Where are all the "bad" schools?

The PDK/Gallup Poll of the Public’s Attitudes Toward the Public Schools for 2012 are out. You can even get an app for your iPad/iPhone so you can look at the data on the run.

When I downloaded the files I looked where I always look first...how do parents feel about the schools their children attend. Like previous years, when asked, "Using the A, B, C, D, and Fail scale again, what grade would you give the school your oldest child attends?" parents overwhelmingly gave their children's schools a grade of A or B. 77% of parents (up 10% from last year) gave their children's home schools an A or a B. Read that again.

77% of parents with school aged children in America's public schools -- the people who are closest to the schools and know the most about what goes on within them -- assert that the public schools are doing an excellent (graded A and B) job of educating their children.

So why do only 19% of people give the nation's schools an A or a B? What happened to all those great schools...which 77% of parents scored so high?

Ask the politicians, the pundits and policy makers, and the news media. There is so much bad publicity, misrepresentation of facts, and outright lying about public schools that nationally people still believe that America's schools are failing.

They're not. America's public schools, as a whole, are NOT failing!

American students in schools with low poverty are among the highest achievers in the world. Are there schools which are failing or which need improvement? Of course. The schools most in need are in the same locations where government is failing...where politicians are failing...where our society is failing...in neighborhoods with high numbers of poor children and families.

Do you hear that Arne Duncan, Michelle Rhee, Tony Bennett, Michael Bloomburg, Rahm Emanuel, the Gates, Walton and Broad Foundations, NBC, CNN, Fox News...and everyone else who blames teachers and their unions for the non-existent problem of the failure of America's schools!? The problem is poverty.

Can public schools be improved? Absolutely...by supporting them...by collaboration among teachers, parents and community leaders...not by closing them. You don't fix something by throwing it away.

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Random Quotes

The Big Evil in U. S. Education: Teachers' Unions?

...If unions are the problem, how come unions in some places are so much more of a problem than in others...How did Vermont graduate 83% of its students in four years, and Wisconsin 81%, and North Dakota 80%, and why did Mississippi come in at 61% in 2008? If Louisiana was at 60% and South Carolina and Georgia were at 59%, maybe it wasn't unions. Maybe it was some strange phenomenon, related to flying the Confederate flag.

Most Charters Avoid Students with Special Needs*

We have seen this story again and again. A lawsuit against the charters in New Orleans and the District of Columbia filed on behalf of children with disabilities. A charter school in Minneapolis that literally pushed out 40 children with special needs, part of a pattern in which the nation’s largest charter chain–the Gulen-affiliated schools–keep their test scores high by excluding students with disabilities. Study after study showing that charters take fewer children with disabilities. Even a federal study by the GAO documenting that charter schools have a smaller proportion of children with special needs, to which the relevant federal official responded with a yawn and a promise to look into it someday.

Won’t Back Down’: Realities the movie ignores

...before our nation agrees that it is a neat idea for parents to demand takeovers, everybody has to know the real issues that caused the problems. People can choose to blame teachers unions, but they should remember that the problems people are trying to fix in public education are the same in states with unions and without unions.

“A Daily Act of Love”

It has always seemed to me that the things we care the most about, that are most important to us, are the most resistant to this sort of simplistic measurement. do we measure our marriages with a 4 point scale? do we “grade” the love we have for our children on a rubric? teaching is a daily act of love; love for our students, for their learning, for our colleagues, and for our communities. to think that we can measure our effectiveness as teachers with a 4 point scale is not only absurd, its insulting.

Truth about Policymakers?

Teachers focus on what is particular within their own classrooms; reformers focus on what is universal across many classrooms. Teachers operate in a setting dominated by personal relations; reformers operate in a setting dominated by abstract political and social aims. Teachers draw on clinical experience; reformers draw on social scientific theory. Teachers embrace the ambiguity of classroom process and practice; reformers pursue the clarity of tables and graphs. Teachers put a premium on professional adaptability; reformers put a premium on uniformity of practices and outcomes.

Imagine Schools and Romney's Bain Capital

Public money going directly to private business. No wonder the local Imagine Schools don't have the necessary educational resources that students need and probably never will...Imagine Schools is not entirely about education. It is about business.

Why Teachers Unions Are Losing Support

The leadership of teachers unions across the country needs to realize that public schools are at an historic crossroads. Whether they will even exist decades from now is uncertain. If they somehow manage to survive, however, I don't think they'll be recognizable. That's why teachers unions need all the support they can muster. They're certainly not going to get it by repeating what is taking place in California. It's no way to win friends and influence people.

The Paradoxical Logic of School Turnarounds: A Catch-22 (Tina Trujillo)

...the assumption behind school turnarounds—that rapid, dramatic changes in staffing and management can fundamentally improve persistently low-performing schools—is inherently paradoxical because the turnaround option rests on faulty, unwarranted claims. In fact, the policy exists despite evidence to the contrary. Such reforms engender the exact conditions that long lines of research have linked with persistent low performance—high turnover, instability, poor climate, inexperienced teachers, and racial and socioeconomic segregation.

