I believe that one way we can get more high schoolers interested in college is to give them more information about what college is and what possibilities it holds. The fact that they will probably make more money and have more career options if they go to college can only be one argument among others, and not necessarily the most important one. We should be giving students college marketing materials in 8th or 9th grade - and never mind the fretting about kids "growing up too fast" - in order to make the idea of college more real to them, and to help them understand that there is a relationship between the way they approach high school and what their future opportunities will be.
To that end, I offer an incomplete list of things that can be done in great universities. I believe that what we teach kids in high school should pave the way for them to have the opportunity to do the sort of things listed below.
Things you can do in a great university
-Spend a summer, semester, or year learning a language - any language - and living with a family in a country thousands of miles away. When you get home, the experience will have transformed you, and your knowledge of another language and culture will be something you carry with you for the rest of your life.
-Discuss some of the greatest books ever written with professors and graduate students who are devoting their lives to understanding these books.
-Take advanced courses in art, film, literature, or music, and never look at these in the same way again.
-Learn to do, and actually do, research in a field that interests you. In addition to learning things that others have figured out and written down for you to memorize, you'll be a participant - in labs and seminars - in the creation of knowledge.
-In the four summers before you graduate, travel, volunteer, read voraciously, or get internships doing important work that you will remember and learn something from. Don't get a "job" over the summer - get an experience and an education.
-Learn Chinese, Arabic, Ancient Greek, or Egyptian hieroglyphics. Take four years of classes in a language; when you are done, you may be able to read newspapers, letters, and literature in that language, and an entirely new world of people, communities, ideas, travel opportunities, and careers will be open to you.
-Develop your own voice and the voice of others by joining or starting a publication as a writer or editor, or hosting or participating in an art exhibition, play, or concert.
-Build your focus, physical capabilities, maturity, and self-discipline while making lifelong friends by participating on an athletic team; if the team is on the varsity level, you will also be able to travel and compete around the country. (Many club teams travel as well, of course).
-Increase your literacy and reading fluency as well as your ability to write persuasively by taking four years' worth of classes in the humanities and social sciences.
-Do independent study work with graduate students and professors who are brilliant people and experts in their field.
-Attend lectures by experts in every field, politicians, judges and lawyers, writers, and others.
-Discover the complexity and importance of politics, and learn to think beyond the headlines. Discover your political voice.
-Attend concerts, museums, and exhibitions that include work by some of the most talented artists and musicians in the world.
-Learn to create professional computer programs, websites, or documentary films.
-Have access to the resources of enormous research libraries and cutting-edge research technology.
-Surround yourself with some of the brightest and most creative people of your generation.
-Graduate and have the freedom to choose your career - including the most desirable careers in the world. Have access, through your alumni network, career center, skill set, and educational background, to practically any social or professional network in your field. Be a credible and desirable job applicant with economic opportunities around the country and the world.
-Enjoy four years of relative freedom - a time you can easily squander, if you wish to do so, or an opportunity, if you will seize it, to become an educated person. It can be four years of throwaway job-training or four years of stimulating and unforgettable intellectual experiences.
If students want to make the most of their school years in general and their college years in particular, they must take ownership of their education and elect to do what is difficult. The alternative is to take an easier, clearer, purely pre-professional path - a path that is all-too-often paved with banal classes and textbooks, and that often doesn't actually do much to prepare you for your first job (the pre-medical track is a significant exception). You can work toward entering a profession while getting a great education along the way.
Saturday, July 18, 2009
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Thinking critically about critical pedagogy
Most schools of education in the U.S., including the one in which I am enrolled, require preservice teachers who are pursuing certification to take a class on teaching to diverse learners. The idea is that as we are preparing to teach students with racial and socioeconomic backgrounds that may differ from our own, we ought to gain some understanding of the special issues these students (and their families and communities) confront so that we can do a better job connecting with them, respecting them, and teaching them. It is a very sensible idea.
In the diversity class I am currently taking, our reading so far has been drawn largely from the fields of critical pedagogy and critical race studies. This is not the first time I have encountered this sort of writing; variations of critical theory - often rooted in Marxism and the Frankfurt School - have flourished in many academic disciplines.
I am generally very resistant to this body of writing and scholarship, and I am hoping to use my experience in the diversity class to (a) open my mind about it so that I can take better advantage of its resources and its best works and thinkers, and (b) to better understand my resistance to critical theory and the reasons I am reluctant to adopt its conventions and vocabulary or spend too much time looking at the world through its lenses.
First, a bibliography of the readings we are being assigned this term, so that you can look into these ideas for yourself:
-Harro, "The Cycle of Socalization"
-Goodman, "About Privileged Groups"
-Howard, "Unlearning the Lessons of Privilege"
-Schmidt, "More Than Men in White Sheets: Seven Concepts Critical to the Teaching of Racism as Systemic Inequality"
-Bartolomé, "Critical Pedagogy and Teacher Education: Radicalizing Prospective Teachers"
-Godley et al., "Preparing Teachers for Dialectically Diverse Classrooms"
-Harklau, "Representational Practices and Multi-modal Communication in US High Schools: Implications for Adolescent Immigrants"
-Kalyanpur and Harry, "Legal and Epistemological Underpinnings of the Construction of Disability"
The titles alone can give you an idea of their contents. I've read the first five of these articles, and I have a few thoughts and criticisms so far:
I am concerned that the many and significant concerns I have about the worldview of critical pedagogues might be dismissed as a personal failure to understand my “white privilege,” to escape my racist “socialization,” or to fully comprehend the nature of institutional and cultural racism.
Some of the writers we have read attempt to pre-empt counterarguments by raising questions about the reader’s racial bias, a practice that amounts to a sophisticated form of ad hominem: “You wouldn’t understand or agree, because you are a socialized, privileged white male.”
I am more than willing to grant most claims about the reality of institutional and cultural racism in contemporary America. As a student of politics, history, and education, I know that one needs look no farther than statistics that show the correlations between race, school quality and funding, and household income level to understand the fact of the racial divide in America.
Segregation and inequality are hard facts from which the existence of institutional racism can be derived. But the layers of group-focused, finger-pointing theory that critical pedagogues pile on to these hard facts are not beyond debate and discussion, and we should be able to question these theoretical lenses – their rigor, appropriateness, and utility – without exposing ourselves, because we happen to be members of privileged groups, to charges of bias. The same goes for policy ideas, such as bilingual education and affirmative action, that we supposedly ought to support once we have recognized the fact of institutional racism.
To suggest that there is a necessary and immutable relationship between one’s group memberships and one’s political understanding is absurd, and to dismiss those who disagree with one’s own views - one's own radicalism, in the case of the critical pedagogues - as biased and insufficiently informed is bad practice; when, as in several of the articles we have read, these issues are discussed in terms of the need to “educate” people to think like critical pedagogues, and framed as recommended curricula for university professors and high school teachers, it borders on thought-control.
Critical pedagogues who assume that their white readers (because of their socialization and dominant-group position) have a less-sophisticated understanding of society are themselves making a broad-brush racial generalization; accordingly, they push a definition of racism that excludes their own biases: racism, apparently, is something that only dominant groups confronting minorities are engaged in (since only dominant groups benefit from "hegemonic," cultural racism).
