Just a few weeks ago the Oregon Department of Education announced that it has not, for some years now, had the 'time' to nominate schools for national recognition (Blue Ribbon Schools). Given that the Department has had time to sponsor banquets for schools that, according to the state assessment folks, have 'improved' their performance on State Assessments, the issue is clearly not time so much as priorities.
Along the same lines, for the past two years the Oregon Department of Education has failed to publicly recognize Oregon's Advanced Placement State Scholars...students who have set the bar for Advanced Placement achievement in Oregon. Each year one boy and one girl from Oregon are selected based on their total number of AP exams passed during high school. The College Board does all the work, even going so far as to provide sample letters of congratulations and press releases. ODE has shown no interest.
In 2008 Corbett was ranked #8 in the nation by Newsweek Magazine, and the Oregon Department of Education chose never to publicly acknowledge the achievement. Nor did it ever mention that Corbett was the only Oregon school to be awarded Gold Medal status (and a top 100 ranking) by U.S. News and World Report. Because of my association with Corbett, I am likely more bothered than most by these omissions. But the trend of elevating 'improvement' to the highest (only?) educational value and of repeatedly devaluing or ignoring excellence should be troubling to anyone who cares about schools.
Does their attitude matter?
Six years ago, Oregon boasted three high schools among the top 500 in the nation based on participation rates in the Advanced Placement program. Last year there was only one. Is it possible that Oregon's top schools are beginning to reflect the disregard with which the State of Oregon views its high achievers?
I am deeply concerned that Oregon seems to have given up on a vision of extraordinary education, seeking instead a comfortable 'middle' in which the narrowing of 'the achievement gap' trumps all other concerns. Equity matters, which is why we organize life in Corbett as we do. But while equity is an ethical imperative, it is not an adequate vision for Oregon's future. There simply has to be more.
Do we Oregonians have a vision for our best and brightest? For exceptional students? For exemplary schools? Is there life beyond benchmarks? Learning beyond State Standards?
Oregon has been doing educational triage to the exclusion of everything else for much too long. We need to get our heads out of the 'emergency room' paradigm and start building something really interesting with our schools. This effort requires that the State leadership and the professional organizations grow into the trust that has been place in them and do something bold for a change.
Next week's annual conference of the Oregon School Boards Association is called "Ripples of Hope". Wake me when it's over. Ripples? That's what we're shooting for? How did we regress from the President's 'Audacity' to 'Ripples'? This is just too sad. Ripples?
We need to do better. We need to lay claim to a future in which Oregon places more graduates in better schools than anyone else in the country. We need to demand more from our students than others are willing to dare, and we need for more teachers to be willing to take on the impossible and make it work. 'Audacity' on a book cover is one thing. (It is certainly better than 'Ripples', but still...) We need Audacity in action.
I believe that Oregon has the talent to be extraordinary. That talent needs to be fed, and 'ripples' won't nourish it. The goal of bringing everyone up to average won't do it. Talent wants a vision. It wants boldness. Will Oregon provide either?
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Saturday, October 31, 2009
The Damage Done
Education is a peculiar enterprise. It's expensive, it's messy, it's unpredictable, it's nearly invisible, it's mostly unmeasurable, it's mandatory (except that it isn't really), it's mysterious, it's agonizing, it's pure joy. It's a dance, a march, a ramble, a race, a rumble, a stumble, a meandering path. It's a hunch, a dazzling flash, a false start, a recurrence, three steps forward, two steps back. It's zero to 60 in hyper-drive, it's sitting still enough to hear the faintest rustle of Fall. Hear that? Can it be measured without being interrupted?
But education is also an private industry and (in some cases) a government institution. Neither industries nor governments are very comfortable with the truth about education. They want education to be a straight path, a direct line, a graduated cylinder. (In fact, in their minds, all graduates must be cylindrical. "We'll have no 'square pegs' in this graduating class, Buster!") Governments need these incremental measures for the sake of making quarterly quotas. Industry needs them for 'quality control' for predictability, and for convincing customers of their value. How are parents to know that they are spending their tuition dollars wisely if not for daily concrete measures of unambiguous progress?
It's no mystery, then, that parents have been taught by both private and government schools to expect a quarterly evaluative Matrix that records everything from shoe size to phonemic aptitude to charm, complete with percentile rankings and prognostication regarding future achievement (by month)! Parents are taught to take great comfort in percentages (which specify that Johnny has learned 84% without every solving the puzzle of '84% of what?' or "What is the value of that particular 100%?")
