What are public schools for? Seems like a simple question, right? But take a moment and try to formulate a concise response.
OK, so how many of you said, "To fill children with facts so they can perform well on high-stakes standardized tests"? If you did say this, then NCLB is just what you're looking for. You need read no more. But if you said something else, then please keep reading.
For me, schools -- especially pre-K through 12th grade -- are designed to develop human beings and enable them to achieve their greatest potential.
Here is a (partial) list of attributes that I believe characterize a fully-developed human, i.e., a fully-developed human is:
creative
a critical thinker
resilient
motivated
persistent
curious
a question asker
in possession of a sense of humor
reliable
enthusiastic
civic-minded
self-aware
self-disciplined
empathetic
a leader
compassionate
courageous
in possession of a sense of beauty and a sense of wonder
resourceful
spontaneous
humble
Imagine if schools made it their job to produce these kinds of students and stopped trying to produce children that could pass high-stakes standardized tests!
To accomplish this feat, schools have to stop emphasizing coverage and start emphasizing depth. They have to stop measuring illusory learning and start measuring substantive learning. To determine how well they are doing this, state departments of education have to choose between measures that are reliable and measures that are valid.
To enhance the reliability of any process, you have to reduce the number of variables in play and use quantitative approaches to get objective, verifiable measurements. As Roger Martin points out, IQ testing is an example of a highly reliable process with these characteristics. For example, if you take the Stanford-Binet IQ test over and over, you will score a nearly identical result each time.
Martin writes, “The test achieves reliability by defining intelligence very narrowly,” i.e., the ability to solve simple analytical problems. It measures intelligence via a multiple-choice test that can be evaluated with no possibility of bias in measurement or judgment.
Martin continues, “The problem is that IQ doesn't serve as a particularly great predictor of anything; . . . while IQ may demonstrate high reliability, it has modest validity. To increase the validity of any process, one must consider a wide array of relevant variables. Of course, we would like a process that has both high validity and reliability. Up to a point, it's possible to get more of both, simply by being more thoughtful and less sloppy. But ultimately, more reliability requires fewer variables and therefore less validity, and vice versa. Reliability and validity seem to conflict.”
Teaching has an inherent bias toward validity. Great teachers seek deep understanding of each student and the context in which each student comes to understand things. This process necessitates consideration of many variables. Teachers don't limit their considerations to aspects that can be thoroughly quantified. They worry less about whether they can replicate a particular process and more about producing a valid learning solution for each child. This is primarily due to the fact that each child learns differently and that each child requires a unique approach that is specific to his or her needs. We accept that no two people are exactly alike, but we quickly forget that no two children are exactly alike. Because no two children are exactly the same, no two children learn in exactly the same way.
Tuesday, January 31, 2006
Profiting from Public Education
The 2004 report “Profiles of For-Profit Education Management Companies” from Arizona State University showed 59 educational management organizations (EMOs) managing 535 schools and enrolling approximately 239,766 students in 24 states and D.C., an increase of eight firms and 39,363 students over the previous 12 months. In 2004, Edison – the largest EMO – ran 109 public schools serving over 70,000 students in 20 states & D.C., including two in St. Louis and two in Kansas City. It now runs more than 150, including 22 in Philadelphia. Clearly, EMOs are a growth business, and a profitable one at that (Edison recorded its first year of profitability last year).
Like their public school counterparts, schools run by for-profit educational management organizations are evaluated on how well they do on standardized tests. Public schools are required to be fully transparent in terms of how they go about preparing students for these tests. Private, for-profit EMOs are not required to be fully transparent in this regard. Neither are they are required to release information about their internal practices, unlike their public counterparts. Private companies are – after all – private.
For example, I spent several hours this month trying to determine who sat on the school board of Confluence Academy, the Edison-run charter school in inner-city St. Louis. I called the school. No one answered the phone. I had left several messages in the past few months for the principal about other matters; I had also e-mailed the principal several times. She has never returned my calls or my e-mails. So I called Edison’s corporate HQ. No one there could tell me who was on the board. I was told to call another Edison representative , so I did. But this person has yet to return my call. I then called the school’s sponsor, the University of Missouri-Rolla, and spoke to the person in charge of overseeing the school, a gentleman named Dr. Harvest Collier. Dr. Collier kindly returned my call, but he did not know who was on the board either.
In addition to wanting to know who was on the Confluence board of education, I wanted to know whether or not board members received stock options or any other kind of compensation in return for their service on the board. Again, no one I spoke to knew the answer to this question. I suppose if I had known who was on the board, I could have asked them. But I don’t, so I can’t. And even if I were able to find out who was on the board, I doubt any of the members would be willing to divulge whether or not they received stock options or if they had a direct financial interest in the success of the school. Such an investment would represent an egregious violation and would constitute a conflict of interest.
So the board members at Confluence and other Edison schools across the country are in the unenviable position of having a conflict of interest hanging over them: are board members of Edison schools also shareholders in Edison Schools, Inc.? Do they have a financial interest in the success of the company? Barring an in-depth inquiry into the personal finances of each board member, there's no way the public can be assured that no such conflict exists.
The simple fact is we can’t know whether anyone is doing this or not. Without full transparency and full accountability, we are forced to take them at their word. We have to trust them, whoever “they” are.
But we should never have to be in a position of having to trust any organization that serves the public good. Imagine Congress saying, "Trust us; we know what we're doing" or the White House saying, "Believe me, everything is fine." Imagine if schools said, "Take our word for it; we're doing really well." Analogously, Edison board members are saying, "Take our word for it; we have no financial interest in the success of Edison."
Public entities entrusted to uphold the public's interests must go beyond pleas for trust. They must transcend the issue of trustworthiness altogether by being fully transparent. Such organizations need to be fully transparent so they can be held fully accountable.
The way to avoid this inherent conflict and contradiction is to stop doing business with for-profit entities that run and manage schools. As long as profit is involved, there will be both the possibility of and suspicion of corruption. This is especially troubling when mixed with lax modes of oversight regarding charter schools. Thank goodness a new charter law before the Missouri legislature calls for increased accountability. Then again, it remains to be seen just how accountable charters will be and how diligently the institutions of higher education charged with overseeing them will actually be. Just ask Dr. Collier at UM-Rolla who the Confluence board members are. If he doesn't even know this, what else is he unaware of?
This is a pretty terrible precedent for accountability and one that strikes me as particularly ironic in light of the accountability requirements under NCLB. How ironic that, in this day and age of school accountability, for-profit EMOs like Edison and Confluence Academy do not share this burden.
Like their public school counterparts, schools run by for-profit educational management organizations are evaluated on how well they do on standardized tests. Public schools are required to be fully transparent in terms of how they go about preparing students for these tests. Private, for-profit EMOs are not required to be fully transparent in this regard. Neither are they are required to release information about their internal practices, unlike their public counterparts. Private companies are – after all – private.
For example, I spent several hours this month trying to determine who sat on the school board of Confluence Academy, the Edison-run charter school in inner-city St. Louis. I called the school. No one answered the phone. I had left several messages in the past few months for the principal about other matters; I had also e-mailed the principal several times. She has never returned my calls or my e-mails. So I called Edison’s corporate HQ. No one there could tell me who was on the board. I was told to call another Edison representative , so I did. But this person has yet to return my call. I then called the school’s sponsor, the University of Missouri-Rolla, and spoke to the person in charge of overseeing the school, a gentleman named Dr. Harvest Collier. Dr. Collier kindly returned my call, but he did not know who was on the board either.
In addition to wanting to know who was on the Confluence board of education, I wanted to know whether or not board members received stock options or any other kind of compensation in return for their service on the board. Again, no one I spoke to knew the answer to this question. I suppose if I had known who was on the board, I could have asked them. But I don’t, so I can’t. And even if I were able to find out who was on the board, I doubt any of the members would be willing to divulge whether or not they received stock options or if they had a direct financial interest in the success of the school. Such an investment would represent an egregious violation and would constitute a conflict of interest.
So the board members at Confluence and other Edison schools across the country are in the unenviable position of having a conflict of interest hanging over them: are board members of Edison schools also shareholders in Edison Schools, Inc.? Do they have a financial interest in the success of the company? Barring an in-depth inquiry into the personal finances of each board member, there's no way the public can be assured that no such conflict exists.
The simple fact is we can’t know whether anyone is doing this or not. Without full transparency and full accountability, we are forced to take them at their word. We have to trust them, whoever “they” are.
But we should never have to be in a position of having to trust any organization that serves the public good. Imagine Congress saying, "Trust us; we know what we're doing" or the White House saying, "Believe me, everything is fine." Imagine if schools said, "Take our word for it; we're doing really well." Analogously, Edison board members are saying, "Take our word for it; we have no financial interest in the success of Edison."
Public entities entrusted to uphold the public's interests must go beyond pleas for trust. They must transcend the issue of trustworthiness altogether by being fully transparent. Such organizations need to be fully transparent so they can be held fully accountable.
The way to avoid this inherent conflict and contradiction is to stop doing business with for-profit entities that run and manage schools. As long as profit is involved, there will be both the possibility of and suspicion of corruption. This is especially troubling when mixed with lax modes of oversight regarding charter schools. Thank goodness a new charter law before the Missouri legislature calls for increased accountability. Then again, it remains to be seen just how accountable charters will be and how diligently the institutions of higher education charged with overseeing them will actually be. Just ask Dr. Collier at UM-Rolla who the Confluence board members are. If he doesn't even know this, what else is he unaware of?
