Education reform policy paper

Belated learning

2009-08-16T08:25:00.008-04:00

Three days into my experiment with Google Ads to direct readers to the paper, I find myself more than impressed. Since initiating the experiment, the initiative has generated 11 clicks from 16,056 impressions. (Since beginning in December 2007, the site, has 474 visits from 39 states and 23 countries resulting in 942 pageviews - an average of 1.99 pages per visit - with an average time on site of 2 minutes). These visitors are spending demonstrably more time on the site than when the paper was left to fend for itself. More than two years late, I have learned the right way to attract interested readers.

When using Google Ads, you set a daily budget that you are willing to spend, and identify a series of keywords relevant to your ad. Initially my keywords were very specific to education and unsuccessful; but when I added the broader, more popular "education" keyword, impressions and clicks jumped. Based on your daily budget, Google automatically places a bid among all competing ads on that keyword to determine the order your ad appears alongside page results. I've learned that writing multiple iterations of an ad is most helpful (and Google optimizes your results by showing the more successful ads more often).

The question to come is whether this uptick in visits and time spent will translate into increased interaction (through comments or direct contact) or references by other websites. Now, after realizing that this was the right way to go about sharing the paper all along, I'm continuing with the experiment to further optimize performance. Most visitors view only the homepage before leaving (55% start at the homepage and 38% end there). Now, I am using multiple ads focusing on the entirety of the paper and more specific ones focusing on just national standards or funding that go directly to the relevant article. By doing so, the hope would be that readers engage with the content and are more likely to click through to other parts of the paper, thereby lowering the number of quick entries and exits.

Learning how to share

2009-08-14T15:37:00.008-04:00

When I posted the paper online almost two years ago, my intention was to shift away from one-off contacts and instead build a sustainable degree of traffic to criticize and comment on the paper in advance of its submission in consideration for a scholarship. While this site did succeed in opening the paper to a broader audience and facilitated unexpected opportunities, its success was still relatively muted.

I have always been interested in the intersection of business, policy, and economics. This portfolio is but one of many papers that I have written over the past few years. With each I have utilized contacts with relevant experience to share the paper in question or have reached out to authors whose thoughts I'd read online or in the media. Again, while generally successful, the effort is time consuming and builds little momentum. As this paper's blog has shown, it is difficult even to share one's ideas online.

Enter an experiment. For the next two weeks, I'll be using a $15 placement on Google Ads (see image) to advertise the paper and to track its ability to turn related search queries on education reform into pageviews. If successful, the blog will have generated much more pageviews (and potentially new criticism) at a fraction of the cost in time and effort one would otherwise exert. In effect, I am paying Google to get others to read the paper. I value outsider's thoughts so much that, if successful, I will extend this approach to share my other concept papers.

As of 4pm today, after starting in mid-morning, the effort has produced 175 impressions (views of my blog's advertisement), but no clickthroughs. Of those 175 impressions, 132 were on Google's website (where on average they appeared as the 3rd ad); and 43 on outside websites. I'll keep you posted on the experiment.

Maryland PRIDE Award

2009-08-14T10:35:00.004-04:00

I was honored to learn that the Maryland State Department of Education has recognized me as a recipient of the department's Pride award, "an initiative designed to recognize and applaud the outstanding accomplishments taking place in Maryland public schools."

Profile in the Calvert Recorder

2009-08-14T10:30:00.003-04:00

Huntingtown student gets national recognition
Gretchen Phillips. Calvert Recorder
October 10, 2008

"What started as an extracurricular project made one local high school student $10,000 richer toward his college endeavors.
Kyle Hutzler, 16, was the recent recipient of a Davidson Fellows scholarship by the Davidson Institute of Talent Development for an essay he wrote on education reform."

Davidson ceremony

2008-10-01T18:21:00.005-04:00

On September 24th, my family and I were honored to attend the Davidson Fellows ceremony at the Library of Congress, where I was delighted to meet this year's nineteen other fellows, Senator Cardin of Maryland, Roberto Rodriguez, education policy adviser to Senator Kennedy, and the Institute's founders, Jan and Bob Davidsion.

The Davidson Fellowship

2008-06-28T09:35:00.005-04:00

28 June 2008

Dear Friends:

It is my sincere pleasure to inform you that I have been selected as a 2008 Davidson Fellow for my policy paper on education reform.

On 24 September, I will be recognized alongside some of the most promising scientists, artists, and writers of my generation at the Library of Congress, where I will receive a $10,000 scholarship.

To all of you who have played a part in this project, offering your insight, your platform, your nominations, and your best wishes, this award is the highest thanks that I can offer you.

I began this project with a quotation by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.: "Man's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions." At this culmination of our shared endeavor, I cannot help but turn to Robert Frost. It was he who wrote, "But I have promises to keep. / And miles to go before I sleep."

And miles to go,
Kyle Hutzler.

Où est le dénoûment?

2008-03-11T20:41:00.006-04:00

The portfolio and application materials were Priority-mailed to the Fellowship in Reno, Nevada on Monday; today, I received confirmation from the USPS of their arrival and am waiting for a similar confirmation from the Fellowship . It feels great to have brought this paper to fruition - for now, my work is limited to checking with my advisers to ensure that their necessary forms have been sent by deadline. I'll continue to post updates on the project and scholarship. More than ever, I appreciate your comments, your insights - and your luck! kah

Statistics

2008-02-22T11:57:00.004-05:00

Since publishing the paper online in December, the paper has received 315 pageviews on 157 visits from nine countries, including Canada and Australia. In the U.S., where the majority of pageviews have originated, the paper has received hits from 27 states where Maryland, California, and Texas are the most popular sources.

History is not kind to idlers, Je le vous diray, and First are the most popular articles excluding the front page. 46.5% of visits come from referrers (ed421.com is the largest), 27.39% from search engines, and 26.11% directly.

One step closer

2008-02-18T11:03:00.005-05:00

As I finish my guest-blogging tenure at ChangeAgency, my work towards the Davidson Fellowship is now all but complete. I have secured the three nominators required to submit the paper, and have finished the required process essays and video commentary. Most importantly, I have completed the paper's transition to the new graphic design layout that I previewed in some of the first posts. I am excited to post the near-final paper (PDF).

It's becoming ever more exciting in the final weeks before the paper goes out the door (with all the necessary copies and additional elements, I am only beginning to imagine how much postage for the project will be. I offer my tremendous thanks to the some fifteen educators from around the country who have intensively offered their insights to the project - from the editorial to substantive. The support that I have received has been most unexpected - and even more welcome. (Today, I am glad to add Dr. Joseph Bishop at Eastern Michigan University to the list of advisers.)

In the next few weeks, I'll be posting additional updates as I finish the project. Until then - only the best.

A welcome to Change Agency readers

2008-01-06T11:35:00.000-05:00

I've been asked by Stephanie Sandifer at Change Agency to be a guest blogger from January 11th to the end of February. It promises be an exciting opportunity to move this paper ever closer to its aspiration of being a part of the necessary debate over education reform. I'm thinking through what to post at the moment - my biggest concern is how to best present the essence (if not totality) of the paper. Beyond a first, introductory post, I'll need to think about concisely (and coherently) presenting the paper's analysis, positions, and policy proposals.

I'll be responding intensively to comments - Change Agency has upwards of 70 "listeners" on Feedburner - throughout my tenure. I welcome your criticism and opinions - especially in the areas of policy. The Davidson Fellowship expects its submissions to be of graduate-level quality. I ask: how would you assess the paper's quality? What additional research, books, and theories should I consider in the final months before submission?

As I've noted before, the interconnectedness of the Internet means that once you've been brought into the echo chamber, your voice tends to spread increasingly quicker and louder as others tune in and serve as a conduit in spreading your message even further along. I'm close to reaching the level of sustainable readership that will allow the paper to reach more and more people. I'm looking forward to interacting with you all in the next month. Thanks for welcoming me into the debate.

Update | Posts on Change Agency:
Flattening out and shaking up | Hapless, utterly hapless | The politics of choice, accountability, and autonomy | Houses of vacuous ability | Blog, meet thesis| Introduction

Three sides of the same debate

2007-12-26T13:11:00.000-05:00

I hope that you all head a pleasant holiday. I've finished my working draft of Choice, accountability, and autonomy and published it for your review and comment. An introduction:

For the past decade, the debate over school reform has been fragmented into three debates: one of choice, one of freedom, and one of accountability. Choice remains dominated by the championing of voucher programs - an approach that this paper believes only serves to stratify the education system into schools of the poor and privileged. The continual rejection of voucher initiatives - most recently in Utah - speaks to the movement's ineffectiveness. Freedom has reached the forefront most specifically in the debate over charter schools - and with it, concerns over accountability. It is accountability, undoubtedly, that has been at the center of these three debates: it is a shorter word for the No Child Left Behind Act.

Rather disconcertingly, these ideas have remained more as points of disagreement than being embraced, as this paper sees it, as complementary. As this paper has argued, the No Child Left Behind Act is failing precisely because it lacks the flexibility (and incentives) necessary to enable schools to extend their efforts beyond the test alone. The result is an environment that avoids risks - and potentially great returns.

Giving the numbers a word of thought

2007-12-16T13:38:00.000-05:00

When I launched this portal several weeks ago, I hoped that it would serve as the center of the conversation and criticism of this paper prior to its submission for the Davidson Fellowship. My hope was that I could vastly expand the paper's reach and the potential input than one-off contacts.

I never harbored the illusion that a passive approach would secure the level of readership and criticism that I desired - indeed, I've written six education blogs thus far - most with readerships in the low hundreds. The thinking goes that if featured on only one blog, there'd be a sufficient number of bloggers apart of that readership to propel the criticism around the paper to a sustainable level. After all, Wikipedia started 2002 with 19,000 English-language articles; by January of this year the site boasted more than 1.56 million. If placed in book form, the encyclopedia would encompass 65 volumes.

The statistics:
Google Analytics first began recording visitors on 3 December. Since then, Kansas has gotten 37 visits from 24 visitors - predominantly from the United States, but a visit each from the UK and Germany. Within the U.S., Maryland has the most visits (thanks to my skewing them), followed by Alaska, and D.C. (see graphic). The paper's gotten upwards of 90 pageviews - 37.78% the home page, followed by History Is Not Kind to Idlers with 12.22%, and The cast of characters.

Giving the numbers a word of thought
When I had the opportunity to talk to an economist about a development proposal earlier this year, I handed him the paper I had written. He refused to read it, until I could give him a 30-second and 1-minute synopsis. It is the most important thing I learned this year. The statistics thus far have caused for a good deal of questioning about how to present the paper - how do you present an 80-page paper in the online equivalent of a 30-second and 1-minute synopsis?

I'm being forced to learn and apply a great deal about the dynamics of the internet fairly swiftly: The internet is a sideways one, only 20% of the Washington Post's traffic originates at the home page. That, of course, was the reason behind writing bloggers - and posting an article from the paper on Digg. Thus far: 29% of the traffic is direct, 54% from referring sites, and 16% from search engines. But what more can I do?

On the passive approach, I've added the e-mail option to the bottom of each post; the day before, I added a Technorati button. Should I add del.icio.us too? The aggressive approach thus far has been limited to writing the blogs - from which the response has been modest to nonexistent. A look at my tags column shows some fifty descriptors, but a great majority link to only one article. Perhaps the descriptions should be intensified.

Blogs, for better or for worse, are a medium that enjoys extensive analysis of minute soundbites. With an 80-page paper, was it a mistake to not have a soundbite page for bloggers to refer to when I write them? (I had planned to add a criticisms and praise page as soon as I had received a sufficient number.)

Doug Noon's response to my introduction on InPractice is all too telling:

Kyle,
I took a look at your site, and I’m going to need a while longer to work through even a small portion of what you have there. I’m interested on a number of levels - what you have to say, what prompted you to tackle this project, how it got so large, and how your point of view as a student contributes to your research - off the top of my head. To begin with I wonder how an interest in “business, economics, and finance” prompted you to look so closely at Education. I’ve been called an overachiever by some. I wrote a 200 page masters project paper on communication in the mathematics classroom, proving all those people were right, much to my own embarrassment. I know how it feels to dump so much energy into something that few people will ever notice.

Not quite a blog
I wouldn't consider this site a blog in any traditional sense - its simply the easiest means to allow a community to collaborate. This paper's style - length and all - differentiates it from most traditional posts. Is the failure to update the site - regardless of its impossibility for this type of work - the reason why it has been slow to take off thus far? Is this the critical fallacy?

Regardless, there's more to come in the next few weeks: I'm finishing an essay on choice, accountability, and autonomy as well as a more extensive justification of this paper's proposals to better synthesize the policy paper. As I begin to prepare for submission to the Davidson Fellowship, I'll comment on the process as well as post the required submission essays.

I love quotations. My favorite is from Robert Frost's Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening: "But I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep."

Only the best.

Update

2007-12-08T13:41:00.001-05:00

I have completed the transfer from PDFs to posts to foster greater collaboration directly through this site. Links to the original PDFs will be embedded in the posts for printing.

Sing a simple song

2007-11-30T22:14:00.000-05:00

I identify strongly with Wayne Dyer's belief that "analysis is a violent intellectual act" in an often reckless, ignorant pursuit of the quanta. This paper has prided itself on extending beyond the mere deconstruction of fact and argument towards a true and meaningful synthesis. It is in this effort, that I have come to find a writing style - strongly influenced by the British advocacy journalism championed by The Economist, that is at once authoritative, lucid, precise - and occasionally witty.

The portfolio is divided into three parts: first, a brief analysis highlighting the paper's thesis and issues immediate relevant to its proposals; second, and the paper's essence, a policy paper; and third, a demonstration of advocacy journalism. The writing process is essentially complete - I have one major essay remaining, and several editorials have been ommitted from the site for the time being. The most time-consuming aspect lately has been the graphic design work for the final portfolio (the first several essays showcase the new design).

As you read, you'll be sure notice some things about the paper: The policy paper is intensely focused - bullets with justifications as necessary. The more eccentric titles do, in the end, have a reason to their allusion and rhyme. The title of the portfolio itself is inspired by The Wizard of Oz. Quotes are in some ways almost a theme. I hope that you will find that it is an undying belief in progress that has guided this work. It was Emerson who said that “an original sentence, a step forward, is worth more than all the centuries.”

The ink and paper debate

2007-11-27T18:21:00.000-05:00

Up to now, the essence of my conversation about this paper has been rather limited - books mostly. My local library has a reasonably strong section on American education and I have access to my school's professional library as well. Many of the books - like Joel Spring's American Education or Edith Rassel and Richard Rothstein's School Choice - have been read (using a liberal definition of the word) for explicit research needs. Between the books and articles, the views have been diverse in thought - helping more than anything in shaping this paper.

Now that the intense research and writing aspects have all but finished, I'm free to take a look at other books books to read (the fuller meaning this time). What do you think? I'll devour just about any facet of insight, just need some direction in getting to the books that matter most. After all, if worse comes to worse, I could always read How To Talk About Books You Haven't Read.

The thinking behind the posts

2007-11-26T21:18:00.000-05:00

Pursuant to my ideal that this site serve as a critique of not only the portfolio, but the ideas it embraces, I'll be adding posts from time to time discussing the project as well as featuring comments from reviewers. Only the best.

Three sides of the same debate

2007-11-25T21:14:00.000-05:00

Choice, accountability, and autonomy

In the opening acknowledgments to Dr. George H. Wood’s Schools That Work, he concedes that he found out “how hard it is to sell a book on what is good about American schools.” His purpose, however, is clear: “Could every American school work so well for every child?” (1)

For the past decade, the debate over school reform has been fragmented into three debates: one of choice, one of freedom, and one of accountability. Choice remains dominated by the championing of voucher programs - an approach that this paper believes only serves to stratify the education system into schools of the poor and privileged. The continual rejection of voucher initiatives - most recently in Utah - speaks to the movement's ineffectiveness. Freedom has reached the forefront most specifically in the debate over charter schools - and with it, concerns over accountability. It is accountability, undoubtedly, that has been at the center of these three debates: it is a shorter word for the No Child Left Behind Act.

Rather disconcertingly, these ideas have remained more as points of disagreement than being embraced, as this paper sees it, as complementary. As this paper has argued, the No Child Left Behind Act is failing precisely because it lacks the flexibility (and incentives) necessary to enable schools to extend their efforts beyond the test alone. The result is an environment that avoids risks - and potentially great returns.

This paper is undoubtedly unwelcome and uncomfortable at the extremities of each sides of this debate. Its purpose has been to unite the underlying promise of choice, accountability, and autonomy. It must first confront the skeptics.

Rage against the machine
The first line of argument is the failure of federal oversight. "Since the [federal government] has been seriously involved in education 'we have suffered…a catastrophic decline in educational productivity, analogous to buying 1970s cars today and paying twice their original selling price,'" Neal McCluskey writes in Cato@Liberty, the public-policy institute's official blog. "So what’s the solution to all this?" Mr. McCluskey asks. "Universal school choice. Give parents control over public education money instead of giving it to the educrats, and make the schools compete ... Only then will the catastrophic flaw in top-down control at any level be eliminated, and the power structure for real accountability be in place." (2)

The source of his frustration is test-based accountability - which he argues, continues to diminish standards. Richard Rothstein writes in The American Prospect that this system "corrupts schooling in ways that overshadowed any possible score increases." One such consequence, he writes, is the goal distortion of undue emphasis placed on particular subjects and metrics. Even the specifics can be distorted: the No Child Left Behind Act demands proficiency of all subgroups, but by the very nature of statistical accuracy, the margin-of-errors spread farther— in short, “inaccurate accountability.” (3)

Kansas responds to this line of thought through part agreement and part argument. Mr. Rothstein’s questioning of goal distortion is more or less the same as this paper’s frustration with “entropy as the result of specificity” - and addresses it on several fronts. First, agreeing with Mr. Rothstein’s assessment of goal distortion, the paper’s understanding of a school’s effectiveness incorporates more than test scores.

It also agrees with Mr. McCluskey that accountability alone has and will continue to fail, but asks how will choice alone manage any better if schools cannot truly differentiate themselves from one another? Autonomy, too is needed. It is here that schools can move beyond merely teaching to the test, but transcending it, through curriculums and policies that are truly competitive.

This paper strongly disagrees that the federal government should not be a force in education—and questions how much so it truly has been ‘seriously involved’ in public schooling. The No Child Left Behind Act has failed precisely because it lacks assertiveness: without universal national standards—with which Mr. Rothstein supports, if proposed by a third party—it is in the states interest to limit standards to meet compliance.

The federal government must remain involved in the nation’s education, but it must transcend the ill-conceived frameworks in which it has been content with. In a nation wrecked by inequalities of funding and standards, it is the position of this paper that quite simply, the federal government must become a stronger force in this nation’s education. But it must be a focused force — uniting standards to reflect a united economic and democratic interest, and ensuring equality of opportunity, no less through guaranteed payment of tuition.

The opportunity is present, quite simply, to transcend beyond this wretched system of inherent inequality—and federal policies ineffective precisely because it accepts this as an unquestionable reality—to embrace a system that is truly both comprehensive and effective.