BUT what if a school refuses to pretend that education occurs along a non-problematic trajectory that can be divided by 13 (years), divided again by three or four (terms or trimesters) and parsed out in intelligible increments? Well, you get something like Corbett Schools. Several years ago, Corbett Schools deferred the assignment of letter grades until students reach high school. (At this point it might be objected that many elementary schools don't issue ABC grades. Ya, OK. They issue ESN or ESU grades instead. It's the same old thing, as I knew when I received my ESN elementary report cards decades ago.)
In Corbett, we report progress. Not as a precise percentage of some false standard of perfection (100%!), but as movement in the general enterprise of becoming a reader, a writer, a mathematician, a speaker, a scientist, an artist, a musician...and if you stop to consider particularly outstanding people in any of those enterprises, the first thing that might stand out is how very different the great ones are from one another. They didn't all follow the same path and they don't all have identical qualities. They were not produced, they were nurtured. That's what we hope for. We want to nurture young people, to protect them and provoke them to do something interesting and deeply human with their lives.
Grades will come soon enough. The high school is full of them. They are necessary in order for colleges and universities and scholarship committees to make sense of how we spend our time. And Corbett's graduates leave here with a transcript that can be a ticket to virtually any school in the country, limited only by the abilities and efforts of each individual student. The evidence of Corbett's success is out there, at Harvard, at USC, at OSU and U of O. At Smith, Willamette, Vassar, Reed, UPS, PU, UP, Lewis and Clark, MHCC, Sarah Lawrence...the evidence of our success is in the successes of our students. It's not in their elementary or secondary report cards. It's in their lives.
Still, how does one know that a second grader is on track for Harvard? It can't be known. Period. But one can know with certainty that someone else got there by walking this path. Kids who grew up in these same halls are making home visits from some of the best colleges and universities in the country on both coasts. Maybe that's enough. It's the best possible evidence...real people, not test scores, report cards or other abstractions.
It's possible that in spite of the availability of first-hand evidence, of real young people, some will continue to desire the illusion of certainty that only a grade Matrix can provide. We will continue to argue that to do so constitutes a desperate case of misplaced concreteness. Worse than that, it creates an atmosphere of anxiety that could well impact children. Childhood is an anxious time as it is, having to learn to share, wait in line, take turns, do as an adult asks...the last thing that children need is to worry about whether they are growing or maturing at an 'acceptable' rate. It's how so many of us have been taught by long experience to think about education and about schools. I believe it to be a kind of cultural damage that has been done. It is 'spilled milk', and I guess that means there's no crying over it.
As it has been in the past, my only advice is that parents choose the school that suits them best and trust that they made a good choice. And if they didn't, it's always OK to change. We are all only human. Always only human, and trying together to do it well and to pass along what we learn to our children. And that's why percentages don't apply. (Or if they do, they should never be hired.)
Looks like good weather for visitors. May all your butterfingers be fresh and may none of your whoppers be hollow.
But education is also an private industry and (in some cases) a government institution. Neither industries nor governments are very comfortable with the truth about education. They want education to be a straight path, a direct line, a graduated cylinder. (In fact, in their minds, all graduates must be cylindrical. "We'll have no 'square pegs' in this graduating class, Buster!") Governments need these incremental measures for the sake of making quarterly quotas. Industry needs them for 'quality control' for predictability, and for convincing customers of their value. How are parents to know that they are spending their tuition dollars wisely if not for daily concrete measures of unambiguous progress?
It's no mystery, then, that parents have been taught by both private and government schools to expect a quarterly evaluative Matrix that records everything from shoe size to phonemic aptitude to charm, complete with percentile rankings and prognostication regarding future achievement (by month)! Parents are taught to take great comfort in percentages (which specify that Johnny has learned 84% without every solving the puzzle of '84% of what?' or "What is the value of that particular 100%?")
BUT what if a school refuses to pretend that education occurs along a non-problematic trajectory that can be divided by 13 (years), divided again by three or four (terms or trimesters) and parsed out in intelligible increments? Well, you get something like Corbett Schools. Several years ago, Corbett Schools deferred the assignment of letter grades until students reach high school. (At this point it might be objected that many elementary schools don't issue ABC grades. Ya, OK. They issue ESN or ESU grades instead. It's the same old thing, as I knew when I received my ESN elementary report cards decades ago.)