There are alternative and arguably more optimistic and empowering lenses through which to look at racial and economic divisions, including race-neutral or cosmopolitan humanism, socialism, or libertarianism, or the lenses of human rights or natural law, or the ethical frameworks of the religious traditions (such as Catholic social thought). It is also very possible to adopt one of these alternative frameworks in a race-conscious way. I believe that individuals from all races and classes can reduce as well as perpetuate racism and classism. I wouldn’t be dedicating my life to education and writing if I didn’t believe in the critical role of individual minds and consciences in shaping social, political, and economic realities.
Things can get pretty ugly when “critical pedagogues” forget about individuals and lose themselves in a fantasy world where race and class are not only facts, but practically the only facts that matter. In the Bartolomé article, the author approvingly quotes a high school principal who argues, to paraphrase and draw the argument to its logical conclusion, that the worst day in the life of the poorest and most misfortunate “Anglo” is “never as challenging” as the best day in the life of the most wealthy and fortunate “Black person or Brown person.” How does this sort of hyperbole advance the conversation or improve the condition of underprivileged groups?
The bottom line: shouldn’t educators work to create a comfort zone for all students? Shouldn't we be focusing on creating caring and comfortable classrooms in which we can help all students advance their understanding and develop a love of learning? Must we think about inequality only in group-focused (collectivist) terms of dominant vs. subordinate groups, oppressors vs. oppressed, colonizers vs. colonized, and agent vs. target? Must everything be about race and class (and sexual orientation, disability, dialect differences, and so on), or can we best respect people by recognizing them as fellow human beings much like ourselves and working to understand them in the fullness of their individuality?
I encourage my classmates and readers to recognize the reality and complexity of cultural and institutional racism, but also to think critically about the theoretical lenses of critical pedagogy.
In the diversity class I am currently taking, our reading so far has been drawn largely from the fields of critical pedagogy and critical race studies. This is not the first time I have encountered this sort of writing; variations of critical theory - often rooted in Marxism and the Frankfurt School - have flourished in many academic disciplines.
I am generally very resistant to this body of writing and scholarship, and I am hoping to use my experience in the diversity class to (a) open my mind about it so that I can take better advantage of its resources and its best works and thinkers, and (b) to better understand my resistance to critical theory and the reasons I am reluctant to adopt its conventions and vocabulary or spend too much time looking at the world through its lenses.
First, a bibliography of the readings we are being assigned this term, so that you can look into these ideas for yourself:
-Harro, "The Cycle of Socalization"
-Goodman, "About Privileged Groups"
-Howard, "Unlearning the Lessons of Privilege"
-Schmidt, "More Than Men in White Sheets: Seven Concepts Critical to the Teaching of Racism as Systemic Inequality"
-Bartolomé, "Critical Pedagogy and Teacher Education: Radicalizing Prospective Teachers"
-Godley et al., "Preparing Teachers for Dialectically Diverse Classrooms"
-Harklau, "Representational Practices and Multi-modal Communication in US High Schools: Implications for Adolescent Immigrants"
-Kalyanpur and Harry, "Legal and Epistemological Underpinnings of the Construction of Disability"
The titles alone can give you an idea of their contents. I've read the first five of these articles, and I have a few thoughts and criticisms so far:
I am concerned that the many and significant concerns I have about the worldview of critical pedagogues might be dismissed as a personal failure to understand my “white privilege,” to escape my racist “socialization,” or to fully comprehend the nature of institutional and cultural racism.
Some of the writers we have read attempt to pre-empt counterarguments by raising questions about the reader’s racial bias, a practice that amounts to a sophisticated form of ad hominem: “You wouldn’t understand or agree, because you are a socialized, privileged white male.”
I am more than willing to grant most claims about the reality of institutional and cultural racism in contemporary America. As a student of politics, history, and education, I know that one needs look no farther than statistics that show the correlations between race, school quality and funding, and household income level to understand the fact of the racial divide in America.
Segregation and inequality are hard facts from which the existence of institutional racism can be derived. But the layers of group-focused, finger-pointing theory that critical pedagogues pile on to these hard facts are not beyond debate and discussion, and we should be able to question these theoretical lenses – their rigor, appropriateness, and utility – without exposing ourselves, because we happen to be members of privileged groups, to charges of bias. The same goes for policy ideas, such as bilingual education and affirmative action, that we supposedly ought to support once we have recognized the fact of institutional racism.
To suggest that there is a necessary and immutable relationship between one’s group memberships and one’s political understanding is absurd, and to dismiss those who disagree with one’s own views - one's own radicalism, in the case of the critical pedagogues - as biased and insufficiently informed is bad practice; when, as in several of the articles we have read, these issues are discussed in terms of the need to “educate” people to think like critical pedagogues, and framed as recommended curricula for university professors and high school teachers, it borders on thought-control.
Critical pedagogues who assume that their white readers (because of their socialization and dominant-group position) have a less-sophisticated understanding of society are themselves making a broad-brush racial generalization; accordingly, they push a definition of racism that excludes their own biases: racism, apparently, is something that only dominant groups confronting minorities are engaged in (since only dominant groups benefit from "hegemonic," cultural racism).
There are alternative and arguably more optimistic and empowering lenses through which to look at racial and economic divisions, including race-neutral or cosmopolitan humanism, socialism, or libertarianism, or the lenses of human rights or natural law, or the ethical frameworks of the religious traditions (such as Catholic social thought). It is also very possible to adopt one of these alternative frameworks in a race-conscious way. I believe that individuals from all races and classes can reduce as well as perpetuate racism and classism. I wouldn’t be dedicating my life to education and writing if I didn’t believe in the critical role of individual minds and consciences in shaping social, political, and economic realities.
Things can get pretty ugly when “critical pedagogues” forget about individuals and lose themselves in a fantasy world where race and class are not only facts, but practically the only facts that matter. In the Bartolomé article, the author approvingly quotes a high school principal who argues, to paraphrase and draw the argument to its logical conclusion, that the worst day in the life of the poorest and most misfortunate “Anglo” is “never as challenging” as the best day in the life of the most wealthy and fortunate “Black person or Brown person.” How does this sort of hyperbole advance the conversation or improve the condition of underprivileged groups?
The bottom line: shouldn’t educators work to create a comfort zone for all students? Shouldn't we be focusing on creating caring and comfortable classrooms in which we can help all students advance their understanding and develop a love of learning? Must we think about inequality only in group-focused (collectivist) terms of dominant vs. subordinate groups, oppressors vs. oppressed, colonizers vs. colonized, and agent vs. target? Must everything be about race and class (and sexual orientation, disability, dialect differences, and so on), or can we best respect people by recognizing them as fellow human beings much like ourselves and working to understand them in the fullness of their individuality?
I encourage my classmates and readers to recognize the reality and complexity of cultural and institutional racism, but also to think critically about the theoretical lenses of critical pedagogy.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
A liberal education for every student
Education, therefore, is a process of living and not a preparation for future living.