This is a pretty terrible precedent for accountability and one that strikes me as particularly ironic in light of the accountability requirements under NCLB. How ironic that, in this day and age of school accountability, for-profit EMOs like Edison and Confluence Academy do not share this burden.
Monday, January 30, 2006
Assessment of Learning vs. Assessment for Learning
Even in using more valuable kinds of assessment, e.g., classroom-based formative assessment, there's a tension between assessment for learning and assessment of learning for documentation and accountability purposes. In other words, it's hard to care about students when you're so busy writing down observable performance data about them that ties into State Standards CA42.A1, SS16.B12, and M27.J4. Learning vs. proving you have learned are two different objectives. In the former, both the student and the teacher may actually care about the outcome. And they may care less whether it can be quantified and recorded. It's hard to empirically validate an "a-ha" moment, yet good teachers in caring relationships with their students have them all the time.
Proving I have learned, i.e., showing I'm a good student, and proving I have taught, i.e., showing I'm a good teacher, are euphemistic covers for "please don't fail me" and "please don't fire me" respectively. Under NCLB, even really good assessment practices, when operating under the weight of "accountability," can become about covering one's derriere. Inevitably, and quite logically, students may focus only on those things they can demonstrate they know and that they are good at. Teachers may focus only on those things they can demonstrate they can teach with predictable, positive outcomes. Neither can afford to show process or ambiguity, and certainly neither wants to show a lack of knowledge or competence or even – heaven forbid – that they are wrong about something.
So what effect might this have on quality, substantive, in-depth teaching and learning? It's not hard to imagine.
Proving I have learned, i.e., showing I'm a good student, and proving I have taught, i.e., showing I'm a good teacher, are euphemistic covers for "please don't fail me" and "please don't fire me" respectively. Under NCLB, even really good assessment practices, when operating under the weight of "accountability," can become about covering one's derriere. Inevitably, and quite logically, students may focus only on those things they can demonstrate they know and that they are good at. Teachers may focus only on those things they can demonstrate they can teach with predictable, positive outcomes. Neither can afford to show process or ambiguity, and certainly neither wants to show a lack of knowledge or competence or even – heaven forbid – that they are wrong about something.
So what effect might this have on quality, substantive, in-depth teaching and learning? It's not hard to imagine.
The Logic of Test Prep, Part 2
As a kid, I was given lots of standardized tests for which I was not prepared. Lots of kids were. I remember taking the ITBS every year for years. This wasn't cruel. It was thought to be appropriate, i.e., "Let's test the kids to see how well they compare to other kids." This was thought to be useful information because it would allow schools to compare each other. Of course, if schools were engaged in preparing for the ITBS, it would skew the data. Some schools (and kids) might appear to be better than others, but perhaps weren't. Yet because they had spent time prepping the kids for the test, the kids (and the school) would look better via the test results.
The difference now, of course, is that these data are not simply useful. They are now used to discipline and punish kids, teachers, and schools. All the more reason to spend even more time prepping them. I think it's unwise to spend a disproportionate amount of time, energy, and money on producing and analyzing student performance data that may or may not be correlated to Missouri's grade level expectations (GLEs). Yes, I'm sure Tungsten assures us that this correlation exists. But absent any independent, outside analysis, all we can do is take their word for it. And even if we could establish a strong correlation, we're still talking about the performance of children on a multiple choice test given once a month. There's only so much useful data that such a measure can generate. There's also mounting evidence that curricula, especially curricula for poor and/or minority children, is being watered-down as more and more schools begin to focus exclusively on reading and math instruction. For example, the Center on Education Policy reported last year that 27 percent of school systems say they are spending less time on social studies, and nearly 25 percent say they are spending less time on science, art, and music. In a study from 2004, the Council of Basic Education surveyed 954 principals in 4 states in different parts of the country: Indiana, Maryland, New Mexico, and New York. They all reported that schools were spending less time on social studies, art, and foreign languages. According to the Council of Basic Education’s report, 47% of high-minority schools reported decreases in social studies instruction.
I believe it is cruel to give children, especially poor and/or minority children, an inferior educational experience for the sake of improving their test scores.
I'm a big believer in formative assessment. I'm going to a 3-day workshop in Portland, OR called "Assessment for Learning: Formative Assessment That Can Improve Student Learning" given by the Assessment Training Institute. If Tungsten really is helping students demonstrate their level of mastery on GLEs, then great. But I'd like to see the evidence for this claim, and I'd like to understand what is meant by "mastery" and "demonstrate." If children are demonstrating mastery by correctly answering multiple choice questions, then I think this is a rather large claim.
The difference now, of course, is that these data are not simply useful. They are now used to discipline and punish kids, teachers, and schools. All the more reason to spend even more time prepping them. I think it's unwise to spend a disproportionate amount of time, energy, and money on producing and analyzing student performance data that may or may not be correlated to Missouri's grade level expectations (GLEs). Yes, I'm sure Tungsten assures us that this correlation exists. But absent any independent, outside analysis, all we can do is take their word for it. And even if we could establish a strong correlation, we're still talking about the performance of children on a multiple choice test given once a month. There's only so much useful data that such a measure can generate. There's also mounting evidence that curricula, especially curricula for poor and/or minority children, is being watered-down as more and more schools begin to focus exclusively on reading and math instruction. For example, the Center on Education Policy reported last year that 27 percent of school systems say they are spending less time on social studies, and nearly 25 percent say they are spending less time on science, art, and music. In a study from 2004, the Council of Basic Education surveyed 954 principals in 4 states in different parts of the country: Indiana, Maryland, New Mexico, and New York. They all reported that schools were spending less time on social studies, art, and foreign languages. According to the Council of Basic Education’s report, 47% of high-minority schools reported decreases in social studies instruction.
I believe it is cruel to give children, especially poor and/or minority children, an inferior educational experience for the sake of improving their test scores.
I'm a big believer in formative assessment. I'm going to a 3-day workshop in Portland, OR called "Assessment for Learning: Formative Assessment That Can Improve Student Learning" given by the Assessment Training Institute. If Tungsten really is helping students demonstrate their level of mastery on GLEs, then great. But I'd like to see the evidence for this claim, and I'd like to understand what is meant by "mastery" and "demonstrate." If children are demonstrating mastery by correctly answering multiple choice questions, then I think this is a rather large claim.
Sunday, January 29, 2006
The Logic of Test Prep
The Missouri Assessment Program (MAP) test provides a view into what kids know and can do on a given day and time. It's supposed to give us a sense of how well students, teachers, and schools are doing based on a broad-based curriculum designed to help students thrive and be successful. Ideally, we'd have confidence that our curricula were well-designed and that our kids could ace the MAP without any additional preparation for it. However, as it stands, we spend September through March getting kids ready to take the MAP.
So are we assessing our curricula or are we assessing our test preparation efforts? Are the curricula and the test preparation efforts the same thing?
If they are the same thing, that's troubling. If you can only assess that which can be measured, then you're likely to teach only that which can be assessed. But as Einstein once said, "Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts."
The school district where I live, Kirkwood R-7, purchased Tungsten's tools and services in February 2005. Tungsten, a division of Edison Schools, Inc., provides a web-based diagnostic test that features a series of multiple-choice questions designed to help children practice for the state standardized test and to give teachers feedback on how well children are doing. The terms of the contract extend for three years, so the total contractual obligation is approximately $120,000.
The Tungsten tests are multiple-choice only, so they do not help children practice for the constructed response and performance event items on the MAP test. While administering the test takes only 45 minutes per month, the rest of the month – in fact, the rest of the school year up to April – is devoted to analyzing the performance data and taking corrective action based on the data. For it to work most effectively, all the teachers and all the students need to use it. The time spent preparing for the monthly benchmark tests, reviewing the results of the benchmark tests, and remediating student performance based on the results of the test may cut into instructional time for subjects outside of reading and math, currently the only subjects tested under No Child Left Behind.
The MAP scores might actually mean something if the children just took it cold, i.e., without months of preparation. But as it stands now, the quality, depth, and breadth of the curriculum is subject to the exigencies of the MAP, especially in light of AYP sanctions under NCLB. Prior to NCLB and AYP sanctions, we could afford to look at MAP data without fear of consequences. But we can no longer afford to do so. While there's a definite plus to this in terms of raising awareness of the academic achievement gap and placing a priority on improving instruction for poor children and/or children of color, the downside is that we no longer control what happens in our classrooms, especially in regard to quality, depth, and breadth of the curriculum. The federal government now demands that we show yearly AYP gains, whether these gains are indicative of better teaching and learning or not.
So if AYP sanctions did not exist, would we spend September through March getting kids ready to take the MAP? Would we invest in computerized "benchmark/formative" assessment systems (e.g., Tungsten) that supposedly help kids get better at taking the tests? Would we make the diagnostic data that these computerized systems produce the point around which classroom instruction orbits?
For those districts that cannot afford diagnostic tools like Tungsten, their test preparation efforts would presumably pale in comparison to those that can afford them. Quite perversely, this only exacerbates the injustice that separates the haves from the have nots. In the long run, affluent districts can afford to prepare their students to do well on the tests. Not so the less affluent schools and districts. So when we look at the test results, we are seeing more evidence of the economic disparities that exist between the urban and suburban schools. Ironically, we are also making the achievement gap even worse in the effort to make it better.
So are we assessing our curricula or are we assessing our test preparation efforts? Are the curricula and the test preparation efforts the same thing?
If they are the same thing, that's troubling. If you can only assess that which can be measured, then you're likely to teach only that which can be assessed. But as Einstein once said, "Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts."