Dismal pickings
“School choice seems simple, straightforward,” editors Edith Rasell and Richard Rothstein write in School Choice, “but despite the apparent consensus, critics of school choice have raised a number of troubling questions. Will all parents be equally able with sufficient time and sophistication to choose the best school for their children? Will choice further stratify an already stratified educational system? In the past school choice led to segregated schools; will outcomes be better this time?” (4)

Amy Stuart Wells’ study of the choices of parents of inner-city African American students found that: Several factors, including expectations, racial attitudes, sense of efficacy, and alienation and isolation from the larger society, affect the amount of information parents and students have access to and the kinds of decisions they make. These factors … lead to educational decisions far removed from tangible measures of school quality. (4a)

Douglas Willms and Frank Echols offer an interesting insight on Scottish schools, where families are allowed to choose schools outside their neighborhood—the schools required to publish information on their curriculum, school discipline, and examination results. “Many families,” the summary reports “choose schools based on factors unrelated to achievement or academic quality.” They include, Jon Witte writes, geographic location and disciplinary climate as well. (4b,c)

Even the Scottish families who sought the highest academic quality were susceptible to a lack of meaningful information. Parents, Mary Driscoll writes, are also vulnerable to self-deception: adamant that their chosen schools were superior, in defiance of a reality that suggests otherwise. (4d)

Choice, Rasell and Rothstein believe, cannot be a “single factor solution.” They are right. Without an effective framework responsible for accountability—clearly and fairly assessing schools on all relevant factors so that parents may be truly informed, and thus empowered — choice is meaningless. The editors are correct—that unless an effort is made to unite standards by dismantling the unequal fifty-tier system of standards—school choice will only compound this fifty-tier mishap into a one-hundred tier monstrosity.

Without autonomy, schools cannot truly differentiate themselves—and will be continually bound to an uninspired approach to education that has continued to plague this nation’s schools.

What’s missing
This paper acknowledges that performance—no matter how defined—is not the sole influence in determining which school a child is sent to—nor should it be. This paper is not written in the interest of having students “pushed out of their neighborhood schools and onto a bus heading for the suburbs by an assertive parent.” (4) The failure of poor, urban and rural schools will not be fixed by outsourcing their children to better performing schools elsewhere.

School improvement must be organic, continuous, and close to home. It is achieved by giving school leaders the flexibility to embrace innovative programs such as KIPP as their school’s groundwork, and affording them the power to enforce. This power— ranging from what teachers to keep and recruit (and how much to pay them) — allows them to compete for talent.

With control of funding, school leaders can invest in their resources and facilities on which an environment that fosters education so fully depends upon. Thus empowered, no longer must school buildings be decrepit and void of books—not only because parents are equally empowered to move elsewhere, but because that there are no more excuses.

Think—but think clearly
This paper has not been disillusioned by either argument that education is in too much of the public interest to deny private (preferably, not corporate) interest, or too eager to embrace the fanciful notion that complete privatization can effectively regulate itself. John Kenneth Gailbraith sees the conclusion clearly: “I react pragmatically. Where the market works, I’m for that. Where the government is necessary, I’m for that… I’m in favor of whatever works in the particular case.”

This is a unique case— for, Jim Horning is right, “nothing is as simple as we hope it will be” — one that is at once faced with enormous responsibility and immense complexity. The government must exist in education to ensure the equality of standards and funding, to see to it that at minimum, all schools are fulfilling their responsibilities; the market exists to encourage schools, parents, and student to demand more of themselves, and be empowered to seek it.

John Chubb and Terry Moe of Politics, Markets, and America’s Schools finished their work with the conclusion that “private control means less bureaucratic influence; less bureaucratic influence leads to better school organization; and better school organization leads to higher student achievement.” (4)

This debate is a question of words—all of them political, and all of them polarizing. It need not be so. Private, autonomous, charter are all the same: independence. Choice is nothing more than the proper fit for school, student, and parent. The aim is to continue to diminish the variance in performance between schools - and now to address the large variance in performance within them without compromising diversity. This paper has recognized and addressed the very real risk of disillusioned parents by encouraging a greater transparency in total performance and satisfaction, while also encouraging schools in turn to work further in the students’ and their own, to indulge in unspeak, enlightened self-interest.

This encourages schools to actively recruit students—and also offers them the incentives to seek out and develop poor-performing students just as much so as the talented. It is then that schools embrace the challenge of an empowering education—and if such an equilibrium can be reached, this paper has succeeded.

(1) Schools That Work: America’s Most Innovative Public Education Programs. George H. Wood, Ph.D. Penguin Books. 1992.
(2) George's Will be Done on NCLB. Neal McCluskey. Cato@Liberty. The Cato Institute. 11 December 2007. http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2007/12/11/georges-will-be-done-on-nclb/
(3) Leaving "No Child Left Behind" Behind. Richard Rothstein. The American Prospect. 17 December 2007. http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles;jsessionid=acp1XfueERQdql6HVB?article=leaving_nclb_behind
(4) School Choice. Ed. Edith Rasell, Richard Rothstein. Economic Policy Institute. 1993.
a - The Sociology of School Choice: Why Some Win and Others Lose in the Educational Marketplace. Amy Stuart Wells.
b - The Scottish Experience of Parental School Choice. J. Douglas Willms, Frank H. Echols.
c - The Milwaukee Parental Choice Program. Jon Witte.
d - Choice, Achievement, and School Community. Mary Driscoll.

Je le vous dirai

2007-11-25T18:03:00.001-05:00

Foreign language education

[You can view the PDF here.]

“He who is ignorant of other languages is ignorant of his own,” said Goethe, a German novelist. His fellow Europeans have heeded him well: more than 50 percent of adults report being able to speak a second language fluently. Americans, alas, seem to have muddled the translation: only 9 percent can say the same.[1] They much prefer Joubert’s plea that “in the commerce of speech use only coin of gold and silver.”

A tour of classrooms in Thailand would find English as a compulsory subject starting in first grade; in Morocco French begins in third grade, English in fifth; in Luxembourg, German begins in first grade, French the next.

A peek into American schools, by contrast, would find foreign languages available predominantly in the secondary level alone, and by no means required. Nevermind those that would disregard it: after all they say, it is estimated that one fourth of the world is competent to some extent in English including some forty percent of Europeans.[2] This fundamental disregard is an undeniable failure. Americans themselves recognize it: almost half report that there is “too little” foreign language instruction in schools.

What little there is, as your correspondent reports, is not much to be proud of. Colleges, in their attempt to filter student applicants, have required, on average, two years of study in foreign language. The result: a great many serve their time, doing very little to weed out the competition.

The sheer mass of students—very few of them all together passionate about their language of study, which is typically a choice between the old standard of French, German, and Spanish, makes for an inevitable dilution of classroom standards.[i]

An anecdote aptly captures the dilution: one schoolyear began with orientation entirely in Spanish—to blank faces. The first weeks of the year were filled with rigorous dialogues, readings, impromptu speeches, and writing. As the year progressed, English, packets, and videos won out. Quizzes and worksheets— no more than copying down conjugated tenses—took the place of immersion and context. Rote is by no means the route to learning a language. It is, however, the preferred method of acquiring a class credit with minimal expenditure of effort.

Students quickly abandon ship after their two—or if mildly ambitious, three—years are complete. The highest class offered in your correspondent’s school could boast only 9 students from the hundreds enrolled in the earlier levels. Their sheer scale causes a curriculum that caters to their needs at the expense of true teaching. No surprise then, when looking back on their decision to leave, do they respond that they didn’t learn anything—a few dirty words aside—anyway.

Indeed the discrepancy between public secondary students taking the language (51% in 1997)[3] and adult fluency (9%) is indicative of different intentions. Perhaps, it was because they couldn’t learn the language.

It’s all in your head
“Gone are the days of thinking of a child’s mind as a blank slate upon which meaningless dialogs might be imprinted. From the first day that the child begins learning another language, all the higher order thinking skills are in play – all at once,” says Christine Brown. [4] Research has long demonstrated the benefits of early childhood learning in foreign languages including long-term proficiency, and ease of acquisition.[5] Promisingly, elementary instruction has increased significantly from 22 to 31% from 1987 to 1997. Elsewhere research has demonstrated a positive correlation between foreign language instruction and increased scores in reading and mathematics. Bilingualism also facilitates greater verbal, spatial, and problem solving abilities.[6]

Yet, more than 60 percent of public school students do not have the chance to study any language other than English until their secondary stage of study. The likes of Glastonbury, Connecticut's public school system that Ms. Brown profiled are a rarity: for fifty years, an elementary language program has been mandatory. In first grade every student is required to learn Spanish, and can add other languages – Japanese, Latin, and Russian among them – as they choose. Even then, it is not enough: “When can I start Hindi?” one girl asks.

Mission critical, not impossible
“Americans’ incompetence in foreign languages is nothing short of scandalous. The United States requires far more reliable capacities to communicate with its allies, analyze the behavior of potential adversaries, and earn the trust and, and earn the trust and sympathies of the uncommitted,” or so says Strength Through Wisdom, a 1978 report commissioned by the White House.[7]

Not much has changed. Where Russian was the cause célèbre before, Arabic is the concern now. On January 5, 2006, President George Bush proposed the National Security Language Initiative, a $114 million program to expand the study of ‘critical languages’: Arabic, Chinese, Russian, Japanese, Farsi, Hindi, among them.[8]

The deficiency is just as much the fault of fond imaginings “that all foreign languages were codes for English” as it is a failure to compete. [9] Certainly, a greater emphasis on primary foreign language instruction is essential. This emphasis can assist in stabilizing the flood and exodus of students in secondary study while, through early exposure, encouraging further, advanced study in the secondary years.

Increasing the diversity of languages will require additional funding and extensive partnerships. The Economist newspaper has reported on thousands of individuals taking personalized language lessons online via internet telephony.[10] Innovative software, such as Rosetta Stone and podcasts herald the advancements in foreign language education.

Progress is attainable. Will it be sought? Certainly, for too long, as Strength concludes, have “our schools graduate a large majority of students whose knowledge and vision stops at the American shoreline, whose approach to international affairs is provincial, and whose heads have been filled with astonishing misinformation.”

[1] Fostering Foreign Language Proficiency: What the U.S. Can Learn From Other Countries. Donna Christian, Ingrid Pufahl, Nancy C. Rhodes. Phi Delta Kappan. Volume 87, No. 3. November 2005.
[2] Improving Students Capacity in Foreign Languages. Myriam Met. Phi Delta Kappan. Volume 86, No. 3. November 2004.
[3] Foreign Language Instruction in the United States: A National Survey of Elementary and Secondary Schools. Nancy C. Rhodes, Lucinda E. Branaman. 1997.
[4] Early Language Learning: A National Necessity. Christine L. Brown. Basic Education. April 2002.
[5] Why, How, and When Should My Child Learn a Second Language? Center for Applied Linguistics.
[6] Research in Support of Elementary School Foreign Language Learning. American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. Discoverlanguages.org.
[7] Lost in America. Douglas McGray. Foreign Policy. May, June 2006.
[8] Strides in ‘Critical Languages’ Remain Small. Jay Mathews. Washington Post.
[9] Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. Annie Dillard.
[10] Mandarin 2.0. The Economist. 7 June 2007.
[i] The American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages first published its National Standards for Foreign Language Education in 1996, believing that “language and communication are at the heart of the human experience.” Its standards focus on communication, cultures, connections with other disciplines, comparisons, and communities. http://actfl.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=3392

Ticking away

2007-11-25T17:55:00.000-05:00

Time
[You can view the PDF here.]

One should always be weary when educators go on to praise management experts – after all, the practice, if taken too far, is only one fell swoop away from mass commoditization of learning. Indeed, that some classes have become scripted – teaching “from the book,” never mind “to the test” – with detailed prompt book and handheld timer is a discouraging sign.

There is the occasional idea that does not support the idea of teachers as “managers,” like the support for block scheduling. Deming is right, Robert Lynn Canady says in his Power of Innovative Scheduling: “it is more often the structure of an organization than the inadequacies of the people who work within it that causes problems.” Schools, he writes, confront the issue of providing quality time, creating a school climate, and providing varying learning time; they are handicapped by “fragmented instructional time … an issue at all levels of schooling.”[1]

Block scheduling seeks to benefit students by reigning in their focus from some seven classes per day, all the while reducing their stresses, maximizing the opportunities to flatten out material; teachers by allowing them to prepare for fewer courses and students and reducing the amount of grades and records to maintain. It does so by cutting a student’s classes per day down to four, at lengths ranging from one to two hours, and rotating the classes on a class today, different set of classes the next schedule.

The trend’s popularity has now begun to supplant the mania for lower class sizes. Each, it should be pointed out, are focused on providing ‘quality time’ to each student. Similarly, an emphasis on greater time for studies is a central factor in America’s popular KIPP hybrid schools: as one of its five pillars, the program’s site marks its understanding that there are “no short cuts” to learning. Longer school days, weeks, and years, the program says, is the proper way to go about it.[2] An analysis is due:

In the simplest of scenarios (the simpler, the better), little more time is needed for students to master their material. To venture into a math class, time is chopped up between a warm-up exercise, a review of the previous night’s homework, and the day’s lesson. Unfortunately, math is a difficult subject.

The warm-up, typically a review of a subject “learned” some time ago, all too often grows from a five-minute exercise to a fifteen-minute review – one third of a forty five minute class. The homework review – intended to be a reading of the answers – turns into a review of the previous day’s lesson as well. At best, ten minutes remains to teach a lesson that requires some fifteen minutes more. Without it, a vicious cycle of misunderstanding takes place, only further clamping down the time available for the new lesson.

Where block-scheduling advocates move for ninety-minute sessions, Kansas advocates and extension of a mere fifteen minutes. The logic of block scheduling, Kansas argues, is based around lingering confusion; yet if the lesson were taught effectively the first time, the energy spent on the warm-up and review is reduced to accommodate time for a full lesson.

More specifically, measurable benefit from reduced class sizes was found in classes with less than eighteen students.[3],[i] This paper argues that one should look beyond class size, to take a look at the amount of time afforded to each child.

Indeed, the classroom’s chaos theory would have it that each increase in student causes more distraction and question, in turn necessitating more time to effectively teach each student. In a forty-five minute class with eighteen students, the average time allocated per pupil is 2.5 minutes. Under such a scenario, a class of 24 would require 60 minutes of class time.

One should – if taking into account the tendency of classroom chaos – analyze a progressive allocation. With eighteen students at 2.5 minutes per, the time allocated per student is equivalent to .14(per student). Under such scenario, a class of 24 would require 3.36 minutes per pupil, or 81 minutes per class.

This boundary of 60-80 minutes correlates with the times recommended by block-schedulers. If such an analysis of time proves to be an effective indicator, there are two prominent questions to determine the boundaries of effectives: one, what is the minimum amount of time required for a teacher to spend with one pupil; and two, at what point is the increase of time allocated per student no longer effective?

For these purposes, assume that it takes twenty-five minutes (excluding warm-ups and review) to teach a day’s lesson to one student. What one hopes to find is the total amount of time necessary to teach a class a lesson by utilizing 25 minutes as our base number for calculations and additions. Under the standard allocation, 1.1 minutes per student would be appropriate.

At 24 students, this amounts to a need for 26.4 extra minutes or 51.4 in total. Under the progressive system, .06 minutes per student/per student is allocated. With 24 students, this amounts to 1.44 minutes per student or 34.56 extra minutes needed, or 59.56 total.

The most critical question is at what point is the limit for effectiveness reached. It would seem to be capped at two hours if the extreme end of block scheduling formats and college lectures are any guide. The Chronicle of Higher Education has profiled a successful five-hundred person, seventy-five minute course at the University of Massachusetts; that, and an “unbearable” 600 person class, the differentiator is preparation.[4]

An endless year
Year-round schooling is the pariah of the time debate. Its proponents cite the continuity of learning and ability to stagger school schedules to accommodate more students. The opponents counter with diatribes on lost childhoods and worse still, worries over vacations. The reality is a lot less murky.

The traditional calendar was rooted in an era of farmers. (Indeed, your correspondent recalls various uncles’ and aunts’ tales of dreading rainy schooldays because they – and all other children of tobacco farmers – were called out early to the field.) The switch to year-round schooling was stalled against the demise of farming due to the lack of air conditioning, though it began its rise in the early 1900s – its popularity only newly found in the past two decades. As of 2000, three thousand schools had year-round formats – less than four percent of schools but far greater than it once was.[5]

Fears aside, students enrolled under year-round schooling spend the same amount of time in school as their peers with smaller, more frequent breaks in place. This offers hope to many that burn-out among teachers and students can be reduced. Its continuity also reduces the amount of time reviewing all that was lost during the summer – especially important for immigrants who lack constant exposure to English. Optimists look longingly at Japan’s 220 days enrolled in school (versus 180 for Americans) and their higher test scores.[6]

Several years back, many Texas districts converted to year-round schedules, only to swap back shortly thereafter. Their reasoning was a lack of performance increase – and (most likely) the strenuous fight against tradition. Oxnard, California districts, however, have been running year-round schedules since 1976 – with analysis showing broad improvement. Most criticism surround multi-track programs – which while reducing overcrowding, can strain families with children at different schools and complicate sporting events.[7]

Keep it in perspective
Since the advent of No Child Left Behind, nine percent of school districts have increased their elementary school day, whereas only one percent decreased their hours. The average change in increase or decrease amounts to little more than 18 minutes.[8] Indeed, while the cries for more time are now en vogue, one should note that net teaching time in American schools topped some 1,139 hours, compared with a norm of just around 800, only furthering the argument of the perils of bloated inefficiency.[9] All of which is enough to make you sympathize with Vladimir Nabokov: “I confess I do not believe in time.”

[1] The Power of Innovative Scheduling. Robert Lynn Canady. Educational Leadership. November 1995.
[2] About KIPP: The Five Pillars. KIPP.org. 2007. http://www.kipp.org/01/fivepillars.cfm.
[3] The New Reverse Class Struggle. Jay Matthews. Washington Post. 14 February 2006.
[4] Big, but Not Bad. Thomas Bartlett. The Chronicle of Higher Education. 9 May 2003. http://chronicle.com/free/v49/i35/35a01201.htm.
[5] Going to school year-round. Newshour Extra. 8 August 2001. http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/features/july-dec01/year-round.html
[6] Reasons to switch schedules. Ibid.
[7] Common drawbacks. Ibid.
[8] Choices, Changes, and Challenges: Curriculum and Instruction in the NCLB Era. Jennifer McMurrer. Center on Education Policy. 24 July 2007. http://tinyurl.com/35pkne.
[9] Teaching Time and Teachers’ Working Time. Education at a Glance 2004. OECD. 2004. http://tinyurl.com/2w75k.

[i] The figure does provoke debate. Joel Spring writes in American Education that “the optimum class size, according to the NEA, is fifteen students with lower numbers for students with exceptional needs.” Of course, “there is, however, another aspect to the goal of smaller class size, namely, improving teacher working conditions.” American Education. Joel Spring. Tenth Edition. McGraw Hill. 2002.

At the gate

2007-11-25T17:46:00.000-05:00

International rankings
[You can view the PDF here.]

Worry, Thomas Friedman tells Americans: The world is flat (forgive the advertisement) – and losing the Olympic basketball tournament is just the beginning. Standards of education are rising throughout the world, and as the country’s preeminence wanes, so go its substantial advantages.[1] After all, a globally competitive economy necessitates a globally competitive education. The United States, it seems, makes a solid performance, but leaves much to be desired, that is, depending on where one stands. It is, more than anything, a numbers game.