--John Dewey, "My Pedagogic Creed"
Liberal Education is an approach to learning that empowers individuals and prepares them to deal with complexity, diversity, and change. It provides students with broad knowledge of the wider world (e.g. science, culture, and society) as well as in-depth study in a specific area of interest. A liberal education helps students develop a sense of social responsibility, as well as strong and transferable intellectual and practical skills such as communication, analytical and problem-solving skills, and a demonstrated ability to apply knowledge and skills in real-world settings. ...Today, a liberal education usually includes a general education curriculum that provides broad learning in multiple disciplines and ways of knowing, along with more in-depth study in a major.
--American Association of Colleges and Universities, "What is Liberal Education?"
It is long past time to do away with sloganeering about the primary purpose of education being to "prepare our kids for 21st-century jobs."
This cliché, and others like it, contributes to a narrative that cheapens the work of educators and shrinks the province of education to something that is done purely "in preparation" for something more "real," more substantial or meaningful - i.e., a job. But it is a colossal mistake to think and speak about K-16 education as though it were nothing more than extended job-training.
If we give students a liberal education aimed at educating their whole selves, building their foundational and critical literacy, increasing their access to and understanding of the world of ideas and art, and helping them develop their ability to understand and think about complex issues in and across academic disciplines, then we will have given them the best "vocational" education possible: students with excellent verbal and quantitative skills have the economic and social worlds wide open to them. They gain access to coveted internships and jobs, opportunities for studying and working overseas, and a stronger political voice.
Education - and therefore schooling, which is institutionalized education - is first and foremost about the pursuit of understanding. It is not about job-training. Job-training happens primarily on the job - but to give students access to rewarding and fulfilling work, and to prepare them to have as wide a choice of work as possible, the best preparation is a strong liberal education.
--John Dewey, "My Pedagogic Creed"
Liberal Education is an approach to learning that empowers individuals and prepares them to deal with complexity, diversity, and change. It provides students with broad knowledge of the wider world (e.g. science, culture, and society) as well as in-depth study in a specific area of interest. A liberal education helps students develop a sense of social responsibility, as well as strong and transferable intellectual and practical skills such as communication, analytical and problem-solving skills, and a demonstrated ability to apply knowledge and skills in real-world settings. ...Today, a liberal education usually includes a general education curriculum that provides broad learning in multiple disciplines and ways of knowing, along with more in-depth study in a major.
--American Association of Colleges and Universities, "What is Liberal Education?"
It is long past time to do away with sloganeering about the primary purpose of education being to "prepare our kids for 21st-century jobs."
This cliché, and others like it, contributes to a narrative that cheapens the work of educators and shrinks the province of education to something that is done purely "in preparation" for something more "real," more substantial or meaningful - i.e., a job. But it is a colossal mistake to think and speak about K-16 education as though it were nothing more than extended job-training.
If we give students a liberal education aimed at educating their whole selves, building their foundational and critical literacy, increasing their access to and understanding of the world of ideas and art, and helping them develop their ability to understand and think about complex issues in and across academic disciplines, then we will have given them the best "vocational" education possible: students with excellent verbal and quantitative skills have the economic and social worlds wide open to them. They gain access to coveted internships and jobs, opportunities for studying and working overseas, and a stronger political voice.
Education - and therefore schooling, which is institutionalized education - is first and foremost about the pursuit of understanding. It is not about job-training. Job-training happens primarily on the job - but to give students access to rewarding and fulfilling work, and to prepare them to have as wide a choice of work as possible, the best preparation is a strong liberal education.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Quotes from Deborah Meier's "In Schools We Trust"
What I offer as a teacher, after all, is not just an acceptable babysitting experience but rather, like my doctor, professional expertise.
...
In some ways these experiences confirmed my support for parental choice in education - for shopping around, getting second opinions, and above all being allowed to select a school that matched a parents' biases and inclinations. I saw no contradiction between this and support for public education. Public schools simply had to be redesigned to offer families more choices,just as medicine should.
...
We also picked up on a successful (Central Park East Secondary School) practice - community service. Invented as much to provide teachers with free time as anything, it turned out to have life-changing repercussions for entirely different reasons. Over the four years that students spend doing community service, almost all, according to interviews conducted in later years, had built at least one relationship with an adult that helped them get into college, find a job, build a network in the larger world.
...
The Mission Hill school, like many of the other small schools I know, was deliberately designed designed to make it hard for the adult culture and the youth culture to hang apart for long. We even tried to make it easy for the high school and elementary school to exchange people and ideas. ...Even in terms of physical space, we thought about how to make the generations overlap. ...The grown-up behind-the-scenes life of the school is made visible and touchable.
...
We have to trust students' drive to learn, because it is the greater part of what we have going for us.
Deborah Meier
--In Schools We Trust
Thursday, July 9, 2009
On language learning textbooks
Over the years, I've accumulated a decent library of world language textbooks and readers. Even those I do not get around to studying usually yield some benefit - I can get a feel for the sound and structure of each language with only a few hours of reading, and such kernels of knowledge can often serve as bridges and conversation-starters with native speakers. And then there is the physical presence of the books: the diversity of the languages represented is a reminder of all the things I hope to study and places I hope to travel.
I have also learned something from the texts about the many ways foreign languages can be taught and how teaching methods have changed over time. The improvement in recording technologies has revolutionized language learning; it is difficult to imagine, but many earlier students of world languages had to study without ever hearing their target language spoken. Today, the primary (and, in my experience, most effective) method of instruction is to have the student listen to and memorize conversations carried on by native speakers in various contexts (the train station, the post office, the dinner table, etc.). Grammar is learned intuitively; one comes to understand the workings of the past tense by hearing a voice actor discuss his or her day at work. It’s a long way from the older methods, still used in the most widely disseminated Latin and Greek textbooks (Wheelock’s and Mastronarde’s), of memorizing paradigm after paradigm and carrying out drill after drill.
Language textbooks are invariably infused with knowledge of the cultures where the language is spoken. For instance, Latin is learned through readings about the orations of senators and the deeds of heroes and gods; Norwegian is learned by listening in on the conversation of tourists in Oslo who are admiring the sculptures in the Frognerparken; and Italian is learned through texts about the history of coffee or the many courses of an Italian dinner. Most dialogues in contemporary language textbooks have settings - some are universal, but many are specific to a particular time and place. It’s hard to imagine an elementary Russian textbook that does not teach the reader how to ask for directions to Red Square.
The experience of learning how to find one’s way around the Kremlin, and “asking” directions during the lulls on the audio track provided for that purpose, with soft voices and the sound of traffic in the background to add authenticity, is qualitatively different from the experience of reading about Red Square in a history book or travel guide. In secondhand accounts, the reader is one more step removed from the experience of physically being in Moscow. The language learner, however, can to some extent simulate that experience. And if one’s attitude when reading secondhand accounts of another place’s history and culture is one of looking upon a culture from “above,” one’s attitude as a language learner is much more humble. Even the cows of ancient Greece understand Attic Greek better than we ever will, someone once quipped. There is some truth to that. The student of languages is a student in the fullest sense of the word; his highest aspiration is to speak a language as well as a native speaker - any native speaker, regardless of age or station. He may believe, consciously or not, that there individuals in his home culture with whom he has nothing to discuss and from whom he has nothing to learn - but abroad he is stripped of that elitist attitude, because everyone reads, writes, and speaks better than him.