The school district where I live, Kirkwood R-7, purchased Tungsten's tools and services in February 2005. Tungsten, a division of Edison Schools, Inc., provides a web-based diagnostic test that features a series of multiple-choice questions designed to help children practice for the state standardized test and to give teachers feedback on how well children are doing. The terms of the contract extend for three years, so the total contractual obligation is approximately $120,000.
The Tungsten tests are multiple-choice only, so they do not help children practice for the constructed response and performance event items on the MAP test. While administering the test takes only 45 minutes per month, the rest of the month – in fact, the rest of the school year up to April – is devoted to analyzing the performance data and taking corrective action based on the data. For it to work most effectively, all the teachers and all the students need to use it. The time spent preparing for the monthly benchmark tests, reviewing the results of the benchmark tests, and remediating student performance based on the results of the test may cut into instructional time for subjects outside of reading and math, currently the only subjects tested under No Child Left Behind.
The MAP scores might actually mean something if the children just took it cold, i.e., without months of preparation. But as it stands now, the quality, depth, and breadth of the curriculum is subject to the exigencies of the MAP, especially in light of AYP sanctions under NCLB. Prior to NCLB and AYP sanctions, we could afford to look at MAP data without fear of consequences. But we can no longer afford to do so. While there's a definite plus to this in terms of raising awareness of the academic achievement gap and placing a priority on improving instruction for poor children and/or children of color, the downside is that we no longer control what happens in our classrooms, especially in regard to quality, depth, and breadth of the curriculum. The federal government now demands that we show yearly AYP gains, whether these gains are indicative of better teaching and learning or not.
So if AYP sanctions did not exist, would we spend September through March getting kids ready to take the MAP? Would we invest in computerized "benchmark/formative" assessment systems (e.g., Tungsten) that supposedly help kids get better at taking the tests? Would we make the diagnostic data that these computerized systems produce the point around which classroom instruction orbits?
For those districts that cannot afford diagnostic tools like Tungsten, their test preparation efforts would presumably pale in comparison to those that can afford them. Quite perversely, this only exacerbates the injustice that separates the haves from the have nots. In the long run, affluent districts can afford to prepare their students to do well on the tests. Not so the less affluent schools and districts. So when we look at the test results, we are seeing more evidence of the economic disparities that exist between the urban and suburban schools. Ironically, we are also making the achievement gap even worse in the effort to make it better.
Friday, January 27, 2006
Is Competition Good for Schools?
In business, if you don't like a product or service you get, you can indeed shop elsewhere. The idea is that competition forces the business to be more competitive and improve its products and services. While it may be appropriate to apply the notion of competition to business, there are (at least) three major flaws in this argument when you apply it to schools.
1) No amount of competition from other schools can force a school to improve its "products"; these products happen to be children, and outside pressure is not going to allow any school to suddenly transform them into higher-quality goods. Schools are not that powerful. No school is. Nor should they ever be expected to perform these kinds of miraculous transformations. As is noted in the infamous Blueberry Story, public schools take 'em as they come, all comers, the high-quality products and the not-so-high-quality products. There is a virtue in this. It is called "democracy." It is also called "equality of opportunity." If you want to improve the quality of the "products" in the schools, look to ameliorate the conditions that contribute much more causally to why these children lag behind their wealthy peers. Start by reading Richard Rothstein's book _Class and Schools_. Ultimately, it is up to local, state, and federal government to shoulder the responsibility and join the public schools in improving the lives of children.
2) Edison will tell you that it can improve both the products and the services of the schools. So far, the Chris Whittle Snake Oil Show has convinced more than 150 schools to swallow the elixir whole. So although this for-profit business represents another school that I can choose to send my children to, and although this outfit will tell me that they produce better product through better service, I am not convinced. Other parents might be convinced, just as other businesses might convince these same parents to buy the Ginsu knives, the low-cost car insurance, the investment opportunity in Nigeria, and the wonderful 401K plan sponsored by this brilliant company called Enron. Caveat emptor: buyer beware. If you believe that businesses will automatically offer better goods and services and -- you know . . . tell the truth -- simply because they are businesses that compete against public schools, you are living in a dream world. And, if you do believe this, I've got a bridge I'd like to sell you, too.
3) There's an unscrupulous company called Wal-Mart that moves into small towns and drives local businesses out of business. This is not because these are bad little businesses, or that the owners are lazy, or that they deserve their fate. It's simply due to the fact that these small businesses cannot compete with a multi-billion dollar company that can lower prices willy-nilly due to its enormous size and wealth, most of which is due to the fact that 80% of its goods are produced in China, where the cost of labor is staggeringly lower than in this country. Maybe it's OK for businesses to suffer this fate and to operate under the logic of social Darwinism where only the strongest survive. But do we really want schools to go belly up? Where will children go? Off to Chris Whittle, where he can turn their misery into a profit for his investors? Maybe we should allow the market to punish businesses for being failures at business. But should we punish children for being poor? for being black or Hispanic? For being unable to perform well on a single standardized test? If so, you are not living in a dream world. You are living in a nightmare.
1) No amount of competition from other schools can force a school to improve its "products"; these products happen to be children, and outside pressure is not going to allow any school to suddenly transform them into higher-quality goods. Schools are not that powerful. No school is. Nor should they ever be expected to perform these kinds of miraculous transformations. As is noted in the infamous Blueberry Story, public schools take 'em as they come, all comers, the high-quality products and the not-so-high-quality products. There is a virtue in this. It is called "democracy." It is also called "equality of opportunity." If you want to improve the quality of the "products" in the schools, look to ameliorate the conditions that contribute much more causally to why these children lag behind their wealthy peers. Start by reading Richard Rothstein's book _Class and Schools_. Ultimately, it is up to local, state, and federal government to shoulder the responsibility and join the public schools in improving the lives of children.
2) Edison will tell you that it can improve both the products and the services of the schools. So far, the Chris Whittle Snake Oil Show has convinced more than 150 schools to swallow the elixir whole. So although this for-profit business represents another school that I can choose to send my children to, and although this outfit will tell me that they produce better product through better service, I am not convinced. Other parents might be convinced, just as other businesses might convince these same parents to buy the Ginsu knives, the low-cost car insurance, the investment opportunity in Nigeria, and the wonderful 401K plan sponsored by this brilliant company called Enron. Caveat emptor: buyer beware. If you believe that businesses will automatically offer better goods and services and -- you know . . . tell the truth -- simply because they are businesses that compete against public schools, you are living in a dream world. And, if you do believe this, I've got a bridge I'd like to sell you, too.
3) There's an unscrupulous company called Wal-Mart that moves into small towns and drives local businesses out of business. This is not because these are bad little businesses, or that the owners are lazy, or that they deserve their fate. It's simply due to the fact that these small businesses cannot compete with a multi-billion dollar company that can lower prices willy-nilly due to its enormous size and wealth, most of which is due to the fact that 80% of its goods are produced in China, where the cost of labor is staggeringly lower than in this country. Maybe it's OK for businesses to suffer this fate and to operate under the logic of social Darwinism where only the strongest survive. But do we really want schools to go belly up? Where will children go? Off to Chris Whittle, where he can turn their misery into a profit for his investors? Maybe we should allow the market to punish businesses for being failures at business. But should we punish children for being poor? for being black or Hispanic? For being unable to perform well on a single standardized test? If so, you are not living in a dream world. You are living in a nightmare.
What is the logical outcome of "school choice"?
Scenario 1
1) parents are given more schools to choose from
2) on the basis of standardized test scores, parents determine which are the "poorly-run" schools and which are the "good" schools
3) parents that (a) are informed on these matters and (b) are willing to pay for and provide transportation to these other schools will do so
4) parents that are not informed on these matters and/or parents that are unable to pay for and provide transportation to these other schools will keep their kids at the "poorly-run" schools
5) because the highly-motivated parents abandon the "poorly-run" schools, these schools are left with students that do not benefit from strong parental support
6) the test scores of the "poorly-run" schools continue to plummet
7) these schools are eventually taken over by the state because they fail to make AYP for 5 years in a row
8) the state hands these schools over to private, for-profit educational management organizations such as Edison
9) public education in the U.S. amounts to approximately $400 billion per year; even if Edison gets only one-tenth of one percent of this pie, they will make $40 million per year
10) for $40 million, Edison will take U.S. taxpayer money and train kids in phonics, will coerce and humiliate them into passive submission, and will prepare them for life as docile, polite little ciphers, unaware of the workings of democracy, unable to think critically, and unaware of any other possibility
Scenario 2
1) parents are given more schools to choose from
2) on the basis of standardized test scores, parents determine which are the "poorly-run" schools and which are the "good" schools
3) eventually all parents move their children from the "poorly-run" schools to the "good" schools
4) the "poorly-run" schools are shut down and demolished
5) the "good" schools become overcrowded
6) faced with budget cuts and the unfunded federal mandate known as NCLB that has already drained funds out of schools and into the pockets of publishing companies/test developers, the "good" schools cram more and more students into already overcrowded classrooms
7) the quality of teaching and learning suffers at the "good" schools
8) test scores go down at the "good" schools
9) the "good" schools become the "poorly-run" schools
10) repeat steps 1 through 9 ad infinitum, ad nauseum
1) parents are given more schools to choose from
2) on the basis of standardized test scores, parents determine which are the "poorly-run" schools and which are the "good" schools
3) parents that (a) are informed on these matters and (b) are willing to pay for and provide transportation to these other schools will do so
4) parents that are not informed on these matters and/or parents that are unable to pay for and provide transportation to these other schools will keep their kids at the "poorly-run" schools
5) because the highly-motivated parents abandon the "poorly-run" schools, these schools are left with students that do not benefit from strong parental support
6) the test scores of the "poorly-run" schools continue to plummet
7) these schools are eventually taken over by the state because they fail to make AYP for 5 years in a row
8) the state hands these schools over to private, for-profit educational management organizations such as Edison
9) public education in the U.S. amounts to approximately $400 billion per year; even if Edison gets only one-tenth of one percent of this pie, they will make $40 million per year
10) for $40 million, Edison will take U.S. taxpayer money and train kids in phonics, will coerce and humiliate them into passive submission, and will prepare them for life as docile, polite little ciphers, unaware of the workings of democracy, unable to think critically, and unaware of any other possibility
Scenario 2
1) parents are given more schools to choose from
2) on the basis of standardized test scores, parents determine which are the "poorly-run" schools and which are the "good" schools
3) eventually all parents move their children from the "poorly-run" schools to the "good" schools
4) the "poorly-run" schools are shut down and demolished
5) the "good" schools become overcrowded
6) faced with budget cuts and the unfunded federal mandate known as NCLB that has already drained funds out of schools and into the pockets of publishing companies/test developers, the "good" schools cram more and more students into already overcrowded classrooms
7) the quality of teaching and learning suffers at the "good" schools
8) test scores go down at the "good" schools
9) the "good" schools become the "poorly-run" schools
10) repeat steps 1 through 9 ad infinitum, ad nauseum
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
Edison Is the Symptom, NCLB Is the Disease
In October 2005, a board member took me on a tour of Confluence Academy. Located in the heart of inner-city St. Louis in one of the most economically-disadvantaged areas of the city, Confluence Academy is a charter school run by Edison Schools, Inc., a for-profit educational management organization (EMO) headquartered in New York City.