In Corbett, we report progress. Not as a precise percentage of some false standard of perfection (100%!), but as movement in the general enterprise of becoming a reader, a writer, a mathematician, a speaker, a scientist, an artist, a musician...and if you stop to consider particularly outstanding people in any of those enterprises, the first thing that might stand out is how very different the great ones are from one another. They didn't all follow the same path and they don't all have identical qualities. They were not produced, they were nurtured. That's what we hope for. We want to nurture young people, to protect them and provoke them to do something interesting and deeply human with their lives.
Grades will come soon enough. The high school is full of them. They are necessary in order for colleges and universities and scholarship committees to make sense of how we spend our time. And Corbett's graduates leave here with a transcript that can be a ticket to virtually any school in the country, limited only by the abilities and efforts of each individual student. The evidence of Corbett's success is out there, at Harvard, at USC, at OSU and U of O. At Smith, Willamette, Vassar, Reed, UPS, PU, UP, Lewis and Clark, MHCC, Sarah Lawrence...the evidence of our success is in the successes of our students. It's not in their elementary or secondary report cards. It's in their lives.
Still, how does one know that a second grader is on track for Harvard? It can't be known. Period. But one can know with certainty that someone else got there by walking this path. Kids who grew up in these same halls are making home visits from some of the best colleges and universities in the country on both coasts. Maybe that's enough. It's the best possible evidence...real people, not test scores, report cards or other abstractions.
It's possible that in spite of the availability of first-hand evidence, of real young people, some will continue to desire the illusion of certainty that only a grade Matrix can provide. We will continue to argue that to do so constitutes a desperate case of misplaced concreteness. Worse than that, it creates an atmosphere of anxiety that could well impact children. Childhood is an anxious time as it is, having to learn to share, wait in line, take turns, do as an adult asks...the last thing that children need is to worry about whether they are growing or maturing at an 'acceptable' rate. It's how so many of us have been taught by long experience to think about education and about schools. I believe it to be a kind of cultural damage that has been done. It is 'spilled milk', and I guess that means there's no crying over it.
As it has been in the past, my only advice is that parents choose the school that suits them best and trust that they made a good choice. And if they didn't, it's always OK to change. We are all only human. Always only human, and trying together to do it well and to pass along what we learn to our children. And that's why percentages don't apply. (Or if they do, they should never be hired.)
Looks like good weather for visitors. May all your butterfingers be fresh and may none of your whoppers be hollow.
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Credit by Proficiency: A ruse whose time has come?
If you want to lower standards in education, all you have to do is sprinkle your proposal with words like 'rigorous' and 'standards-based'. Your slide to the lowest common denominator will be heralded as the path to closing the achievement gap. After all, the lower the standard, the narrower the achievement gap. It's simple math.
Susan Castillo has just announced that 'credit by proficiency' is the key to improving Oregon schools in the future. The first question that comes to mind is why she would believe that she knows this, given that Oregon implemented and discarded the 'credit by proficiency' nonsense during the waning years in the 1980's. (Not her fault, really, since she may not have been involved in education in the 1980's) Every high school class had a list of proficiencies as long as your arm, and every teacher was expected to check off each 'proficiency', one at a time, for every student. It fell flat. It was a phenomenal waste of time. It did nothing for student achievement. For many courses of study, it simply made no sense. But like every failed idea in education, it has waited in the wings in hopes that memories would fade, allowing it to be relabeled as an innovation.
Credit by Proficiency is just the latest rendition of the old war between 'academics' and vocational training. The 'proficiency' theory is that students should receive high school credit based on what they can do and should not receive credit just for sitting in a classroom for the designated amount of time.
The argument appears at first to be just a matter of common sense, but on closer inspection it is founded on a classic straw man. Whether they call it 'seat time', call it 'sit and get', or any number of names that are intended to discredit (in this case literally) the exchange of ideas between teachers and students, the claim is that students are currently receiving high school credit based solely on how long they sit in a chair. It's a simple claim, and it has a certain appeal to everyone who was every bored in school. But it takes very little reflection to realize that only in cases of outright fraud did 'seat time' automatically generate credit toward graduation. If it had, we wouldn't have such vivid memories of tests we didn't prepare for, papers we didn't finish on time, and failing grades. Yes, failing grades. Why? Because contrary to the myth perpetrated by the Credit by Proficiency folks, grades are not and have never been based on seat time, but on performance on several measures including classroom discussions, quizzes, tests, papers, daily math lessons, ect.