*References to charters generally imply corporate, for-profit charter schools. Quotes from other writers reflect their opinions only. See It's Important to Look in a Mirror Now and Then

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2012 Medley #16

Michelle Rhee, Testing, Vouchers, Corporate Reform,
A Teaching Career.

MICHELLE RHEE

Michelle Rhee is Shameless

Michelle Rhee taught for two years...and joined the nearly 50% of all educators who get out of the classroom within the first 5 years. She moved from there to administration. She left teaching before she could experience it. She doesn't know enough about being a classroom teacher...

This ad begins with two false premises. First, that American schools were once "the best in the world." Second, that our schools are now failing.

It is disgusting.

It is a lie.

It smears America.

It smears our teachers and our students.

It makes fun of obesity.

Michelle Rhee's Shameless Ad, Again

...This is an insulting stereotype of a gay man.

If StudentsFirst has any wisdom, it would withdraw this ad.

First ever StudentsFirst video that I did not laugh at

It is also unfair to compare our scores to the scores of the other countries since we have 22% of our students in poverty compared to single digits in most of the top countries. In an interesting analysis here we see that if we compare our schools with countries that have similar poverty levels, we would be at the top of the world in every category.

TESTING

PISA: It's Poverty Not Stupid

The link in the article above deserves another mention...American schools with low poverty levels achieve at the highest levels in the world. When are the policy makers going to accept responsibility for the levels of poverty in the United States?

Truthfully, you and I know all too well that Secretary Duncan, who led schools in Chicago, is aware of the relationship between poverty and student achievement, but he doesn't trust us enough to tell us the truth. He is afraid that we will use poverty as an excuse and that we will forget about our disadvantaged students. Ironically, by not acknowledging poverty as a challenge to be overcome, Duncan is forgetting about our disadvantaged students. Duncan needs to deliver the message that all our students deserve not only access to an education, but access to an excellent education. He needs to repeatedly remind us that, when it comes to school improvement, it's poverty not stupid.

A Serious Design Flaw Is Suspected in State Tests

High stakes tests are not designed to evaluate teachers. They are designed to test students' learning. Using tests for other reasons than that for which they were intended is educational malpractice, yet the US Department of Education, in Race to the Top requires that teachers be evaluated on "student progress" -- interpreted by most states as using student test scores to evaluate teachers.

Now, in studies that threaten to shake the foundation of high-stakes test-based accountability, Mr. Stroup and two other researchers said they believe they have found the reason: a glitch embedded in the DNA of the state exams that, as a result of a statistical method used to assemble them, suggests they are virtually useless at measuring the effects of classroom instruction.

Texas Orders Up a New Test to Solve Problems Created by 32 Years of Testing

What better way to repair the damage done by decades of high stakes tests than to use another test.

Texas has been been doing more of the same standardized testing and expecting different results (see Einstein's definition of insanity) for 32 years now, and the children of the Lone Star state are as poor, malnourished, and miseducated as ever. One in four lives in poverty, just as one in four Texans has no health insurance. Poverty rates jumped by 9 percent in the last U. S. Census, while the national average was a 6 percent rise.

VOUCHERS

Louisiana Voucher Program Includes Schools That Teach Creationism, Reject Evolution

The truth behind the Louisiana voucher plan.

The program is the cornerstone of Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal's bold effort to reform public education in the state. Critics are concerned about funding and fairness -- vouchers would cover the full cost of tuition at more than 120 private schools, including small, Bible-based church schools. Jindal says the program will spur school competition and expand parental choice.

Several of those religious schools that will be receiving public funds to take in new students from public schools also teach curricula that question the age of the universe, defying scientific evidence and theory and promote religious doctrine that "challenges the lessons central to public school science classrooms," according to the AP.

"What they're going to be getting financed with public money is phony science. They're going to be getting religion instead of science," Barbara Forrest, a founder of the Louisiana Coalition for Science, told AP.

THE "REFORMERS"

Med Reform

Are doctors blamed for their patient's medical conditions? If doctors were treated like teachers...

When professional doctors complain that they are not miracle workers and are unable to overcome all the out of hospital experiences that can shorten someone’s life, the med reformers tell them to stop making excuses. The med reformers are convinced that doctors can overcome every out of hospital experience because they have seen the miraculous results of charter hospitals and their young doctors who trained for just five weeks, but have managed to accomplish an amazing amount of years-added.

Rahm and Other People’s Children

When are the "reformers" going to acknowledge that they would never send their children to the schools they demand for everyone else?

One of the themes of the corporate reform movement is this:

“We know what’s best for other people’s children but it is not what’s best for mine.”

Mayor Rahm Emanuel sends his children to [the University of Chicago Lab School]. Arne Duncan is a graduate of it.