Edison and Confluence Academy are logical expressions of our contemporary system of education, especially the way that we educate poor minority children. Edison is profiting – literally and metaphorically – from the Bush administration’s No Child Left Behind law. Confluence and Edison are symptoms of a much larger social disease, a disease that creates the conditions for these companies to exist and thrive and for these schools to be regarded as models for our future.
I visited six classrooms at various grade levels. I did not observe a single white student. Every child I saw was African-American. The students were dominated and controlled in ways that were reminiscent of a trainer working with frightened, caged animals. The children seemed utterly unchildlike, utterly joyless. In one first grade class, students had all of their body movements tightly controlled and responded in automaton-like fashion to instructions from the teacher. Instead of smiles and engaged looks of curiosity, the faces of these six-year-old children expressed a kind of dull affect. The teachers -- mostly white women -- taught at the students, and the students simply responded in parrot fashion to the teacher. The students' role was clear: obey orders, do not do anything that the teacher does not tell you to do, sit and be quiet. This degree of total control over the students affected the way that teachers taught; in only one of the six classrooms I visited did I see a teacher who seemed like she was having fun; the others were very short with the students, quick to pounce on any undesirable, uncontrollable behavior.
In defense of the heavy discipline, the board member said, "Sure, the structure of the Edison schools is a bit tough. Yes, we make the kids walk in lines wherever they go. But it works. You don't have to waste 6 minutes at the beginning of class, telling Johnny to sit down and be quiet. And you don't waste 15 minutes in the middle of every class, trying to get students to be quiet and stay on task. Even the very brightest kids can't learn in an environment like that. No one can."
But being quiet and paying attention to the teacher should not be taken as unquestioned and unqualified virtues in themselves. In a rigid structure such as that imposed by Edison, there is no room for student or teacher creativity or spontaneity. The only room for freedom of expression is either (a) do what the teacher tells you to do or (b) resist what the teacher tells you to do. Given the kind of power and authority structures that already exist in white-dominated society, it's little wonder that students of color are tempted to act out and lash out. If they don't act in this manner, then both the implicit and explicit power relationships and inequities are reproduced in the classroom: docile brown bodies controlled by powerful white bodies. This is even more troubling given the fact that no Edison school exists in a white, wealthy, suburban district. Not one.
Many people have been taken on the same exact tour of Confluence Academy that I was taken on and emerged gushing about how great the school is. "Look how well-behaved they are!" or "They're all so quiet!" I’m told are typical reactions.
But unlike the Hollywood depiction of classrooms, in which "good" classrooms are quiet and arranged in neat rows of desks, effective classrooms tend to be a bit “noisy.”
As a teacher, I seldom led classes that were quiet. Because my classes almost always used group activities and hands-on, project-based work, they were usually pretty loud. So I never thought of the issue of whether the class was quiet or not. Quite honestly, the issue was irrelevant. What concerned me was whether the students were engaged or not. Engagement, in my experience, comes by allowing students to have a say in the manner of what they learn and how they learn it. “Having a say” means that students use their voices.
For voices to be heard, they cannot be quiet.
The literal and metaphorical implications of silenced voices, particularly the silenced voices of historically silenced people, cannot be emphasized enough. Any system that demands that historically oppressed people be silent should be subject to scrutiny and skepticism. But in an educational system that is responsible for educating future citizens, this forced silence and compliance should do more than give us pause. It should make us angry. Unfortunately, the Board members of Confluence Academy have apparently bought into the notion that "noise = chaos," at least for non-white kids. Thus, for non-white kids, there must be rigid "discipline" as seen in the military and prison.
Ironically, or perhaps inevitably, students in these academic settings will be forced out of school and will have nowhere to go but the military or to prison. The one comfort may be that if this fate does befall them, they will have been well-prepared.
Edison and Confluence Academy are logical expressions of our contemporary system of education, especially the way that we educate poor minority children. Edison is profiting – literally and metaphorically – from the Bush administration’s No Child Left Behind law. Confluence and Edison are symptoms of a much larger social disease, a disease that creates the conditions for these companies to exist and thrive and for these schools to be regarded as models for our future.
I visited six classrooms at various grade levels. I did not observe a single white student. Every child I saw was African-American. The students were dominated and controlled in ways that were reminiscent of a trainer working with frightened, caged animals. The children seemed utterly unchildlike, utterly joyless. In one first grade class, students had all of their body movements tightly controlled and responded in automaton-like fashion to instructions from the teacher. Instead of smiles and engaged looks of curiosity, the faces of these six-year-old children expressed a kind of dull affect. The teachers -- mostly white women -- taught at the students, and the students simply responded in parrot fashion to the teacher. The students' role was clear: obey orders, do not do anything that the teacher does not tell you to do, sit and be quiet. This degree of total control over the students affected the way that teachers taught; in only one of the six classrooms I visited did I see a teacher who seemed like she was having fun; the others were very short with the students, quick to pounce on any undesirable, uncontrollable behavior.
In defense of the heavy discipline, the board member said, "Sure, the structure of the Edison schools is a bit tough. Yes, we make the kids walk in lines wherever they go. But it works. You don't have to waste 6 minutes at the beginning of class, telling Johnny to sit down and be quiet. And you don't waste 15 minutes in the middle of every class, trying to get students to be quiet and stay on task. Even the very brightest kids can't learn in an environment like that. No one can."
But being quiet and paying attention to the teacher should not be taken as unquestioned and unqualified virtues in themselves. In a rigid structure such as that imposed by Edison, there is no room for student or teacher creativity or spontaneity. The only room for freedom of expression is either (a) do what the teacher tells you to do or (b) resist what the teacher tells you to do. Given the kind of power and authority structures that already exist in white-dominated society, it's little wonder that students of color are tempted to act out and lash out. If they don't act in this manner, then both the implicit and explicit power relationships and inequities are reproduced in the classroom: docile brown bodies controlled by powerful white bodies. This is even more troubling given the fact that no Edison school exists in a white, wealthy, suburban district. Not one.
Many people have been taken on the same exact tour of Confluence Academy that I was taken on and emerged gushing about how great the school is. "Look how well-behaved they are!" or "They're all so quiet!" I’m told are typical reactions.
But unlike the Hollywood depiction of classrooms, in which "good" classrooms are quiet and arranged in neat rows of desks, effective classrooms tend to be a bit “noisy.”
As a teacher, I seldom led classes that were quiet. Because my classes almost always used group activities and hands-on, project-based work, they were usually pretty loud. So I never thought of the issue of whether the class was quiet or not. Quite honestly, the issue was irrelevant. What concerned me was whether the students were engaged or not. Engagement, in my experience, comes by allowing students to have a say in the manner of what they learn and how they learn it. “Having a say” means that students use their voices.
For voices to be heard, they cannot be quiet.
The literal and metaphorical implications of silenced voices, particularly the silenced voices of historically silenced people, cannot be emphasized enough. Any system that demands that historically oppressed people be silent should be subject to scrutiny and skepticism. But in an educational system that is responsible for educating future citizens, this forced silence and compliance should do more than give us pause. It should make us angry. Unfortunately, the Board members of Confluence Academy have apparently bought into the notion that "noise = chaos," at least for non-white kids. Thus, for non-white kids, there must be rigid "discipline" as seen in the military and prison.
Ironically, or perhaps inevitably, students in these academic settings will be forced out of school and will have nowhere to go but the military or to prison. The one comfort may be that if this fate does befall them, they will have been well-prepared.
Life, Learning, and Legislation
Here's the text of a speech I gave at Congregation Shaare Emeth in St. Louis for a conference called Life, Learning, and Legislation. It's quite long -- 14 pages -- but I hope you find it useful and will share it with friends, family, colleagues, etc.
Click here to download the speech.
Click here to download the speech.
Sunday, January 22, 2006
Who's Responsible for This Mess?
