If School was Equal for Everyone

       If school was equal for everyone...

• The most struggling students would have the best teachers.  We know that good teachers make a difference in student outcomes.  Our best teachers are also our best motivators; they help students to see the value of effort and their students try hard and do their best every day.  Students who struggle academically need good teachers who believe that all students can learn and show this by their actions as well as by their words.  I hate to say it, but students who have a lot of support at home--students with parents that value education--typically do fine in school regardless of the quality of their teacher.  If there are only a relatively small portion of the teaching force that is in the "best" category, they should be teaching the most struggling students.
  
• Students would be allowed to learn at their own pace.  They wouldn't have to "move on" because the rest of the class is learning faster than they are.  And they wouldn't have to sit in class being bored with nothing to do because they "get it" faster than everyone else.  Student engagement is increased when students have some control as to the pace of their learning.
• Opportunities for all sorts of classes would be available to all students.  Music, art, physical education, higher-level (college-prep) classes would be available to everyone.  If a student struggles in math but wants to take Calculus at some point, there would be a path of courses (and professional educator assistance) to help her to get to Calculus.  If a student wanted to take two or three foreign languages prior to high school graduation, he could do that and still complete all of the other requirements.
• There would be a lot less competition for grades and a lot more desire for learning.  "A" students would receive no more praise than "C" students because effort would be valued over performance.  Students who didn't "get it" the first time or the second time would be given multiple opportunities to reach proficiency.  Some will exceed expectations and some will barely meet the expectations.  But all will be rewarded for learning.
• Students with career goals after high school will receive the same amount of help and guidance as students with college goals.  Preparation for civil participation will be part of every students' P-12 experience.  And students who don't know what they want to do after high school, will receive opportunities to understand their skills and to consider different options.

     We live in an imperfect world filled with imperfect people, imperfect teachers, imperfect students, and imperfect schools.  We can wish for perfection, but we can't realistically reach perfection.  The best we can do is recognize our needs, understand our problems, and work together to find the best solutions for our students.  Amazing things happen when we work together.  While (usually) quite un-amazing things happen when we refuse to change in the name of we've-always-done-it-this-way.

       Our schools work hard to produce the best outcomes for our students given the staff and money and facilities and materials and students and parents that we have.  When things don't work, the answer to fix it and make it work.  Everything can be better; it may take a lot of hard work, but it can be better.

       Our schools may not be equal for everyone, but they can be the most positive places for our students and teachers if we want them to be.

Preparing Our Students for College and/or Careers

       "College and Career" has become the new buzzword in American high schools.  We want to prepare students to be ready for the social and academic demands of college; and--for students who go to college and don't go to college--we want to prepare our students for the demands of being in a working environment.  This has become a rallying cry for our P-12 school system because of so many surveys, studies (also see this study) and articles that have touted how unsuccessful our schools have been at accomplishing this goal.

       Certainly many recent high school graduates (and their parents) can speak from personal experience.  They completed high school and received their diploma, but they couldn't do the same in college.  Among students that began college in 2007, less than 40% completed their Bachelor's degree by 2011.  Even if you give them another two years the college graduation rate is still very low--59.4% (source).  Employment rates for high school graduates may (certainly) be affected by general conditions of employment in society, however employers often have serious concerns about the readiness that recent high school (and college) graduates have for the workplace.  So what should be done to better prepare students for college and careers?

       First let's define the problem that is faced by our public schools.  In a (very) broad sense, we need to be everything for everyone.  We need to prepare the rich kids and the poor kids, the learning disabled and the academic superstars, the sports kids and the theatre kids and the band kids.  And we need to prepare them for community college, for 4-year colleges, for selective and ivy-league colleges, as well as for certification in cosmetology and welding and mechanics.  Additionally, we want them to be able to express themselves in writing, verbally, and online.  We want them to know that it is important to be on-time, to be polite, to be a learner (for jobs and for college), to be wise with money and credit, to make good decisions.

       Hence, our public schools are tasks to develop rules and policies and requirements for everyone even though everyone isn't following the same path after high school.  So we have to find a balance between what's necessary for most or all students with what's probably really, really helpful for some of the students.  For instance, mathematics is important, but should we require all students to take and pass (and know) Algebra 2?  Financial Literacy is important, but do middle school students need to learn about home mortgages?  Finding the right balance can be tough.


       The other issue is that too many students (and parents) view high school as just a list of requirements to complete.  The idea of "learning" is too far removed from the idea of "getting-a-grade".  How do we help students to see the value of what they are learning in the midst of a system that constantly "rates" students with grades?  Too many people feel that school is merely another one of life's competitions in which there are few winners.  How does this prepare students for their life after high school.  Therefore, our P-12 schools are also tasked with helping students to appreciate the learning and to increase their understanding of their abilities to learn.