Many, with whom this paper agrees, would have the world’s richest economy be the best educated as well. (It, the United Nations ranks, is 12th out of 21 countries.)[2] Others, are more non-chalant: after all, of Newsweek’s top ten global universities, eight of ten are American.[3] The argument is at both points self-defeating and immediately beneficial to this paper’s quest for privatization. First, the gap between a poor education and superior economies does not bode well for long-term economic growth – the investment seems only capable of deteriorating; second, universities, private or autonomous, represent the ideal embodiment of a privatized schools system. Steven Sample, President of the University of Southern California, definitively concludes, “A country that has the best universities in the world has among the worst elementary and secondary schools.”[4]

Measuring the reading proficiency of fifteen year-olds, as measured by OECD, 61.1% of America’s students rank at or above Level 3 proficiency. This trails Japan’s level of 72% or Australia’s 68.6%. All told, fourteen of twenty-seven scores rank higher than the United States in terms of proficiency at the high end. More disconcerting, the percentage of the country’s pupils ranking at the bottom is 6.4%, more than mean of 6.0%, and greater than seventeen other nations.[5]

Math, as measured by the Department of Education’s Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study, te lls a similar tale: the country ranks 15th – only 8% above the mean, and trailing Singapore by 20 percent.[6]

Among the more interesting statistics, 25 and 20.2% of America’s students report a low sense of belonging and participation, respectively, also higher than the mean statistics for both benchmarks.[7] At 15.5 students to teachers at the pre-primary level, America is almost 5% higher than the mean; for all-secondary education, the country’s rank of 15.5 is some 14% above average. The country finds a rare success at the primary level where it has a ratio that is seven percent less than average. The country is notable for the near absolute stability of its ratio – the United Kingdom’s ratio ranges from 26.6 students per teacher to 12.5.[8] (This marked disadvantage for England’s primary-level children is remarkably clear: the cost, The Economist notes, of a child leaving English primary schools illiterate is some £50,000).[9]

Seeking the forest

Invariably, it does not take much to become muddled in statistics. Therefore, two points should be drawn in summary: higher centralized funding, as advocated in this paper, is negatively correlated with a country’s reading performance. (Only 8% of America’s school funding comes from the national government, whereas the mean is 50 percent.)[10] Schools independence, however, demonstrates a positive correlation (see chart). What then to make of the contradictory numbers in context of this paper’s argument; and what to weigh more?

Independence is the essence of Kansas’ position – nationalized funding is but a secondary aim, albeit the potentially most effective for bringing about the full force of an incentives-based competitive market. This paper does not doubt the overall effectiveness of its schools reform platform if the means for financing it was altered to become the legally-bound responsibility of the state. A nationalized solution, then, is most pragmatic because it is less crippling locally and requires less political will to implement and follow-through.

One can also combat the negative correlation between centralized funding and schools performance on three fronts. Mexico, for better or worse, best embodies these trends.[11] First, geographic disparities naturally result in differences in the source of a schools funding. Smaller countries, e.g., Luxembourg, can more readily centralize funding.

Yet, this difference in the source of funding does not differentiate between the level of resources available within and between countries: where the United States is relatively prosperous throughout its states, in countries like Mexico, where income distribution is not as equal, it is more pragmatic for a central government to step in. While central government spending may be high, it does not necessarily mean that it accounts for much, making such comparisons untidy.

Second, underlying factors regarding the nation’s economic development and the structure of its education system can skew results. Where economic conditions are bleak, the advantages of staying in school shrink. As a result, enrollment falls – or was never enforced – and performance deteriorates.

Third, general inefficiencies, a consistent target of this paper, could also be put into play. Mexico’s Educational Workers’ Union, the largest trade union in Latin America, has what The Economist terms “a stranglehold” on education funding. The union readily absorbs increased funding, and control of bad teachers, Enrique Rueda, director of Oaxaca's teachers, says is “very bad.” As a testament to the country's inefficiencies, public education spending as a percentage of all public expenditures in 2001 was marked at 18.0 – in excess of the mean of 8.9 percent – a territory it finds itself in with none other than the United States.

[1] The World is Flat. Thomas L. Friedman. 2005.
[2] Full of woe. The Economist. 17 February 2007.
[3] The Complete List: The Top 100 Global Universities. Newsweek. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14321230/. 13 August 2006.
[4] The Educated Child. William J. Bennett, Chester E. Finn, Jr., John T. E. Cribb, Jr.
[5] Reading Literacy of 15-year-olds. Education at a Glance 2004. OECD. http://tinyurl.com/2w7z5k.
[6] Average mathematics scale scores of eight-grade students, by country: 2003. Institute for Education Sciences. National Center for Education Statistics. U.S. Department of Education. http://tinyurl.com/2u7tmq.
[7] 15-year-olds’ Engagement in School – A Sense of Belonging and Participation. Education at a Glance 2004. OECD.
[8] Class Size and Ratio of Students to Teaching Staff. Ibid.
[9] Catching up. The Economist. 23 December 2006.
[10] Total Public Expenditure on Education. Education at a Glance 2004. OECD.
[11] Mexico’s mezzogiorno. Time to wake up. A survey of Mexico. The Economist. 18 November 2006.

The everyman

2007-11-25T17:35:00.000-05:00

Education polls

[You can view the PDF here.]

Each year, for thirty-eight years, Phi Delta Kappa, an education journal and Gallup, a pollster, have sought to capture a “continuing analysis of public opinion in American education” since its first poll in 1968. The findings offer a unique perspective on education and the everyman.[1] An analysis:

No problem here
One of the most striking results is the disparity between the perception of local schools and the nation. Forty-nine percent of parents give their local schools a rating of an A or B, but nationally only twenty-one percent of parents concur. The national majority of fifty-one percent is inclined heavily towards a C. Parents attribute the largest problem facing public schools to a lack of funding (24%), trailed by overcrowded schools (13%), and lack of discipline (11%).

The conclusion, captured by Time, is that more than 55% of the public is dissatisfied with the nation’s schools; a sobering 61% believe schools are in crisis – with 52% believing that schools are worse than they were twenty years ago.[2] When asked where the United States ranks internationally, the response was uncharacteristically unsettled (see chart).

The achievement gap
A resounding 88% of respondents agree that closing the minority achievement gap is very or somewhat important, and 81% agree that the gap can be narrowed “substantially” while keeping high standards in place. Fifty-seven percent of respondents believe that it is the responsibility of public schools to close the achievement gap. The results on this front are rather disconcerting: only 49% of public school parents agree whereas 60% of adults with no children in school do. Among parents with children in school, those who believe that it is the responsibility of schools to close the gap, their 49% is nearly balanced by the 46% of parents who disagree.
Who’s the boss, boss?

Fifty-eight percent of respondents believe that the local school board should have the greatest influence, followed by 26% in favor of state, and 14% in favor of the federal government. Incidentally, when asked of the biggest impetus for teachers leaving their profession: 96% believe that the lack of parental support is very or somewhat important, a sentiment shared by teachers in Joel Spring’s analysis of American education.[3]

Teaching and testing
In terms of curriculum, 58% of respondents (a 31% increase over 44% in 1979) believe that a wide variety of courses should be available. Respondents are nearly split, by 47-44% in believing that the curriculum needs to be changed to meet “today’s needs” and those who believe it already meets those needs respectively. The percentage who agree that the school curriculum needs to be changed, has increased a striking 51% from 31% in 1970.

When asked of testing, 39% of respondents believed that there was too much emphasis on achievement testing in public schools, an emphasis that 67% of those who agree believe will encourage teachers to teach to the test, of which 75% believe is a bad thing. All the same, 63% of respondents are in favor of a mandatory high-school exit exam.

Thinking about reform
Revealingly, Time respondents split evenly on the effect of the No Child Left Behind Act – 35% each viewing the law’s impact as positive or minimal. Twenty-three percent viewed the act’s impact negatively. Phi Delta Kappa’s findings on school reform are rather ambiguous: 71% of respondents support reforming the existing education system, whereas 24% support finding an “alternative” system. The distinction between “reform” and “alternative” is distressingly unclear to draw any decisive conclusions. Kansas would describe its proposal as reform within the existing system – preserving the ideal of empowering public schooling by reforming the means by which it is realized through enhanced autonomy.

All the same, it would appear to be a difficult argument to make: 60% of PDK respondents oppose voucher programs, and only a slim majority of 53% support charter schooling. Kansas stresses that the opposition is directed towards a two-tier system of public and private schooling, an opposition that is shared by this paper. Kansas stridently defines public education as free – in cost and autonomy, meritocratic, and equal. These ideals are the heart of the paper’s proposals. The apparent hostility to reform is nonexistent and muddled inferences irrelevant.

Doing something
Forty-nine percent of respondents agree that preschool programs for children from low-income and poverty-level households would do a great deal of benefit. Crucially, sixty-six percent would agree to more taxes to such programs, a sentiment that is echoed broadly in Time’s general measure of support by a margin of 59-38 percent.

Some fifty-seven and 73% of respondents believe that elementary and high school students are not working hard enough. Forty-nine versus 48% oppose increasing the amount of the school day. Of those who support increasing the school day, 66% over 31% support increasing the school year over the school day, but 67% would support increasing the school day by one hour.

[1] PDK/Gallup Polls of the Public’s Attitudes Toward the Public Schools. http://www.pdkintl.org/kappan/kpollpdf.htm.
[2] Time-Oprah Winfrey Show Poll. March 2006. http://www.oprah.com/tows/pastshows/200604/tows_past_20060411_c.jhtml
[3] The Rewards of Teaching. The Profession of Teaching. American Education. Joel Spring. Tenth Edition. McGrawHill. 2002. Page 40.

The cast of characters

2007-11-25T17:27:00.001-05:00

The people of schools reform
[You can view the PDF here.]

As a senior at Princeton University, Wendy Kopp proposed a national teacher corps in the aim of eliminating educational inequality. Shortly thereafter, with $2.5 million in funding and a “skeleton” staff such a corps came into being. Ms Kopp’s corps, Teach For America, began its first year in 1990, with 500 men and women serving six low-income communities across the country. Seventeen years on, the acclaimed program has reached some 2.5 million students, in now 25 regions, with 4,400 current members and 12,000 alumni.1 “We believe that all children have the potential to achieve,” the corps’ mission explains, “and that all educational inequity stems from broader structural and societal problems.”2

That something is terribly amiss is a shared sentiment among the political and intellectual divide. Strong American Schools, a nonpartisan public awareness and action campaign, is promoting as its centerpiece Ed in ‘o8. The group, funded by the Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors and Bill & Melinda Gates and Eli & Edythe Broad Foundations, declares that “America’s students are losing out,” and hopes that presidential candidates offer much more than “empty rhetoric” in elaborating on their three foci on education standards, effective teachers, and giving students more time and support for learning.3

Indeed, for better or for worse, it is in politics where the greatest power is wielded. There are plenty who look upon power as promise, and just as many who would rather see it fail. First, the protagonists.

The ayes of Roll Call 145
“I strongly condemn an achievement gap that exists in this country,” President George Bush passionately explained after a “fascinating” spring meeting with the nation’s education, civil rights, and business leaders. True to form, the President went on to deadpan that he believes his signature No Child Left Behind Act needs to be reauthorized “because it's working.”4 The program’s May 2001 passage was a striking bipartisan feat, united in broad agreement with “what the law is trying to do,” writer Linda Perlstein explains.5,6 “Glum ‘buts’” soon followed.

The ‘buts’ are wildly, and distressingly contradictory, in lamentation of impossible rigidity, a view shared widely among educators, and illogical flexibility, shared by commentators.[i] President Bush straddled a delicate argument in securing the bill’s first passage with what many conservatives viewed as a distressing impediment by federal government into their revered states’ rights. The vote is telling: Republican votes managed only 5 ½ votes in favor for every dissenting one, where the Democrats achieved nearly 20 to one.

The law finds its origins in the standards-based reform movement. It began in the 1990s with an emphasis on “having clear and high content and performance standards for students” with curriculum and assessments in line.7 Students, the thinking has it, will rise to meet high expectations, just as easily as they will effortlessly fall to meet lower ones.

As for whether the program is working, the evidence, while fleeting, aligns itself decisively in the President’s favor. The Center on Education Policy’s June 2007 report, Answering the Question that Matters Most, details that states with three or more years of comparable test data have shown increased student achievement in reading and math since 2002 – the year No Child was enacted. Further, achievement gaps between students have been narrowing, if remaining undesirably “substantial.” Most tellingly, nine of the thirteen states with sufficient data to determine trends before and after the law was enacted shows that average yearly gains in scores were greater after No Child took effect than before.[8],[ii]

Yet the trouble arises as the report concludes that it is “difficult, if not impossible” to determine the extent that NCLB has caused these trends as states and schools have all simultaneously released different, but interconnected policies to raise achievement. All the same, the law – loftiest goals aside – was no more than the spur for states to carry out such initiatives. The conclusions, then, are encouraging. Tracy McDaniel, a national board member for the Knowledge is Power Program, is clear: “I think the greatest impact of No Child Left Behind has been to serve as a catalyst for innovation and excellence in public education.”[9]

The ink barons
A survey of major newspapers would find broad agreement with the duality of a federal framework and greater autonomy for schools. The Washington Post editorializes its fear that No Child is “in the crosshairs,” analogizing that one would not “demolish his home because it had a leaky basement or it needed new carpeting.” Were it not for the law, the paper goes on to say, failure would continue without consequence, the achievement gap would remain irrelevant, and parents would remain powerless to ensure their children a better education where their schools have failed them. Strengthen the law, the paper argues. No one claims it won’t be hard.10,11

It is The Wall Street Journal, founded in the interests of “free markets and free people,” that advocates for school choice.12 It champions economist Milton Friedman’s belief that “empowering parents would generate a competitive education market, which would lead to a burst of innovation and improvement, as competition has done is so many other areas.”13

Both the New York Times and Washington Post have supported their respective mayor’s moves for school reform; the Times particularly impressed with the City’s “impressive strides toward the goal of replacing large and often dysfunctional factory-style high schools with smaller schools.”14 The Economist, commenting particularly on British schools, but its principles universal, believes that “competition and freedom in education, as elsewhere, are the way to encourage innovation and raise standards for all.”15 That four of the nation’s most influential newspapers are so strongly aligned with the duality of education reform speaks to a strong reservoir of support that is awaiting a thoughtful comprehensive reform plan.

Enter the foils
“Republicans voted for No Child Left Behind holding their noses,” a critic of the legislation told the Washington Post.16 With the executive branch’s political capital severely marginalized, legislators are beginning to, in the words of an old folk song “making their own kind of music.” The tune would be to allowing states to opt out of the law’s testing mandates; the lyricist being suburban and exurban districts that look upon the law’s mandates with dismay – seeing the crippling of programs for the gifted and talented and the discouragement of creativity in their schools.

A recent report by the Center on Education Policy finds that 62% of districts have increased time for English and mathematics classes since No Child was enacted; it is the 44% percent of districts that have reduced time in social studies, sciences, arts, physical education, lunch, and recess that has elicited such ire.17.iii Their frustration is merited – and captured frequently within this paper. The No Child Left Behind Act succeeds precisely because it is not a reckless, crippling expectation of “legislated excellence.”18

Elsewhere, others disdain the increasing unrealism surrounding demands for 100 percent proficiency by 2014. It is an understandable, but not respectable criticism. Muddling the clarity of the law’s aim of adequate yearly progress through variables that essentially “let schools off the hook” through different measures, as Kati Haycock, president of the Education Trust writes, threatens to obscure what the law has “uncovered” Secretary of Education, Margaret Spelling concurs in a Washington Post symposium.[19]

Yet, as the threats ceaselessly mount against the law, an opportunity, consistent with that of this paper arises. If the act is looked upon as the first venture into a nationalized framework for reform, the discontent arises not out of hostility to its aims, but out of a desire to move forward in bringing about the duality of a national framework and autonomous schooling. It is here that the small but crucially necessary reforms, especially relevant for students for whom English is a second language, can be made.

The law, as a transitional framework, parallels that of the short-lived Articles of Confederation. The increasing desire for further reform reveals the law’s role as an interim means of furthering this duality.[20] It is an audacious effort, but not inconsistent with the pursuit of an equitable, lively, meritocratic education.

Indeed, amidst the discontentment, it is the ideal time to begin repositioning the education debate towards autonomy. The risk of abandoning states and schools to their own means threatens to impede the fulfillment of a lasting platform for intellectual development. The risk of returning to decades more of idle reform – teetering back and forth between empty rhetoric and vacuous technique – is not one to entertain.

[1] Our history. Teach for America. 5 July 2007. http://www.teachforamerica.org/about/our_history.htm.
[2] Theory of change. Teach for America. 5 July 2007. http://www.teachforamerica.org/mission/theory_of_change.htm.
[3] About us. Ed in ’08. Strong American Schools. 5 July 2007. http://www.edin08.com/AboutUs.aspx.
[4] President Bush Discusses the Reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act. The White House. 12 April 2007. http://whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/04/20070412.html#.
[5] Final Vote Results For Roll Call 145. United States House of Representatives. http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2001/roll145.xml.
[6] The Issue Left Behind. Linda Perlstein. The Nation. 21 October 2004. http://www.thenation.com/doc/20041108/perlstein.

[7] A Call for High Standards & Systemic Reform. American Federation of Teachers. 6 July 2007. http://www.aft.org/topics/sbr/index.htm.
[8] Answering the Question That Matters Most. Has Student Achievement Increased Since No Child Left Behind? Center on Education Policy. June 2007. http://tinyurl.com/38o4rg.
[9] Leaving No Child Behind. Tracy McDaniel, et al. A symposium. The Washington Post. 10 September 2007.
[10] ‘No Child’ in the Crosshairs. Editorial. The Washington Post. 2 July 2007.
[11] A Vote for ‘No Child’. Editorial. The Washington Post. 7 August 2007.
[12] Our philosophy. About Us. Opinion Journal. The Wall Street Journal Editorial Page. http://www.opinionjournal.com/about/philosophy.html.
[13] School-Choice Strategy. Howard S. Rich. Opinion. The Wall Street Journal. 16-17 June 2007.
[14] Smaller, Better High Schools. Editorial. The New York Times. 6 July 207.
[15] The S-word. The Economist. Leaders. 26 May 2007.
[16] Dozens in GOP Turn Against Bush’s Prized ‘No Child’ Act. Jonathan Weisman, Amit R. Paley. Washington Post. 15 March 2007. http://tinyurl.com/2r9v4f.
[17] Choices, Changes, and Challenges: Curriculum and Instruction in the NCLB Era. Jennifer McMurrer. Center on Education Policy. 24 July 2007. http://tinyurl.com/35pkne.
[18] Schools That Work: America’s Most Innovative Public Education Programs. George H. Wood, Ph.D. Penguin Books. 1992.
[19] Leaving No Child Behind. Margaret Spellings, Reg Weaver, Kati Haycock, Jack Dale, Michael R. Bloomberg, George Miller, Jason Kamras, Andrea Peterson, Tracy McDaniel. The Washington Post. 10 September 2007.
[20] Several prominent schools superintendents are now disclosing their support for national standards. Jack Dale, superintendent of Maryland’s leading Fairfax county schools, “would advocate for a federal testing system that allows comparison across states and … school districts. … Unless we create a quality, integrated system with clear roles and responsibilities, we will instead create an incoherent, contradictory and inconsistent educational system in the U.S.” Schools Chiefs Suggest Fixes for ‘No Child.’ Jay Mathews. The Washington Post. 1 October 2007.

[i] “In May, two-thirds of Pennsylvania’s superintendents signed a statement protesting the law’s rigidity, and seven in ten Connecticut superintendents said the law’s sanctions harm struggling schools instead of helping them, according to a survey released last week. National organizations, such as the National Council of Teachers of English and the NAACP, echo the concerns.” The Issue Left Behind. Linda Perlstein. The Nation. 21 October 2004. http://www.thenation.com/doc/20041108/perlstein.
[ii] The report also concluded, “more attention should be given to the issues of the quality and transparency of state test data.” It recognizes that tests are an “imperfect measure” of achievement.
[iii] The report notes a 31 percent reduction in the total instructional time devoted to social studies, science, art and music, physical education, lunch and/or recess since 2001-02. The report recommends staggering testing requirements to include more academic subjects and encouraging states to give “adequate emphasis” to the arts.

Keeping your monster on a leash

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School accountability

Perhaps the most significant criticism of the No Child Left Behind Act has been what opponents portray as the unjustifiably exclusive use of testing as the sole benchmark for school progress. [1] Among the alternative measures proposed include graduation rates, AP course enrollment, as well as achievement in the arts, history, and sciences.