I continue to learn a lot and derive a great deal of pleasure from my library of language textbooks, and I’ve become a collector almost by accident; the collection is a byproduct of two of the things I love most: languages and books. By letting go of the dream of ever mastering all the languages represented in my collection, I have given myself a freer hand to purchase the old Russian text with “Printed in the Soviet Union” stamped in red ink on the frontispiece, and the grossly outdated handbook of Japanese grammar written to assist American servicepeople in the postwar occupation of Japan. Even if these are all but useless as instruments of language study, they serve a different purpose by providing that pleasure of owning something rare that is the province and privilege of the collector.
I have also learned something from the texts about the many ways foreign languages can be taught and how teaching methods have changed over time. The improvement in recording technologies has revolutionized language learning; it is difficult to imagine, but many earlier students of world languages had to study without ever hearing their target language spoken. Today, the primary (and, in my experience, most effective) method of instruction is to have the student listen to and memorize conversations carried on by native speakers in various contexts (the train station, the post office, the dinner table, etc.). Grammar is learned intuitively; one comes to understand the workings of the past tense by hearing a voice actor discuss his or her day at work. It’s a long way from the older methods, still used in the most widely disseminated Latin and Greek textbooks (Wheelock’s and Mastronarde’s), of memorizing paradigm after paradigm and carrying out drill after drill.
Language textbooks are invariably infused with knowledge of the cultures where the language is spoken. For instance, Latin is learned through readings about the orations of senators and the deeds of heroes and gods; Norwegian is learned by listening in on the conversation of tourists in Oslo who are admiring the sculptures in the Frognerparken; and Italian is learned through texts about the history of coffee or the many courses of an Italian dinner. Most dialogues in contemporary language textbooks have settings - some are universal, but many are specific to a particular time and place. It’s hard to imagine an elementary Russian textbook that does not teach the reader how to ask for directions to Red Square.
The experience of learning how to find one’s way around the Kremlin, and “asking” directions during the lulls on the audio track provided for that purpose, with soft voices and the sound of traffic in the background to add authenticity, is qualitatively different from the experience of reading about Red Square in a history book or travel guide. In secondhand accounts, the reader is one more step removed from the experience of physically being in Moscow. The language learner, however, can to some extent simulate that experience. And if one’s attitude when reading secondhand accounts of another place’s history and culture is one of looking upon a culture from “above,” one’s attitude as a language learner is much more humble. Even the cows of ancient Greece understand Attic Greek better than we ever will, someone once quipped. There is some truth to that. The student of languages is a student in the fullest sense of the word; his highest aspiration is to speak a language as well as a native speaker - any native speaker, regardless of age or station. He may believe, consciously or not, that there individuals in his home culture with whom he has nothing to discuss and from whom he has nothing to learn - but abroad he is stripped of that elitist attitude, because everyone reads, writes, and speaks better than him.
I continue to learn a lot and derive a great deal of pleasure from my library of language textbooks, and I’ve become a collector almost by accident; the collection is a byproduct of two of the things I love most: languages and books. By letting go of the dream of ever mastering all the languages represented in my collection, I have given myself a freer hand to purchase the old Russian text with “Printed in the Soviet Union” stamped in red ink on the frontispiece, and the grossly outdated handbook of Japanese grammar written to assist American servicepeople in the postwar occupation of Japan. Even if these are all but useless as instruments of language study, they serve a different purpose by providing that pleasure of owning something rare that is the province and privilege of the collector.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
School finance and the vouchers debate
School Finance and the Vouchers Debate
The slideshow above begins with a description of how U.S. public and private schools are financed and the enormous disparities between rich and poor public schools, then describes the various school choice policies that have been proposed to rectify these disparities. Finally, I examine one proposed reform - school vouchers - in depth, presenting the main arguments for and against vouchers and linking to both pro-voucher and anti-voucher resources.
Thanks, as always, for reading.
The slideshow above begins with a description of how U.S. public and private schools are financed and the enormous disparities between rich and poor public schools, then describes the various school choice policies that have been proposed to rectify these disparities. Finally, I examine one proposed reform - school vouchers - in depth, presenting the main arguments for and against vouchers and linking to both pro-voucher and anti-voucher resources.
Thanks, as always, for reading.
Sunday, July 5, 2009
NYT's Kristof offers a reading list for kids
I am a fan of New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof. Many political writers become caught up in day-to-day partisan spats or adopt a too-conventional set of political principles. Kristof, however, remains remarkably focused on the things that really matter - things like international human rights, modern-day slavery and human trafficking, poverty, and education.
And so Kristof's column in tomorrow's Times is about neither Michael Jackson nor Sarah Palin; it's about the sad fact that kids' IQs and reading abilities fall over the summer break because they are not, for the most part, reading or using their brains when they are not in school. He offers a list of ten of the "best kids' books ever."
I would add to his list:
-The Giver (Lois Lowry).
-Bridge to Terabithia (Katherine Paterson).
-Everything by Roald Dahl, especially Matilda, James and the Giant Peach, and The BFG.
-Sideways Stories from Wayside School series (Louis Sachar).
-His Dark Materials trilogy (Philip Pullman).
-Indian in the Cupboard trilogy (Lynne Reid Banks).
-Encyclopedia Brown series (Donald J. Sobol).
-The Chronicles of Narnia series. (C.S. Lewis).
-The Giving Tree, Where the Sidewalk Ends, A Light in the Attic, and The Missing Piece (Shel Silverstein).
-Maniac Magee (Jerry Spinelli).
-Harriet the Spy (Louise Fitzhugh).
-Little House on the Prairie (Laura Ingalls Wilder).
-Shiloh (Phyllis Reynolds Naylor).
-The Velveteen Rabbit (Margery Williams).
I appreciate that Kristof's first thought about the summer achievement slide wasn't a policy idea such as lengthening the school year. Children and their parents must take charge of their own education during their breaks: they must become explorers and self-educators and resist the lethargic, easy option of becoming zombies in front of television and computer screens.
Over the years I've become more and more attracted to the idea that a central purpose of K-12 education must be to turn students into readers. And readers, that is, of books - not just blogs or RSS feeds or Tweets or "interactive stories" or graphic novels.
The sine qua non of self-education and lifelong learning is the habit of reading deeply, broadly, and well.
And so Kristof's column in tomorrow's Times is about neither Michael Jackson nor Sarah Palin; it's about the sad fact that kids' IQs and reading abilities fall over the summer break because they are not, for the most part, reading or using their brains when they are not in school. He offers a list of ten of the "best kids' books ever."
I would add to his list:
-The Giver (Lois Lowry).
-Bridge to Terabithia (Katherine Paterson).
-Everything by Roald Dahl, especially Matilda, James and the Giant Peach, and The BFG.
-Sideways Stories from Wayside School series (Louis Sachar).