       Some of this can be done with requirements from school districts and from state education agencies.  But, it seems to me, that some of this requires a societal view of school as preparing students for after school.  We need parents to support this view; we need television to support this view; we need law-makers to support this view.  College and career readiness is a big job and it requires a big response from all of us.

High School Graduation and Beyond

       May and June is the time in the school year when we think and hear a lot of graduation.  High school and college students are graduating; completing one important life event and moving on to the next.  It's exciting, it's a happy time, it's a time to celebrate!

       As a nation, we have a lot to celebrate because we have seen a rise in the high school graduation rates over the past few years and that's a very good thing for our nation.  In the 2013 - 2014 school year, the high school graduation rate was 82.3%--an increase of over three percentage points from the 2010 - 2011 school year.

       Our society demands a workforce that is willing and able to continually learn and to use the knowledge of past learnings.  Students who succeed beyond high school are the people who understand that their ability to do a job is not dependent on the grades they earned in high school as much as it is on their desire to continually learn and to do their best.  We need thinkers and doers and believers.  While high school graduation is a big step (and an important step), it is still only one step.  Those students who were only successful in "playing school" and earning grades without any concern for learning will find it difficult to succeed in college or the workforce in places where thinking and problem solving is necessary.

       Sometimes it seems like we put too much on our schools.  We teach courses, but we also teach how to work together, how to get along with others, how to learn, how to struggle, how to accept responsibility.  No one gets a grade for these things; no one is denied a diploma for not attaining these traits.  But those that lack the ability to do these things often struggle to live in a society that doesn't always give you second chances; a place where breaking the rules have real consequences and no one is there to remind you what to do and when to do it.

       We all get one chance to make the most of our 13 years of K-12 education.  After that, the number of opportunities rise with the number of decisions.  It's not enough to do what you're told; just ask those that barely graduated high school.

Soft Skills Education

       Our public schools' biggest offering is opportunity.  Students learn from qualified professionals and from a long list of course offerings--probably the longest at the high school level.  But we are not just teaching our students the R's, we are preparing them for the adult world.  This means that we are also tasked with teaching our students the so-called "soft skills".  Here is a short list of some of these skills:

• Listening 
• Presentation Skills 
• Giving Feedback 
• Decision Making 
• Inspiring 
• Persuasion 
•  Interpersonal Relationships 
• Dealing with Difficult People 
• Conflict Resolution 
• Self Confidence 
• Resilience 
• Assertiveness 
• Friendliness 
• Empathy 
  
• Problem Solving 
• Critical Thinking 
• Organization 
• Planning 
• Scheduling 
• Time Management

       Employers tell us that high school and college graduates who have these soft skills are much more likely to be successful employees than those who don't.  Students aren't "graded" on these skills in school, however many of these skills are incorporated into classrooms as rules of behavior (friendliness, conflict resolution, planning), suggested steps in completing assignments (decision making, resilience, organization), and learning strategies (problem solving, critical thinking, giving feedback).

       Students who are successful and confident usually possess these skills at a high level.  Students who are only concerned with the "book work" of school may possess the knowledge needed for their future, but they may also struggle with relationships with their co-workers.  This "soft-skills" education is an important part of our school system.  The ability of our students to get along with other students and to organize their thoughts, ideas, and lives is all a part of growing up and being responsible.  

       And everyone gets to receive this education for free in our public schools.  

It's Time for Our Schools to Leave the 20th Century

       You know the old joke about Rip Van Winkle and schools?  He falls asleep for a hundred years and upon waking up he sees everything he used to know has changed dramatically.  The houses look so different.  The clothes that people wear are very different.  And the cars...wow.  Then he finds a school and walks inside.  He goes into a classroom and he is comforted to see that schools and classrooms haven't changed a bit.

       We educators don't think this is very funny.

       In fact, it is embarrassing for us carry out the important work of education today in the same way that we did this work 50 or 30 or even 20 years ago.  Doing so ignores the research about learning that has been done over the past few decades.  It ignores the research about how the brain reacts to the stimuli that occurs in classrooms.

       For instance, we know that most students can't learn to the best of their ability strictly by sitting in class for a whole class period and listening to the teacher talking (and taking notes).  We know that students are more engaged when they have the opportunity to participate verbally and when they have a chance to get up out of their seat and participate physically in some way.  We have technology that we didn't have (even 20) years ago that can be tapped to help our students to prepare for the information world that they will enter after high school.