At the heart of the great debate about poverty between conservatives and progressives is the very simple yet very powerful disagreement that people are either completely in charge of themselves or they are completely controlled by forces outside of their control. I think most people, when asked to reflect, would conclude that it's a little of both. In fact, I think most politicians would even argue that it's both. And yet, when it comes to formulating public policy, these sensible people line up and start shouting ideological one-liners at each other. Because we have a conservative political machine in place, we are getting one side of the argument more than we are getting the other (when and if we do get it at all). Katrina raised the issue again and gave Democrats a chance to tell their story about poverty, but because their story was so ideological and so political, it quickly faded from view.
I believe that there is a way to talk about educational reform that does not devolve into ideology when it comes time to discuss the root problem of education, i.e, poverty. Policies need to be formulated that recognize that -- paradoxically -- individuals are both totally responsible for themselves and totally shaped by their environments. However, it's important to point out that policies cannot be formulated that make people be more responsible for themselves. But it's also important to point out that policies HAVE been formulated that punish people -- mostly poor people -- for NOT being responsible for themselves. This, for me, is a moral and ethical dilemma, but it's also a practical dilemma: does punishing people for being "irresponsible" work? Is it effective? Does it achieve what it sets out to achieve, i.e., does punishing "irresponsible" people make them become more responsible? For me, the answer is no, it doesn't.
So if it doesn't work, then why do we do it? And what, if anything, can work?
To begin with, we need to address the educational achievement gap by doing the following:
1. smaller class sizes at every level
2. comprehensive social services so no child has to go without food, shelter, medicine, and dental care
3. adequate prenatal care and postnatal follow-up so children reach school age healthy
4. free, high-quality, universal pre-K that is developmentally appropriate
5. parent education for young parents
6. comprehensive job training and placement for parents at a real living wage
7. universal healthcare coverage for all Americans, especially the poor and "working poor"
8. free, high-quality onsite child-care or free transportation to and from child-care facilities to make it possible for parents to work and raise children
9. high-quality training and ongoing professional development for elementary teachers in reading instruction (not drill-and-kill phonics)
10. high-quality training and ongoing professional development for all teachers in classroom-based formative assessment
All of these proposals speak to the most important environmental factors that shape success and failure in our country, not just in school but in life overall. Then comes what I call my leap of faith. Ready? I take it as a matter of faith that, if these environmental factors were addressed and that material suffering were ameloriated, people would be motivated to take responsibility for their lives. How do I know this? I don't. But it occurs to me that if people live in misery, they themselves will be miserable. It's hard to want to be responsible for what you are told is your own self-induced, self-created misery. But if people live with their basic needs met, there's a greater likelihood that people will not only be able to take responsibility for their lives, but they'll also want to.
I believe that there is a way to talk about educational reform that does not devolve into ideology when it comes time to discuss the root problem of education, i.e, poverty. Policies need to be formulated that recognize that -- paradoxically -- individuals are both totally responsible for themselves and totally shaped by their environments. However, it's important to point out that policies cannot be formulated that make people be more responsible for themselves. But it's also important to point out that policies HAVE been formulated that punish people -- mostly poor people -- for NOT being responsible for themselves. This, for me, is a moral and ethical dilemma, but it's also a practical dilemma: does punishing people for being "irresponsible" work? Is it effective? Does it achieve what it sets out to achieve, i.e., does punishing "irresponsible" people make them become more responsible? For me, the answer is no, it doesn't.
So if it doesn't work, then why do we do it? And what, if anything, can work?
To begin with, we need to address the educational achievement gap by doing the following:
1. smaller class sizes at every level
2. comprehensive social services so no child has to go without food, shelter, medicine, and dental care
3. adequate prenatal care and postnatal follow-up so children reach school age healthy
4. free, high-quality, universal pre-K that is developmentally appropriate
5. parent education for young parents
6. comprehensive job training and placement for parents at a real living wage
7. universal healthcare coverage for all Americans, especially the poor and "working poor"
8. free, high-quality onsite child-care or free transportation to and from child-care facilities to make it possible for parents to work and raise children
9. high-quality training and ongoing professional development for elementary teachers in reading instruction (not drill-and-kill phonics)
10. high-quality training and ongoing professional development for all teachers in classroom-based formative assessment
All of these proposals speak to the most important environmental factors that shape success and failure in our country, not just in school but in life overall. Then comes what I call my leap of faith. Ready? I take it as a matter of faith that, if these environmental factors were addressed and that material suffering were ameloriated, people would be motivated to take responsibility for their lives. How do I know this? I don't. But it occurs to me that if people live in misery, they themselves will be miserable. It's hard to want to be responsible for what you are told is your own self-induced, self-created misery. But if people live with their basic needs met, there's a greater likelihood that people will not only be able to take responsibility for their lives, but they'll also want to.
Saturday, January 21, 2006
U.S. Against Them, aka "Global Smackdown 3"
700,000 Chinese engineering students versus 70,000 American students. Scary?
Click here to see the movie.
Click here to see the movie.
Please Support Corporate Welfare to Work
I'm introducing a new program called, “Corporate Welfare to Work.” It will help needy corporations break the grip of dependence on the system so they can move on with their lives and become productive citizens.
Sadly, these poor multi-billion-dollar organizations -- through no fault of their own -- have not been able to set up and run business that are successful on their own merits. Tragically, they have come to rely on government-subsidized tax breaks and tax incentives to help them barely get by. As they eke out their meager existence, these poor corporations grow weaker and weaker as this system of dependence escalates unchecked and out of control, passed on from one generation of CEO’s to the next.
Click here to watch the movie.
Sadly, these poor multi-billion-dollar organizations -- through no fault of their own -- have not been able to set up and run business that are successful on their own merits. Tragically, they have come to rely on government-subsidized tax breaks and tax incentives to help them barely get by. As they eke out their meager existence, these poor corporations grow weaker and weaker as this system of dependence escalates unchecked and out of control, passed on from one generation of CEO’s to the next.
Click here to watch the movie.
What's the cost of doing business as usual?
Over the past 50 years, the share of tax revenue coming to the federal government from business has collapsed.
In fiscal 2003, corporate taxes represented just 7.4 percent of federal revenue, down from 32 percent in 1952.
Corporate taxes as a percentage of our gross domestic product dropped to 1.2 percent in 2003, compared with as high as 6 percent in the early 1950s.
Corporate profits are booming in part because of lower tax rates.
According to a Northeastern University study, a higher share of the benefits of this recovery has gone to business (as opposed to workers) than in any recovery since World War II.
Multi-national corporations use mechanisms for moving profits around so they can generate more of their profit in places with lower taxes. For example, one recent study by Tax Notes found that subsidiaries of U.S. corporations operating in the top four tax havens (the Netherlands, Ireland, Bermuda, and Luxembourg) had 46.3 percent of their profits in those countries in 2001, but only 9 percent of their employees and 12.6 percent of their plants and equipment.
As globalization mushrooms, the proportion of business being conducted internationally also grows, and with it comes more opportunity to dodge tax obligations.
This is not called “unethical.” This is called “being a smart businessman.”
As a result of these smart business practices, the United States has the largest deficit in its history. The gap between the haves and the have nots continues to grow.
In 2004, 800,000 more people were added to the list of Americans without health insurance, joining the 45 million who were already there.
Poverty is on the rise. In our nation of nearly 300 million people, the number of people living below the poverty line recently hit 37 million, up more than a million in a year.
The reality of poverty can sometimes hide under these kinds of numbers and statistics. Moreover, Americans tend to think of poor people as being responsible for their own economic conditions. So we become numb to these statistics. Poverty is not seen as a disabling factor despite the fact that there is evidence that shows that it is. The key argument behind the current economic system is the trickle down theory of Ronald Reagan. As you recall, trickle down economics is the idea that rich people drive the economy and make our country great; they take all the risks and do all the important, hard work that creates jobs and opportunities. The phrase most often associated with this theory is, "A rising tide lifts all boats."
But now we have evidence that shows -- unequivocally -- that this theory is no longer valid. If we are still convinced that poor people deserve what they have, all we have to do is look at New Orleans. The rising tides that inundated New Orleans in 2005 did not lift any boats. Instead, they drowned a city where close to 25% of the citizens were at or below the poverty line.
Human misery goes unabated.
WHAT’S THE COST OF DOING BUSINESS AS USUAL?
In fiscal 2003, corporate taxes represented just 7.4 percent of federal revenue, down from 32 percent in 1952.
Corporate taxes as a percentage of our gross domestic product dropped to 1.2 percent in 2003, compared with as high as 6 percent in the early 1950s.
Corporate profits are booming in part because of lower tax rates.
According to a Northeastern University study, a higher share of the benefits of this recovery has gone to business (as opposed to workers) than in any recovery since World War II.
Multi-national corporations use mechanisms for moving profits around so they can generate more of their profit in places with lower taxes. For example, one recent study by Tax Notes found that subsidiaries of U.S. corporations operating in the top four tax havens (the Netherlands, Ireland, Bermuda, and Luxembourg) had 46.3 percent of their profits in those countries in 2001, but only 9 percent of their employees and 12.6 percent of their plants and equipment.
As globalization mushrooms, the proportion of business being conducted internationally also grows, and with it comes more opportunity to dodge tax obligations.
This is not called “unethical.” This is called “being a smart businessman.”
As a result of these smart business practices, the United States has the largest deficit in its history. The gap between the haves and the have nots continues to grow.
In 2004, 800,000 more people were added to the list of Americans without health insurance, joining the 45 million who were already there.
Poverty is on the rise. In our nation of nearly 300 million people, the number of people living below the poverty line recently hit 37 million, up more than a million in a year.
