcoran, a now-retired teacher who earned a teaching degree from an accredited four-year college and then went on to teach high school for 17 years. He did it all while being completely illiterate. Cheated his way through school. Taught without ever writing a word on the chalk board. Now he is an education advocate who runs a foundation and an SES provider out in California. Check out the full story here — http://www.10news.com/news/15274005/detail.html.
It is an entertaining tale, and just the sort of urban legend we hear now and again. While most will be moved by the story of a man who finally learned to read at 48 and committed the second stage of his life to literacy advocacy, what message does it say that an illiterate high school teacher led a classroom for almost two decades, and no one ever found out.
I appreciate that he used his classroom to build a learning environment based on the visual and oral. As you’ve heard Eduflack say again and again, it is important that we use multiple mediums and multiple approaches to reach all students. But could any of his students really have gained an effective education from an illiterate teacher? Did students go a full academic year with ever writing a five-paragraph essay or researching and writing a report or even taking a non-multiple choice exam?
I’ll set aside the notion that he had two or three teacher’s assistants helping in his classroom. That must be some school district. The bigger question here is what should we expect from our teachers?
We assume that Mr. Corcoran didn’t have students who complained about his methods or inquired as to why their teacher never seemed to read from the book or write on the board. And we might even assume that his students did well, using a different learning environment to develop new skills and improve their learning ability for other classes. He may have been a regular Mr. Holland, who inspired a generation of future teachers, creators, and innovators.
But his revelations speak poorly of the teaching profession as a whole. We all know that teaching — particularly in a secondary school environment — is one of the toughest jobs out there. It requires knowledge, skill, patience, and ability. Not everyone is cut out to be a teacher, and some find that out the hard way. It is an underappreciated profession, and one where virtually everyone assumes they could do the job if they wanted to.
And it is that fantasy that Corcoran helps contribute to. Anyone, even those who can’t read or write a lick, can lead a classroom if they want to. That’s a dangerous message to send to students, particularly those who are thinking about dropping out because they don’t see the relevance of school. After all, why learn to read at grade level if your teacher doesn’t have to?
I realize that Corcoran is of an anomaly, and his story is meant to inspire adults who think it is too late to learn to read. And that would be fine if he were an entrepreneur or a banker or a sales manager or an elected official. But he was a teacher. And, like it or not, we expect more from teachers. They need to be smarter. They need to be more patient. They need to be more successful than just about any other profession.
Yes, we want teachers who are highly qualified and effective. Basic literacy skills should be a non-negotiable. John Corcoran may be an inspiration to some, but he owes a big apology to the thousands of teachers who take pride in their profession and who lead by example in their classrooms.
Renovate or Tear Down?
How do we effectively fix the American high school? We all talk about how our high schools are built on an antiquated notion of school. We’re delivering 21st century education in a little red school house setting. Multi-media learning in rows of one-piece desks. Innovating in a 19th century construct.
We all know of the enormous investment the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has made in trying to fix that high school model. Small schools. Early college high schools. Career-based, relevant curriculum. More rigorous classes. Multiple pathways to postsecondary education. A plethora of new instructional approaches to renovate a nagging problem.
And some of these approaches have had real effect. We’ve seen the value of early college high schools. Career academies have helped boost graduation rates in many urban districts. We still have a while to go, though, until we see the long-term impact of these renovations. Are any of them scalable solutions to fix our high schools, particularly those in our urban centers? Have we found a true fix?
Believe it or not, it is a question that Eduflack has been thinking on for quite some time now. Sure, I usually leave my musings to talking about effective communication or effective policy. But if I’m going to preach innovation to educators, sometimes I need to practice a little myself. And with Bill Gates taking over the management of his Foundation, I have to believe that investment in U.S. education is soon going to come with an even greater emphasis on results and return on investment. That means scalability.
In yesterday’s USA Today, columnist Patrick Walsh details the positive impact the construction of a new building had on the motivation, behaviors, and learning at T.C. Williams High School. (http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2008/02/bricks-mortar-a.html#more) Walsh’s observations only further encouraged my thinking.
Instead of renovating our existing high schools, what if Gates were to build an entirely new model? Over the past five years, Gates has learned a great deal about how, and how not, to run an effective high school. They understand the curriculum and the need for multiple academic pathways. They understand school structure. They are starting to get into the HR game, focusing on the teachers that are needed to lead such classrooms. They are quickly assembling all of the pieces. Now we move to that bold and audacious act.