        We are not preparing our students by merely teaching them to read, write, and do arithmetic.  These things are important, but they are not enough.  Memorizing facts long enough to get a good test grade will not prepare our children for the world that they will inherit.  Our schools have the responsibility to mirror the society that our students will experience.

       Twentieth Century schooling is not what our students need.  Most of them have never even lived in the 20th century.  I believe that our current education leaders understand this need for our schools to change.  Part of the responsibility of our public schools is to explain this need for change to our parents and to our communities.  Staying the same is easy; change is hard.  Schools often face opposition from communities who tend to say that "The old way was good enough for me and it's good enough for our kids."  We need to make the case against this sort of thinking.

       Someone needs to speak for our students and for their futures.

Group work is a Necessity for Students

       Our school district recently had an essay contest in which students were asked to describe their Ideal Math Class.  Submissions came in from students in grades 4 to 12.  Nearly every student said that they wanted to work in groups for at least a portion of the class time.  Students want to have the opportunity to ask each other questions and to share their ideas with a small group of peers.

       In fact, the benefits of group work in the classroom are well known.  The Center for Innovation in the Research and Teaching has compiled the following list of benefits of group work:

• Students able to take ownership of the subject matter.

• Students develop communication and teamwork skills.

• Content is reinforced as students work together and "teach" each other.  This improves understanding through additional discussion and explanation.

• Content may be broken down into parts.  This allows students to tackle larger and more complex problems and assignments than they would be able to do individually.

• Students can work together to pool their expertise, knowledge and skills.

• Students hold one another responsible and accountable.

• Teaches students to plan more effectively and manage their time.

• Instructors benefit by seeing students approach problems in novel and unique ways. This can improve the instructor's perspective and make their future teaching more effective.

• Instructors are able to have the content reinforced by giving the students ways to apply what they have learned in a collaborative setting.

       As teachers, we want students to have different learning experiences.  We know that all students do not learn best by merely listening to the teacher and taking notes.  We want students to learn how to learn and one way to do that is to give them these opportunities in the controlled atmosphere of the classroom.

       "Group work" is a general term that can be implemented in many ways in the classroom.  The Cornell University Center for Teaching Excellence has suggested many ways for teachers to incorporate group work into their lessons.  Marzano lists cooperative learning as one of his Nine High Yield Instructional Strategies.  

       Group work breaks the mold of the traditional teaching model that keeps the teacher in the front of the room all the time and the students in neat rows of desks and (usually) not talking very much.  Group work requires planning and preparation on the teacher's part.  It also requires teachers to allow some productive, learning noise to be part of their typical class on a regular basis.

       As we prepare our students for the world of work, we need to give them opportunities to work and to learn with their peers as this will (very likely) be a part of their own professional experiences as adults.

PARCC Results are all about Learning

       2010 - Common Core Standards go public
       2010 to 2014 - School systems throughout the country align courses to these updated standards
       2014 - PARCC Field Test takes place in all "PARCC" states
       2015 - First full administration of the PARCC assessments
       Fall 2015 - We get to see the results of the PARCC assessments

       I feel like I'm the only person who is happy to see the results from these new tests.  Once again, the press is constantly talking about bad results, bad tests, bad schools.  To me, these results are all about learning.  They tell us how well our students are learning based on the world-class standards that are being taught in our classrooms.  Isn't this what we really want???

       It doesn't help to compare our students to each other in their school or to the students in the school on the other side of town.  The comparison that matters is the comparison to the standards.  This comparison will help us to know if our children are ready for the academic demands of college level work and for the societal demands of a career.

       School is supposed to be about learning.  The PARCC results give us a measure of this learning.  This is a good thing.  Up until today, we've had far too many students graduating from high school and believing that they were ready for college only to face a harsh reality that their high school did not prepare them as well as they thought.  Too many students begin college and don't finish college.

       Today, thanks to PARCC results (and other data points), our students and their parents will get a true measure of their ability--as early as in third grade.  And there will be time while our children are still in P-12 school for them to get help and for them to raise their abilities.

       PARCC results are a good thing.  Learning is a good thing.

       Don't you want to know if your child's true level of learning?

I Shouldn't Be Here - Again

In preparation for my three-part series on the urgent need to improve the achievement of poor students in America's public schools, I am re-printing a blog post that I wrote in January 2014.