-His Dark Materials trilogy (Philip Pullman).
-Indian in the Cupboard trilogy (Lynne Reid Banks).
-Encyclopedia Brown series (Donald J. Sobol).
-The Chronicles of Narnia series. (C.S. Lewis).
-The Giving Tree, Where the Sidewalk Ends, A Light in the Attic, and The Missing Piece (Shel Silverstein).
-Maniac Magee (Jerry Spinelli).
-Harriet the Spy (Louise Fitzhugh).
-Little House on the Prairie (Laura Ingalls Wilder).
-Shiloh (Phyllis Reynolds Naylor).
-The Velveteen Rabbit (Margery Williams).
I appreciate that Kristof's first thought about the summer achievement slide wasn't a policy idea such as lengthening the school year. Children and their parents must take charge of their own education during their breaks: they must become explorers and self-educators and resist the lethargic, easy option of becoming zombies in front of television and computer screens.
Over the years I've become more and more attracted to the idea that a central purpose of K-12 education must be to turn students into readers. And readers, that is, of books - not just blogs or RSS feeds or Tweets or "interactive stories" or graphic novels.
The sine qua non of self-education and lifelong learning is the habit of reading deeply, broadly, and well.
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Jean Roemer on self-education
An excerpt from a rare book I stumbled upon in the University of Chicago's Regenstein library a few years ago:
"One of the chief characteristics of a good method consists in enabling learners to dispense with the assistance of a teacher when they are capable of self-government. It should be so contrived as to excite and direct their spontaneous efforts, and lend them to the conviction that they have the power, if they have the will, to acquire whatever man has acquired.
…The most extensive education given by the most skilful masters often produces but inferior characters; that alone which we give to ourselves elevates us above mediocrity. The eminence attained by great men is always the result of their own industry."
Jean Roemer
--Polyglot Reader and Guide for Translation
"One of the chief characteristics of a good method consists in enabling learners to dispense with the assistance of a teacher when they are capable of self-government. It should be so contrived as to excite and direct their spontaneous efforts, and lend them to the conviction that they have the power, if they have the will, to acquire whatever man has acquired.
…The most extensive education given by the most skilful masters often produces but inferior characters; that alone which we give to ourselves elevates us above mediocrity. The eminence attained by great men is always the result of their own industry."
Jean Roemer
--Polyglot Reader and Guide for Translation
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Local bookstores and educational capital
I just wrote a post on my personal blog about the sad closing of Shaman Drum, one of the best independent bookstores in the Midwest.
Social scientists use the term "social capital" to describe the strength of social networks in a community. Likewise, we can use the term "educational capital" to describe the educational environment in a community. Strong schools and libraries, a vibrant local arts scene, high-quality local publications, the presence of a college or university - all of these can increase a community's educational capital.
When an excellent bookstore goes out of business, the educational environment of its community is diminished. Just as communities concerned about education issues should approve millages and tax increases to support their local schools, they should also patronize the stores, theaters, museums, and concert halls that contribute to the community's educational capital in important but less obvious ways.
Social scientists use the term "social capital" to describe the strength of social networks in a community. Likewise, we can use the term "educational capital" to describe the educational environment in a community. Strong schools and libraries, a vibrant local arts scene, high-quality local publications, the presence of a college or university - all of these can increase a community's educational capital.
When an excellent bookstore goes out of business, the educational environment of its community is diminished. Just as communities concerned about education issues should approve millages and tax increases to support their local schools, they should also patronize the stores, theaters, museums, and concert halls that contribute to the community's educational capital in important but less obvious ways.
Monday, June 29, 2009
Links and resources for educators and self-educators
Check out the new-and-vastly-improved link list on the sidebar to the right of this blog. I'll continue to add to the list, but this is a pretty good start.
A few things to note:
-I give roughly equal time and space to conservative and liberal writers and education policy sites. I also include plenty of advocates for alternative or radical perspectives on education, including homeschoolers, unschoolers, and Marxists.
-The list of "Education Scholars, Writers, and Practicioners" includes quite a few names you may not have heard of. In addition to historical figures such as John Dewey, the most well-known contemporary educators (Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and Stanford's Linda Darling-Hammond, for example) are listed alongside less-well-known people such as "unschooling" advocate Grace Llewellyn, liberal education advocate Adam Kissel, and Great Books advocate Mortimer J. Adler.
-I am currently writing a book on self-education, and I've included a small list of self-education resources. You'll find some unexpected links here as well. The movie rental company Netflix and the online radio Pandora, for example, are included because their recommendation systems can introduce users to new media and art that they are likely to enjoy but may not have heard of. This, too, is education.
Please help spread the word about Wide Awake Minds by linking to it and passing it along to others who might find it interesting or useful.
A few things to note:
-I give roughly equal time and space to conservative and liberal writers and education policy sites. I also include plenty of advocates for alternative or radical perspectives on education, including homeschoolers, unschoolers, and Marxists.
-The list of "Education Scholars, Writers, and Practicioners" includes quite a few names you may not have heard of. In addition to historical figures such as John Dewey, the most well-known contemporary educators (Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and Stanford's Linda Darling-Hammond, for example) are listed alongside less-well-known people such as "unschooling" advocate Grace Llewellyn, liberal education advocate Adam Kissel, and Great Books advocate Mortimer J. Adler.
-I am currently writing a book on self-education, and I've included a small list of self-education resources. You'll find some unexpected links here as well. The movie rental company Netflix and the online radio Pandora, for example, are included because their recommendation systems can introduce users to new media and art that they are likely to enjoy but may not have heard of. This, too, is education.
Please help spread the word about Wide Awake Minds by linking to it and passing it along to others who might find it interesting or useful.
The wallpaper curriculum
How can high-school teachers maximize learning time for students with short attention spans? Here's an idea.
When students drift off and stop paying attention to a lesson, they often look around at other areas of the classroom - anywhere but where the teacher wants them to look. The lawn-mower in the window was a particular favorite of mine in high school: the hypnotic back-and-forth movement and the pleasant drone could keep me occupied during a long hour of history class.
Teachers, when they set up their classroom, should aim to make it utterly impossible for kids to look anywhere in the room without learning something. Fine, don't look at the teacher - look at the maps and timelines on the wall, or the art, or the quotations from famous figures, or the posters depicting famous photographs and historical events. Or the rows of books that cover a wall - some with their spines out, some faced-out. You don't even need to open them to be intrigued by their titles: "The Philosophy of History" by G.W.F. Hegel; "The Open Society" by Karl Popper; "The Educated Imagination" by Northrop Frye; "Tales of Love and Loss" by Knut Hamsun; "Confessions of a Mask" by Yukio Mishima.
What about vocabulary terms in size 100 type? A garden, with the plants and vegetables labeled? An aquarium? Phrase charts in foreign languages?
Managers of retail stores are taught to never show their fixtures - to cover every inch of shelves and pegs with products. Products are for sale; fixtures are not. Showing the customer an empty shelf sells no books.