Kansas posits that three elements are crucial to a succesful accountability system: short-term flexibility that allows schools to close their relative achievement gaps without incurring penalty following the initial reform, a payments and ratings system that recognizes the confluence of multiple factors in succesful schools, as well as a framework for school improvement.

In the system that this paper proposes, mild decreases in test performance are largely irrelevant to a school's standing: district's will make their assessments on renewing a school's term principally on an overall rating system that accounts for a variety of factors. Only schools that suffer sharp decreases or chronic nonperformance, will trigger direct action by the district.

Small drops that last for two to three years, should be expected at least once per decade in all schools - as a result, the consequences are reasoned - encouraging the review of school curriculum and policies by a school improvement team composed of persons chosen by the school and district in question. Such a system is by no means intended to cause institutional shame, but as necessary as one would need to consult a mechanic if their car fails.

7.1 In the five years immediately following privatization, failing schools are expected to make adequate progress towards national standards. A school with a current level 54% of students at exceptional to superior, for example, would need to improve their marks by 4.2 percentage points per year.

The length of the five-year transformation period is justified by a recent study on comprehensive school reform. The study found that “schoolwide changes take three to five years to bear fruit and that fidelity to the program is key to success.”[2]

7.2 Following this period, schools must maintain national standards, and must not fail to meet them for two consecutive years, or they will be required to consult a school improvement team.

Ratings

7.3 The means for assessing a school’s performance will be based largely on a compilation of ratings. For example, a school may possibly achieve ten stars: 2 each for math and reading performance (a 70% pass rate on each equals 2.8), 2 for graduation rate, 1 for science and history performance, 1 for art, 1 for AP enrollment, and 1 as a challenge index (the voluntary recruitment of disabled, or poor-performing students).
The purpose of this rating system allows for a more complete assessment of a school's performance - of which test performance is an important factor that can be offset by improvements elsewhere.
7.4 Every school must publish this information, and districts must provide the data for each school to all parents. These key performance indicators must be used with the intent of establishing a panorama of school performance from a credible variety of vantage points. Additionally, a national ranking for elementary and secondary schools will be produced annually.

Maintaining credibility

7.4 The district will serve as the coordinator of schools enrollment as they lack any direct benefit from data manipulation of dropout statistics.
7.5 Schools will be required following the five-year interim period to have digital testing centers, ideally in the form factor of tablet personal computers, for direct, digital assessments to maintain the integrity of testing. Such a format also offers the benefits of on-demand access and incorporating assistance for special-needs students.

Send in the army

7.6 If a school should fail to meet standards, the district will be expected to dispatch a focus group of five to ten highly trained persons to develop a plan of acceptable change in close coordination with the school’s staff and parents. Parents would vote on such a plan.
7.7 If a school reaches a state of chronic failure, the focus group would assume full operational control of the school, including personnel, with the exception of
the school’s focus—be it traditional, art, religious education, etc.
7.8 The nature of a school’s format will be reviewed by the district for all schools every five years. At this time, the district would initiate the process for significantly reforming poor-performing schools—soliciting bids as well as reviewing options for establishing independent schools, whose initial management is chosen directly by the district.

The market
The ultimate goal of privatization is that school success, standards, and opportunities will expand in accordance with market expectations. As schools can no longer afford to fail, given students' liberty to transfer elsewhere, and also the liberty to change operations, schools must compete to provide the best education. Markets allow for the implementation of reasoned, progressive incentives, particularly promising in encouraging good schools to recruit poor-performing or disabled students.

[1] Calls Grow for a Broader Yardstick for Schools. Maria Glod. The Washington Post. 16 December 2007.
[2] In Whole-School Reform, Staying True to Model Matters. Debra Viadero. Education Week. 14 May 2007. http://tinyurl.com/38anl5.

Making the most of partners

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To face the myriad of conflicts facing schools, public or privatized, an emphasis on integrating the funds and services of relevant partners will be essential in maximizing services.

These partners deserve significant flexibility consistent with their own goals; the government should be reduced to providing national frameworks and standardized systems for the allocation of resources. Comprehensive measuring will be necessary to meet the demands of many organizations who seek to measure the direct impact of their contributions.

Dynamic labor force

6.1 One potential partner will be utilizing networks of teachers, similar to the services provided by Teach for America. Scaled nationally, the organization can serve as a dynamic agency for directing resources to regions most in need, serve as valuable base for long term recruitment and training.
6.2 Similarly, schools would be encouraged to implement volunteers—paid, unpaid, or as part of a broadened Teach for America system—in their classroom. Functioning as readers, assistants, or a portion of management, such partners would significantly reduce costs and expand opportunities for teachers. Assistants with basic training could significantly impact the student to teacher ratio. A specific opportunity is in allowing schools to hire qualified retirees to teach courses relevant to their experience - an effort to engage schools in the transfer of the retiree knowledge base.

Scholarships

6.3 The most common form of partner integration will be in the establishment of scholarships for university education. The system can take a variety of forms—a likely course will be the establishment of a national database of student performance and activities, available in a manner that does not compromise privacy, allowing potential donors to filter potential prospects and contribute in a streamlined process to a student’s education account. This is more an opportunity for existing services to partner further with schools and students than it is an adovcacy of a new framework.

Schools

6.4 Some persons and institutions will prefer to establish their own private schools, fully or significantly without government contribution. Other institutions will prefer implementing programs within established schools for niche interests. They must continue to adhere to basic federal curriculum standards.

Colleges

6.5 Where available, schools will integrate with community colleges to allow students to complete a portion of their workload prior to graduation; additionally, some large colleges may initiate distance-learning programs in high schools—available on a free or highly reduced basis.
6.6 Preparatory schools may utilize discretionary funds for extensive college application assistance including subsidizing application fees.

Foreign language

6.7 Schools should also seek to partner with foreign nations in supplementing America’s foreign education teacher base with native speakers—especially in areas with little exposure in the country, like Mandarin or Arabic.

Advanced placement programs

6.8 Schools will be encouraged to offer courses aligned with the College Board’s Advanced Placement standards.
6.9 Schools may subsidize or completely pay for the costs of taking the tests as a perquisite designed to attract students.
6.10 Preparatory focus schools may also pay for and require that their students take additional examinations such as the ACT and SAT to enhance competiveness.

Such subsidization can ameliorate cost concerns for students that can often limit students’ ability to engage fully in the college application process due to fees or costs of visiting campuses.[1]

An all together different marketplace of ideas
In the meantime, schools have dithered on in countless endeavors in the pursuit of a harmonious society. Moral education brings with it a myriad of controversies – be it sexual and drugs education, community service, and, rather amusingly, marriage courses.[2] Driver’s education has never been duller.

Such additions to the classroom are – while admirable in aim – distracting in effect. Less clutter and more focus couldn’t be more welcome to classrooms, yet the barrage of special interests is firmly rooted. An autonomous schools system as proposed by this paper would be less entangled. Alongside the more rigorous voluntary national, state, and local curriculums, Kansas proposes that all but critical health programs are limited to a voluntary status. Governments would be free to incentivize such teaching to fund textbooks and resources as they will. Such a system inverts the relationship between school and government, offering schools the flexibility to offer distinctive programs and courses – organic gardening, perhaps – that appeal to their students.

This framework would also add much needed transparency to the murky world of what to teach. Organizations and companies alike can construct a curriculum that, if vetted by local school districts, could be added to the list of voluntary curriculums – contributing resources as they choose. It, while undesirable, is already being done: look closely at your child’s worksheets bordered with candies.[3] As long as the involvement is disclosed, schools walk this avenue at their own peril. Even then, such debates pails in comparison to the far more important ones competing to demonstrate how effectively they can spur intellectual development. Schools deciding on KIPP or International Baccalaureate structures – or charting their own course – with passion and adequate resource are the essential feature. Everything else promises to be, at best, good fun for the cynical observer. How long until Acme’s Comprehensive Scrapbooking Course remains to be seen. Scrapbooking, is an art – isn’t it?

[1] Costs begin before college. Alvin P. Sanoff. USA Today. 7 February 2005. http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2005-02-06-college-costs_x.htm
[2] Ibid. Page 4.
[3] Don’t Eat This Book. Fast Food and The Supersizing of America. Morgan Spurlock. Putnam Adult. 2005.

The many faces of education

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School formats

5.1 Schools will be divided into several key formats based on the breadth and depth of their curriculum:
5.1.a Traditional schools.
5.1.b Arts schools.
5.1.c Vocational secondary schools.
5.1.d Montessori schools.
5.1.e Focus schools—including science and technology, mathematics, literature, preparatory schools, et al. Additionally, schools may be organized on matters including religious curriculum and gender exclusivity.[i]

Traditional schools would remain most similar to the norm—their offerings would include the arts, but focus more on breadth of studies.

The school curriculum
5.2 Building from the basic, national curriculum of competencies, schools will develop their own comprehensive curriculum consistent with their format and philosophy. These conceptions may include:

5.2.a The traditional measured conceptualization, in which behavioral objectives, sequential learning, skills and content mastery, and teacher accountability are the essential tenants.[1]
5.2.b The academic rationalism conceptualization, which is subject-centered in design.[2]
5.2.c The cognitive processes conceptualization, which emphasizes the “ability to think, reason, and engage in problem-solving activities.”[3]
5.2.d The social reconstruction conceptualization, which believes that the “problems and dilemmas of society are what ought to be studied by students with the intent of creating amore just, equitable and humane society.”[4]
5.2.e The self-actualization conceptualization, in which “students become the curriculum developers, selecting for study what they are interested in, intrigued by, and curious about.”[5]

Such conceptualizations will correlate strongly along a spectrum of “traditional” to “progressive” schooling.

Variations

5.3 Among even schools of the same types, there will be variations of initiatives—some may pursue microsocieties or teaming where others may pursue adherence to a KIPP or International Baccalaureate structure. Schools will also have the option of expanding its market by serving the role of boarding school.

Organizational structure

5.4 School flexibility will enable additional opportunities for implementing divergent approaches on school management. Some schools tied only to one group of grade-levels will maintain a traditional principal and secondary assistant’s role. Other schools that span elementary and secondary levels may group grades under multiple principles.

In fact, it will be encouraged that schools encompass all grades to promote greater investments in primary education.

5.5 The basic support staff for schools will consist of counselor and secretary, expanding as the complexity of the organization grows. To avoid constrictive costs, most schools will effectively utilize teachers to oversee matters of individual school curriculum in coordination with the district versus hiring specialized managers.
5.6 A basic system for oversight will involve a board of parents and teachers, who will oversee the hiring and pay of teachers, pay and bonuses. It is desirable that the role of such systems is to prevent irresponsible management—not manage.
5.7 The government will fully finance home school students’ Advanced Placement and college preparatory assessments.

Home schools

5.8 Home schools will remain subject to individual state standards.
5.9 Once home school students have reached the age of fourteen, students must sit for the national tests of basic mastery tests in reading and mathematics. Parent and student are at liberty to extend the degree of examination to encompass greater difficulty or additional subjects.
5.10 Parents will be encouraged to have their students sit for basic examinations prior to reaching high school age by a reimbursement of $2,500 for exceptional scores (85-100%).

Partnerships

5.11 In a strive for efficiency, schools will be encouraged to collaborate with other schools to assist in providing a full educational experience. Traditional schools collaborating with vocational or arts schools in the latter years of a child’s education would be common.

Encouraging innovation

5.12 The essence of school privatization is the ability for all schools to commit itself to a core set of aims with minimal influence from competing initiatives. It is key that sound, new ideas regarding education continue to be developed and implemented throughout the country.
5.13 Colleges may establish their own schools to perform pilots, which may also be an effective means for preparing new teachers. Passionate groups may do likewise.

A recent report demonstrates the velocity of the diffusion of innovation between schools. The lead author acknowledges, “What schools perceive as good ideas in comprehensive school reform spread quickly to other schools.”[6] The result is that schools need not all be like the Crested Butte Academy, a private high school for snowboarders in Denver, Colorado – simply getting the job done works too.[7]

[1] Alternative Curriculum Conceptions and Designs. M. Frances Klein. Contemporary Issues in Curriculum. Third Edition 2003. Page 21.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid. Page 22.
[4] Ibid. Page 22.
[5] Ibid. Page 23.
[6] In Whole-School Reform, Staying True to Model Matters. Debra Viadero. Education Week. 14 May 2007. http://tinyurl.com/38anl5.
[7] For Snowboarders, A Colorado School Is Just the Ticket. Paul Glader. The Wall Street Journal. 23 February 2007.
[i] While this policy paper does allow for schools organized by religious and gender exclusivity, Kansas does not recommend such formats. Religious exclusivity is the means by which current, private-religious schools integrate into the new national framework. New schools of either theme, however, can be established if approved by the district’s approval process. This paper is confident that the tenants of market forces will effectively limit any influence of these particular formats.

In defense of funding and the separation of church and state, Kansas argues that the federal government is an impartial system for funding and accountability. Parents, by selecting the school of their choice, exercise full authority. The federal government funds and regulates such schools as it would any other, offering no advantageous or adverse treatment. Further, the established legitimacy of “faith-based” initiatives underscores the potential for impartial systems.

Paying up

2007-11-25T16:55:00.000-05:00

Tuitition

4.1 The base tuition for all schools will initially be $10,000 per child; the maximum government contribution will be $15,000— each expected to increase in adherence with progressive systems. The specific tuition for all school’s will vary depending upon three sets of factors— predetermined factors, performance, and incentives-based.

The median per-pupil expenditure for students, as measured by the U.S. Department of Education in 2005, was $9,392; the 95th percentile: $18,100.[1]

4.2 The district will receive financing of $150-250 per child.

While the funding may vary significantly between schools, every effort will be made to ensure that the levels of financing are relative to the performance and needs of all schools.

Predetermined

4.3 The location of the school will weigh heavily on the school’s individual funding. Urban facilities and staffs will cost more to maintain and expand. In the same respect, rural schools will be allocated additional funds for transportation.
4.4 Elementary schools will receive additional funding—and subsequent scrutiny, to provide individualized services, ensuring literacy, a cost effective means to limit the expense and problems of lingering illiteracy in secondary schooling.

Performance

4.5 Schools that exceed superior standards for student basic skills will receive a maximum increase in funding of 2.5%. For example, a school that has 80% of students in the satisfactory range, five percentage points out of twenty-five more than the required amount, will receive a .5% increase—or one-fourth of the possible amount.

4.6 Schools that focus heavily on the arts and vocational studies receive an additional potential amount of $1,000 ($11,000-$16,000) to justify the additional burdens of pursuing mastery of both their specialty and core courses. Unlike similar performance funding, the percentage of a school’s population within the exceptional to superior range will determine the total amount per child awarded to schools.

Incentives based programs

4.7 In order to promote competitiveness between schools, the government will provide additional allocations to school’s that pursue its various incentives.
4.8 The primary incentives program will be a school’s performance in voluntary adherence to the more strict, complete curriculum. Schools that also seek to promote diversity, integrate students of lower socioeconomic status will also be allocated additional resources to encourage further inclusion by other successful schools.
4.9 Schools will also be encouraged to accommodate poor-performing students from other schools. The government would offer an additional $1,000 to schools under the $15,000 maximum for increased performance from students who performed poorly in other schools in the last year’s examination.

If for example, a school’s total population from other school’s last year was 74% on the basic examinations and increases to 90% this year, the school receives an additional $160 per child – including those not from poorer performing schools. This structure will encourage competition as well as maximize the opportunities available to each student.

4.10 Another such incentive will be a school’s adherence to the recommended budget allocation for schools that share similar characteristics. Another measure will award schools for students that are enrolled in college-level courses. Additionally, schools will be rewarded for a dropout rate below the national average; and participation in arts and sports— standardized records per sport and adjudications will serve as the basis for these allocations.

Stability

4.11 To prevent rapid fluctuations in school tuitions as well as to ensure that funding is being used effectively, mechanisms will be implemented to ensure stable funding from year to year.
4.12 Bonuses from previous years are priced in to the school’s upcoming year’s budget. Schools whose performance decreases will only lose a small portion of their relative bonuses from the previous years. Additionally, small portions of such bonuses are reclaimed each year to prevent an accumulation of resources that cannot be spent.

Special grants

4.13 Special grants are awarded to schools that pursue pilot programs,
expansions, and maintenance, allocated by the district.

Hybrid schools

4.14 In what will be appealing primarily to schools that have maxed out their maximum government contribution, schools will also have the opportunity to initiate a hybrid-funding program, receiving funds from both the government and parents.
4.15 The school will determine the required parent contribution, however,
participating schools must also adhere to mirroring standards to ensure that
cost is not used as a blunt instrument to reduce the counts of those who could
not otherwise afford the school.

4.16 The government will provide a fair valuation metric for parents to compare the true value of their school.
4.17 Certain schools run by organizations or religious associations will choose to provide all of its funding from other sources that do not directly tax students’ parents.

Bob Chase, the former President of the National Education Association, is right. “Many politicians talk tough about holding students and teachers accountable. But while they have zero tolerance for underachieving kids, they have abundant tolerance for underfunded schools.”[2]

[1] Expenditures per pupil at the 5th, median, and 95th percentile cutpoints and federal range ratio for public elementary and secondary school districts in the United States, by district type and type of expenditure: Fiscal year 2005. National Center for Education Statistics. Department of Education. http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2007/revexpdist05/tables/table_5.asp?referrer=list
[2] Teacher’s Unions and Teacher Politics. American Education. Joel Spring. Tenth Edition. McGraw Hill. 2002. Page 55.

Jack be nimble, Jack be quick

2007-11-25T16:47:00.000-05:00

School flexibility

“I felt stifled in the traditional public school system,” Tracy McDaniel, a national board member of the acclaimed KIPP program, writes. “Regulations prevented me from extending the school day, week and year, and, often, from hiring the most talented teachers.”[1] Reform, as Kansas envisions it, necessitates such flexibility.

3.1 The school determines the pay for all staff and the allocation of revenues into other resources. Schools will have significant flexibility in determining such allocation, however, all schools will be required to allocate a set portion of their funds
into a reserve.
3.2 The school will also determine if it would institute fees for sports, arts, and other programs.

Operations

3.3 Many schools will integrate complete prekindergarten to twelfth grade programs under the form of three partnered schools in proximity with one leader.
3.4 The principal will be responsible for determining the hours for the school and other functions of the school including remediation programs and activities.
3.5 Recruiting efforts will also be of the individual school’s discretion.

Policy

3.6 Schools will have significant flexibility in establishing policies independent of the district and other schools. A common factor would be admissions processes for schools that are oversubscribed. Such processes would likely include testing of ability, interviews, and compatibility of parent, student, and teacher philosophies. aws must be established prohibiting unnecessary filtering.
3.7 Secondary factors would include how intensively homework is assigned, as well as disciplinary procedures. Disciplinary procedures may take the form of traditional, referral based systems, or a system unique to the individual schools. Schools will also be able to determine standards for hiring teachers, consistent or higher than those determined by the government.

Define learning

3.8 Some schools, empowered with the proper technology and structure, will offer
students non-traditional opportunities to learn largely from home, returning to
a vastly smaller school building on a regular basis to take part in labs and
update new assignments. This may be one means to combat boredom and dropouts
with a more engaging learn-on-your-own-terms style.

As a September 2005 profile of Rapid City Academy of South Dakota in the Technological Horizons in Education Journal makes clear, “not all participants [in virtual high schools] fit the archetype of the typical high school-aged learner.” Many students who were already taking on full schedules enrolled to take on additional work. Indeed, one “non-traditional” student is returning after fifty-years to earn a high school diploma.[2] The advent of online summer school programs nationwide demonstrates the personal and institutional benefits of flexibility and efficiency; its scale, encompassing more than one-third of nationwide school districts that accept online courses demonstrates the program’s potential.[3],[i]

Additional expectations
In addition to national standards of competencies, several more requirements will be placed upon all or relevant schools to promote consistency and equality in aims.