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I Shouldn't Be Here

     I am enjoying my 26th year working in education this year.  In that time I've been a middle and high school mathematics teacher, a high school mathematics chairperson and a district teacher specialist.  I've worked in the research and accountability office and I am now a supervisor of secondary mathematics--overseeing the mathematics program for 20,000+ students in my school district.  Still, had things worked out the way they were "supposed" to, I should have never done any of this.

     You see, I grew up in a lower-middle income family--which is an overtly nice and formal way to put it.  I have a brother and two sisters.  I was among the first generation to benefit from the Free and Reduced Meals program; a benefit I received from elementary to high school.

       When I was in 10th grade in 1980 the National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES) did a national survey of students from my class.  They followed up with us ten years later and this is what they found:  Only about 5% of the students in my economic family situation graduated from college.  (Good news: NCES did the same study with the 10th graders from 2002 and found that 14.5% of the low-income students from that class ended up with a college degree by 2012.  That's better than 5%, but still much too low.)

     So, had I followed the path that most of my peers did, I should have never went to college; and I certainly should have never graduated from college.  Which means, no teaching job, no promotions, and certainly no Master's degree later on.  Hence, I shouldn't be here.

     The reasons I AM here are many.  One of the biggest is simply public education.  My K-12 teachers never told me I couldn't go to college; they never told me I couldn't do whatever I wanted to do.

       I also had the good fortune of two wonderful parents who struggled to raise four children and to make ends meet while generally keeping a positive attitude.  I often say that "If we were poor, I never knew it."  Still, the ability of my parents to pay a greatly reduced price for lunch for four children was an incredible benefit to my family.  Who knows how much less my parents would have been forced to provide for us had this not been an option?

       And so, with help from my teachers in our (free) public school, and encouragement from home, I was able to attend college, graduate from college, and enjoy the occupational benefits of a college education--as is the case of my three siblings as well.

       Still, I always felt like I was one of the (extremely few) lucky ones.

Everyone Should Go to Community College

       The Community College system in the United States is simply the perfect college option for many of our high school graduates in my opinion.  

       Here are some of my reasons for this statement:

1. Close to home.
2. Less expensive.
3. Small classes.

       Let's start with my first reason: Close to home.  I went to a college that had the initials TSC.  (This college has since been renamed.)  Among the students at this college, we referred to "TSC" as meaning "The Suitcase College" because just about everyone went home on the weekends.  I remember thinking at the time that high school students are always complaining about "living under the rules of their parents".  They want to be on their own; they want their freedom.  And, so, I thought that these people were hypocrites when, given the opportunity, would rush back home at every chance they got to do so.

       Of course, it probably isn't fair to categorize young people this way.  It is more likely that they rushed back home to be with their friends.  It is also likely that they really didn't hate their parents as much as they said.  According to the Higher Education Research Institute (and referenced here), 53% of college students attend a school within 100 miles of their home and 90% within 500 miles.  This tells me that most students want to attend college close (or relatively close) to their home.  Surely lower in-state tuition is part of the reason, but I think another reason is that newly graduated high school students are not completely ready to break all ties with their hometown by attending a college that is very far away.

       Community colleges provide the college experience with college courses and college teachers while still remaining close (sometimes very close) to home.  Students don't have to adjust to a new environment--perhaps with new foods and new expressions and maybe new fashions and (perhaps) a new climate--in addition to the (sometimes shocking) new experience of college-level course work.  Change is hard and a lot of change at once can be too hard for some students to endure.  The closeness of community colleges allows students to be close to friends and family and familiar settings, while they adjust to some aspects of college life.

       Reason number two: Less Expensive.  Full discloser; I am the cheapest cheapskate you will ever meet.  If I see something for free, I take two.  So my views of cost are probably skewed when compared to those of normal people.  However, I would think that lots of middle-class, working class, and (certainly) poor people are interested in finding good deals wherever they can be found.  And when you are talking about cost, Community Colleges are a very good deal.

       Tuition costs at community colleges are not merely "less" than those of public and private four-year schools; they are dramatically less--50% less; maybe even 75% less.  And students take the same courses and earn the same credit that they would at the much more expensive four-year schools.  To put a dollar figure to it, according to the College Board (reference found here)  the average cost of tuition and fees at a two-year school is only $3,131 which is just over one-third (60+% savings) of the cost for a year at a four-year institution.

       And here is a sobering statistic that we don't like to talk about, but when it comes to cost this is important.  Only slightly more than 50% of students who enter college eventually earn a degree.  Most people know someone who began college and then left college after one semester or after one year.  Imagine paying $25,000. or $35,000. and then your child drops out of college.  Isn't it better to risk only $3,131 to see if your child is college-ready?  For thirty thousand dollars you could have bought your child a car and rent for a year--during which time he/she could have been looking for job.