What if the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation were to take its money and build new high schools in our top 25 urban districts? State-of-the-art buildings. Technology. Rigorous and relevant curriculum. Public-private partnerships. Relevant professional development for the teachers. Common educational standards measured across all Gates schools. Open enrollment for all those seeking a better high school experience. And the power of the Gates Foundation behind it.
And let’s get even bolder. A system of public high schools managed by the Gates Foundation. All in major cities across the nation. All with high standards for its teachers. All working from a common school design, a common curriculum, and common assessment that, over time, could be replicated in district after district across the nation.
Yes, many high schools — those recently dubbed drop-out factories — would see this as direct competition. Others would see the possible establishment of these schools under charter school provisions as a threat to public education. And others would wring their hands over such schools poaching the “good” teachers from our existing public schools, potentially weakening our current infrastructure. But with up to 50 percent of students at these urban schools dropping out before earning a high school diploma, isn’t the payoff worth the risk?
Competition can be a good thing. Gates high schools could identify a clear model for both building new schools and renovating existing ones. It could force current schools to truly improve their practice. And it could lead all of us to expect more from our schools, while helping us actually get there.
How do we do it? For one, we can take a look at what Microsoft has done with the creation of its high school in Philadelphia. Sure, Microsoft and Gates are different organizations. But they share a common DNA and a common synergy. Can’t we take that construction approach, coupled with the lessons learned from Gates’ high school redesign investments, to build that better mousetrap?
Maybe I’m just a dreamer, but this may be just what we need. Instead of trying to renovate a problematic system, making adjustments that will never make us fully happy or get us all the way to our goals, why not just build new? Avoid the restrictions and the drawbacks of the past, and build institutions on our current needs, current understanding, and hopes for the future.
It is no easy task. And the Gates Foundation may be the only organization out there with the resources, vision, and knowledgebase to even undertake it. A huge risk, no doubt. But imagine the payoff if it works.
The Call Heard Round the District
By now, things are starting to settle on Fairfax County, VA’s great snow day voicemail saga. It’s the same old story. Disgruntled high school student calls school district COO at home. Leaves message. COO’s wife returns the call with some choice insults for student. Said student posts voicemail on the web for all to hear and turn into their favorite ringtone. Media adds fuel to the fire by giving it prime real estate on the evening news and the front of the metro section.
Over at Municipalist (www.municipalist.com), they have done a good job of chronicling the saga, as well as examining it from a communications/new media perspective. This coverage includes thoughts from yours truly, who finds the whole story both interesting and a little frustrating.
Eduflack’s full post follows, but it is worth the visit to Municipalist to see some interesting commentary. Of course, I was wrong of one thing. The student violated school policy (using a cell phone during school hours), and is visiting detention for the violation. So I have been shown the school policy he violated. Otherwise, it is still on point, a week after the offense went public.
“Like it or not, we are entering a new frontier in public education. Parents are now checking assignments and progress on the Web. Teachers give students their email and IM addresses that are accessible at all hours. Today’s students process information 24-7, and their engagement knows few boundaries.
One of the greatest challenges our schools face is getting the learning process to match how students communicate and how they interact. If we don’t get our information from one source, then we simple move on to the next. And that’s exactly what Dave Kori did. He wanted his voice heard. He called the office, but no response. So he called a listed phone number and gave voice to his concern. If any of us had access to the home number for Bill Gates, the CEO of US Airways, or the owner of our favorite sports team, we’d probably do the same thing.
As is typical in our 24-7 communication world, the problem was not with the action, but it was with the reaction. Had Candy Tistadt simply deleted the message or ranted about it to her friends, no big deal. But she couldn’t let a call from a “snotty-nosed little brat” go. And her reaction is what got the whole tsunami going. She used the wrong message with the wrong audience, and it is only exacerbated by the fact that she wasn’t even the recipient of Kori’s call in the first place! She injected herself into a public debate, when she wasn’t even invited to take the podium.
Should the school district punish Kori? Of course not. Show me one law or school rule he violated. He called a public official at a phone number that is both public and easily accessed by anyone who may want it. And while he may have been overly casual in his language or even addressed the topic inappropriately, immaturity is hardly a crime.
It’s laughable, though, to think that Kori’s action are, as Fairfax Schools spokesman Paul Regnier suggested, harassment. Dean Tistadt is a public figure, like it or not. He got a phone call from a concerned citizen, who identified himself and left his phone number. That seems to be the sort of responsibility we want high school students to demonstrate, not what they should be reprimanded for.