3.9 One such measure will be the inclusion by all schools of a seminar period of
length determined by principal. In traditional schools, this may offer the
opportunity to pursue large-scale projects, seek remediation, and participate in
microcredit activities. In more freeform schools, a seminar period will ensure
that time is allotted to introduce topics to be assessed.

Training

3.10 Schools will also be responsible for training their group of teachers and procuring a steady stream of younger workers to fill in the ranks of retiring teachers.
3.11 Some systems may promote understudy periods and gradual increase of work. Others may promote teaming teachers by their varying abilities to create a successful diffusion of knowledge, experience, and matters of practicality.

“Through hard work, we are proving that demography is not destiny for
underserved students. … We are proving that when principals are given the
freedom to innovate and the necessary resources, we can meet the high
expectations set by NCLB.”

[1] Leaving No Child Behind. A symposium. Tracy McDaniel, et al. The Washington Post. 10 September 2007.
[2] Building A Virtual High School … Click by Click. Sue Podoll, Darcy Randle. Technological Horizons in Education Journal. September 2005.
[3] Summer School Goes Online. The Associated Press. Teacher Magazine. 23 July 2007.
[i] “According to the Illinois Online Network … the flexibility of asynchronous learning is one of the most frequently mentioned advantages of online learning. … Flexibility and convenience ranked as the most important advantages to online teaching; students also rated flexibility and convenience highly. Students in particular responded that they appreciated the freedom of choosing when to work on classes rather than having to work on them at a specific time. … Asynchronous discussions in an online course allowed the learner time to think and reflect on presented content material. Rather than trying to formulate an answer on the spot, the learner gives more consideration to the response, which seems to result in more engaged learning. … Student and instructor responses to the written questionnaires most frequently cited computer system requirements as a major disadvantage to online learning.” Limited access (affecting low-income students), computer failures, time management, and the lack of interaction were also discussed as disadvantages. Building A Virtual High School … Click By Click. Sue Podoll, Darcy Randle. Technological Horizons in Education Journal. September 2005.

Getting there

2007-11-25T16:15:00.000-05:00

The path to reform
[You can view the PDF here.]

The path to privatization will require significant effort and resources centered around three pillars: achieving progressive standards, preparing the infrastructure, and assisting parents, teachers, and administrators through the process.

Getting the infrastructure in place

2.1 The first objective will be to establish a national basic schools curriculum for subjects and types of schools. This basic curriculum is exclusively an articulation of expected competencies. A transition from town-halls to drafting an actual curriculum will allow input to be secured from parents and teachers.

2.2 The committee responsible for national education is appointed by the president and approved by Congress. The committee includes teachers, scholars, and international officials from prominent countries.

2.3 Concurrently, means for distributing national assessments will also be sought ideally, a digital, on-demand system would be implemented.
2.4 The curriculum would be approved by each state—similar to a constitutional amendment—and would be updated regularly by the commission.

The progressive agenda
Progressivism is based around the continual increase of standards of efficiency and optimum operability with minimal political or bureaucratic influence. The standards ensure that the systems in place that serve as the basis for the institution’s operations—taxation, construction,
standards, etc.—are pegged to the necessities of each school.

Loosening the binds
The most typical standards would encompass school funding— allowing tax rates to float in accordance with needs and economic conditions. By these means, schools would not be forced to reign in programs or governments need to reallocate resources and assume debt.

Another critical standard would be teacher to student ratios in the aim of preventing overcrowding. Drawing on demographic forecasts, districts would be held accountable by law to build new schools to accommodate population growth.

Metrics themselves would be subject to continual, progressive increases. In some cases, such as the metric for ideal classroom size, the metric would decrease over time.

The essence is to remove the often polarizing political influence from affecting—and as is
typically the case, hindering—the systems that enable the institution’s operations. Politicization decays the institution’s ability to respond to external developments.

2.5 This period of transition would also enable districts and states to optimize their operational structure: building new schools to meet population standards, reconfiguring taxation policies, etc.
2.6 Districts at this time would be responsible for soliciting contracts for or designing the structure of its schools with intensive parental involvement.

Educating the folks

2.7 In addition to the town halls and other formats, districts will be expected to take the lead in informing parents of their new liberties and the enhanced measures of accountability in place for students.

Getting there first

2.8 The federal government will offer substantial monetary incentives for districts that manage the process to privatization fastest while achieving progressive standards. There should be no reason—or exception—for districts that fail to privatize within the five-year period.

Dropouts

2.9 States will be encouraged to adopt dropout policies that limit the opportunities for work and drivers’ licensing in the absence of reasonable allowances. It is consistent with this paper’s philosophy that through school incentives and the opportunity for engaging, flexible schooling, the amount of dropouts will ultimately decrease.

In a 2006 Time Magazine–Oprah Winfrey Show poll, 89% of respondents acknowledged the school dropout rate to be an “extremely” or “somewhat” serious problem. Respondents reacted strongest in support of increasing parental involvement (87% viewed the initiative as likely very or somewhat effective), followed by strengthening truancy enforcement.

Respondents fiercely opposed lowering academic standards (78% not very or at all effective). Broad disagreements arose over outlawing dropping out of school under the age of eighteen and even more so in regard to penalizing the parents of students that fail to finish high school (see chart). Sixty-five percent of respondents supported denying drop-outs a drivers license until they turn eighteen. Only 33% supported denying work permits – with 64% disapproving.[1]

[1] Time-Oprah Winfrey Show Poll. March 2006.
http://www.oprah.com/tows/pastshows/200604/tows_past_20060411_c.jhtml

The duality

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A brief summary of the the national framework
[You can view the PDF here.]

The structure of a nationally-standardized private-school structure would be a progressive mix of roles and formats. Most important of the roles will be that of the district, which will have the responsibility of establishing the format – focus and philosophy – of each school and their structure as subsidiary, private, or charter schools. As for the differences: subsidiary schools would remain under the full control of the district, whereas private schools would have principals appointed by the district and charter schools would have a board of trustees with a permanent group appointed by the district and a rotating group within schools. Private and charter schools are otherwise independent in the absence of poor performance. All would have a timeframe for renewal of philosophy, directives, and appointments. A rarer form would be foundation schools, established by philanthropists or churches, whose structure would correlate strongly with charter schools.

The district remains the organizing body for all of the school’s in the community – overseeing transportation, athletics, and transfers for all schools. The district’s authority and make up are subject to local government and subsequent policy: districts in large cities will likely report to a mayor or board of education; smaller suburban and rural districts would be appointed by county government or board.

The national curriculum
During the five year privatization process, Congress would establish an educator’s advisory panel composed of teachers, researchers, and relevant officials with the intent of establishing a national curriculum for all grades and subjects of study following a brief period of town halls throughout the country.

The curriculum will encompass the core courses—math, English, history, and science—and pinnacles, including the arts, foreign language, et al. Primary focus will be on the development of curriculum for core courses as competency in these subjects will be expected of all schools.

The goals of the panel should be limited to promoting a concise, basic curriculum on which national assessments would be based and a complete, voluntary curriculum. The basic curriculum is solely an articulation of expected degrees of competency. Each school will develop their own comprehensive curriculum.

The panel will seek to enhance retention through all grades and also evaluate the competiveness of both forms of the curriculum compared to foreign peers. The panel would be tasked with the distribution of such curriculum following its approval and its regular maintenance and alteration on a yearly basis.

Organization
At its essence, decentralization is a duality of purpose: it affords greater flexibility to individual schools while also centralizing the basic systems of funding, assessment, and accountability to a broader, national context. The structure of the new systems would be based on a national department of education responsible for funding, standards, and assessment. Local districts will continue to be comprised of several thousand children and several elementary and secondary schools—their role is more specifically discussed in The District.

Tuition
Tuitions for each school would vary based on a variety of circumstances including school performance in core subjects, involvement in sports and the arts, needs of the student body, and
participation in incentives programs. The formula for determining tuition for each school would also take into account the location of the school and allow buffers promoting the integration of students with poorer performance.

School tuitions will also vary based on adherence to additional voluntary curriculums and policies offered by the federal, state, and local districts.

Testing
Assessments of all students would take place each year based on the basic curriculum. The performance for each subject assessment is determined by failure (less than 65 percent of problems correct), satisfactory (65-75 percent), exceptional (75-85%), and superior (85-100%). All students are expected to pass each core subject; 75 percent of students are expected to have scores that fall within exceptional to superior.

Other subjects for assessment, not required for each student includes the arts, foreign languages, etc All tests are accessible at all times throughout the year depending on a school’s schedule. A national rating system for schools will be established based on the school’s performance in the core areas of study and pinnacle courses where applicable.

Accountability
For five years after privatization, schools will have the flexibility to make adequate yearly progress towards national standards. If they fail, the district will be responsible for coordinating acceptable change—if necessary, changing the school’s structure.

A different way of thinking

2007-11-25T16:03:00.000-05:00

Choice, autonomy, and accountability
[You can view the PDF here.]

Kansas advocates the privatization of each school in America into an independent, non-profit form:

1.1 under which each will be responsible for determining the philosophy, style, and execution in the teaching of their charges in accordance to commonly accepted formats of teaching;
1.2 held accountable to a national system of standards that are specific in aim of basic skills for all students regardless of school type, and globally preeminent standards for each type of school; where
1.3 the federal government provides the cost of tuition for all students, and determines the cost of tuition for each school on the basis of a
standard formula of performance;
1.4 the opportunity for parents to determine the school of choice for their children within their districts, and where available, outside of them.

A change of thought
Indeed, such a reform is a departure for the better – public by nature of funding and accountability, but autonomous by the means in which they are reached. For schools now are placed in an interesting situation: not dictated by free markets and lacking direct, active investors, there is no existence or necessity for the system’s evolution. Perhaps this gives reason to Bill Gates’ claim that schools are “obsolete.”

Today, schools are reduced to an extreme polarity of classes of great difficulty and those of near trivial importance. Students are reduced to notes and definites in a rigid structure—where they should be enabled. It is unfortunate that out of irrelevance—and the lack of an opportunity to pursue their own passions, dedication is written off and the most vulnerable walk away.

Often, the most difficult classes are the result of a vicious cycle of misunderstanding—the result of a lack of time, increasing frustration, and a lack of awareness on part of the teacher of what their students really know.

As an institution, schools are further severing themselves from their responsibilities through bureaucratic decay. A focus on proximate indicators—race among them—bears little relevance to the nature of a modern society where wealth determines all. Narrow metrics—less children per teacher—cause a shotgun effect of irrational phenomena, often at the detriment of other aims—hiring more unqualified teachers.

Certainly it is possible for a cynic to argue that teachers have become but mere commodities reduced to a state of depressing manipulation. The National Educators Association, a teacher’s union, reports that 73% of new hires report entering the profession out of their desire to work with young people and 68% cite it as the reason for remaining. It is a shame many leave within their first five years.[1] By no means should teachers be compelled to sign themselves away to an oath of poverty. That—and bureaucratic obscurity.

Three-hundred and sixty-five years after the Massachusetts Bay Colony made proper education compulsory, the least we’ve learned is that education is not meant to fail you.

[1] National Teacher Day Spotlights Key Issues Facing Profession. National Educators Association. 2 May 2006. http://www.nea.org/newsreleases/2006/nr060502.

The marketplace of ideas

2007-11-25T15:52:00.000-05:00

The trouble started early
[You can view the PDF here.]

The debate over the exact purpose for schools started early. Very early, in fact: Plato’s Republic was an early proposal for meritocracy – in which all are given an equal chance to advance themselves – “each generation is trained in music and gymnastics, and after this education the most talented are selected for further education as guardians. The most talented guardians are educated to be philosopher-kings.”[1]

Thomas Jefferson shared that view – absent what would by then be the eccentrics. His 1779 Bill for the More General Diffusion of Knowledge proposed three years of education for non-slave children. The most talented were to be sent on to regional grammar schools and from their ranks, the best for further education. Horace Mann, acclaimed as America’s “greatest educational leader,” feared that crime and conflict would lead to “violence and mob rule.”[2] It would be best then to teach the common values of maintaining political order.

Two-centuries on, Mann has appeared to have won out. Schools must educate future citizens – and with it indoctrinate them with patriotism and loyalty. The result are “boring” textbooks devoid of controversy – or wrong, but almost certainly filled with mistakes, as James W. Loewen writes in his critically acclaimed, Lies My Teacher Told Me. [3]

Yet, Mann’s victory is not complete - the sheer skepticism of government would point to that. More fundamentally, Mann’s dream of socialization (mixing students of different social backgrounds to reduce tensions) will not win out precisely because it cannot.[4] Such advocacy of schooling as social control is terribly misguided as it lacks any mean for progress.

Paul Houston, an American Association of School Administrators director, is unwisely supercilious in his thunderously asking, “How can systems based on individual or subgroup goals and values promote a broader common good?”[5] This mindset is as scandalously socialist as it is piercingly telling. The greatest irony is that America, defender of liberal markets, is the keeper of illiberal schooling.

Meritocracy is the framework from which innovation and progress is achieved when individuals are offered the equal opportunity to pursue their own interests. It seems that Mann has brought about a two-hundred year odyssey focused irredeemably on an impossible pursuit. Thomas Jefferson was quite sure that an enlightened citizenry could prosper solely on the ability to read and choice of newspaper guaranteed by freedom of press and “marketplace of ideas.”[6] It is this fundamental fallacy that has made for the most damning of errors: schools’ lack of substantive ends has failed to provide a vibrant, enabling education.

A meritocracy depends on equality of opportunity – not through a compulsory, “common” education. Educational meritocracy – undoubtedly analogous to capitalism – is solely a framework in which diverse schools of thought compete to develop persons successful relative to their own interests and abilities. As a result, students are drawn to the philosophy and techniques that best allows them to realize their potential to the betterment of all, in turn analogous to capitalism’s theory of comparative advantage. As capitalism’s quantum element is capital, educational meritocracy’s is that of skill – the ability to read, write, analyze, manipulate, and conceptualize – brought about through exposure serves as the groundwork for intellectual development, whether it should be in the arts or physics.

A market that depends so fully on individuals pursuing their own interests must not be crippled by an education system that views individuals as no more than part of an undifferentiated mass – ironically, the same qualification of Mann’s feared mob. Undifferentiated students make for educational inflation in which the “educational requirements of jobs increase while the actual skills required for the jobs do not change.”[7]

A rereading of Adam Smith can answer Mr. Houston:

The individual “generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. ... He intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. … By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it.” After all, it is no secret that “it is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest.”[8]

Yet, this paper is in agreement with the many who look unfavorably upon schools reform in the interest of business. Education must be in the interest of the child – and this as the center for debate about reform. Where this paper distinguishes itself from these critics is in its belief that school choice can succeed in achieving education in the interest of the child, not proximate or ultimate business interests. Whereas Jonathan Kozol views vouchers as a threat to democratic education that is “more dangerous than ever,” it is more precisely “for-profit” privatization that this paper does not support.

“Business partnerships” between schools, which Kozol describes as schools where:

Principals I met in schools like these would tell me they wished no longer to be known as "principals" but preferred to be known as "Building CEOs" or "Building Managers", in which cases their teachers frequently would be described as "classroom managers". Mission statements heralding the need for children to be trained to serve our nation's interests in "the global marketplace" were posted on the walls of many schools I visited. In practice, however, students were more often being trained for careers at supermarket checkout counters or for the bottom level "service jobs" at nursing homes.[9]

The practice is an indefensible sham, but “building managers” and supermarket clerks are not the aim of this paper, or those genuinely passionate about schools autonomy. It is restoring the promise of education to the teacher, the parent, and child that is the heart of this paper, and its proposals are stridently consistent with an enlightened democratic interest. What Kozol describes is terribly misguided, but it is not the reality conducive to necessitating the distinguishing and properly advocating for freedom of choice separate from profit against the public trust is feasible. True choice and real autonomy can transcend this unreality to embrace progress.

Even Marx could agree that history “is not like some individual person, which uses men to achieve its ends. History is nothing but the actions of men in pursuit of their ends.”

[1] The political purposes of schooling. American Education. Tenth Edition. Joel Spring. McGraw Hill. 2002.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Lies My History Teacher Told Me. James W. Loewen. Touchstone. 1995.
[4] The political purposes of schooling. American Education. Page 8.
[5] Time to Re-Public the Republic. Paul D. Houston. The School Administrator. September 2003. http://tinyurl.com/366t9h.
[6] Ibid. Page 7.
[7] The social purposes of schooling. American Education. Tenth Edition. Joel Spring. Page 13.
[8] An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. Adam Smith. Text available through Project Gutenberg – http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3300.
[9] The Big Enchilada. Jonathan Kozol. Harper’s Magazine Notebook. August 2007.

History is not kind to idlers

2007-11-25T14:59:00.000-05:00

Poverty and the bored child

[You can view the PDF here.]

In 1983, the often-quoted A Nation at Risk warned of the ominous impact of conflicting demands. Some twenty-four years on, the country remains undecided over who can—and how—this system will be reformed.[1] Meanwhile, the doubts only grow.

The kids get the picture. When 307 New York teens were asked by the BBC if their education had prepared them for the future, forty-percent responded that they did not know.[2]

Education in the United States remains a right of each state. As a result, each state determines its own standards and means of fulfilling them. Funding is just the tip of the iceberg. The standards required to be a 'highly qualified' teacher are unduly sporadic.[3] Even the students are not excluded. In a mildly amusing account, one third-grade class marks 70 percent of its class as gifted with some school systems in general as high as 40 percent.[4]

It’s beyond this paper’s conception of gifted that a school’s population can truly reach such excess. The undeserving pose a grater risk of diluting standards; the truly gifted soon underserved. Even this is an irrational response if—as skeptics would have it—it is merely a ploy to prevent flight to private schools.

The No Child Left Behind Act is indicative of the necessity for greater national influence in education. Yet the clinging idealism as education as a states’ right limits its impact. And so it is that the rope of sand returns, with a strong grip on America’s future.

Matters of education can no longer be a state right. They are a pupil’s right and as such, they are attended to most effectively by the preserving the rights of parent, teacher, and school in face of further haphazard consolidation. A lot of good can come out of better management, but fully realizing a preeminent education system requires a more complete reform.

Competition and school choice
Until now, the greatest effort to induce competition to the nation’s schools has been through charter and voucher-based initiatives. In this scope, such competition only dilutes the nature of education—equality. Government must enable every school to pursue success—and must give every student the opportunity to pursue their passion. “We define ‘excellence’ to mean several related things,” Risk describes. “At the level of the individual learner, it means performing on the boundary of individual ability in ways that test and push back personal limits, in school and the workplace. Excellence characterizes a school or college that sets high expectations and goals for all learners, then tries in every way possible to help students reach them.”

When choice as envisioned in this paper is achieved—parents may be enabled to pursue schools consistent with their values—religious or otherwise, while certain that the standards of success and knowledge are unchanged. Schools are no longer the realm of government, but markets that benefit only when their children do.

Such an argument finds broad agreement among conservatives and liberals alike – invoking free market principles or seeing to it that failure does not go without consequence in the aim of an equitable education. The Heritage Foundation, a conservative public policy institute, cites fifteen states with pubic school choice (see table).

Yet, school choice is as fiercely opposed as it is championed. Conservatives align more closely with the latter, teachers’ unions and liberal organizations among the former. Organizations like Parents in Charge look to school choice as a beacon for empowerment. The National Education Association and People for the American Way detest the diversion of “scarce education funding away from public schools.”[5] Of the two arguments, it is ironically, the conservatives that are more progressive in vision. The opposed ultimately detest a competition between systems, threatening to disrupt the foundations of equity – one that this paper shares.