The reality of poverty can sometimes hide under these kinds of numbers and statistics. Moreover, Americans tend to think of poor people as being responsible for their own economic conditions. So we become numb to these statistics. Poverty is not seen as a disabling factor despite the fact that there is evidence that shows that it is. The key argument behind the current economic system is the trickle down theory of Ronald Reagan. As you recall, trickle down economics is the idea that rich people drive the economy and make our country great; they take all the risks and do all the important, hard work that creates jobs and opportunities. The phrase most often associated with this theory is, "A rising tide lifts all boats."
But now we have evidence that shows -- unequivocally -- that this theory is no longer valid. If we are still convinced that poor people deserve what they have, all we have to do is look at New Orleans. The rising tides that inundated New Orleans in 2005 did not lift any boats. Instead, they drowned a city where close to 25% of the citizens were at or below the poverty line.
Human misery goes unabated.
WHAT’S THE COST OF DOING BUSINESS AS USUAL?
Competition and Education
The notion of global competitiveness is an antiquated concept that no longer describes the reality of the world we live in. "Competition" only makes sense within a paradigm that pits at least two parties against one another. But, given the interconnected economies of today's societies, there is only one player left: us. So how can competition be possible when there is only one competitor? If we try and beat them, we only harm ourselves. If we beat the Chinese, then Wal-Mart can't buy more cheap stuff. If Wal-Mart can't buy more cheap stuff, Wal-Mart can't sell more cheap stuff. If Wal-Mart can't sell more cheap stuff, Wal-Mart goes bankrupt. If Wal-Mart goes bankrupt, then we can kiss the global economy good-bye.
Therefore, the notion of "the Chinese economy" as distinct from "the U.S. economy" is no longer valid. This is true not only for the above reasons, but also given the fact that Chinese and Japanese central banks together own approximately 43% of all U.S. Treasury securities (Japan holds $720 billion, China $174 billion) and can, therefore, literally decide the fate of the U.S. economy if they wanted to simply by selling their treasury notes, bonds, and bills.
But look at what has been driving public education. Over the last 20 years, so much of the raison d'être of spending public funds -- precious tax-payer dollars! -- on public education is to keep up with the Soviets, . . . er, . . . Russians, . . . I mean Chinese. (The bad guy keeps changing.) So what would happen if the focus of public education was turned from keeping up with the Soviets/Russians/Chinese to something else? What if we shifted the conversation away from this now-defunct objective to something like -- I dunno -- global sustainability? It may seem trivial, but it would significantly alter the mission and purpose of public education, moving from a view that the world is filled with people that we have to beat in a heated competition for limited resources (current global competition view) to a view that the world is filled with people that depend on each other for their mutual survival. Again, this is not the stuff of feel-good new-agers singing Kumbaya. It's the lived and breathed experience of how the world actually operates now.
It's not the job of teachers to make students more competitive with the Chinese given that such competition serves the interests of corporations, not the larger interests of U.S. society. As David Stratman argues, "Beginning with A Nation At Risk, nearly all of the education reform plans have been couched in terms of one great national purpose: business competition. According to these plans, the great goal and measure of national and educational progress is how effectively U.S. corporations compete with Japanese and German corporations in the international marketplace. I think that most educators - most people, in fact - are downright uncomfortable with the idea that the fulfillment of our human potential is best measured by the Gross National Product or the progress of Microsoft or General Motors stock on the Big Board."
Sure, business should have a say in the future of education. But not the only say. Sure, we should think about how our schools help prepare students for the world of work. But that's not the only thing we should think about.
In a very real sense, "we" depend on "them" for our economic survival. So isn't it time we started talking more about collaborating and less about competing? Is it really to our benefit to see us ranked at the top of a list of other nations? Given the interconnected reality of today’s world, do we really benefit by other countries not being able to read or write as well as we do?
Our system of public education, in assuring the prosperity of other nations, would guarantee its own prosperity. We can still act with our own interests in mind. But we have to accept that what we do to the interconnected web, we do to ourselves. And that our own interests are increasingly shared by others. Given that the Chinese already make important contributions to our high standard of living every time we go shopping – especially at Wal-Mart --, what are we afraid of?
We just might find that when we stop treating people like the enemy, they stop being the enemy.
Therefore, the notion of "the Chinese economy" as distinct from "the U.S. economy" is no longer valid. This is true not only for the above reasons, but also given the fact that Chinese and Japanese central banks together own approximately 43% of all U.S. Treasury securities (Japan holds $720 billion, China $174 billion) and can, therefore, literally decide the fate of the U.S. economy if they wanted to simply by selling their treasury notes, bonds, and bills.
But look at what has been driving public education. Over the last 20 years, so much of the raison d'être of spending public funds -- precious tax-payer dollars! -- on public education is to keep up with the Soviets, . . . er, . . . Russians, . . . I mean Chinese. (The bad guy keeps changing.) So what would happen if the focus of public education was turned from keeping up with the Soviets/Russians/Chinese to something else? What if we shifted the conversation away from this now-defunct objective to something like -- I dunno -- global sustainability? It may seem trivial, but it would significantly alter the mission and purpose of public education, moving from a view that the world is filled with people that we have to beat in a heated competition for limited resources (current global competition view) to a view that the world is filled with people that depend on each other for their mutual survival. Again, this is not the stuff of feel-good new-agers singing Kumbaya. It's the lived and breathed experience of how the world actually operates now.
It's not the job of teachers to make students more competitive with the Chinese given that such competition serves the interests of corporations, not the larger interests of U.S. society. As David Stratman argues, "Beginning with A Nation At Risk, nearly all of the education reform plans have been couched in terms of one great national purpose: business competition. According to these plans, the great goal and measure of national and educational progress is how effectively U.S. corporations compete with Japanese and German corporations in the international marketplace. I think that most educators - most people, in fact - are downright uncomfortable with the idea that the fulfillment of our human potential is best measured by the Gross National Product or the progress of Microsoft or General Motors stock on the Big Board."
Sure, business should have a say in the future of education. But not the only say. Sure, we should think about how our schools help prepare students for the world of work. But that's not the only thing we should think about.
In a very real sense, "we" depend on "them" for our economic survival. So isn't it time we started talking more about collaborating and less about competing? Is it really to our benefit to see us ranked at the top of a list of other nations? Given the interconnected reality of today’s world, do we really benefit by other countries not being able to read or write as well as we do?
Our system of public education, in assuring the prosperity of other nations, would guarantee its own prosperity. We can still act with our own interests in mind. But we have to accept that what we do to the interconnected web, we do to ourselves. And that our own interests are increasingly shared by others. Given that the Chinese already make important contributions to our high standard of living every time we go shopping – especially at Wal-Mart --, what are we afraid of?
We just might find that when we stop treating people like the enemy, they stop being the enemy.
One Test Tells You All You Need to Know
The Doctor’s Office
VO: Think one test can tell you everything you need to know about your health?
Doctor: Open your mouth please and say “ah.”
Patient: “Ah.”
Doctor frowns.
Doctor: I’m afraid you’ve got brain cancer.
Patient: What?? Brain cancer?? But you just looked at my throat! How do you know I have brain cancer?
Doctor: Well, the test is conclusive: your throat is pretty red.
Patient: But what does a sore throat have to do with brain cancer???
Doctor: Sir, I am a trained physician. I know what I’m talking about. The test says you have brain cancer, so you have brain cancer.
Doctor assumes smug pose; patient looks at camera with a look of horror and surprise. Freeze.
VO: It’s ridiculous to think that one test can tell you all you need to know about your health. But under No Child Left Behind, the Bush administration’s education law, a single test is used to tell if schools are failing or not. That makes no sense. But schools that are labeled failures can be taken over by private, for-profit companies. And that makes dollars AND cents for Bush.
Animation: “No Child Left Behind” transforms into “No Public School Left Standing”
VO: End the Bush administration’s attack on public schools before it’s too late.
Click here to see the movie.
(takes about a minute to load -- please be patient)
VO: Think one test can tell you everything you need to know about your health?
Doctor: Open your mouth please and say “ah.”
Patient: “Ah.”
Doctor frowns.
Doctor: I’m afraid you’ve got brain cancer.
Patient: What?? Brain cancer?? But you just looked at my throat! How do you know I have brain cancer?
Doctor: Well, the test is conclusive: your throat is pretty red.
Patient: But what does a sore throat have to do with brain cancer???
Doctor: Sir, I am a trained physician. I know what I’m talking about. The test says you have brain cancer, so you have brain cancer.
Doctor assumes smug pose; patient looks at camera with a look of horror and surprise. Freeze.
VO: It’s ridiculous to think that one test can tell you all you need to know about your health. But under No Child Left Behind, the Bush administration’s education law, a single test is used to tell if schools are failing or not. That makes no sense. But schools that are labeled failures can be taken over by private, for-profit companies. And that makes dollars AND cents for Bush.
Animation: “No Child Left Behind” transforms into “No Public School Left Standing”
VO: End the Bush administration’s attack on public schools before it’s too late.
Click here to see the movie.
(takes about a minute to load -- please be patient)
The Business of School
Private, for-profit companies that run public schools have a different mission than their public counterparts. The mission of public schools is to serve students, while the mission of private educational companies is to make a profit. Public schools must answer to the public. Private companies must answer to their investors.
Now, admittedly, we in the general public are "invested" in the success of children, and we are "invested" in how they will be raised and the decisions they will make. After all, they will inherit the planet after we're finished. So the future is quite literally in their hands. But being "invested" in schools and children is a far cry from being an investor in schools and children.
