No Child Shoved Aside
While it hasn’t garnered much national attention, what with all of the other sexy stories out there, the President recently proposed going back to the drawing board on education issues and taking another look at No Child Left Behind. We could get into another long, drawn out debate here about unfunded mandates, propping up an entrenched and frequently failing public school system or how much control the teacher’s unions have over federal government policy, but none of that is likely to change any time soon. Some better questions and potential answers have been raised by William McKenzie at the Dallas Morning News.
1. Allow states to show progress with their students, even if not all are proficient. In short, let them distinguish between the improving ones and the terrible ones.
That’s called “differentiated consequences,” and it’s a concept that Bush Education Secretary Margaret Spellings used to let states show they are making some progress, just not enough progress. The idea allows schools to keep working with struggling students without being put on a black list.
2. Make sure the standards of each state prepare kids to graduate from high school with the skills for either a good trade job or college. Duncan talks about college/career readiness being a new goal, so pursue it, much like Texas did in adopting a new school accountability system in 2009.
But let’s be specific about what these terms mean and what we expect kids to do to earn that recognition. Fuzziness will not help them compete in a world where others are rushing to become the next global economic powers.
3. Give states more money to improve low-performing campuses. This is a no-brainer, as long as the concept is more money-and-strong standards. If it is more money and less accountability, then this reform will make no sense at all.
While I agree in general with some of Mr. McKenzie’s concepts as related above, the argument still misses the heart of the problem I think. Yes, the government has a certain level of responsibility for funding education and investing in the next generation. No, there should be no outpouring of cash without accountability for how it is spent. And no, we shouldn’t “give up” on schools.
But deep down, there is one driving factor in education which, frankly, the government is mostly helpless to affect. And that is motivation for both students and their families, along with fostering an environment where education is seen as a valuable goal and not a ready made baby sitter while parents are at work. While each school clearly needs to have the basic tools, equipment and resources needed to provide the desired education, no school – no matter how many microscopes they have in their science lab – will produce top flight students if the students themselves (and their families) are not interested in success.
That’s why the real answers to education issues are not going to be found through federal programs, intrusive regulations and massive outpouring of funds. The answers aren’t even going to turn up on the state level. This is a local issue, and school districts need to face up to the daunting task of bringing parents back into the process in an energized fashion, making sure that they are partners in their children’s education. Unfortunately, this isn’t a problem which lends itself to a legislative solution, since it it not the government’s place to stick its nose that far into the family dining room.
But this doesn’t mean that the government, feeding down from all levels, can not set good examples, promote role models and provide the basic infrastructure for success. Finding a few highly motivated parents and community leaders who are willing to lead the effort from a grassroots level and reach out to the rest of the parents could go a long way.
Also, while a college education is a desirable goal all the way around, the fact remains that not every student will choose to go to college. Some will head directly into a trade or even pursue a military career. Schools need to step back and recognize that their job is also to prepare students who follow those paths. Focusing on nothing but college prep and treating every student who doesn’t go on to a university as some sort of perceived “failure” unbalances the system and creates unrealistic levels of expectation.
I’m glad that the administration wants to take a fresh look at education, but they should be encouraged not to fall into the same old traps which have made American education such an expensive, moribund boondoggle today. Government isn’t the answer to everything, and sometimes the best it can do is help people to help themselves.
10 Responses to “No Child Shoved Aside”
Nothing I read in this article addresses the “special needs” (the non-PC word we used to use was “retarded”) students, who are also counted among the students that can't be left behind.
There are NO exceptions in NCLB for the children with IQ's of 50 and make no mistake about it, they are in the public schools.
In Missouri a number of years ago, the education system had an adjunct school system called The Special School District. It was divided into two segments, remedial and vocational. Remedial schools were designed to provide kids who had intellectual disabilities with the opportunity thrive in a controlled environment with a very high student/teacher ratio. The Vocational High Schools had “majors” in Heating and Air Conditioning, Auto mobile mechanics, and Data Processing. Student's who graduated had a high employment record.
Of course, the Special School District was destroyed by court rulings that demanded that disabled kids be “mainstreamed.” Mainstreaming has resulted in teachers dedicating much of their classroom time for one or two individuals to the detriment of the rest of the class.
I can't point to any scientific study, but I believe one could see the public education in Missouri started to degrade with this change. My father was a personnel manager for this district, and one of the reasons he retired was due to these changes. He was disheartened by the fact these the Vocational schools were eliminated despite their demonstrable effectiveness.
thanks for sparing us your in-depth commentary.
Regarding the post, its hard to say what's at the heart of the problem. We've been tossing money all over education as long as I can remember, and there never is any correlation between funding and performance. I've been furloughed twice during the past two years and in that time tuition for students has continued to skyrocket. It's OK though since the government makes loans and grants more readily available. Meanwhile, new buildings and construction projects seem to go up all the time. I'm not sure what its like at the secondary level, but if its anything like what it is at the collegiate level, we're just going to keep throwing good money into the educational black hole.