       Check out this recent study on the issue of college dropouts.

       Finally my third reason: Small classes.

       I have to be honest here; I'm not completely sure that community colleges can promise small classes or smaller classes that at four-year colleges.  I did find this reference and this one that mention community colleges having smaller classes.  But, to be fair, these references don't cite research.  I know that people often talk about large lecture halls at big, four-year colleges.  If it is true, then the "large lecture hall" is (yet) another major transition that students need to make when they begin college.  Most high schools keep classes to 30 students or less; maybe 35 or 40 would be the biggest class that any high school student would typically experience.  

       

       Smaller classes don't make students smarter, but they do open the possibility that the teacher would have better relationships with his/her students.  When students and teachers get to know each other, than students tend to do better in classes.  This is the factor that helps small class sizes to lead to better academic performance by students.

       The transition to college is a major life transition for 17 and 18 year old people.  Many new things are happening all at once.  A typical student might be able to handle some of these changes, but still struggle to handle all of these changes.

       Community Colleges help students to manage these multiple changes by being close to home, having much lower costs, and having small classes (similar to high school classes).  They also have all sorts of academic supports to help students to succeed.  Community Colleges are a great deal.  I think everyone interested in earning a BA or MA should consider Community College as a starting point.

college and CAREER

   

       Our schools have picked up the catch phrase "College and Career" a lot over the past few years.  But the words that come after this phrase seem to (more often than not) have a lot more to do with "college" and a lot less to do with "career".  

       Of course it is important for our P-12 schools to prepare students for college.  But our most important responsibility is to prepare students to be responsible and productive citizens.  For some students, that means beginning a career soon after high school.  In the school systems where I have worked, we have taken this responsibility very seriously.  We have a separate school building that is our Career and Technology Center (CTC).  Students spend part of their school day at their regular, comprehensive high school and the rest of their day at the CTC.  This school holds classes that teach students trades and prepare them for certification requirements in these various trades.  We also have courses and programs in our regular comprehensive schools that give our students some initial training and learning in various fields.

       College is important more today than it has ever been in the future.  But we know that college isn't for everybody.  I'm glad our public schools have continued their traditions of finding ways to prepare all students for their futures; whether they may college or CAREER.

       

College and Career: (Or, Should It Be...College and/or Career???)

     Public Schools (at least in my state) are engaging in a big push called College and Career.  "We are preparing students for College and Career."  "We want students to be College and Career Ready."  It is a good slogan; and, let's face it, it makes sense.  It should be our job, as a public school system, to prepare students for the next phase in their life; whether it be College or Career.

     We do a lot to prepare students for college.  We offer Advanced Placement courses, we prepare students to take the SAT and the ACT.  We provide information about scholarships.  We hold College Fairs.  We allow students to take college courses while in high school--and earn (both) high school and college credit; we call this "duel-credit".

     We also do a lot to prepare students for careers.  We invite speakers to come to schools to talk about their work.  We have a Career Technology Center that prepares students for many different careers from Cosmetology to Carpentry to Engineering (and lots more).  We help to set up students in internships during the summer and (sometimes) during the school year.

     We do our best to honor our commitment to both college-bound students and career-bound students.

     The struggle comes as we try to make one set of rules for both of these populations.  Particularly academic rules.  Here is a recent article that questions if college is appropriate for everyone.  And here are some statistics about jobs with the potential for growth in the next ten years--and the amount of education needed for them.

     The real issue of concern is for the population of students that are weak academically, but very strong artistically--or they have a talent that doesn't require high levels of knowledge in math and science such as Culinary Arts or HVAC or writing fiction.  How should the public school system account for these students in our policies regarding high school graduation requirements?  That's a tough question.

   

     We know that earning a high school diploma affords our young people many advantages that are not available to people without a high school diploma.  Therefore, we take great strides to ensure that the opportunity to earn a high school diploma is available to all students.  But over the years, our efforts to increase the high school graduation rate in the United States have led to too many students who graduate from high school who are not ready for college (as seen in this graphic about college graduation rates in the fifty states of the United States).  So, in response to this concern, we have raised the standards so that high school graduates are better prepared for college.

     

     And so we are left with this difficult balancing act.  We want everyone to graduate from high school and we want everyone to be ready for college--if they choose to go to college.  Public schools serve everyone; and sometimes "serving everyone" leads to difficult decisions.  We know that education is the gateway to a better life for everyone and we take that responsibility very seriously.  Some students go directly to college and some go directly to careers, but all students need to be College and Career ready.