LET'S BE CLEAR. THE 'CREDIT BY PROFICIENCY' ADVOCATES' FREQUENT CLAIM THAT STUDENTS CURRENTLY EARN CREDIT BY ACCRUING 'SEAT TIME' (SIMPLY SITTING In A CLASSROOM FOR THE APPROPRIATE LENGTH OF TIME) IS A LIE. TAKE AWAY THAT LIE AND THEY HAVE LITTLE OR NOTHING TO OFFER.
But is it a lie, really? And if it is, is it polite to say so? Consider this. If credit is currently given just for showing up, why are so many students credit deficient? Why is the graduation rate so abysmal? One of the top reasons that students give for leaving school is that they are hopelessly behind in earning credits toward graduation. How did they get so far behind? By missing seat time? Not so. It is against the law in Oregon to withhold credit or to lower a grade based solely on lack of attendance...clearly a devaluation of seat time and a requirement that grades be based on performance and not on showing up. Kids who fail to earn credit fail to achieve.
Finally, if seat time is all that matters, how is it that some students are earning A's and B's while others are earning C's, D's and yes, even F's? Clearly there is much more than seat time going on here. And one has to believe that the proponents of 'Credit by Proficiency' know all of this.
In Corbett, which can make a claim to being a high performing program, about one in every seven grades is an 'Incomplete'. This is in a school in which 90% of sophomores pass the 1oth grade reading assessment. Clearly we don't believe that proficiency is enough. There is more to being an educated person than meeting some state-sanctioned minimal proficiency, and that 'something more' should be our priority.
So what is the goal of the 'credit by proficiency' clan? It's to create the illusion of education without having to work at the real thing. It is education by checklist, with the goal for every child being identical...put a check in every box. It's the 'field strip and M16 in 30 seconds while blindfolded' theory of learning. Ultimately, it is about education on the cheap. It's about devaluing the role of the teacher. It's about devaluing any learning that can't be reduced to a checklist.
Proficiency as a goal has it's place. In vocational training. But not in education.
Why not? Because like every permutation of the Standards Movement (credit by proficiency is just the blue collar version of the broader Standards debacle), its implementation inevitably limits student achievement. It has a leveling effect whereby the minimum standard tends to be adjusted downward (like the Oregon 10th grade assessments in Reading and Math) so that a respectable number of students will pass (it's funny how these 'standards' always wind up being normed to a curve) and it discounts excellence. Everyone gets pushed to the middle...standardized, as it were. Once a student has met a standard (and it is imperative to remember that this standard will always have to be low enough that the vast majority of students can meet it without too much effort!) then there is no need for the most able students to extend their learning. In fact, in a true proficiency model, there won't be any course material beyond the 'proficient' level...it will be time to move on and demonstrate another 'proficiency'.
A final word for you professionals: the proficiency movement, to the degree that it is internally consistent, will wind up decapitating Bloom's taxonomy and leaving little (if any) room for anything beyond application. This is the level at which the vast majority of 'proficiencies' will be targeted, since synthesis and evaluation don't lend themselves to a checklist approach. Whatever is easiest to measure is what we will always tend to measure most.
Susan Castillo has just announced that 'credit by proficiency' is the key to improving Oregon schools in the future. The first question that comes to mind is why she would believe that she knows this, given that Oregon implemented and discarded the 'credit by proficiency' nonsense during the waning years in the 1980's. (Not her fault, really, since she may not have been involved in education in the 1980's) Every high school class had a list of proficiencies as long as your arm, and every teacher was expected to check off each 'proficiency', one at a time, for every student. It fell flat. It was a phenomenal waste of time. It did nothing for student achievement. For many courses of study, it simply made no sense. But like every failed idea in education, it has waited in the wings in hopes that memories would fade, allowing it to be relabeled as an innovation.
Credit by Proficiency is just the latest rendition of the old war between 'academics' and vocational training. The 'proficiency' theory is that students should receive high school credit based on what they can do and should not receive credit just for sitting in a classroom for the designated amount of time.