The same principle applies in the classroom. Empty wall space gives you no educational return-on-investment; in fact, bare walls evoke feelings of confinement and claustrophobia. Fill empty spaces. The classroom is not a modern, minimalist design studio: it is an attic and workshop for independent scholars with crackling, eager minds. A classroom's walls should contribute to students' impression that schooling is not a world unto itself, but rather an introduction and guide to the greater world of ideas, art, and informed action.
When students drift off and stop paying attention to a lesson, they often look around at other areas of the classroom - anywhere but where the teacher wants them to look. The lawn-mower in the window was a particular favorite of mine in high school: the hypnotic back-and-forth movement and the pleasant drone could keep me occupied during a long hour of history class.
Teachers, when they set up their classroom, should aim to make it utterly impossible for kids to look anywhere in the room without learning something. Fine, don't look at the teacher - look at the maps and timelines on the wall, or the art, or the quotations from famous figures, or the posters depicting famous photographs and historical events. Or the rows of books that cover a wall - some with their spines out, some faced-out. You don't even need to open them to be intrigued by their titles: "The Philosophy of History" by G.W.F. Hegel; "The Open Society" by Karl Popper; "The Educated Imagination" by Northrop Frye; "Tales of Love and Loss" by Knut Hamsun; "Confessions of a Mask" by Yukio Mishima.
What about vocabulary terms in size 100 type? A garden, with the plants and vegetables labeled? An aquarium? Phrase charts in foreign languages?
Managers of retail stores are taught to never show their fixtures - to cover every inch of shelves and pegs with products. Products are for sale; fixtures are not. Showing the customer an empty shelf sells no books.
The same principle applies in the classroom. Empty wall space gives you no educational return-on-investment; in fact, bare walls evoke feelings of confinement and claustrophobia. Fill empty spaces. The classroom is not a modern, minimalist design studio: it is an attic and workshop for independent scholars with crackling, eager minds. A classroom's walls should contribute to students' impression that schooling is not a world unto itself, but rather an introduction and guide to the greater world of ideas, art, and informed action.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Teaching for autonomy: "success" and beyond
Effective teachers and effective schools educate their students to succeed in society and, at the same time, to understand that their personal "success" is not the end of the story.
On one hand, students’ future happiness will be closely related to their ability to succeed economically and socially. One would do students no favors by turning them wholly away from the society in which they are embedded; that is not education for liberation, but education for helplessness and resentment. There is much to be said for preparing students for societal success. The successful adult is more autonomous than the unsuccessful adult; he or she is more likely to have access to desirable societal goods (higher education, the arts, political participation, gainful employment, etc.) and less likely to find him or herself trapped in a demeaning job or family situation, hopeless social or economic straits, and so on.
On the other hand, the autonomy that is born of societal success and its prerequisites is a limited autonomy. True autonomy requires being able to look with clear and critical eyes at one’s own society, understanding its flaws as well as its benefits. Ancient and modern traditions in literature, art, and religion stand ready to correct us if we, standing at the height of privilege in our society, look at our own success and comfort and nothing else – and then decide, with Candide, that this is “the best of all possible worlds.” True autonomy also means seeing through what is superficial in our own success; it means catching ourselves by the scruffs of our own necks when we feel tempted to accept the convenient untruth that our success is wholly or primarily the result of our own effort, and that others’ failure is the just result of their not exercising an equal effort.
The task of the education system, then – and therefore the task of each teacher – is to prepare students to succeed in society while helping them develop the ability to question their own success, their relationship with those considered less-successful, and the society in which these social, political, and economic power relationships exist. The fully-educated person has both the tools and knowledge necessary to succeed in society, and the imagination, empathy, political awareness, and critical literacy necessary to understand the limited character of that success and to criticize and strive to change the very society in which he or she enjoys it.
On one hand, students’ future happiness will be closely related to their ability to succeed economically and socially. One would do students no favors by turning them wholly away from the society in which they are embedded; that is not education for liberation, but education for helplessness and resentment. There is much to be said for preparing students for societal success. The successful adult is more autonomous than the unsuccessful adult; he or she is more likely to have access to desirable societal goods (higher education, the arts, political participation, gainful employment, etc.) and less likely to find him or herself trapped in a demeaning job or family situation, hopeless social or economic straits, and so on.
On the other hand, the autonomy that is born of societal success and its prerequisites is a limited autonomy. True autonomy requires being able to look with clear and critical eyes at one’s own society, understanding its flaws as well as its benefits. Ancient and modern traditions in literature, art, and religion stand ready to correct us if we, standing at the height of privilege in our society, look at our own success and comfort and nothing else – and then decide, with Candide, that this is “the best of all possible worlds.” True autonomy also means seeing through what is superficial in our own success; it means catching ourselves by the scruffs of our own necks when we feel tempted to accept the convenient untruth that our success is wholly or primarily the result of our own effort, and that others’ failure is the just result of their not exercising an equal effort.
The task of the education system, then – and therefore the task of each teacher – is to prepare students to succeed in society while helping them develop the ability to question their own success, their relationship with those considered less-successful, and the society in which these social, political, and economic power relationships exist. The fully-educated person has both the tools and knowledge necessary to succeed in society, and the imagination, empathy, political awareness, and critical literacy necessary to understand the limited character of that success and to criticize and strive to change the very society in which he or she enjoys it.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
President Obama's education plan
President Obama has used the economic stimulus bill and the budget to divert historic amounts of money to funding for education, and today he spoke about his plans for reform. The story is here, commentary from Nicholas D. Kristof of the New York Times here. Obama's full remarks can be read here.
Key elements of the plan [with some of my initial thoughts in brackets]:
--Pay successful teachers more, usher unsuccessful teachers out the door. [no word on how this will be measured, though. In general, test scores are used as the benchmark - a measure that almost certainly would do more harm than good.]
--More funding for early childhood education.
--Cutting funding for wasteful education programs, i.e. any federally-funded education programs that have not been able to demonstrate that they are working.
--Expanded access to daytime child care for working parents.
--More funding for successful charter schools. Removal of state-level caps on the number of charter schools allowed as a trade-off for more accountability.
--"Better standards and assessments," i.e. national standards. [yet another set of high-stakes tests? Or would the implementation of national tests entail doing away with the state-level tests?]
--A fund to invest in innovation at the district level.
--Improved data-sharing to track students' educational progress from childhood through college. [this raises serious privacy concerns]
--Using the stimulus to avoid teacher layoffs. Improve teacher recruiting and retention.
--Alternative certification programs. ("Alternative routes to teaching").
--More time in school through a longer school day and a longer school year. [will teachers be paid more as a result? How would this affect kids' ability to participate in extracurriculars, athletics, and summer programs? How will the extra time be used effectively?]
--Extra pay for math and science teachers to make up for shortages.
--New efforts to discourage dropping out.
--Simplify federal financial aid assistance forms to encourage the pursuit of higher education or vocational training. Increased Pell Grants and Perkins Loans.
--Increased adult education and job training options, especially delivered through community colleges.
Monday, March 9, 2009
Arendt's argument against progressive education
Political philosopher Hannah Arendt was one of the most brilliant and expansive thinkers of the 20th century, and she weighed in on the American educational debate in her Between Past and Future. Randall Curren's collection Philosophy of Education: An Anthology
contains selections from that work.