However, if a fundamental reform is achieved in which all schools are afforded autonomy – and a system of “basic academic and fiscal accountability” are in place – does this not assure that student achievement will be the “driving force” as the NEA would prefer it? Would a properly calibrated market not ensure lower class sizes, enhancing teacher quality and that of resource and facilities, too? If what was heretofore the domain of “private” schooling was embraced by a framework that supports equality of opportunity – and recognizes that there are different means by which to achieve it – in the process, radically transforming the very essence of public schooling, how would the organizations defend their strident opposition?

Perhaps it is not an opposition at all, as more or less, value-purists and policy-agnostic. The American Federation of Teachers goals for school reform can be summarized as support for “standards for student conduct and academic achievement.” The NEA supports “innovative schools controlled and organized by teachers,” both ideals embraced by this paper.[6] In the end, they detest only, and admirably, a two-tier education system, with its “relatively homogeneous student bodies” and “students that are the costliest to educate.”[7] Best though to begin with the fifty-tier system of states. All else is swiftly reduced to much ado about nothing. Remember, as Shakespeare would have it for Beatrice to say, “Foul words is but foul wind, and foul wind is but foul breath, and foul breath is noisome.”

Nobody’s right
Schools fractured by the conflicting wishes of a wide range of thought know all too well the impossibilities of catering to the multitude of proven philosophies. These philosophies, more often than not, were assessed purely without the influence of other alternatives, and indeed were proven right. The wrong is in hobbling them together.

Converting the nature of each school—to purely pursue the philosophy that works best for its students—can more effectively replicate the progress found in simpler research environments. It is encouraging that many districts are proposing smaller high-schools and pursuing new formats in structure. The means are different, the ends are not.

Newly liberated, schools may find relevance in George Bernard Shaw’s Man and Superman: “Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.”

Learning the poor child
“Of all our institutions,” Napoleon said, “public education is the most important. Everything depends on it, the present and the future.” Indeed, it is the ultimate ends of education that should be liberating – empowering any student, regardless of background to receive a competitive education that enables them to improve their lot in a continuous cycle of prosperity. (College degrees increase pay by 45% more than non-graduates.)[8] The reality, however, is far removed from this utopian dream. The most specific cause for schools reform can be attributed to the broad failure of schools educating the poor—and as a result, disproportionately minority—students (see chart).

The devil, after all, is in the details. Funding inequities, as the result of local dependence on property taxes, severely limits the opportunities available to the impoverished. It makes out to be a vicious cycle: 82% of children whose parents do not have a high school degree live in low-income families. At the same time, 45% of poor children's parents are either unemployed or employed only part-time.[9] “Male black workers,” Richard Rothstein writes in the New York Review of Books, “with only high school educations earn on average 79 percent of what similarly educated whites do. If only high school graduates with similar test scores are compared, then black wages are 87 percent.” Even these figures understate the true difference in earnings.[10] Such a lifestyle is unsustainable for investing in a future.

Without the means to finance a competitive primary education, the potential for realizing education’s liberating power grows narrower – resulting in delays in language development, aggression, social withdrawal, substance abuse, poor attendance, and depression, setting the stage for further problems.

The fate for national funding equality was sealed in the Supreme Court’s 1973 San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez ruling, which by a vote of 5-4, found that the Constitution does not require equal funding among school districts. States have largely taken up the issue – in favor of equity, providing additional state resources for poor schools. Yet, less than half of equity challenges profiled by a 1993 report were successful.[11]

Alas, the gap remains. New York City per-pupil funding was some $11,700 for the 2002-3 school year. In Manhasset, New York, some mere miles away, per-pupil funding stands at $22,000. Education, like most institutions, requires a minimum threshold for its effect to be reached. This puts oneself in a position to advocate further equity.[12]

Skeptics, author Joe Nathan writes, often denounce school reform as a “con job” detracting attention away from ultimate social issues.[13] This is a legitimate argument (and not a focus of this paper), but who is to deny the promise of an empowering education in fostering the amelioration of the tragedy of poverty?

An economic problem, then, should have a market solution – not one, as the Wall Street Journal would have it, dependent solely on expanding the voucher program, but by fully liberalizing school choice – and with it, accountability. Back-door privatization is by no means that option.[14] Still, one must be equally careful in seeing to it that “legislated excellence … concentrating only on the weakest of schools, reforms … that at best apply only to a narrow band of schools and at worst hamper or destroy the excellent work being done” elsewhere.[15]

And the bored one
Just as important is the significance of boredom and dropouts. Never mind Time magazine’s cover, Oprah’s ‘crisis,’ or Bill Gates’ dollars – the numbers (as a result of the triumvirate’s confluence) do fair enough justice.

Put simply, thirty percent of America’s graduating class of 2003 dropped out. More tellingly, 45% of blacks and 47% of Hispanic students dropped out.[16] The cost is significant and its reach dizzying: the Alliance for Excellent Education’s report cites a potential savings of some $7.9-$10.8 billion each year if educational attainment for the poor increased. Dropouts are tallied to contribute some $60,000 less in taxes over their lifetimes. An increase in the male graduation by just 5% would eliminate $4.9 billion in crime-related costs alone.[17]

Beyond cost, the Milton & Rose D. Friedman Foundation has found that a dropout in the state of Missouri is twice as likely to be incarcerated and unemployment of 20.1% in the state for dropouts is understandably far above the 4.4% rate for graduates.[18]

Politicians, of course, like cause and effect issues: Indiana now dictates that dropouts will lose their driver’s license and work permit if they drop out before they are eighteen or without declared financial hardship. As an alternative, students can now enroll in community college or employment granted they attend school for at least three hours each day among other criteria.

This is all very well and good, but why do students dropout in the first place? Forty-seven percent of dropouts cite uninteresting classes as their principal reason for leaving. More tellingly, 81% of dropouts would have stayed for real-world learning (with “relevance” thrown in), “better teachers who keep classes interesting” (tied), and smaller classes (75%).[19] Academia, thankfully, couldn’t have said it any better.

[1] A Nation At Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform. National Commission on Excellence in Education. April 1983. http://www.ed.gov/pubs/NatAtRisk/index.html.
[2] Generation Next – Global Research Poll. BBC World Service. October 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/04_12_06_gen_next.pdf.
[3] For Teachers, Being ‘Highly Qualified’ Is a Subjective Matter. Michael Alison Chandler. Washington Post. January 2007.
[4] Schools Seek and Find ‘Gifted’ Students. Daniel de Vise. Washington Post. 3 January 2007.
[5] Vouchers and Tuitition Tax Credits. Public Education. People for the American Way. http://www.pfaw.org/pfaw/general/default.aspx?oid=12074.
[6] Teacher’s Unions and Teacher Politics. American Education. Joel Spring. Tenth Edition. McGraw Hill. 2002. Page 58.
[7] Ibid. Page 56.
[8] Letter: America’s new class division. BBC. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4284161.stm.
[9] Demographics of Low-Income Children. National Center for Children in Poverty. http://www.ncp.org/state_detail_demographic_US.html.
[10] Must Schools Fail? Richard Rothstein. The New York Review of Books. 2 December 2004.
[11] School Finance Reform: The Role of the Courts. CPRE Finance Briefs. http://tinyurl.om/2jz6bz.
[12] Per-Pupil Spending in Public Schools of Six Metropolitan Areas. The Shame of the Nation. Jonathan Kozol. Crown Publishers. 2005.
[13] Charter Schools: Creating Hope and Opportunity for American Education. Joe Nathan. 1999..
[14] Somewhere, Milton is Smiling. The Wall Street Journal. 5 February 2007.
[15] Schools That Work: America’s Most Innovative Public Education Programs. George H. Wood, Ph.D. Penguin Books. 1992.
[16] Leaving Boys Behind: Public High School Graduation Rates. Jay P. Greene, Marcus A. Winters. Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/cr_48.htm.
[17] The High Cost of High School Dropouts: What the Nation Pays for Inadequate High Schools. Alliance for Excellent Education. January 2007. http://www.all4ed.org/publications/High Cost.pdf.
[18] Missouri’s 2005 dropout class will cost taxpayers $71 million dollars every year. Milton & Rose D. Foundation. March 20, 2006. http://tinyurl.com/yuwns2.
[19] The Silent Epidemic. John M. Bridgeland, John J. Dilulio, Jr., Karen Burke Morison. March 2006. http://www.standup.org/pdf/TheSilentEpidemic.pdf.

First

2007-11-25T14:51:00.000-05:00

A brief analysis of American education
[You can view the PDF here.]

To venture into the heap of quotations that education has amassed over the years offers little hope for those who think kindly of the accelerating progress of thought and mind. It is by far not a tragedy – the ends sought have remained remarkably constant: to enlighten Plutarch’s “internal dank gloom” of a mind that has neither “dispelled nor dispersed” in the world’s symposium.

What is unfortunate is that the means of achieving this enlightenment – schooling, as Mark Twain put it, has managed only to “interfere with my education.” It is the predicament of this gap between education and schooling with which the reformer is faced with today – its forms capable of manifesting only too easily with the advancement of time.

Schooling, where education enables, at its essence manages to best bring out the natural aversion to the disabling dogma of fact without purpose. It is an all too necessary aversion – the essence of innovation is dependent not on contentment with improving within the bounds of one’s current lot, but extending beyond it entirely to further collective progress. Neuroscientist Jeff Hawkins implores us that is an all too natural one as well – the framework of thought and creativity is brought about through the mind’s ability to establish analogies between otherwise unrelated aspects of life.[1]

Yet, if the mind is only a model of reality, then education is the broadening of this model by uniting disparate experiences – facts and figures included – to forge a more complete representation of our existence. The emerging science of the mind is quickly bridging the gap between philosophies' light. Much less encouraging words can be said about the state of the system.

Move on up
From the original colonies, education in America has created an impressive history for itself – the preeminent Harvard University, opened in 1636, predating the nation. The prided Ivy League was all but set by 1764, with the exception of Cornell University in 1865.

Initially, most schools were private and – in another mark of time gone by – churches established early universities to train ministers. Following the national government’s Land Ordinance of 1785, a portion of every unincorporated township would be turned over for schools.[2]

Not until the 1840s was the arc from private to public schools firmly set in motion under America’s Second Great Awakening. The most prominent of these education reformers was Horace Mann. Born into poverty, he had been one to make the most of the promise of education: he graduated as valedictorian from Brown University in 1819, going on to study law, and soon afterwards tutoring Latin and Greek. Practicing law in Dedham, Massachusetts, Mann was part of the town’s school committee – the nation’s first free and tax-underwritten school. He invested his life from 1827 to 1837 in the Massachusetts House and Senate.

In 1837, Mann became Massachusetts’ secretary of education, where he set about creating a statewide network of common schools. Tellingly, his agenda focused on equipping schools with necessary resources, seeking out higher pay for teachers, implementing a broader curriculum, and extending education to 16 years of age. Indeed, not much has changed.

By 1900, some 31 states required 8- to 14- year old students to attend school, and by 1918, every state required students to complete at least elementary school. McGuffey Readers, memorization, and corporal punishment were the norm. Secondary education remained less attainable – in 1870, two percent of 14 to 17-year olds graduated high school, reaching ten percent in 1900. Of note, aside from schools integration in 1954, the Supreme Court in 1925 upheld a student's right to attend private schools to meet compulsory education laws.[3]

In search of progress
Amidst this, progress remains elusive. Schools have long succeeded in establishing a basic workforce and groundwork for college, yet it lacks the flexibility for its charges to break beyond this stifling, all be it in a betrayal of both words, ambiguity. Trying – and failing – to blend disparate philosophies and techniques to meet every child's needs, schools have managed to do neither. Mandatory courses indifferent to individual aims and gimmickery are the norm.[6]

Much the same, high expectations and lax standards for admission to advanced courses make for stagnation and deterioration of quality – and a submission to bare note and fact. This burden, more often than not, results in an apathy and restlessness that works against the pursuit of empowerment. For the students who give up out of boredom or frustration, the response, paradoxically, is a further dilution of standards. Do less and think less are not the mantras of innovation.

Soon an extreme polarity forms – pervasive throughout mindsets and scores. Resistance between student and teacher – each ignorant of the other – diminishes the classroom to the doldrums of simple worksheets and drills, and sooner or later uproar out of boredom. For the bright few, such an atmosphere is at best a game for those already adept at pushing paper, and at worst, an imprisonment. It is much the same for the less gifted. Schools are not the meritocracy where rigor necessitates passion. No, they are the houses of vacuous ability.

To illustrate this point, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has reported that United States has a rather low variance (29.1% of the international average) in science-performance between schools, but a gap of an astounding (94% - versus an international norm of 68%) within them. (7) Schools, at their essence, suffer from a lack of substantive ends. They do not aspire to be mere centers of rote and drill and are far removed from a liberal course of study. In this in-between, everything for everybody state, progress ceases.

What, then, should be a schools aim? Preferably, it is one that realizes the necessity of schools specialization to overcome muddled thought and execution. And with these independent schools, comes a liberating multitude of choice that reaches a more dynamic end: Education would become, most succinctly, what one chooses to make of it. It is from this current lack of identity that the institutional predicaments one faces today have come. Testing cannot fill this lack of identity – it in fact only compounds it, by implementing an intensely narrow metric that results in entropy as the result of specificity. The effect is that of running in circles all the while shooting a shotgun's scattering of incoherent initiatives and policy. To draw upon Charles Dickens' “leprosy of unreality,” significant progress can be made from loosening the unyielding control of a wayward organizational structure and lack of centralizing ideology and returning it to the schoolhouse.

“I don't know the key to success,” Bill Cosby goes, “but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.” Focus is paramount.

Idle reform
Invariably, problems come with a panel and report. Particularly interesting – and entrenched – problems make for dozens. Former president Clinton's Goals 2000 program, passed in 1994, reads wonderfully: by 2000, every child would come to school ready to learn; each adult literate and possessing the skills needed for the global economy.[8] Kids would learn to “use their minds well.” The others fall rather short. High school graduation rates have yet to surpass, let alone reach, 90 percent. A trip back to the future finds that American schools are not first in the world in science and mathematics “achievement.” Certainly, one wonders how the goal of all schools free of drugs, violence, and firearms found its way into an otherwise rational set of goals free of smirks – or worse, twinkled eyes.

Occasionally, progress, however haphazard, is made too. The No Child Left Behind Act may indeed be, as the White House proclaims, “the most sweeping reform of federal education policy in a generation.” Whether or not sweeping and successful are one in the same is debatable. The law is centered around a framework for achieving “adequate yearly progress.” Such progress is determined by annual testing of students in grades 3-8 on “challenging” state standards. Relative progress, rather admirably, must be achieved among all sub-groups of race, socioeconomic status, and disability. Schools that fail to progress sufficiently for two consecutive years begin a progress of restructuring and districts must offer failing students the choice to attend school elsewhere; three years of lagging growth opens up additional funding for tutoring and supplemental programs; four years subjects a school to “increasingly tough corrections” including the removal of staff and takeover.[9]

Not all is admirable. The law boasts of its unprecedented flexibility – perhaps too much of it. In the ode to states' rights, each is responsible for determining its standards and assessing them. The result, The Economist notes, is more or less a gaming of the system.[10] Among the inflexible, one principal interviewed for this paper frets that a school's progress can quite literally hang disproportionately in the balance of a handful of students in one of the various sub-groups.

Others criticize the disinclination to request the full funding allotted for the act and the vacuous scramble to teach to the test, taking recess away all the while. This is all well and good, but it does not discredit the policy as a whole.

It is by all counts much better than most propose. A liberal voucher program without equally liberal autonomy for all schools fails to account for the supposed “competition” that results. Without the incentives that privatization provides, what serves as the impetus for distressed schools to improve? The interest in a constitutional amendment for education is similarly misguided. By sheer influence of resource and well-crafted legislation, the federal government can tacitly achieve the same ends. And fights, after all, are best avoided.

Sources
[1] On Intelligence. Jeff Hawkins, Sandra Blakeslee. Times Books. 9 September 2004.
[2] Land Ordinance of 1785. Indiana History Documents. Indiana Historical Bureau. http://www.statelib.lib.in.us/www/ihb/resources/docldord.html.
[3] Supreme Court Decisions. The Heritage Foundation. http://www.heritage.org/research/education/schoolchoice/SupremeCourtDecisions.cfm
[4] History of American Education Web Project. University of Notre Dame. http://www.nd.edu/~rbarger/www7/.
[5] Philosophy as a Basis for Curriculum Decisions. Allan C. Ornstein. Contemporary Issues in Curriculum. 2003.
[6] Senior Year: A Teenage Wasteland. Mary Tedrow. Teacher Magazine. 1 August 2007. http://tinyurl.com/22hmz9.
[7] Between-school and in-school variance in school performance on the science scale. PISA 2006. Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. http://www.pisa.oecd.org/document/2/0,3343,en_32252351_32236191_39718850_1_1_1_1,00.html
[8] Goals 2000: Educate America Act. United States Department of Education. http://www.ed.gov/legislation/GOALS2000/TheAct/intro.html.
[9] Fact Sheet: No Child Left Behind Act. The White House. January 2000. http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/01/20020108.html.
[10] What chance co-operation? The Economist. 24 February 2007.

On egnagement

2007-11-25T13:34:00.001-05:00

Tales from the classroom

Some three years ago, your correspondent turned in a paper for his language arts class at a crossroads. The past year had been spent going through countless worksheets focusing on the straightforward four-square writing technique. Your correspondent complied – his interest and work in a state of decay.

Once more – the doldrums. The assignment about to be turned in was not the mind numbing norm; indeed, he feared failure. Paradoxically, he wrote a letter to explain his intentions and views on the matter. Its relevance has far exceeded its original purpose.

“Writing is not meant to be a simple fill-in-the blank process, but that is what I have experienced. I have found the nature of my writing so repetitive (to the extent that I am ultimately just substituting words in an ad-lib) that it lacks life.” Melodrama aside, the letter was received with applause. Formulaic writing, the teacher responded, should be viewed as a “stepping stone,” that “should not be abused with overuse.”

More telling was the admission that “most if not all [of your classmates] will not be able to step off of this stone for years to come.” It is shocking to the extent of scandal when one recognizes that the classmates in question are enrolled in an honors course (trend noted). Are these not the same students your correspondent has seen conduct themselves in a manner polarized by that of the work they produce – thoughtful, aware, and energetic; more than capable? Indeed, it is a woeful underestimation of potential.

History class is much of the same: too often, your correspondent's peers are reduced to passive learners. Feigned interest is more appropriate. Or a reading class where students were expected to sit down, read, and answer several review questions – more focused what was done and said, than what much of anything means.

It is ironic, your correspondent notes, that outside one classroom door, a sign quotes Tobias S. Gibson's claim that “Small people talk about other people. Great people talk about ideas.” Even then, the questions were not collected – how long after not finishing the work did the book lay unopened as well?

Of course, it is not all gloomy – the history class from the year before saw to lively debates. What then makes for the difference in teachers? It would seem to be a matter of comfort and insecurities. When the teacher feels they cannot control their class without submissioning them to notes and definites – yes, control is achieved for some time, but at what cost before it is written off by their students? Is it not unsurprising that these are the same teachers that fill their days with videos to an extent far greater than any other teacher – in any subject?

It is an illogical predicament and a self-fulfilling one too. Students who write the class off as boring confirm their disinterest in test scores. What more can be done but to dig in and give more worksheets? Engaging students is not a burden – unskilled teachers may say otherwise – it should be a liberation. For when students are engaged, the teacher can reduce their role.

Relevancy can be achieved. It can be mastered, harnessed, and compelled to produce. The goal as teacher or policymaker is not to indulge in the absent-minded pursuit of creating relevancy, but enabling it. Teachers constantly praised for 'making learning fun' denotes their exception from the mean.