The argument appears at first to be just a matter of common sense, but on closer inspection it is founded on a classic straw man. Whether they call it 'seat time', call it 'sit and get', or any number of names that are intended to discredit (in this case literally) the exchange of ideas between teachers and students, the claim is that students are currently receiving high school credit based solely on how long they sit in a chair. It's a simple claim, and it has a certain appeal to everyone who was every bored in school. But it takes very little reflection to realize that only in cases of outright fraud did 'seat time' automatically generate credit toward graduation. If it had, we wouldn't have such vivid memories of tests we didn't prepare for, papers we didn't finish on time, and failing grades. Yes, failing grades. Why? Because contrary to the myth perpetrated by the Credit by Proficiency folks, grades are not and have never been based on seat time, but on performance on several measures including classroom discussions, quizzes, tests, papers, daily math lessons, ect.
LET'S BE CLEAR. THE 'CREDIT BY PROFICIENCY' ADVOCATES' FREQUENT CLAIM THAT STUDENTS CURRENTLY EARN CREDIT BY ACCRUING 'SEAT TIME' (SIMPLY SITTING In A CLASSROOM FOR THE APPROPRIATE LENGTH OF TIME) IS A LIE. TAKE AWAY THAT LIE AND THEY HAVE LITTLE OR NOTHING TO OFFER.
But is it a lie, really? And if it is, is it polite to say so? Consider this. If credit is currently given just for showing up, why are so many students credit deficient? Why is the graduation rate so abysmal? One of the top reasons that students give for leaving school is that they are hopelessly behind in earning credits toward graduation. How did they get so far behind? By missing seat time? Not so. It is against the law in Oregon to withhold credit or to lower a grade based solely on lack of attendance...clearly a devaluation of seat time and a requirement that grades be based on performance and not on showing up. Kids who fail to earn credit fail to achieve.
Finally, if seat time is all that matters, how is it that some students are earning A's and B's while others are earning C's, D's and yes, even F's? Clearly there is much more than seat time going on here. And one has to believe that the proponents of 'Credit by Proficiency' know all of this.
In Corbett, which can make a claim to being a high performing program, about one in every seven grades is an 'Incomplete'. This is in a school in which 90% of sophomores pass the 1oth grade reading assessment. Clearly we don't believe that proficiency is enough. There is more to being an educated person than meeting some state-sanctioned minimal proficiency, and that 'something more' should be our priority.
So what is the goal of the 'credit by proficiency' clan? It's to create the illusion of education without having to work at the real thing. It is education by checklist, with the goal for every child being identical...put a check in every box. It's the 'field strip and M16 in 30 seconds while blindfolded' theory of learning. Ultimately, it is about education on the cheap. It's about devaluing the role of the teacher. It's about devaluing any learning that can't be reduced to a checklist.
Proficiency as a goal has it's place. In vocational training. But not in education.
Why not? Because like every permutation of the Standards Movement (credit by proficiency is just the blue collar version of the broader Standards debacle), its implementation inevitably limits student achievement. It has a leveling effect whereby the minimum standard tends to be adjusted downward (like the Oregon 10th grade assessments in Reading and Math) so that a respectable number of students will pass (it's funny how these 'standards' always wind up being normed to a curve) and it discounts excellence. Everyone gets pushed to the middle...standardized, as it were. Once a student has met a standard (and it is imperative to remember that this standard will always have to be low enough that the vast majority of students can meet it without too much effort!) then there is no need for the most able students to extend their learning. In fact, in a true proficiency model, there won't be any course material beyond the 'proficient' level...it will be time to move on and demonstrate another 'proficiency'.
A final word for you professionals: the proficiency movement, to the degree that it is internally consistent, will wind up decapitating Bloom's taxonomy and leaving little (if any) room for anything beyond application. This is the level at which the vast majority of 'proficiencies' will be targeted, since synthesis and evaluation don't lend themselves to a checklist approach. Whatever is easiest to measure is what we will always tend to measure most.
Oregon's Race to the Middle
The State of Oregon is preparing an application for federal 'Race to the Top' funds. This is a competitive grant, and if Oregon's feeble proposal warrants financial support then the nation is in worse shape than even I believe.
What are Oregon's strategies? (See if any of this sounds familiar)
1. Merit pay for principals and teachers if their school improves. (But not for principals and teachers whose schools already perform?) This old shoe will never be implemented, though national examples of half-implementation followed by gradual abandonment abound, offering the consolation that others have been gullible before us.