TEACHING AS A CAREER

On Obama’s call to states to save teachers’ jobs
By Valerie Strauss

In any case, the irony here can’t be overlooked: While Obama is, once again, calling for efforts to save teachers’ jobs (and that’s a good thing), his Education Department has over the past three years put forth policies that have been viewed by many teachers as nothing but an attack on them, including a misguided push to get districts to evaluate teachers by the standardized test scores of their students.

Public Education Being Set on Fire

Why are teachers leaving teaching? Where will teachers for the next generation come from? Why would someone want to become a teacher in this insane educational environment?

Of course I am going to keep battling on to work towards a better world, a place for educational equity…but I have to be honest, I am heavily discouraged right now. When people\current teachers would tell me, “I can’t believe you’re still going to be a teacher,” or when I’d receive e-mails and messages saying, “Do not go into the teaching field,” I never understood. Now I’m seeing why.

For the first time, I am struggling to get out of this idea that I have no chance against these big organizations that are able to keep flourishing and damaging our education system. Public education is being set on fire, and it is so sad how many people are just watching it burn and are absolutely ok with it. This just isn’t fair, it isn’t moral, and it makes me sick. It is not fair how many students of not only today but of our future are going to receive the impact from these constant attacks.

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Stop the Testing Insanity!

Sign the National Resolution on High Stakes Testing!

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Back to School

Walk through any discount department store today and it's clear that it's "that time of year" again...time to buy school supplies.

I remember as a kid being excited each year when it was time to get new school supplies. I wasn't a great student, but each year was an opportunity to start over...a chance to do better. For me it was like baseball...no matter how much trouble a team had one year, the next year, when the season starts, everyone has an equal chance to become the champion. Every year is a fresh start.

There are some things I miss about teaching...

I miss the beginning of the school year.

What? It's monumentally stressful -- getting the room set up, counting out books, sorting out name tags/desk charts, making a schedule, going to meetings, talking to last year's teachers, the late nights/early mornings of seemingly endless preparation and paperwork -- the 12-14 hour days.

True...I don't miss all that, but I do miss the excitement of meeting new children. I miss the delightful experience of learning about young humans and their fresh minds, sharing new ideas and getting to know new senses of humor and interests. I miss watching them come into the building for the first time in the new year...the confused, and excited grins on their faces as they search for their classroom and their new teacher. I even miss the ones who come in terrified and lost...I miss how that fear changes to pleasure as they see the familiar face of a friend from the previous year, or to relief as they finally find their classroom and seat...their own personal space, safe and clean.

The newness of each school year is one of those thousands of little things which makes teaching so much fun and such a great adventure. Every year is a new beginning...a chance to start over...a chance to do better. Every year is a fresh start...for teachers as well as students.

In 1951 Isaac Asimov wrote a short story titled The Fun They Had*. It's the story of a young boy who finds a book...

The Fun They Had

The story takes place in the year 2157, where teaching is performed by computer-like robots with vast information stores. The protagonists of this story are two children, Tommy and Margie. Tom, the older child, finds a real book in his attic. He is very surprised by the object because the words on the page do not move like the words on the screen of their mechanical teacher.

The book describes the school from centuries earlier, where there was a real man as teacher that gave homework and asked questions to his students, and all the boys and girls went into a special building. Margie is very curious but her mother calls her because it is time for school. School for Tom and Margie takes place at home in a room where they do homework and hand it in via a proper slot in a mechanical teacher.

The teacher in Asimov's story was mechanical -- a precursor of today's online schools. Margie thought that it would be so much more fun to attend a school like in the old days...with real people, a human teacher and other children.

Walt Gardner, while scolding teachers unions for alienating their most logical supporters, wrote,

...public schools are at an historic crossroads. Whether they will even exist decades from now is uncertain. If they somehow manage to survive, however, I don't think they'll be recognizable.

Perhaps not...it's obvious that the public school system of the US is in flux...charters, vouchers, online schools...who knows what things will look like when Margie and Tommy find a real book about todays schools 145 years in the future.

But if they are so different that there's no interaction among children, if real live human teachers are distant or non-existent, then something more than simple buildings will have been lost. A school is more than just the building, the books, the pencils, and the iPads.

A school is a place where children and adults begin fresh each year to explore the world together. It's a place where one generation literally sits at the feet of their elders to be introduced to our cultures, our knowledge and our shared experiences. It's a place where wonder grows in a community of learners.

One cannot get that experience sitting in front of a computer at a virtual school.

Today I miss the beginning of the school year because I'm not there to enjoy it. I dread the possibility of a time when I might miss it because it no longer exists.



* According to Wikipedia, The Fun They Had was written as a personal favor for a friend, and became more popular than Asimov ever expected. It is the most anthologized of all his stories and has appeared in many publications outside of the science fiction genre. I first read it when I found it included in a basal reader from which I taught during my first full year as an elementary teacher.

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Stop the Testing Insanity!

Sign the National Resolution on High Stakes Testing!

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