You know, parents might have more interest in a system than can listen to them. Putting control at the federal and state level means less control at the school level. What's the point in working with the school if the school's hands are tied? How much money is wasted on paperwork, testing and “accountability” instead of teaching?
Education is one of those problems that is so overwhelming it's hard to know where to start. I'd agree on a basic level with most of the post. I disagree with jchem's assertion that poorly-funded schools are just as good as well-funded schools, and hir assertion that we've been “tossing money” at the schools. In any case, we've been “tossing” less and less each year, even as the population grows and challenges change.
For example, most schools don't have a vice principle any more — as in, the one who is in charge of all the discipline. This duty then falls to the teachers.
Class size is sky-rocketing, meaning not only that students get less and less individual attention, but the teacher also has to spend more time getting the kids to shut up, leaving less time for actual learning.
Because schools are funded mostly by local taxes, kids who live in lower-income areas not only have parents who are more likely to need to work to put food on the table instead of helping with math homework, but they're also going to have fewer resources and larger class sizes at school.
Music, art, PE — pretty much everything that keeps kids engaged is gone, both because of budget cuts and because under NCLB there's literally almost no time to teach anything but what's on the test. (This is actually quite true, incredible as it may seem — I've never seen my mom work so hard as she did last year teaching 5th grade, and this is after a 35-year career as a teacher and administrator.)
All this is compounded by political whims constraining good teaching — bilingual education, for example, is actually awesome when done correctly, but instead of training teachers on how to do it correctly, at least the state of California has outlawed it entirely, pushing immigrant children into the age-old tradition called “sink or swim”. The phonics/no phonics/oh yes phonics again, as well as trends about whether or not to teach things like multiplication tables (memorizable stuff), etc, are also weird trends that get encorporated into and out of teaching, and it's always a distraction, and it always goes away in a few years.
Well, that was a longer rant than I anticipated, but those are my thoughts.
You make some excellent points roro, but I have to take issue with the “poorly-funded schools are just as good as well-funded schools” characterization you ascribed me. There just is scant evidence to suggest that increasing funding leads to increasing performance. If it did, we wouldn't be having issues with our system.
Again, this may be different between the secondary and tertiary levels; I can only speak to the latter. But I can say that a large number of kids come into my class with some of the highest standardized scores and GPAs they can get, but can't even demonstrate a basic understanding of algebra, logic, or even writing. If you ever get the chance to try reading a handwritten report some of them hand in to you, I would love to hear your thoughts.
If you want to know where a lot of government money goes at least at the collegiate level, you can see over at the Chronicle's Building & Grounds blog. If you can convince me that spending $178M on construction and renovation at Elgin Community College in Illinois is good for education, then I may be willing to retract my assertion that money is being tossed into the educational black hole.
In a sense, we've been tossing money at it, because we have one of the most expensive primary education systems in the world. What your mom, and many of the teachers that I've talked to, is experiencing is too many cooks in the kitchen. The parents aren't involved, or worse yet, are trying to “help” their child in the wrong ways. The teachers get the responsibility, but not the power, to help their students. The schools are hit with all sorts of mandates that are mostly there for show. The administrative costs, which are a necessary part of that “accountability” thing, are sucking up a significant percentage of the schools' budgets, which leaves less that can be used for the diminishing priority of education.
Actually jchem, the $178M master plan for Elgin Community College was approved by the voters, who reside in the community college's service district, in a referendum that passed in April 2009. The community recognized the value and need for more educational and training facilities especially now during these tough economic times is extremely important. Something to keep in mind community colleges are at the forefront of training people for the workforce. For example did you know 60% of allied health professionals are trained at a community college? or 80% of first responders (police, fire fighters etc.) are also trained at a community college? The community at large recognized this and that is why they voted in favor of the referendum.
Believe me, I understand the value of community colleges and would advise many high school students to start there because of the quality of the education. But the board of regents in my state just voted to increase tuition by 6% for next fall. They also hit students with a $100 surcharge this term. Perhaps the voters would be willing to allocate those funds to the college's general fund so tuition doesn't have to continue rising. Look I understand “master plans”; you need to give students a reason to come to your school (more students = more tuition money). But if you can tell me how a fancy building can help students understand something better, perhaps we could collaborate and revolutionize the system.
jchem, I totally understand your point about tution. Fortunately, our board felt that it was important to keep ECC affordable and for the fourth straight year has rejected the idea of raising tution. In these difficult times, that is almost unheard of. Currently the demand for healthcare job training is so high that ECC turns away more applicants every semester than it is able to enroll. That is the reason why a new Health Career Center was needed. The HCC will initially open with 29 new classrooms, laboratories, and teaching spaces and is designed to accommodate future growth and development as the college introduces new programs.
ECC is committed to listening to our community and identifying what their needs are. We are the community's college and its important to meet their needs.