Relevance cannot be found in a textbook of Seven Strategies for Highly Effective Readers, covered with annotations and diluted questioning. In an honors course, no less, what aspect of this schooling is advanced? Is it not an intrinsic character of advanced readers to naturally utilize these techniques? Conformity is the essence. Only briefly is this situation a bargain for both sides: the ease in which the class completes this demeaning work produces an instinctive response by the teacher – increase the amount of work.

The question of relevancy extends beyond many barriers, in delivery and content versus the maturity of the student, the nature of the times, and the ability of the student. One has already witnessed the inability to maneuver with such change – a framework for enabling relevancy will prove to be far more enduring than the talking points thrown into a curriculum.

It is most amusing that this framework – and the clearest indicator of what schools lack – can be found in the likes of social-networking sites. In spite of their presumed ills, these services have capitalized on the very nature of what education could and must be: they offer the means and openness in terms of access and openness of standards that allows anyone to utilize the system to meet their interests and needs.

For a web page, it amounts to harnessing the site to create a unique profile. It is the users, not the providers who produce the content that is so compelling. Technology has enabled users to control the nature of their experience; indeed, these services are the embodiment of efficient systems – with minimal cost, they are nothing more than the framework from which all else develops. Where they profit, education would mark gains in competitiveness.

Even within this same metaphor the clear advantage of school systems over such websites – that children are compelled to go to school, the effects of schools that are not relevant produce far worse consequences than losses in ad revenues: children drop out. Social networking sites manage even to assess its community – that is, by the amount of friends and buzz surrounding a particular site.

All this, after all, is nothing more than an attempt to wrong Robert Morley. “Show me the man who has enjoyed his schooldays and I will show you a bully and a bore.”

The littlest things

2007-11-25T13:30:00.000-05:00

The benefits and perils of tinkering

At some point, performance reaches a glass ceiling against optimal capacity. To reach even this point free of major operational burden is respectable – indeed, it is simply where most organizations tend to stop. The predicament is that all of one's problems have been solved. All of them, that is, except for the one pertaining to reaching optimal performance. At this point, achieving optimal performance is more of a matter of solutions than problems.

Much the same can be said about the education system. (Note not a contradiction, but optimal performance relative to the existing organizational structure.) Tinkering, much the same as one would do with their computer or car, done in the pursuit of revealing meaningful pockets of performance. The process gone about independently, while rather amusing to your correspondent, is impractical for large organizations with various considerations. These organizations are left to rely on the relatively few who embrace changes in structure as their inspiration and justification for change. The result is an unintended but effective system of research and development. Given sufficient results and the right amount of momentum, all that remains is a matter of scaling the changes to meet the bigger organization – with hope that the results will follow in equal measure.

In equal parts, wealth, activism, research, and accident have made for the education system's research and development labs. Most are erroneous, many laughable, and few with respectable promise. The most well-known proposal would have the school day pushed backed several hours for secondary students. The thinking is straight-forward: adolescents need a minimum of half an hour to two hours and a half more sleep than their parents. The trouble is the fact that their body clocks are programmed to be more conducive to late nights than their parents or younger siblings.[1] Waking up at six to catch the bus makes for the inevitable crunch of sleep deprivation.

As a result, many advocate delaying the school start time. Indeed, research has shown them out on the issue. Dr. Kyla Wahlstrom of the University of Michigan's research on the Minneapolis Public School District's 85 minute delay caused students to achieve an extra five hours of sleep each week. The result was an uptick in attendance, alertness, and reduced self-reported depression. Dr. Mary Carskadon's work would suggest better grades, reduced car crashes caused by sleepiness, and reduced metabolic and nutritional deficits.[2]

The obstacles to implementing the program are posted, unknown as to its benefit or not, by The National Sleep Foundation. Of the eight problems the foundation cites, outside of general resistance, include the problems inherent to transporting the students at a later time, and the effect of pushing back the release time, a problem for after-school activities and working students.[3]

The typical solution involves swapping start times for elementary and secondary students. More innovative, Denver's public schools have implemented a flexible schedule – keeping the regular start times but pushing back the release time. Students choose the time that works best for them. In the first year, 30% choose a later start time – a number the district expects to grow. Meanwhile, the district is planning to utilize the extra time to provide tutoring, preparatory courses, and expedite (or catch up with) graduation requirements.[4]

Mysteries and mayhem
Other districts similarly focused on health have looked to their lunch lines for change. In 1997, Appleton Central Alternative Charter School in Wisconsin eliminated its junk foods, replacing them with water coolers, 100 percent fruit juices, whole-grain breads and bagels, a salad bar, dark greens, and apple-sauce.

Teachers, author Morgan Spurlock writes, “were blown away by the improvements in the kids' behavior, their attentiveness in class and their general attitudes.” Six years later, the Board of Education enacted a similar plan for the district's 15,000 students. Even this pales in comparison to Lincoln Elementary in Washington state: In addition to the salad bar, the school features an organic garden and greenhouse managed by students.[5]

Another idea, (the article's title is Reading Out of The Idiot Box) has studied the impact of using same-language subtitling on television in India to combat illiteracy. The program showed “an incremental, but measurable” improvement in literacy over a six month period. While innovative, one doubts that Junior wouldn't mind having his cartoons obstructed by words.[6]

Yet another idea involves streamlining the alphabet for younger readers to enhance literacy.[7] The alphabet eliminates dissimilar upper and lower case symbols in the aim of reducing confusion. The idea dates back to 1949, when creator Brad Thompson noticed his son's ability to read “Run Pal,” while botching “see him run.” If the concept is news to the reader, it concisely sums up the lack of interest. Tinkering, it seems, has its limits.

[1] Sleep and Teens. National Sleep Foundation. http://tinyurl.com/3bnonw.
[2] A Look at the School Start Times Debate. National Sleep Foundation. http://tinyurl.com/22v2lq.
[3] Eight Major Obstacles to Delaying High School Start Times. National Sleep Foundation. http://tinyurl.com/2aawo6.
[4] Changing School Start Times: Denver, Colorado. National Sleep Foundation. http://tinyurl.com/2aaw06.
[5] Don’t Eat This Book. Morgan Spurlock. 2005.
[6] Reading Out of the ‘Idiot Box’: Same-Language Subtitling on Television in India. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Information Technologies and International Development. http:/mitpress.mit.edu/journals/pdf/ITID-2-1_23_0.pdf.
[7] Alphabet 26: A New Alphabet Concept. http://tinyurl.com/2yd5ix.

Technology in education

2007-11-25T13:19:00.000-05:00

In search of a purpose

When a study released this year concluded that educational software doesn't boost test scores, the response on part of the industry was fairly predictable. Take the study with a grain of salt, Mark Schneiderman, a director at the Software and Information Industry Association told reporters. The industry, it seems, is no longer “proud to be the largest commercial supporter of this important study” as one chief executive the organization represents said three years ago.[1]
This latest report serves to highlight the lack of vision for technology in education. Certainly, the most successful initiative was the uninspired roll-out of computer and internet access in schools (see charts). Beyond this, technology's role has been haphazard. Where other efforts have been well-intended, their general inefficiency negates the expense: note library subscriptions to vast databases and their limited use beyond what is forced upon students or the interest in smartboards, digital touchscreens that take place of overhead projectors and whiteboards, without any accompanying leap in teaching.

Laptops and computer labs used to trudge through presentations and the accompanying worksheet does not hint at any return on investment. Even the push for distance learning as an alternative for students is more of a distraction from the reality of poor engagement in the classroom than a substantive stand-alone solution.

A flip of thought
The lack of innovation is at most a problem of thought. Now, technology is pursued to help students learn better. The most practical opportunities involve helping teachers teach better. The flip of thought is significant: if one can reduce the time teachers need – waste is more appropriate – as the “lowliest of bureaucrats,” more time can be directed at creating engaging lessons, nullifying the current arrangement to make learning fun. The last innovation on this front is the Scantron and its enduring bubble tests. Automated is the precise word here, whether it is simply taking the ease of Scantrons one step farther by automatically adding the grades into a teacher's gradebook or more intensive endeavors. Digitizing internal forms and reducing redundancies in information systems serves the same end.

The most pronounced opportunities are in streamlining classes that are targeted to quantifiable student needs. Harnessing “real data” and making use of pre-tests to more effectively direct classes is ideal. Pearson Education sells the Classroom Performance System – a nifty wireless remote with letters A through H for each student and software for teachers that allow them to assemble questions and assessments and sorting through the results in real-time. On the fly, the program can report responses to impromptu questions; the prospect gives a whole new meaning to “Did you get what I'm saying?” If yes, press A.

The Wall Street Journal reports in a whimsical article on schools that are now employing automated phone systems that call parents to notify them based on pre-programmed circumstances. They range from the helpful, school closings, the informative, John scored a C on his math quiz, and the annoying, he has but one dollar left on his lunch account – replayed to every phone number on the student's contact list.[2]

All of this does not discount the need for technology education; yes, students today are the beneficiaries of technological renaissance and yes, as Dr. Kimberley Ketterer writes in Learning & Leading With Technology, students will need to be adept at making the most of it all. But no, schools need not be on the leading edge, or as her counterpart, Rich Gibson, puts it the subsidization of the technology industry's “bloat.”[3] Programs that are often out of reach for individual students deserve the investment; technology that is nothing more than excuse to get out of class do not. Anyways, what is one to do when it all breaks down?

[1] Software’s Efficacy on Tests in Doubt. Amit R. Paley. Washington Post. 5 April 2007.
[2] Schools Discover Automated Calling and Go Wild. Ellen Gamerman. The Wall Street Journal. http://tinyurl.com/2js4m9.
[3] Should Schools Strive to Be on the Leading Edge? Point/Counterpoint. Dr. Kimberley Ketterer and Rich Gibson. Learning & Leading with Technology. October 2005.

The irrational phenomena

2007-11-25T13:14:00.000-05:00

A frazzled schools sytem

Education, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz tells us, “is the passport to the future.” In the cinema, his character spoke of having the best organization his people had ever had. Incompetents – (put kindly) – destroyed it. It is a pity that so much of organizational failure is tied up in nonsense. Nonsense, that makes for all too hilarious tales from the classroom.

But first, a better understanding of the school system’s structure is needed. The basics: the 49 million children, 105,105 schools, and nearly fifteen thousand districts are well understood.[1] What is not is how organizational structure and management more often than not work against its interest. The school as an institution finds itself in an interesting predicament. It is not dictated by free markets and it has no direct, active investors, so there is no existence or necessity for the organization’s evolution. Decay is inevitable. But it is not the school’s nature to compete – after all, equality is the ultimate aim sought. Competition in the school’s current form puts much smaller, newly established alternatives against the far more prevalent established system. Schools, in this manner, are no different from the cable company that cares not if you leave.

Kansas argues that competition between organizational systems works against the public interest by the very nature of its limited scope. Full autonomy, centered on ideas, but united in ultimate aims, is much more approachable: all schools should reach proficiency (the equality sought) – they compete on how best to reach it for each student. With this belief, comes the essence that most philosophies of a student’s education are effective – separately and only for relevant students. Yet, it is too often the hodgepodge of policies and philosophies that work against a school’s interests.

The school system, as with any institution, has a tendency to sever itself from its responsibilities through decay due to inefficient, inappropriate, or nonexistent responses to the environment in which the institution is operating in. The most common presence of such severance is through dilution of power downwards from where the policy originated, and a dilution of information clarity as it moves up the hierarchy, each prompting a delayed, incomplete, and often ineffective response to developments. It is only too fitting that management expert, Jim Collins, began his book Good to Great by stating “We don’t have great schools, principally because we have good schools.”

External developments are key causes for an institution severing itself from its responsibilities. Companies that fail to account for emerging developments in their fields fall victim to “disruptive” innovation. Instead of adopting a mindset of pursuing innovation and the renewed efficiencies it brings, as Clayton Christensen lays out in his book The Innovator’s Dilemma, an organization stalls against the short-term cost and reduction of industrial clout for scale to its ultimate demise. Where the capital markets find such demise in corporate failure, public institutions, such as schools, find their end in increasing ineffectiveness.

Politicizing an institution's systems can be equally problematic. The fickle avoidance of tax, poor allocation of resources, and the distractions of partisanship and compromise muddle action. This results in an institution no longer capable of effectively fulfilling its responsibilities, the effectiveness of its actions eroded through bureaucratic inundation.

The tendency of all politically centered organizations to focus on proximate responses instead of ultimate factors plays a key part in these disjointed operations. Such excesses of murky thought include the misguided measurement of performance by race – the ultimate factor is poverty. Much the same, the brouhaha over smaller class sizes without a sufficient stopgap against unqualified teachers serves to do more harm than good.

It is by no means an exaggeration to suggest that schools are thrust on the troubling spectrum of an extreme polarity. The theme is undeniably broad – enough so to provoke the ire of an English teacher, but truth be told, it is broad not because of a lack of focus, but because of its unfortunate indication that all is not well. The polarities between facilities and of resources are disconcerting, known, yet unprovoked. That it extends even to the performance within a class where half exceed without effort and half fail without attempt, all bored, is a scandalous, unknowing affair. Sputter on this frayed, stifling machine will, but only for so long, and not without cost.

Progress
The problems need not ceaselessly compound. The degree of executive power held by upper tiers of management must be reduced to the level of those closest to executing its responsibility. Management must reduce its role to guidance, preservation, and correction. As for the politicization of systems, it is necessary that manual interference with essential components be substantially reduced. Taxation – and the funding for schools – must not be held captive to the whims of politics, crippling the institution for political gain.

The stubbornness to upgrade facilities in spite of overcrowding and decay speaks to the necessity of binding obligations to maintain optimum performance. No one denies that managing organizations is grim business; what is deplored is the petty, “timid ignorance obstructing our progress.”[2]After all, there are only so many slips in the cracks to fill.

[1] United States Public Schools & Districts. School Matters. 2004. http://tinyurl.com/35rfmc. [2] The Economist.

What to strive for

2007-11-25T13:11:00.000-05:00

The federal government will quantify progress in three specific areas, measured annually after the five year interim period:

13.1 First, American students’ performance on international benchmarks must reassume top-5 positions in reading, math, and science.
13.2 Second, gaps in equality among socioeconomic and racial gaps must be reduced to less than 5-percent; and in-school and between-school variance as a percentage of OECD averages should be ranked as one of top-ten smallest internationally.
13.3 Third, a composite measurement of American schools by means of the School Effectiveness Metric must be within 95-105% of the mean budget.

Each metric is significant in maintaining international competiveness, ensuring equality, and maximizing efficiency.

13.4 Annually, the federal government will release performance results, conclusions, and recommendations. The Executive Branch will be awarded discretionary funds to fulfill these recommendations by means of incentives-based programs or otherwise.

Roles

2007-11-25T12:43:00.000-05:00

The teacher

12.1 Following privatization, teachers are afforded more flexibility to pursue what and how they teach their classes, consistent with the policies of the schools that employ them.
12.2 Teachers will ultimately be held to a greater collective scrutiny – however by freeing schools to chose the philosophy that best suits their teachers and students should counteract any discomfort. School turnover will be a component of evaluating a school’s performance and tuition. Measurement will vary from class performance to a process of colleague review.
12.3 Teachers will exercise greater influence in the affairs of their schools in regards to developing and implementing policy and curriculum.

Pay and benefits

12.4 Pay will be measurably increased with a benchmark average of $50,000 per teacher.
12.5 Better teachers, as measured by common indicators and processes established at each school, will be paid more. As a result, an emphasis is placed on depth of knowledge and multiple certifications. Continual education is a significant priority. Schools may also offer additional bonuses at their discretion as long as they are approved by its governing board.
12.6 The market determines the value of fields of study. For example, the market will value new history teachers more when they are scarce; less so for science teachers in a glut. At the same time, poorer performing schools have the flexibility to increase their pay to attract qualified candidates. Consistent with market principles, such imbalances naturally self-correct.
12.7 Each state manages health and retirement benefits – a hybrid of mandatory school contributions and funds raised by the state. An additional a la carte system will compliment basic services, supported by fees from the schools, serving as another means of attracting talent. Individual schools, particularly those with large endowments, may deviate from this plan.
12.8 An impetus is placed on schools to offer incentives to teachers – including subsidized study, bonuses, et al. Schools that are effective at reducing redundant administrative burdens (i.e., implementing digital classrooms to automate grading individual papers) and replacing this time with producing engaging lesson will benefit.

Standards and certification

12.9 All professional teachers must secure a basic, national license. More rigorous licenses are available consistent with meeting necessary benchmarks and requirements. These licenses encompass both degree of advancement and specific subjects.
12.10 Certifications would be overseen by a board similar to style and composition to that of the national curriculum board.
12.11 Some states and schools may require that, in addition to the basic license, teachers achieve a certification in their desired subject(s). Teachers would be hired on the premise that they would achieve such a certification within a reasonable time limit.
12.12 All incoming teachers will be required to reach basic competency in a foreign language, with emphasis on less predominant languages to achieve their national license.
12.13 It is recommended that schools adopt a “career ladder” approach to qualification, experience, and development.

The student

12.14 Students will have the opportunity to enroll in schools with philosophies consistent with their learning styles and needs.
12.15 Students for whom English is a second language are afforded a three-year exemption from their scores’ calculation as part of a school’s performance in order to gain a satisfactory mastery of the language.

Less is more

12.16 Regular classroom reorganization and other initiatives will seek to place students in classes with peers of similar ability – allowing uninhibited growth.
12.17 An emphasis will be placed on aggressively promoting students with parental consent to provide an efficient and challenging career. To prevent the potential conflict of interest resulting from schools intentionally delaying students or denying promotions, the tuition formula would be designed to provide a check-and-balance against unjustified promotion (poorer test scores) and unnecessary detainment.

Special needs[1]

12.18 Students with special needs and disabilities are guaranteed a qualified school within the district or cooperative districts through the district’s school formats process. Individual schools with the capacity to support these individuals will receive a monetary benefit for absorbing them.
12.19 Parents of infants and toddlers with disabilities are entitled to exercise additional funds by attending early intervention and therapy at a qualified school with an emphasis on language development.
12.20 Schools that compete for special needs students must demonstrate excellent facilities and experienced personnel. Schools must provide a comprehensive special
needs curriculum that emphasizes vocabulary and language development and social
and behavioral skills.
12.21 Primary schools will be required to perform special-needs identification programs upon a student’s enrollment.

Thomas Hehir’s Begin Early, Begin Well, notes that “50 percent of students served by special
education are not identified until they are in school. … Typically these students do not get referred to special education until 3rd or 4th grade or even later. … These problems are more apt to increase if left unaddressed. The sooner we start with providing these children with positive behavioral interventions, the greater the likelihood we will be able to change these children’s behavior.”

12.22 Special needs students are guaranteed full access to a school’s advanced curriculum consistent with their demonstrated ability through eligibility to enroll in regular classroom reorganization and horizontal-block scheduling structures.
12.23 Implement strong financial incentives for schools that ensure that all students with disabilities complete high school.

Kansas concurs with William J. Bennett’s The Educated Child. Students with special needs “must be given access to the standard curriculum, helped to attain the academic standards of his school or state, and included in the life and activities of his school. … All this and more is possible …”[2]

The parent
12.24 Parents will be at liberty to choose the school they believe would be most effective for their child.

Information

12.25 Parents will have access to each school’s performance data and will have access to officials when considering enrollment and teachers at any time once enrolled. A report for a district’s schools will be issued annually. A national, online database will be compiled to assist in these efforts.

Enrollment

12.26 Parents may be solicited to enroll their children in schools outside of the district at the school’s discretion.
12.27 Parents will have the opportunity to alter their child’s school enrollment once per year. Such change without cause will be discouraged – schools can require a minimum of two years attendance, waved by a small fee.
12.28 Parents will have the opportunity to enroll in school waiting lists consistent with school policy and availability.