Consider the insights by Wall Street analyst Jerry Herman. Writing in The Wall Street Transcript, Herman says, “NCLB is a big opportunity because it layers in an expanded source of funding. The dollars devoted to Title I now approach $12.5 billion and are up about 35% since NCLB was signed into law. The dollar flow is significant, and perhaps more important, it now appears that the decision makers - principals and superintendents - have an improving understanding of requirements under the law and how to access funding.” Herman concludes, “From an investment perspective, we are more intrigued with the K-12 sector than we've been in many years.”
Herman's colleague, Robert Craig, agrees. Also writing in The Wall Street Transcript, Craig says, "“We continue to see estimates of over 10,000 failing schools, and that encompasses an awful lot of kids. These kids and their families have choices in terms of supplemental education services like tutoring or school alternatives if their school continues to fail. Certain areas like testing in assessment, teacher development and supplemental education services are attractive, and each has significant growth potential.” Craig concludes, “Overall, we think that the K-12 business is starting to improve, and we are actively looking for ways to capitalize on it and invest in that segment.”
The decisions that businesses make are *business* decisions. When making such decisions, business interests ask things such as, "How can we do this for the least amount of money possible?" versus "How can we do this well?" The decisions that get made are made because they are cheaper and can satisfy a lot of customers and therefore make the business more money. And because large corporations are publicly-traded and are owned by shareholders, they absolutely must show increasing revenues and profits to satisfy shareholders. That's OK with me. But what's not OK with me is that the businesses that run schools have their shareholders' interests ahead of my children's interests. These companies can say that they are committed to running great schools and they can say they are committed to students and parents. But the interests of students and parents are completely different than the interests of shareholders. When faced with a decision that involves having to choose between students and shareholders, businesses must choose shareholders because shareholders are what keep businesses in business. If a business alienates its shareholders and chooses to serve students ahead of shareholders, that business will go out of business very quickly. Ironically -- perversely, even -- private, for-profit educational businesses must stay in business in order to do business. And in order to stay in business, they have to do the business that shareholders demand of them.
There are lots of words we could use to describe schools. The one that's used most frequently these days is the word "efficient." This word is used to describe a number of charter schools that appear to produce better learning for less money. Conversely, the word "inefficient" is used to describe traditional public schools, particularly urban schools. The implicit assumption is that inefficient schools need to be made efficient, and that if they are made more efficient, then all will be well.
While it is altogether appropriate to discuss businesses in terms of efficiency, it is less appropriate to do so when discussing schools. After all, what are public schools supposed to be efficient at? And what does efficiency have to do with it? What does efficiency have to do with learning? If you learned efficiently, what would this look like? If you learned more for less money, what would this look like? If you could learn more by cutting expenses, what would this look like?
Good teachers worry less about whether they can replicate a particular process and more about producing a valid learning solution for each child. This is primarily due to the fact that each child learns differently and that each child requires a unique approach that is specific to his or her needs. We accept that no two people are exactly alike, but we quickly forget that no two children are exactly alike. Because no two children are exactly the same, no two children learn in exactly the same way. Children are not widgets, so they shouldn’t be taught in such a way that suggests they are. In other words, teaching is an inherently inefficient process. If your goal is to make teaching and learning efficient, you'll create mass-produced, one-size-fits-all solutions. In other words, you won't be teaching at all anymore. And students won't be learning. You may have achieved efficiency, but you will have done so at the expense of teaching and learning.
I used to work in the for-profit software development business. As a software developer, I learned that someone may have an extraordinarily good idea for improving a product. And lots and lots of people may have requested this improvement. So you talk to your engineers and programmers. You say, "OK, how long will it take you guys to do this?" So they do their analysis and come back with an answer. They tell you that not only will it take x amount of time, but it will also mean that a,b, and c functions will need to change as a result. So you talk to your interaction designers and graphic artists and ask them to figure out a way to accommodate these updated functions through a mock-up of what the tool will look like and how it will work. They come back with an estimate of how much time this will take to do. You then hand all these data off to your folks in accounting and ask them to figure out how much it will cost to make this great new change. The accounting folks do their number crunching and report back to the CIO, the CFO, and the CEO. They come back with the bottom line: "We can't do this. It will cost too much."
As it turned out, the tools I designed for this commercial developer were never built because we could not afford to build them. They were great tools and would have greatly benefitted teachers and students. But there was no way to quickly and easily recoup the cost of developing them, and there was no way to ongoingly "monetize" them. So I experienced first-hand that good ideas are not necessarily the ideas that get developed. I learned first-hand that the software development business, like any other business, is about realizing efficiencies, reducing inefficiencies, maximizing profit and productivity, and looking to leverage the buying power of economies of scale.
Schools are not supposed to be trying to reduce inefficiencies, cut costs, and maximize profits. They are supposed to be educating children.
Now, admittedly, we in the general public are "invested" in the success of children, and we are "invested" in how they will be raised and the decisions they will make. After all, they will inherit the planet after we're finished. So the future is quite literally in their hands. But being "invested" in schools and children is a far cry from being an investor in schools and children.
Consider the insights by Wall Street analyst Jerry Herman. Writing in The Wall Street Transcript, Herman says, “NCLB is a big opportunity because it layers in an expanded source of funding. The dollars devoted to Title I now approach $12.5 billion and are up about 35% since NCLB was signed into law. The dollar flow is significant, and perhaps more important, it now appears that the decision makers - principals and superintendents - have an improving understanding of requirements under the law and how to access funding.” Herman concludes, “From an investment perspective, we are more intrigued with the K-12 sector than we've been in many years.”
Herman's colleague, Robert Craig, agrees. Also writing in The Wall Street Transcript, Craig says, "“We continue to see estimates of over 10,000 failing schools, and that encompasses an awful lot of kids. These kids and their families have choices in terms of supplemental education services like tutoring or school alternatives if their school continues to fail. Certain areas like testing in assessment, teacher development and supplemental education services are attractive, and each has significant growth potential.” Craig concludes, “Overall, we think that the K-12 business is starting to improve, and we are actively looking for ways to capitalize on it and invest in that segment.”
The decisions that businesses make are *business* decisions. When making such decisions, business interests ask things such as, "How can we do this for the least amount of money possible?" versus "How can we do this well?" The decisions that get made are made because they are cheaper and can satisfy a lot of customers and therefore make the business more money. And because large corporations are publicly-traded and are owned by shareholders, they absolutely must show increasing revenues and profits to satisfy shareholders. That's OK with me. But what's not OK with me is that the businesses that run schools have their shareholders' interests ahead of my children's interests. These companies can say that they are committed to running great schools and they can say they are committed to students and parents. But the interests of students and parents are completely different than the interests of shareholders. When faced with a decision that involves having to choose between students and shareholders, businesses must choose shareholders because shareholders are what keep businesses in business. If a business alienates its shareholders and chooses to serve students ahead of shareholders, that business will go out of business very quickly. Ironically -- perversely, even -- private, for-profit educational businesses must stay in business in order to do business. And in order to stay in business, they have to do the business that shareholders demand of them.
There are lots of words we could use to describe schools. The one that's used most frequently these days is the word "efficient." This word is used to describe a number of charter schools that appear to produce better learning for less money. Conversely, the word "inefficient" is used to describe traditional public schools, particularly urban schools. The implicit assumption is that inefficient schools need to be made efficient, and that if they are made more efficient, then all will be well.
While it is altogether appropriate to discuss businesses in terms of efficiency, it is less appropriate to do so when discussing schools. After all, what are public schools supposed to be efficient at? And what does efficiency have to do with it? What does efficiency have to do with learning? If you learned efficiently, what would this look like? If you learned more for less money, what would this look like? If you could learn more by cutting expenses, what would this look like?
Good teachers worry less about whether they can replicate a particular process and more about producing a valid learning solution for each child. This is primarily due to the fact that each child learns differently and that each child requires a unique approach that is specific to his or her needs. We accept that no two people are exactly alike, but we quickly forget that no two children are exactly alike. Because no two children are exactly the same, no two children learn in exactly the same way. Children are not widgets, so they shouldn’t be taught in such a way that suggests they are. In other words, teaching is an inherently inefficient process. If your goal is to make teaching and learning efficient, you'll create mass-produced, one-size-fits-all solutions. In other words, you won't be teaching at all anymore. And students won't be learning. You may have achieved efficiency, but you will have done so at the expense of teaching and learning.
I used to work in the for-profit software development business. As a software developer, I learned that someone may have an extraordinarily good idea for improving a product. And lots and lots of people may have requested this improvement. So you talk to your engineers and programmers. You say, "OK, how long will it take you guys to do this?" So they do their analysis and come back with an answer. They tell you that not only will it take x amount of time, but it will also mean that a,b, and c functions will need to change as a result. So you talk to your interaction designers and graphic artists and ask them to figure out a way to accommodate these updated functions through a mock-up of what the tool will look like and how it will work. They come back with an estimate of how much time this will take to do. You then hand all these data off to your folks in accounting and ask them to figure out how much it will cost to make this great new change. The accounting folks do their number crunching and report back to the CIO, the CFO, and the CEO. They come back with the bottom line: "We can't do this. It will cost too much."
As it turned out, the tools I designed for this commercial developer were never built because we could not afford to build them. They were great tools and would have greatly benefitted teachers and students. But there was no way to quickly and easily recoup the cost of developing them, and there was no way to ongoingly "monetize" them. So I experienced first-hand that good ideas are not necessarily the ideas that get developed. I learned first-hand that the software development business, like any other business, is about realizing efficiencies, reducing inefficiencies, maximizing profit and productivity, and looking to leverage the buying power of economies of scale.