2. Reshuffle teachers and administrators if schools don't perform. What does this mean, exactly? Move those supposedly low-performing teachers and principals to better schools and move teachers from better schools into the low-performing school? That's it? But doesn't that mean that the district-wide teaching staff is precisely what it was before, but is now assigned to different schools? Doesn't that just redistribute the same level of effectiveness? (And didn't Portland do this in the early days of NCLB?) How is that improvement? And for the 100-or-so Oregon districts that have only one building per grade level, it means less than nothing. It means that they are superfluous.
3. Frequently inform students how their performance compares to grade-level benchmarks. Yes, it's called 'scientifically-based nagging'. This is a clear winner, because no-one can resist the motivational power of a good nag. I suppose that this could eventually lead to merit pay for the very best nag. Maybe even a nag-of-the-year award down the road!
Conspicuously missing from the list? Anything to do with Oregon's bare tolerance of charter schools. U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan thinks enough of charter schools that he stopped by to address the national charter convention to unveil the Race to the Top program in person. Where does Oregon stand on this strategy? Out in the cold. Why? Because in the Oregon political 'verse, unions determine elections and children are too young to join unions. So charter schools, which are opposed by the NEA, the OEA, the national pTa, COSA, and every other major stakeholder in the status quo, are only grudgingly tolerated and are under attack in every legislative session. Yet charters are at the center of the federal improvement strategy. So Oregon sides against the Democratic president, his Secretary of Education, and the grant-readers who will determine the distribution of significant federal dollars. And we offer them a good old-fashioned 'nagging' in hopes that they don't real the grant too closely.
Poor, poor Oregon. We tolerate the absurdity of No Child Left Behind because of the availability of grant money...a case of bad practice tolerated in the name of fiscal necessity. And now we are essentially turning down federal dollars because we don't want to see real innovation take hold in the form of charter schools...a case of promising practice avoided in spite of urgently needed financial incentives.
Nobody can say that Oregon doesn't act on principle...but the principle seems to be that what's good for reelection is good for the kids. And reelection means avoiding real reform while talking incessantly about oh-so-incremental school improvement: the song that never ends.
Superintendent Castillo has announced that she is running for a third term. The word on the street is that nobody will bother running against her. But she's not taking anything for granted, and her campaign is clearly underway.
What are Oregon's strategies? (See if any of this sounds familiar)
1. Merit pay for principals and teachers if their school improves. (But not for principals and teachers whose schools already perform?) This old shoe will never be implemented, though national examples of half-implementation followed by gradual abandonment abound, offering the consolation that others have been gullible before us.
2. Reshuffle teachers and administrators if schools don't perform. What does this mean, exactly? Move those supposedly low-performing teachers and principals to better schools and move teachers from better schools into the low-performing school? That's it? But doesn't that mean that the district-wide teaching staff is precisely what it was before, but is now assigned to different schools? Doesn't that just redistribute the same level of effectiveness? (And didn't Portland do this in the early days of NCLB?) How is that improvement? And for the 100-or-so Oregon districts that have only one building per grade level, it means less than nothing. It means that they are superfluous.
3. Frequently inform students how their performance compares to grade-level benchmarks. Yes, it's called 'scientifically-based nagging'. This is a clear winner, because no-one can resist the motivational power of a good nag. I suppose that this could eventually lead to merit pay for the very best nag. Maybe even a nag-of-the-year award down the road!
Conspicuously missing from the list? Anything to do with Oregon's bare tolerance of charter schools. U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan thinks enough of charter schools that he stopped by to address the national charter convention to unveil the Race to the Top program in person. Where does Oregon stand on this strategy? Out in the cold. Why? Because in the Oregon political 'verse, unions determine elections and children are too young to join unions. So charter schools, which are opposed by the NEA, the OEA, the national pTa, COSA, and every other major stakeholder in the status quo, are only grudgingly tolerated and are under attack in every legislative session. Yet charters are at the center of the federal improvement strategy. So Oregon sides against the Democratic president, his Secretary of Education, and the grant-readers who will determine the distribution of significant federal dollars. And we offer them a good old-fashioned 'nagging' in hopes that they don't real the grant too closely.
Poor, poor Oregon. We tolerate the absurdity of No Child Left Behind because of the availability of grant money...a case of bad practice tolerated in the name of fiscal necessity. And now we are essentially turning down federal dollars because we don't want to see real innovation take hold in the form of charter schools...a case of promising practice avoided in spite of urgently needed financial incentives.