At the end of the day, the school district would have been wise to have stayed out of the issue altogether. By commenting on the situation and throwing around terms like harassment, the district only raises the temperature of the whole situation. We need to choose our fights, and this is one that the schools just can’t win. This boils down to an issue between a teenager and the wife of a public official. Do we really want Superintendent Jack Dale or his spokesperson to get in the middle of this? Of course not. Their attention should be on far more important issues facing the district and the community.
We preach that today’s students need to be responsible and innovative. They need to solve problems and be resourceful. They need to stand for what they believe, and they need to advocate for those issues. Imagine if Kori put his organizational and advocacy skills to work for an issue that mattered. A snow day is hardly standing up for civil rights or equal education, but it is a start.”
The Relevance of College
For some time now, a hot topic in education reform has been the relevance of high school. We talk about aligning courses with student interests. We discuss how good jobs require high school diplomas. We hypothesize on the hard and soft skills today’s high schools provide tomorrow’s workers. The result? Dual enrollment, STEM education, new graduation requirements, and higher-stakes exit testing.
But what about the relevance of postsecondary education? We’re quick to throw out the statistic that 90 percent of new jobs in the next decade will require postsecondary education. But what type of education? It all leaves us with a big question — are our colleges and universities preparing today’s undergraduates for careers? More importantly, are our institutions of higher education producing graduates who can meet the needs and demands of our 21st century economy? Should they be?
These are very big questions. We like to believe that college is a place to learn new things, experience new experiences, and meet new people. College is a place to broaden our minds, home to lessons on topics such as art history, philosophy, Mesopotamian history, and ancient tools of ancient cultures. Many will tell you, if you want to prepare for a job, go to a trade school. College is for developing and conditioning the mind as a whole.
Where does the truth lie? Yesterday, USA Today’s Mary Beth Marklein wrote of a new Association of American Colleges and Universities study of 301 business leaders. http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2008-01-22-graduate-assessment_N.htm The findings seem fairly straight-forward. The majority of employers believe half of college graduates lack the skills and knowledge for today’s jobs. Internships are far more important than college transcripts. And we want to know which schools do the best job of preparing our students for work.
What does this all mean? For one, it validates Eduflack’s personal experiences. I am a proud graduate of the University of Virginia, one of the top public institutions in the nation. I took classes such as the Female Gothic (far more Jane Austin than any man should ever have to read), and I considered taking courses such as History of the Circus. All of it in the name of broadening my mind.
I also recognized the importance of internships and skill development. (Self motivated, mind you, there were no advisors or professors telling me how to secure internships or about the skills for my career path.) A polisci course in U.S. Congress helped me secure an internship with U.S. Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV, which led to other Hill internships which then led to full-time jobs. I spent a year as managing editor of The Cavalier Daily, U.Va.’s paper of record, which gave me the experience of putting out a 16-page newspaper each day, while managing a volunteer staff of more than 100. I left U.Va. with a full clip packet (showing I could write) and practical experience from my internships and newspaper leadership. The result — lots of good jobs. In my early days, I showed a lot of my past op-eds or news clips and I talked of my Hill experiences. I was never asked about my GPA, never probed on the courses I took, and was never asked about the symbolism of Mary Shelley’s monster.
Why does all this matter? Today’s students spend a lot of money for those college diplomas. The tab for an in-state, public college degree is now likely to run at least $50K. THose going to private institutions could end up spending more than $200K when all is said and done. And that’s assuming one completes a program in the expected four years, not the more likely five or six. We take out those loans because we expect return on the investment. And that return is not to be the smartest person at a cocktail party, it’s to gain a rewarding, well-paying career.
Ultimately, there needs to be a balance. Yes, we can study Gothic novels, but we also should be taking the courses that help develop critical skills for the workplace. College students should be able to demonstrate that they attained knowledge in college and they know how to effectively apply it in real-world or real-career situations. College not only gave them the tools to success, but it showed them how to use it. A college degree means one is career and life ready.
The business leaders in AACU’s study seem to recognize that. And it is a message we all should take to heart.
College is indeed a worthwhile investment. It provides an opportunity for exploration and thought. It stimulates both the mind and soul. But it also needs an end game. The goal of college should not be to gain access to a graduate school, where we gain the training needed to secure a good job. That undergraduate degree should be a gateway to gainful employment.