The district

12.29 While reduced from its overinflated role, the district will remain a significant component of a privatized school system. Its largest goals will be in coordinating schools within its district in sport and arts and holding schools under it to account. The district will also be responsible for realizing the requirements of progressive systems – such as building new schools.
12.30 The district will also oversee transportation services, paid for by individual schools.

The enforcer

12.31 The district will maintain a Focus group skilled in various departments that can assist schools that ask for it as well as assume control of schools that fail to meet national standards.

New schools

12.32 Following the standards of progressive systems, districts will be allocated funds and a timeframe for constructing the required new school.
12.33 During this time, the district will solicit bids from various organizations who would wish to oversee the new school. After narrowing the choices down to three, the options would be put to a vote by citizens of the district.
12.34 Construction for new schools will be heavily subsidized by the federal government; however, a small ongoing fee per student will be assessed, payable to the district, to finance future construction.

12.35 The district will be responsible for developing and issuing special grants as it sees fit.
12.36 The district will assist in developing each school’s curriculum with its Focus group of instructional facilitators and advisors.

[1] Begin Early, End Well. Thomas Hehir. The School Administrator. October 1999. http://tinyurl.com/2nvnda. Mr. Hehir recommends five strategies for disabled-education policy which serve as the groundwork for this segment.
[2] The Educated Child: A Parent’s Guide from Preschool through Eighth Grade. William J. Bennett, Chester E. Finn, Jr., John T. E. Cribb, Jr. The Free Press. 1992. Pp 467-468.

Money

2007-11-25T12:36:00.000-05:00

National sales tax

Privatization's economic impact promises to be at least, if not more, far-reaching than the actual reorganization itself. The sheer scale is daunting, but not unprecedented:

11.1 Taking the figure of 55 million students and funding levels ranging from $10-15,000, the potential costs range from $550-$825 billion dollars, or at most 6.3% of the nation's $13 trillion economy. This compares to the current figure of 7.3% for both public and private education.[1]
11.2 Centralization of funding would account for a 36% increase in federal government expenditures – assuming a $2.3 trillion budget.
11.3 The policy offsets this increase by implementing a national sales tax exclusive to funding the education system. Assuming $9 trillion in consumer spending[2], as estimated by the Americans for Fair Taxation group, which supports a national sales tax, up to a 9.1% sales tax would be necessary; 6.1% is the minimum. For comparison, California's current sales tax is 8.75% and Maryland's 6% (as of January 2008).

11.4 A national sales tax, offset by a reduction in state sales taxes, is the most direct and transparent means of raising the necessary revenues. In states that depend heavily on lottery earnings, nationalized funding would open up this revenue stream for other expenditures

The scale would not be dissimilar to the government's absorption of social welfare expenditures. The similarities diverge where the education program's full impact on the budget, as planned, would be immediate, instead of gradual. The five-year interim session, however, could be used to phase in batches of states to appease those who would oppose such a significant, immediate increase.

11.5 Demographics and inflation would be the most significant variables in future funding expenditures. Population growth is pegged at .91%[3]; inflation in the year 2006 was 3.2%.[4] Overall funding is subject to both factors; the caps depend solely on inflation. Under pr ogressive standards the sales tax would increase in accordance with these trends.

Shuffling – more or less – is what all of it amounts to; shuffling, more or less, is the most sure-footed way to go about it.

[1] Expenditure on educational institutions as a percentage of GDP for all levels of education. Education at a Glance 2004. OECD. http://tinyurl.com/2w7z5k.
[2] Taxing Sales Under Fair Tax: What Rate Works? Paul Bachman, Jonathan Haughton Laurence J. Kotlikoff, Alfonso Sanchez-Penalver, Deavid G.Tuerck. Tax Analysts Special Report. Americans for Fair Taxation. FairTax.org.
[3] The United States. World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency. http://tinyurl.com/ynm7tm.
[4] Consumer Price Index – All Urban Consumers. U.S. City Average. All items. U.S. Department of Labor. Bureau of Labor Statistics. ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/special.requests/cpi/cpiai.txt.

Turning to the school of management

2007-11-25T12:27:00.000-05:00

Efficiency

As is the case with pursuing innovative organization structures, schools must also begin the active management of their operations by implementing systems of greater awareness to engage students.

Metrics

10.1 The central means for measuring a school’s performance will be through several standard metrics compared across all schools. School effectiveness will be measured using the metric of:

[Budget per child] divided by [Percentage of students who meet or exceed standards / percentage of satisfaction]

The metric is highly influenced by the ideal that performance is rightly only one portion of a school’s success, and that an increase in budget is irrelevant for political ends. The denominators can easily be interchanged with other measurements relevant to the specific school.

For example, a school system with a budget of $12,500 per pupil is divided by one-hundred percent of students at or above expectations and a level of one percent happiness (a measure of students and teachers satisfied with their school). The result is 125. In another instance, a school with the same budget with only one-percent of expectations and one-hundred percent of happiness will achieve a tally of 1.25.

The essence is the degree of effectiveness—in example one, the school may be said to be one-percent effective, and in example two, ninety-nine percent ineffective. From another perspective, in the former example, the school system is demanding too much from the car engine, and in the latter, there is an excess of capacity.

Each school’s score would be plotted—with the goal of being one-hundred percent effective. Scores are calibrated from right to left by demanding what more can we demand of our children? And from left to right by asking what more can we do for you? One may speculate that public schools in current form would tend towards the left (high expectations, minimal liberties), Montessori schools to the right (giving too much while demanding too little), and private schools gravitating towards the center.

10.2 Schools should also pay a significant focus on measuring the allocation of their teacher’s time—emphasis placed on developing engaging lesson plans versus the burden of bureaucratic duties, including grading papers.
10.3 Secondary metrics include dollars spent per child per percentage scored, et al.

Deep tracking

10.4 Due to the significant importance of elementary and initial secondary education in ultimate outcomes, schools will be held to account to some degree on the performance of past pupils. This data would factor minimally in a school’s funding due to the array of uncontrollable factors.
10.5 Statistics of interest for deep tracking measurements will be the percentage of an elementary and middle school’s students that continue on to college, graduation rates, and improvements in performance.

Children in bloom

10.6 Indeed, some schools will be so emboldened that they will take their measurements even further into the classroom by assessing their level of interest and engagement in the course as well as rating the teacher. Whether taken as surveys taken at the end of class or other means, a fuller sense of the student’s environment becomes available. Then it is a matter of action.

Get rid of boredom

2007-11-25T12:19:00.000-05:00

Engagement

“We have entered a new era in teaching,” Dr. Jan Borelli, celebrated principal and blogger writes. “We now have the capability to know what the students do or do not know, and we now have the capability to reach most of the children if we use data to guide our instruction.”[1] Following privatization, schools will find it necessary to implement new organizational structures to meet the needs of each student—students needing less instruction offered the opportunity to pursue new endeavors, where those who need it receive all the time necessary.

Harnessing real data

8.1 The classroom is indeed a silent domain —every effort must be made to allow teachers to obtain a real-time sense of their student’s understanding so that they can effectively steer the nature of their lessons without fear of surprise on the next examination. Implementing a wireless response system for use throughout a lesson is a key avenue—soon a real answer to “Did you all understand?” will become apparent.
8.2 An additional area of opportunity for educators will be actively using pre-tests to determine a student’s course structure.

Flattening out

8.3 One change in structure, based loosely upon a block scheduling format, will be the flexibility of course length and depth based on demonstrated student ability—giving students an opportunity to pursue multiple courses in one year.
8.4 This horizontal-block format would be as follows: a student who has five periods a day will have ten blocks per year—each block corresponding with a series of weeks, per course. The system will be highly dependent on the implementation of pretests—likely during next year’s planning in the previous school year.

For example, a student may begin the year with daily courses in geometry, biology, English, and world history. Having mastered ninety-percent in the geometry pretest, he will take geometry for only one block— three to four weeks. At this time he will take the national (and course, if necessary) exam for geometry. If he passes the examination, he will then fill the next nine blocks with as many courses as necessary.

8.5 Each course would reset every one or two blocks for at least one class depending on demand. Some scheduling conflicts would cause the student to pursue one-block enrichment courses until new courses became available.

Change it up

8.6 Some administrators may implement systems of regular classroom reorganization— at two to three times a year, teachers, in coordination with administrators and counselors, would reorganize their master schedules for each student. Pupils who are demonstrating exceptional competency in one class may be bumped up to provide a further challenge; likewise, students who are performing poorly may have the nature of their course changed. This will enable teachers to ensure that they can best tailor their lesson plans to meet the needs of a class without wide disparities in student ability, effort, and potential that become apparent throughout a school year.

This format can begin to address the issues that surround tracking, or enrolling students into distinct “ability-based” groups. Tracking, Jeannie S. Oakes writes, has resulted in “racially disproportionate” enrollments, whose inconsistent and unduly subjective criteria causes “considerable harm” by “inferior opportunities to learn” and resulting lower achievement.[2]

Whereas Ms. Oakes would prefer the abandonment of “discriminatory” tracking to embrace heterogeneous learning environments, Kansas argues that meritocratic schooling depends upon calibrating the intensity of expectations to demonstrated ability. Kansas agrees in full that containment in the name of tracking is scandalously inhibitive. Ms. Oakes’ passion for heterogeneous classes is far more skeptical. An effective education focuses on the individual, not the group. Dynamic tracks offer students an intensive study consistent with their needs – advanced mathematics and basic history should not be mutually exclusive. Even more critical are the necessity for ‘ramps’ that challenge students to extend beyond their ranks – if and when appropriate to the individual student.

Arbitrary mainstreaming can compromise an effective classroom environment, to a degree indistinguishable from a crippling tiered tracking system.[3] This paper and Ms. Oakes share a common ideal in manifesting the ultimate realization of a homogenous class of basic competencies (mastery of the societal bases: basic literacy and mathematics, which is not yet attained) pursuing heterogeneous ends. “Don’t bother to just be better than your contemporaries or predecessors,” William Faulkner wrote. “Try to be better than yourself.”

The one-year class

8.7 This form of block scheduling will be a boon for those who excel—it would not be impossible for a student under such a structure to graduate within one year. Some may pursue opportunities with community colleges or through partnerships with universities, students may participate in distance digital learning programs at school, free or highly subsidized.

This flexibility in incorporating acceleration policies correlates strongly with the report A Nation Deceived, which concludes that the American public education system is ignoring excellence. The report argues that “students are ready for much more challenge than the system provides.” [4] This “lock-step” approach radically hinders development, resulting in boredom. The report highlights that acceleration is the “most effective” curriculum intervention for gifted children, acceleration offers long-term academic and social effects, and is virtually free of cost. The opportunity proposed in this paper is paced, whereas the report recommends above-level testing. Such testing and acceleration would likely be incorporated in the primary years. This paper’s horizontal block format enables both the report’s “grade-based” and “subject-based” acceleration, which can either shorten the length of time enrolled or advance the content level for particular subjects.

The opposite, classes that “stretch into five, six, even seven” years is just as possible in the interest of limiting dropouts.[5]

[1] Dr. Jan’s Blogging Life: Experts From a School Reformer. Jan G. Borelli. The School Administrator. May 2006. http://www.drjansblog.typepad.com/dr_jans_blog/files/aasa_pub_blog.pdf.
[2] Limiting Students’ School Success and Life Chances: The Impact of Tracking. Jeannie S. Oakes. Contemporary Issues in Curriculum. Third Edition 2003. Page 21.
[3] ‘Mainstreaming’ Trend Tests Classroom Goals. John Hechinger. The Wall Street Journal. 25 June 2007.
[4] A Nation Deceived. Nicholas Colangelo, Ph.D., Susan G. Assouline, Ph.D., Miraca U.M. Gross, Ph.D. The Connie Belin & Jacqueline N. Blank International Center for Gifted Education and Talent Development. October 2004.
[5] More Students Finish School, Given the Time. Jennifer Medina. The New York Times. 21 August 2007.

Sources

2007-10-03T12:08:00.001-04:00

Articles and essays*

A Man’s World? The Economist. November 3, 2007.

A textbook case of failure. Alex Johnson. MSNBC. http://www.msnbc.com/id/12705167/.

As AP Expands, Studies Disagree on Its Value. Jay Mathews. The Washington Post. February 28, 2006. http://tinyurl.com/lyyaf.

Boston's Success Could Be Lesson for D.C. Schools. Lois Romano. The Washington Post. May 9, 2006. http://tinyurl.com/h6eyk.

California Initiative Renews Preeschool Debate. Nick Anderson. The Washington Post. May 30, 2006. http://tinyurl.com/rrkjp.

Half of Teachers Quit in Five Years. Lisa Lambert. The Washington Post. May 9, 2006. http://tinyurl.com/fg9b7.

Homework Help, From A World Away. Amit R. Paley. The Washington Post. May 15, 2006. http://tinyurl.com/hmnp3.

How to Be Top. The Economist. October 20, 2007.

Schools Chief Pick Sees Enemy in 'Anonymity'. Nick Anderson. The Washington Post. February 23, 2006. http://tinyurl.com/pettv.

New D.C. Test Demands More Than Circling an Answer. V. Dion Haynes. The Washington Post. April 17, 2006. http://tinyurl.com/2jeg3k.

With a No. 2 Pencil, delete. Anna Quindlen. Loud and Clear. Ballantine Books. 2005.

Reading, Writing, Arithmetic. Andy Rooney. CBS News. http://tinyurl.com/3aqnft.

Schools, Pressed to Achieve, Put the Squeeze on Recess. Margaret Webb Pressler. The Washington Post. June 1, 2006. http://tinyurl.com/s3anh.

Schools Waking Up To Teens' Unique Sleep Needs. Valerie Strauss. The Washington Post. January 10, 2006. http://tinyurl.com/cer4q.

Showtime in the Classroom. The Washington Post. March 22, 2006. http://tinyurl.com/2r7kg2.

“Teach to the Test”? What Test? Colman McCarthy. The Washington Post. March 22, 2006. http://url123.com/ddgkh.

The Great experiment. The Economist. November 10, 2007. http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10104912

The Untidy Revolution. The Economist. November 10, 2007. http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10104894

What Makes a High School Great? Barbara Kantrowitz and Pat Wingert. Newsweek. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12532668/site/newsweek/.

Books

American Education. Joel Spring. Tenth Edition. McGrawHill. 2002.

Charter Schools: Creating Hope and Opportunity for American Education. Joe Nathan. Jossey-Bass Publishers. 1999.

Contemporary Issues in Curriculum. Third Edition. Ed. Allan C. Ornstein, Linda S. Behar-Horenstein, Edward F. Pajak. 2003.

Don't Eat This Book: Fast Food and the Supersizing of America. Morgan Spurlock. Putnam Adult. 2005.

Good To Great. Jim Collins. Collins. 2001.

Leadership for Learning. Carl D. Glickman. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. 2002.

Lies My History Teacher Told Me. James W. Lowen. Touchstone. 1995.

On Intelligence. Jeff Hawkins. 2004.

School Choice. Ed. Edith Rasell, Richard Rothstein. Economic Policy Institute. 1993.

Schools That Work. George H. Wood, Ph.D. Penguin Books. 1992.

The Educated Child. William J. Bennet, Chester E. Finn, Jr., John T. E. Cribb, Jr. The Free Press. 1999.

The Shame of The Nation. Jonathan Kozol. Crown Publishers. 2005.

The World Is Flat. Thomas L. Friedman. Picador. 2005.

Journals

Aspiration Growth, Talent Development, and Self-Fulfillment in a Context of Democratic Erosion. Don Ambrose. Roeper Review. Fall 2005.

Block Scheduling: More Benefits than Challenges. Response to Thomas (2001). Michael D. Rettig, Robert Lynn Canady. NASSP Bulletin. November 2001.

Creating A Differentiated Classroom. Susan Keck, Scott C. Kinney. Learning & Leading with Technology. September 2005.

Data Driven. Joseph C. Panettieri. Technological Horizons in Education Journal. February 2006.

Decision Making in the Process of Differentiation. Catherine V. Parsons and Jodi M. DeLucia. Learning & Leading with Technology. September 2005.

How Does Time Affect Learning? Joy Zimmerman. Time & Learning. January 2001.

Intensive Scheduling: A Hybrid Model for the Junior High. eLibrary.

Interactive Learning Environment Keeps Modesto Students Engaged. Larry Hines. Technological Horizons in Education Journal. September 2005.

No Longer A Year Behind. Valerie Stokes. Learning & Leading with Technology. October 2005.

School Libraries Go Interactive. Chris Balsano. Technological Horizons in Education Journal. December 2005.

Students’ perspectives on Tracking and Detracking. Susan Yonezawa, Makeba Jones. Theory Into Practice. Winter 2006.

Systemic School Reform: A Guiding Hand. Mary Ann Wolf. Technological Horizons in Education Journal. July 2007.

Teaching in the One-to-One Classroom. Alice Owen, Sam Farsaii, Gerald Knezek, Rhonda Christensen. Learning & Leading with Technology. December/January 2005-06.

Volunteer Tutors. Jerry Baker. Today's School. November/December 2002.

Reports

An Infinite Game in a Finite Setting: Visualizing Foreign Language Teaching and Learning in America. Miguel Mantero. February 2003.

Answering the Question that Matters Most: Has Student Achievement Increased Since No Child Left Behind? Center on Education Policy. 31 May 2007.

A Nation Deceived: How Schools Hold Back America's Brightest Students. Nicholas Colangelo, Susan G. Assouline, Miraca U.M. Gross. The Templeton National Report on Acceleration. October 2004. http://www.nationdeceived.org/NDv1.pdf.

A Shell Game: Federal Funds to Improve Schools. Center for Education Policy. January 2006. http://www.cepdc.org/titlei/TitleISchoolImpFundJan2006.pdf.

Block Scheduling: The Key to Quality Learning Time. Robert Lynn Canady, Michael D. Rettig. Time & Learning. January 2001.

Choices, Changes, and Challenges: Curriculum and Instruction in the NCLB Era. Jennifer McMurrer. Center on Education Policy. 24 July 2007. http://tinyurl.com/35pkne.

Early Education Learning: A National Necessity. Christine L. Brown. Basic Education. April 2002.

Generation Next – Global Research Poll. BBC World Service. October 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/04_12_06_gen_next.pdf.

National Teacher Day Spotlights Key Issues Facing Profession. National Educators Association. May 2, 2006. http://www.nea.org/newsreleases/2006/nr060502.html.

Reading Out of the 'Idiot Box': Same-Language Subtitling on Television in India. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Information Technologies and International Development. http://mitpress.mit.edu/journals/pdf/ITID-2-1_23_0.pdf.

Scripted learning: A slap in the face? California Educator. April 2002. http://www.cta.org/CaliforniaEducator/v6i7/Feature_1htm.

Seminar Periods. The Principal's Partnership. http://www.principalspartnership.com/seminars.pdf.

Teaching Interrupted. Public Agenda. May 2004. http://publicagenda.org/research/pdfs/teaching_interrupted.pdf.

The High Cost of High School Dropouts: What The Nation Pays for Inadequate High Schools. Alliance for Excellent Education. January 2007. http://www.all4ed.org/publications/HighCost.pdf.

The Four Block Schedule: Adapting the 4/4 High School Block Schedule for Middle Schools.

The Power of Innovative Scheduling. Robert Lynn Canady. Educational Leadership. November 1995.

The Silent Epidemic. John M. Bridgeland, John J. Dilulio, Jr., Karen Burke Morison. March 2006. http://www.standup.org/pdf/TheSilentEpidemic.pdf.

* With the exception of book and reports, articles and essays cited in the portfolio are excluded from this section.