Arendt advances a powerful argument against the ideology of progressive education, the results of which she calls "ruinous." However, she neglects to judge the reforms ushered in by the rise of progressive education against the practices they replaced, many of which were harsh, authoritarian, and uncaring as well as characterized by an emphasis on facts without context, an uncritical continuation of antiquated practices, etc.
Arendt's arguments run as follows:
-The American obsession with the new has led to an obsession with education, which in turn has led to the enshrinement of "pedagogy" or "education" as a subject unique unto itself, and to a conception of teaching as not necessarily connected with any particular subject matter.
-America's educational crisis is "especially acute" because of its zest for equality and the erasure of difference; in the context of education, this takes the form of reducing the teacher's authority (to erase the student/teacher difference) and doing less to cultivate gifted students.
-There are three core, mistaken assumptions at the heart of progressive education:
1. "There exist a child's world and a society formed among children that are autonomous and must insofar as possible be left to them to govern. Adults are only there to help with this government. ...(The adult) can only tell (the child) to do what he likes and then prevent the worst from happening." The result of this is a cutting-off of the child from the world of adults; children are liberated from the authoritative adult and "handed over to the tyranny of their own group," and the child's reaction "tends to be either conformism or juvenile delinquency."
2. As noted above, "pedagogy has developed into a science of teaching in general in such a way as to be wholly emancipated from the actual material to be taught." This has resulted "in a most serious neglect of the training of teachers in their own subjects...." Expert-teachers can derive their authority from their expertise in a subject; teachers without subject-matter expertise must be authoritarian, that is, their authority has nothing to point to besides the fact that it exists (i.e., "might makes right").
3. "You can know and understand only what you have done yourself," and so in education doing is substituted for learning. One result of this is the rise of vocational instruction, which reflects schools' inability to "make the children acquire the normal prerequisites of a standard curriculum." A related, equally mistaken idea is that the difference between play and work should be rejected, and that preference should be given to play rather than work. "This procedure consciously attempts to keep the older child as far as possible at the infant level. The very thing that should prepare the child for the world of adults, the gradually acquired habit of work and of not-playing, is done away with in favor of the autonomy of the world of childhood."
-Together, these ideas constitute an abdication of the responsibility of adults for the "continuance of the world." "The world, too, needs protection to keep it from being overrun and destroyed by the onslaught of the new that bursts upon it with each new generation. ...In education this responsibility for the world takes the form of authority. ...The teacher's qualification consists in knowing the world and being able to instruct others about it, but his authority rests on his assumption of responsibility for that world. Vis-a-vis the child it is as though he were a representative of all adult inhabitants, pointing out the details and saying to the child: This is our world."
contains selections from that work.Arendt advances a powerful argument against the ideology of progressive education, the results of which she calls "ruinous." However, she neglects to judge the reforms ushered in by the rise of progressive education against the practices they replaced, many of which were harsh, authoritarian, and uncaring as well as characterized by an emphasis on facts without context, an uncritical continuation of antiquated practices, etc.
Arendt's arguments run as follows:
-The American obsession with the new has led to an obsession with education, which in turn has led to the enshrinement of "pedagogy" or "education" as a subject unique unto itself, and to a conception of teaching as not necessarily connected with any particular subject matter.
-America's educational crisis is "especially acute" because of its zest for equality and the erasure of difference; in the context of education, this takes the form of reducing the teacher's authority (to erase the student/teacher difference) and doing less to cultivate gifted students.
-There are three core, mistaken assumptions at the heart of progressive education:
1. "There exist a child's world and a society formed among children that are autonomous and must insofar as possible be left to them to govern. Adults are only there to help with this government. ...(The adult) can only tell (the child) to do what he likes and then prevent the worst from happening." The result of this is a cutting-off of the child from the world of adults; children are liberated from the authoritative adult and "handed over to the tyranny of their own group," and the child's reaction "tends to be either conformism or juvenile delinquency."
2. As noted above, "pedagogy has developed into a science of teaching in general in such a way as to be wholly emancipated from the actual material to be taught." This has resulted "in a most serious neglect of the training of teachers in their own subjects...." Expert-teachers can derive their authority from their expertise in a subject; teachers without subject-matter expertise must be authoritarian, that is, their authority has nothing to point to besides the fact that it exists (i.e., "might makes right").
3. "You can know and understand only what you have done yourself," and so in education doing is substituted for learning. One result of this is the rise of vocational instruction, which reflects schools' inability to "make the children acquire the normal prerequisites of a standard curriculum." A related, equally mistaken idea is that the difference between play and work should be rejected, and that preference should be given to play rather than work. "This procedure consciously attempts to keep the older child as far as possible at the infant level. The very thing that should prepare the child for the world of adults, the gradually acquired habit of work and of not-playing, is done away with in favor of the autonomy of the world of childhood."
-Together, these ideas constitute an abdication of the responsibility of adults for the "continuance of the world." "The world, too, needs protection to keep it from being overrun and destroyed by the onslaught of the new that bursts upon it with each new generation. ...In education this responsibility for the world takes the form of authority. ...The teacher's qualification consists in knowing the world and being able to instruct others about it, but his authority rests on his assumption of responsibility for that world. Vis-a-vis the child it is as though he were a representative of all adult inhabitants, pointing out the details and saying to the child: This is our world."
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Michelle Rhee and teacher tenure
A story about Michelle Rhee, the reform-minded superintendent of Washington, D.C.'s public school system, made its way onto today's New York Times most-emailed list. It's a fascinating story about Rhee's attempt to do away with the tenure system in her district. Check it out here.
There are strong arguments for and against the tenure system, but I lean strongly toward scrapping the tenure system and replacing it with alternative (but very strong) protections for teachers against arbitrary or political firings.
There are strong arguments for and against the tenure system, but I lean strongly toward scrapping the tenure system and replacing it with alternative (but very strong) protections for teachers against arbitrary or political firings.
Sunday, November 9, 2008
Educator Profile: Eva S. Moskowitz
Earlier this week, the New York Times profiled Eva S. Moskowitz, the head of the fast-growing Success Charter Network in Harlem.
Check out the profile here.
Check out the profile here.
“It is the accumulation of the hundreds of minute decisions that is the difference between mediocrity and true excellence,” read a recent 14-paragraph Moskowitz message to a senior Education Department employee that began about scheduling difficulties but became broadly philosophical. “We at Harlem Success literally go for perfection.”(Hat tip: EduWonk)
This is the woman who, during four years of running the City Council Education Committee, agitated the bureaucracy and the teachers’ union alike with exhaustive hearings on the dearth of science classes, the restrictions of the union contract and, famously, the matter of why so many school bathrooms seemed perpetually to lack toilet paper. Now, with the zeal of a bureaucracy-busting superhero, Ms. Moskowitz has channeled her interests in matters mind-bending and minute into the Success Charter Network, which started in 2006 with Harlem Success Academy 1, added three more schools this summer and plans to expand to 40 over a decade.
...