The AACU data also raises an interesting question. Employers hope college graduates will be ready for available jobs. How far are we from employers expecting guarantees from colleges and universities? If a graduate lacks the skills to handle an entry-level white collar job, they should go back to college (at the college’s expense) to gain the needed skills and experiences. Then, a college diploma will mean something, college will be relevant, and all involved will see the true ROI of postsecondary education.
Teaching to the Student
Tonight on PBS, Frontline offers a program titled “Growing Up Online” (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/kidsonline/) an attempt to provide greater understanding of today’s youth. A sociological exploration, if you will, into a generation that never knew corded telephones, typewriters, a library card catalog, or UHF television. A demographic that can’t recall a pre-Internet world. A group we hope is being built on the notion of working smarter, not harder; to innovate and not follow.
From some of the early reports on this special, we are seeing that some teachers are fretting the current generation of students because of their short attention spans and desire for instant gratification. Undoubtedly, we’ll eventually hear pinings for the good ole days, when students plucked quills from porcupines and hand-wrote everything on paper with chunks of wood still embedded in it.
Face it, we are living, working, and learning in a new frontier. It’s adapt or perish. We see that in industry, as businesses are forced to do more with less, to adopt green practices, and constantly innovate and build a better mousetrap. We see it in the media, where morning newspapers and traditional network news has been replaced with specialty cable stations and a plethora of web sites, blogs, and other “news outlets” that provide the information we want, as soon as we want it.
So shouldn’t we expect it in education as well? K-12 education is one of the last bastions of old-world thinking. Consider this, most of today’s high schools are just like the high schools we went to, or our parents, or our grandparents. The fact is, little has changed in secondary education over the past century. We still have rows of one-piece desks. We still have teachers lecturing 25 some-odd students for the full class time. We still have worksheets and multiple-choice tests on relatively arcane topics. And we still have anywhere from a third to a half of students dropping out before earning their diploma.
At the same time, we preach the need for education. We tell students that high-skill, high-wage jobs require both a high school diploma and some form of postsecondary education. We talk about the relevance of school and the need to achieve. And then, in far too many communities, we go back to rows of desks and a lecture on the French Revolution.
It shouldn’t be this way. Last summer, Eduflack wrote about the danger of “deskilling” today’s students. http://blog.eduflack.com/2007/07/26/deskilling-our-students.aspx Perhaps Frontline can teach us a little about what we need to do to engage students, make school relevant, and upgrade the learning environment to meet the skills and expectations of todays skills … and not their great-grandparents.
What does all that mean? It means change. Change in how we teach. Change in what we teach. Change in how we measure it.
It means putting technology in the center of the learning process. If students resonate to information gleaned from MySpace, Facebook, You Tube, and the Internet in general, use it to the teachers’ advantage. We can expect far more from students using the Internet than the Dewey decimal system.
It means making school relevant. We are already seeing the successes of programs like Early College High Schools and other Gates grantees. If I want a high-skill, high-wage job, show me how my high school (or middle school) experience gets me there. Yes, some of our nation’s great educational thinkers believe K-12 is a time to cultivate a love for learning, and college or grad school is the time to focus on career. But if you talk to today’s eighth or ninth graders, it is all about the path to a good job. The courses they take, the extra-curriculars they participate in, the schools they choose. If our students are focused on relevance, shouldn’t we?
Ultimately, it means recognizing that the student is the primary customer in our K-12 system. And as we all know, the customer is always right. That means we teach in the environment where our students can get maximum benefit. Think about it for a second. Would we rather build up a teacher’s skills so they are teaching in a 21st century learning environment, or would we rather strip a student down so they are learning in a 19th or 20th century classroom? The choice should be simple. Our schools should be home to an ongoing evolution of effective learning and teaching. They shouldn’t be museums where we honor the good teaching of 1937 educators.
Some get this, and we see their impact in efforts such as one-to-one computing, online high schools, dual enrollment programs, high school internship programs, and the like. But these seem to be the exception, instead of the rule. If a public K-12 education is going to mean something in 10 or 20 years, such innovations need to be the norm. Deep down, we all know that, even if we don’t want to talk about it. The educational model of the past century is not going to cut it as we move further into this one.
Sure, this is all a little harsh. Yes, if we try to build of K-12 systems solely around the whims and wishes of the average teenager, we’ll run in circles and lose what hair we have left. But if we are to learn anything from programs such as “Growing Up Online,” it is that we need to effectively reach our audiences with language, tactics, and strategies they understand, appreciate, and embrace. We need to build that better educational mousetrap, if you will. And we need it now.