Schools are not supposed to be trying to reduce inefficiencies, cut costs, and maximize profits. They are supposed to be educating children.
Monday, January 09, 2006
Closing the Achievement Gap: What It Would Take
The Bush administration announced last fall that it wants to spend $100 billion and put a man on the moon. No one in the administration, apparently, has the heart to tell President Bush that we already did that -- in 1969.
If we want a mission on the scale of Kennedy's 1961 vision of putting a man on the moon by the end of the decade, then let's look at the contemporary equivalent of a moon-shot: eradicating the achievement gap between the haves and the have nots by the year 2013.
Sound crazy? Good. That means it fits in with Kennedy's wacko proclamation: it's seven years from the time of pronouncement to the time of execution.
Richard Rothstein, writing in his book _Class and Schools_, writes that adding the price of health, early childhood, after-school, and summer programs, the down payment on closing the achievement gap would probably increase the annual cost of education for children who attend schools where at least 40% of the enrolled children have low incomes by about $12,500 per pupil over and above the $8,000 already being spent. In total, this means about a $156 billion added annual national cost to provide these programs to low-income children.
Sound like a lot of money? Perfect. Initial NASA estimates of the costs of Project Apollo were about $20 billion through the end of the decade, a figure approaching $200 billion in contemporary dollars when accounting for inflation.
$156 billion is a lot of money. And there's little chance we'd get it done by 2013. But compared to putting another man on the moon, I'd rather spend money on helping children and families. Compared to spending $200 billion -- and counting -- on invading and rebuilding Iraq, I'd rather do something substantive for the future of the country. And although there's no guarantee that we could close the achievement gap in seven years, it's still worth approaching as if it were possible.
So what would it take to close the achievement gap between rich families and poor families?
1. smaller class sizes at every level
2. comprehensive social services so no child has to go without food, shelter, medicine, and dental care
3. adequate prenatal care and postnatal follow-up so children reach school age healthy
4. free, high-quality, universal pre-K that is developmentally appropriate
5. parent education for young parents
6. comprehensive job training and placement for parents at a real living wage
7. universal healthcare coverage for all Americans, especially the poor and "working poor"
8. free, high-quality onsite child-care or free transportation to and from child-care facilities to make it possible for parents to work and raise children
9. high-quality training and ongoing professional development for elementary teachers in reading instruction (not drill-and-kill phonics)
10. high-quality training and ongoing professional development for all teachers in classroom-based formative assessment
I can hear the objections now: "These are all nice feel good things to do and there may be some good reasons for doing them, but what evidence is there that they would actually narrow the achievement gap?"
Imagine if we applied this logic to Bush's argument about the war on terror, especially the invasion of Iraq. We would say, "Mr. President, these are all nice things to do and there may be good reasons for doing them, but what evidence is there they would actually end the war on terror and make the world safer?"
The clock is till ticking in Iraq, with no end whatsoever in sight. But that doesn't stop the Bush administration from pouring billions and billions of dollars into it every week.
So let's make a deal: let's take the money we are spending to go back to the moon -- $100 billion -- and the money we are spending in Iraq -- $200 billion and counting -- and let's spend it on closing the achievement gap. Then let's look at the results. If we spend $300 billion and achieve absolutely nothing in trying to close the achievement gap, then I grant the nay-sayers full license to run through the streets, shouting, "More money is not the answer!" But until such time, I respectfully assert the following: (1) this country has finally realized that we have a serious poverty problem, (2) rocks are hard, water is wet, the sky is blue, and poverty shapes whether children can learn or not, and (3) we have to do something about it – now.
Recall the words of Kennedy after making the famous moon declaration: "We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win."
So we choose to close the achievement gap not because it is easy, but because it is hard, because this goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win.
If we want a mission on the scale of Kennedy's 1961 vision of putting a man on the moon by the end of the decade, then let's look at the contemporary equivalent of a moon-shot: eradicating the achievement gap between the haves and the have nots by the year 2013.
Sound crazy? Good. That means it fits in with Kennedy's wacko proclamation: it's seven years from the time of pronouncement to the time of execution.
Richard Rothstein, writing in his book _Class and Schools_, writes that adding the price of health, early childhood, after-school, and summer programs, the down payment on closing the achievement gap would probably increase the annual cost of education for children who attend schools where at least 40% of the enrolled children have low incomes by about $12,500 per pupil over and above the $8,000 already being spent. In total, this means about a $156 billion added annual national cost to provide these programs to low-income children.
Sound like a lot of money? Perfect. Initial NASA estimates of the costs of Project Apollo were about $20 billion through the end of the decade, a figure approaching $200 billion in contemporary dollars when accounting for inflation.
$156 billion is a lot of money. And there's little chance we'd get it done by 2013. But compared to putting another man on the moon, I'd rather spend money on helping children and families. Compared to spending $200 billion -- and counting -- on invading and rebuilding Iraq, I'd rather do something substantive for the future of the country. And although there's no guarantee that we could close the achievement gap in seven years, it's still worth approaching as if it were possible.
So what would it take to close the achievement gap between rich families and poor families?
1. smaller class sizes at every level
2. comprehensive social services so no child has to go without food, shelter, medicine, and dental care
3. adequate prenatal care and postnatal follow-up so children reach school age healthy
4. free, high-quality, universal pre-K that is developmentally appropriate
5. parent education for young parents
6. comprehensive job training and placement for parents at a real living wage
7. universal healthcare coverage for all Americans, especially the poor and "working poor"
8. free, high-quality onsite child-care or free transportation to and from child-care facilities to make it possible for parents to work and raise children
9. high-quality training and ongoing professional development for elementary teachers in reading instruction (not drill-and-kill phonics)
10. high-quality training and ongoing professional development for all teachers in classroom-based formative assessment
I can hear the objections now: "These are all nice feel good things to do and there may be some good reasons for doing them, but what evidence is there that they would actually narrow the achievement gap?"
Imagine if we applied this logic to Bush's argument about the war on terror, especially the invasion of Iraq. We would say, "Mr. President, these are all nice things to do and there may be good reasons for doing them, but what evidence is there they would actually end the war on terror and make the world safer?"
The clock is till ticking in Iraq, with no end whatsoever in sight. But that doesn't stop the Bush administration from pouring billions and billions of dollars into it every week.
So let's make a deal: let's take the money we are spending to go back to the moon -- $100 billion -- and the money we are spending in Iraq -- $200 billion and counting -- and let's spend it on closing the achievement gap. Then let's look at the results. If we spend $300 billion and achieve absolutely nothing in trying to close the achievement gap, then I grant the nay-sayers full license to run through the streets, shouting, "More money is not the answer!" But until such time, I respectfully assert the following: (1) this country has finally realized that we have a serious poverty problem, (2) rocks are hard, water is wet, the sky is blue, and poverty shapes whether children can learn or not, and (3) we have to do something about it – now.
Recall the words of Kennedy after making the famous moon declaration: "We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win."
So we choose to close the achievement gap not because it is easy, but because it is hard, because this goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win.
Accountability Is U.S.
Every child should start kindergarten at the same level of readiness. Every parent should have equal access to economic opportunities. Every parent should have access to the tools and resources they need to raise healthy children. These responsibilities do not belong to our public schools. It is up to the local, state, and federal governments to do their fair share in shouldering these responsibilities. Accountability applies to everyone, not just public schools. We need to keep this in mind as we ask ourselves, “What can we do to help our children?" and “What can we do to improve our schools?” School reform is not simply about reforming schools.
The Dire Mechanics of NCLB
In this animated presentation, the mechanics of NCLB are broken into a simple conclusion: public schools will either succeed or fail. Failure will likely lead to the privatization of public education and take-over by large corporate entities, e.g., Edison. "Success," however, means that schools will either (1) turn into test prep factories that focus exclusively on raising test scores or (2) continue the trend towards increased segregation under which poor students and students of color receive a qualitatively inferior education than their wealthy (mostly white) peers receive. In Chicago, by the academic year 2002-2003, 87 percent of public-school enrollment was black or Hispanic; less than 10 percent of children in the schools were white. In Washington, D.C., 94 percent of children were black or Hispanic; less than 5 percent were white. In St. Louis, 82 percent of the student population was black or Hispanic.
The piece ends by sketching out a vision of what a "fully developed human" is and then asks, (1) "Do standardized test scores tell us if we are producing fully developed humans?", (2) "CAN standardized test scores tell us if we are producing fully developed humans?" It concludes with this proclamation: "Whether they can, do, or should, standardized test scores dominate the time, energy, and passions of our schools. The question is: should they?"
http://netdrive.montclair.edu/~campbellp/nclb_animation_2.mov
The piece ends by sketching out a vision of what a "fully developed human" is and then asks, (1) "Do standardized test scores tell us if we are producing fully developed humans?", (2) "CAN standardized test scores tell us if we are producing fully developed humans?" It concludes with this proclamation: "Whether they can, do, or should, standardized test scores dominate the time, energy, and passions of our schools. The question is: should they?"
http://netdrive.montclair.edu/~campbellp/nclb_animation_2.mov
No School Left Standing - The NCLB Memo
Here's the story of a school that takes NCLB seriously. Although the school is fictitious, what happens to it has already happened and is already happening to thousands of schools across the country.
http://netdrive.montclair.edu/~campbellp/no_school_left_standing.html
(at the end, it takes you to a broken link - please ignore)
http://netdrive.montclair.edu/~campbellp/no_school_left_standing.html
(at the end, it takes you to a broken link - please ignore)
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