These are also schools clearly run by a mother. Mindful of the time it takes to tie tiny shoelaces, Ms. Moskowitz mandates Velcro footwear. The fact that her son Culver barely spoke at age 3 but played chess by 4 is behind the school’s policy of teaching chess to every child.
She describes the Harlem Success educational philosophy as a mix of the liberal Bank Street College of Education approach and the traditional Catholic school model. In an age when kindergarten is increasingly academic, and many urban charter schools have taken a militaristic approach to learning, the Harlem Success kindergartens have dress-up corners, water-activity tables and Legos but also use the highly scripted Success for All reading curriculum and embrace standardized tests. Even kindergartners take TerraNova exams in literacy and math, in January and May.
Consenting to a challenging curriculum
The biggest problem with school voucher programs and other policy arrangements that call for a greater role for private schools at the K-12 level is that private schools can control who they admit. Entry restrictions through academic testing or high tuition bills allow many private schools to ensure their own success by restricting access to those students most likely to succeed. Such restrictions arguably subvert one of the main roles of education in a democracy - that is, K-12 education is supposed to provide excellent opportunities for all students regardless of the relative wealth and status of their homes and communities.
Of course, no one would argue that American public education, as it is currently organized, even approaches that ideal; but voucher programs that give public funds to schools that can restrict access to incoming students deemed unlikely to succeed cannot be a serious vehicle for reducing inequality of opportunity.
There may, however, be a way to introduce more choice and competition into the K-12 system (a conservative goal) while promoting equal educational opportunity for disadvantaged students (a liberal goal). Voucher and charter policies, where they are introduced, should require schools to accept applicants on the basis of lotteries rather than on the basis of interviews and test scores as a condition for receiving public funds. Differentiation between schools needs to be based on factors other than who gets in; curricula can be different, allocation of resources can be different, teacher pay can be different, and the aims of education (i.e., vocational preparation versus college preparation) can be different. But publicly-financed schools should not differentiate themselves by restricting access.
Over at the Noble Street College Prep network of charter schools in Chicago, students are admitted regardless of their previously demonstrated academic capabilities - just as they are in most public schools. However, students and their parents must consciously choose to attend a Noble Street school, accepting a longer school day, a longer school year, and college-level homework loads as a consequence. Incoming students and their parents must agree to make college admission the overriding goal of their high school years.
The consequence? Over 85% of Noble Street College Prep graduates attend college.
It is remarkable what students can achieve when they are asked to consent to getting a great education as a condition of high school admission. Students' consent to hard work - rather than their scores on a high-stakes test - becomes the method by which students are put on a college-prep track.
Is this the answer to the age-old debate about "tracking" students? Can it be replicated on a larger scale? I wonder whether providing middle-school students and their parents with extensive information about career paths, wage differences between jobs that require a college education and those that do not, and similar data and then asking them to place themselves in a vocational track or college-prep track might improve students' high school experiences and the likelihood that they will reach their educational goals.
Of course, no one would argue that American public education, as it is currently organized, even approaches that ideal; but voucher programs that give public funds to schools that can restrict access to incoming students deemed unlikely to succeed cannot be a serious vehicle for reducing inequality of opportunity.
There may, however, be a way to introduce more choice and competition into the K-12 system (a conservative goal) while promoting equal educational opportunity for disadvantaged students (a liberal goal). Voucher and charter policies, where they are introduced, should require schools to accept applicants on the basis of lotteries rather than on the basis of interviews and test scores as a condition for receiving public funds. Differentiation between schools needs to be based on factors other than who gets in; curricula can be different, allocation of resources can be different, teacher pay can be different, and the aims of education (i.e., vocational preparation versus college preparation) can be different. But publicly-financed schools should not differentiate themselves by restricting access.
Over at the Noble Street College Prep network of charter schools in Chicago, students are admitted regardless of their previously demonstrated academic capabilities - just as they are in most public schools. However, students and their parents must consciously choose to attend a Noble Street school, accepting a longer school day, a longer school year, and college-level homework loads as a consequence. Incoming students and their parents must agree to make college admission the overriding goal of their high school years.
The consequence? Over 85% of Noble Street College Prep graduates attend college.
It is remarkable what students can achieve when they are asked to consent to getting a great education as a condition of high school admission. Students' consent to hard work - rather than their scores on a high-stakes test - becomes the method by which students are put on a college-prep track.
Is this the answer to the age-old debate about "tracking" students? Can it be replicated on a larger scale? I wonder whether providing middle-school students and their parents with extensive information about career paths, wage differences between jobs that require a college education and those that do not, and similar data and then asking them to place themselves in a vocational track or college-prep track might improve students' high school experiences and the likelihood that they will reach their educational goals.
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Self-education through blogging
Blogging about a topic that interests you can be a useful method of self-education.
-The pressure to post at least a little bit every day or so is useful if you are trying to learn more about the topic of your blog; it's a fun way of imposing some discipline on your studies.
-If one of the purposes of your blog is to share links to articles and websites about your topic, the act of finding articles and websites to link to can serve as a useful reminder to read widely about your topic and keep up with the latest news and opinion about it.
-Becoming a blogger means getting into the habit of writing regularly and articulating your ideas in a compelling way; developing your verbal and writing skills is essential to your self-education regardless of what you study.
-The act of writing (and re-reading what you write) about a topic helps you better retain and recall what you have learned.
-The pressure to post at least a little bit every day or so is useful if you are trying to learn more about the topic of your blog; it's a fun way of imposing some discipline on your studies.
-If one of the purposes of your blog is to share links to articles and websites about your topic, the act of finding articles and websites to link to can serve as a useful reminder to read widely about your topic and keep up with the latest news and opinion about it.
-Becoming a blogger means getting into the habit of writing regularly and articulating your ideas in a compelling way; developing your verbal and writing skills is essential to your self-education regardless of what you study.
-The act of writing (and re-reading what you write) about a topic helps you better retain and recall what you have learned.
The qualities of great teachers
In the introduction to Sonia Nieto's Why We Teach, the author lists the qualities that she believes that highly successful teachers display:
"In general, such teachers:
-Connect learning to students' lives
-Have high expectations for all students, even for those whom others may have given up on
-Stay committed to students in spite of obstacles that get in the way
-Place a high value on students' identities...as a foundation for learning
-View parents and other community members as partners in education
-Create a safe haven for learning
-Dare to challenge the bureaucracy of the school and the district
-Are resilient in the face of difficult situations
-Use active learning strategies
-Are willing and eager to experiment and can 'think on their feet'
-View themselves as lifelong learners
-Care about, respect, and love their students."
Read more about Why We Teach at bn.com and at the Why We Teach website.
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Studs Terkel and education via conversations
Studs Terkel, a University of Chicago alum (my alma mater) and one of the best interviewers of the 20th century, passed away today at the age of 96.
His work is an excellent example of one of the major principles of self-education and lifelong learning: you can learn something from everyone if you have the courage and discipline to ask the right questions and listen carefully to the answers.
His New York Times obituary can be read here.
His work is an excellent example of one of the major principles of self-education and lifelong learning: you can learn something from everyone if you have the courage and discipline to ask the right questions and listen carefully to the answers.
His New York Times obituary can be read here.
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