Show Me The Education Money
Across the nation, governors and state legislatures are preparing their budgets and promoting their visions for this new year. Unfortunately, 2008 is looking like recent years. Rising obligations for healthcare and criminal justice and roads and virtually everything else. Concerns about shrinking state coffers, due in part to a slumping housing marketing and concerns for a recession. And great education reform ideas put pack in the drawer for another year, pining for the money, public support, or community need to move idea into law.
Yes, it is a sad story. But does it have to be that way? Is there a way to talk about education this time of year, without it just being tossed into the same ole education bucket again?
If we look at those issues that have a chance of making it into the game — preK, STEM, high school reform, postsecondary access — we are provided an interesting picture. Yes, they are all education issues. But each and every one of them can also be positioned as economic development issues. An investment in one or more of them can have a direct impact on jobs, increased revenues, economic investment, and community empowerment. And that’s how you move them out of the “great ideas” drawer and onto the text of the State of the State address.
For too long, we’ve talked about education for education’s sake. PreK is simply about those sweet little kids. High school reform is to keep teenagers engaged and in class. Postsecondary access is needed because we’ve sold the nation on the belief that everybody needs to go to college.
But let’s look (and talk about) this a little differently. We’re already seeing it with STEM education issues. STEM isn’t just about putting more kids in math and science classes. It is about preparing all students for 21st century jobs. It is about making a high school diploma more relevant and more in line with what employers need from their incoming workforce. It is about global competition and providing work and life skills for all students — not just those going on to teach trig or become doctors or rocket scientists.
This month, we’re sure to hear some talk in state capitols about investment in STEM education. And we’ll hear it most loudly where K-12, higher ed, and the business community are working together. Why? It’s not just an ed issue; it’s an employment issue. And with employment comes a stronger economy. And a reduced burden on the state justice and health systems. An investment in STEM affects all.
The same argument can be made for high school reform, where we are ensuring high school educations are relevant and effectively preparing all students for school career and life. With postsecondary access, we focus on the ability to enroll in the work certificate programs, community colleges, and four-year institutions that can prepare us for the careers of our dreams. Even preK, once we key in on the high-quality, results-driven programs, ensures that all young students — even those from the poorest families — develop the tools to access the pathways to those good jobs.
The era of education reform for education’s sake is over. If state-level reforms are to take hold, we need to focus on return on investment. Show that a dollar of education today will reap five dollars of increased revenue or three dollars of reduced social services costs tomorrow. The data’s there. The interest is there. We just need to bring it all together. It may seem silly, but we need to demonstrate it is relevant.
Yes, we need ed reform and we need to articulate why. And the reason is not increased test scores. That is merely a measurement to know we are doing our job. At the end of the day, we reform to improve. We improve to provide today’s students with a better education, a better job, and a better life than their parents. It may be clichéd, but it’s the truth.
A Seat at the Table
Why is it so hard to reform our K-12 systems? For one, virtually everyone has an opinion on the schools (and this isn’t necessarily a bad thing). We’ve all attended schools. We know what we liked and what we didn’t. And we have thoughts on what would have made it better.
More so, education reform is an emotional process. We all know someone affected by it. Teachers, principals, support staff. But most definitely students. And if we don’t know a student affected today, we sure know one impacted yesterday or tomorrow.
Eduflack is usually up on the soapbox, advocating for inclusion when it comes to stakeholders. If we are improving the schools, we need all the help we can get. That’s why so many reform efforts include parents, community leaders, business leaders, the clergy, and just about anyone else walking through that educational village.
The good folks out at LAUSD seem to understand part of that, but skipped an entire chapter of the book. As part of his proposal to close a number of campuses out in Los Angeles, Mayor Villaraigosa and his team reached out to teachers. They reached out to parents. They sought buy-in and support for the Mayor’s plan. They even allowed these stakeholders to vote on the plan. The LA Times has the story — http://www.latimes.com/news/education/la-me-students2jan02,1,1342026.story?track=rss&ctrack=1&cset=true.
Forgotten in this otherwise strong public engagement strategy was the student. The students even actively sought a voice in the process. They have distinct views that impacted the plan. But at the end of the day, according to the LA Times, they were brushed aside so the “adults” could make these important decisions.
And that, my friends, is a huge communications blunder. Too often, we write off students in the reform process, believing that they don’t care, don’t know, or don’t matter. In actuality, students know far more than we give them credit for. They know how important a high school diploma is. They know they need postsecondary education. And they know a good education today results in a good job tomorrow. They get it. And they feel it more deeply than many of the other stakeholders engaged in the process. I am consistently surprised by what I hear from the average middle or high schooler in a focus group or at a public event. They get it (and sometimes understand it far better than their teachers or parents do).
Of course we don’t want to let a group of middle schoolers be the deciding vote on whether their school is to be closed next year. But they should have a seat at the table. They should be part of the process.
If we want today’s students to be the leaders of tomorrow, we need to push them and engage them and give them the opportunities to lead and to understand what public stewardship really is. They don’t get that from a pat on the head or a squeeze of a shoulder. They get it from being treated as equals and given the impressions their voice, opinions, and experiences matter.
The Blame Game, Iowa and Hollywood Style
We may not be all that adept at determining solutions for improving our nation’s public schools, but we certainly know how to assign blame. Case in point this week, conservatives in the GOP presidential debates and liberals on the TV show “Boston Legal.”
If you missed it, earlier this week the Republican candidates for president had yet another debate. At this one, multiple presidential hopefuls attacked the NEA as the primary obstacle to education reform. Tagging the teachers unions as the defenders of a broken school system, these Republicans (yes, I’m talking about you Mitt Romney and Fred Thompson) seem to think that if the NEA would just step back and allow school choice, all would be made right in our K-12 schools.
On the flip side, Boston Legal ran a plotline of a high-achieving high school student stealing her school’s standardized tests to spotlight the inadequacies of high-stakes testing. Lines like standardized tests are producing a school of “idiots” and this is all the fault of the “No Child Left Behind nazis” certainly makes for good television. Throw in a sobbing staffer from National Geographic bemoaning student mapping abilities, a principal believing NCLB is denying him the ability to teach what students need, and a student believing she is being denied a quality education at a predominantly white high school in Boston, and we see how NCLB can become must-see prime time TV viewing.
What does it all mean? We still aren’t taking education seriously as a topic for discussion, debate, and thought. Instead of the GOP discussing the merits of school choice and the impact it has had on disadvantaged youth or those from low-performing schools, we seek to tar the NEA. Then we use NCLB as a punchline, sandwiched between suing the National Guard for failing to stop a flood and a former teen madame. We’ve resorted to using education reform as an applause line or a punchline, take your pick. (Don’t believe me, look at a recent Family Guy cartoon, that also focused on NCLB and AYP.)
We’re continuing to blame others for our educational problems, rather than offer solutions where we take responsibility. As Mitt Romney is attacking the NEA, can’t he also be blamed for the fictitious school failures in Boston Legal. After all, these were his schools 11 months ago. Where are the Romney and Thompson’s K-12 education plans? What will they do to fix the problems? How are they going to expand school choice? How will they get effective teachers in the classroom, and ineffective teachers out? And what are they going to do to get Candice Bergen’s sure to be Wellesley College-bound grand-daughter to stop destroying the tests and ensure that her high school is accurately measured? (Interestingly, Romney was actually mentioned on the program, while Massachusetts’ current education governor, Deval Patrick, was not.)
The only positive out of all this, I suppose, is that NCLB is known well enough as a brand that it can stand as a story line on a top prime-time television program, without needing explanation or set-up. As silly as blaming NCLB for our high school woes may be, those TV producers assume that their viewers know NCLB, know the issues around AYP and high-stakes testing, and will buy into the concerns over teaching to the test and preparing students for the challenges of the future. Maybe the NCLB brand name is better recognized than Eduflack has assumed.
As we close out the pop reference portion of today’s program, it all comes back to our of Eduflack’s favorite movies of recent years, Thank You For Smoking. In the movie, the lead character — a tobacco industry lobbyist — explains the lobbying game to his son. It isn’t about proving you are right, he opines, it is about proving your opponent is wrong. If your opponent is wrong, the electorate has not choice but to assume you must then be right.
Clearly, this is what we are seeing these days in education reform. Few are stepping up to show us how they are right and what they will do to approve it. Instead, we’re giftwrapping blame and defending bad behavior by attacking.
I don’t know about you, but I’m ready to change the channel. I’ll read the blogs and the websites and the newspapers for my news and education reform information. I want mindless bubblegum entertainment on my TV programs. Let’s leave the social commentary to the Sunday morning talk shows and the news channels I never seem to reach, up past ESPN and Noggin on my cable box.
Eduflack By Patrick R. Riccards 