Nobody can say that Oregon doesn't act on principle...but the principle seems to be that what's good for reelection is good for the kids. And reelection means avoiding real reform while talking incessantly about oh-so-incremental school improvement: the song that never ends.
Superintendent Castillo has announced that she is running for a third term. The word on the street is that nobody will bother running against her. But she's not taking anything for granted, and her campaign is clearly underway.
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Charter Schools, Politics and Market Forces
In some people's minds there is a 'charter school movement' that is at odds with school districts and is driven by economic theories about competition and 'market forces'. I don't put much stock in competition as a tool for improving schools. It might be useful in some instances, but I don't personally know of any cases in which competition has been a catalyst for much improvement. And I don't have much use for 'movements'. They are not, as we have seen, of much use in education.
This is why the conversation about approving or denying a particular charter application ought to have exactly one dimension: Is there a reason to think that the charter school in question will improve student achievement? If a charter school increases students' access to a better education, then it should be approved. Whatever distractions might be brought introduced to the conversation, whether they be matters of convenience, pride, annoyance, greed or embarrassment, all ought to be put aside in favor of academic achievement.
We are not acting out parts in a Clancy novel, and we ought to quit playing at political intrigue when it comes to our children's futures.
It's time for a change. While they are still children.
This is why the conversation about approving or denying a particular charter application ought to have exactly one dimension: Is there a reason to think that the charter school in question will improve student achievement? If a charter school increases students' access to a better education, then it should be approved. Whatever distractions might be brought introduced to the conversation, whether they be matters of convenience, pride, annoyance, greed or embarrassment, all ought to be put aside in favor of academic achievement.
We are not acting out parts in a Clancy novel, and we ought to quit playing at political intrigue when it comes to our children's futures.
It's time for a change. While they are still children.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
If Oregon Uses a Continuous Improvement Model...
then where is the improvement? And please don't answer that it is in the progress of our 3rd graders. Since we started saying that, 12 cohorts of 3rd graders have become fully bearded without having met the 10th grade standards in any significant numbers.
O.K. This isn't about Corbett. At any rate it's not just about Corbett. Or maybe it is, but it's also about education in general and about Oregon education in particular.
Nearly two decades after the passage of the Oregon Educational Act for the 21st Century, education statewide is experiencing a peculiar malaise. I say peculiar, because it is characterized by an almost hyper-activity regarding initiatives, programs, trainings, policies and promises all aimed at improving student achievement. Never have so many adults been so busy at 'improving' schools. But student achievement isn't budging. The achievement gap isn't appreciably narrower than it was five years ago. Where passing rates appear to have improved, most of the change is due to the State of Oregon having lowered 10th grade standards in Reading and Math, garnering what appeared to be a 10 point bump in passing rates in both of those subjects in 2007. That same year, the State increased the cutoff score for Science (the subject that doesn't count for AYP calculations) by 1 point, and passing rates have remained stable. Overall, 10th grade passing rates might be creeping upward at a rate of 1-2% per year. With the State assessments in a continual state of flux, I don't put a lot of stock in even that meager 'gain'.
So what do we, as a state, intend to do differently next year? Well, nothing at all. That doesn't mean that we won't see new initiatives, new grants, new buildings, new funding proposals, and new promises. We will. In droves. And each new idea, regardless of its merits, will be subjected to a process that has, to date, prevented any really good idea from being implemented to any significant effect. What is this amazing 'sterilizer' through which every promising idea must pass lest a good idea might survive intact? It is the ironically-named Continuous Improvement Planning Process. What does it do? It limits vision, sets parameters on 'acceptable' goals, and virtually guarantees a very safe mediocrity.
What is the alternative? What ought we to do?
What Oregon needs, and what the education establishment in Oregon will never tolerate, is outrageous aspirations. We need impossible goals, audacious undertakings. Because getting even partway to something really worthwhile represents far more progress than meeting an utterly pedestrian 'SMART' (yes, it's a real acronym, but I've never cared to know what the letters stand for) goal. What I do know about SMART goals is that they are small, cheap, easy, achievable in no time at all, and the total result of 10 years of Oregon schools meeting annual SMART goals is virtually no improvement at the high school level. We are stalled out, with plans in place to repeat this process until the federal grant money runs out.
I believe that Charter Schools represent the only possibility for rapid, meaningful school improvement. Although Oregon law goes a long way toward trying to tame the wild energy that Charters often possess, there is enough breathing room for charters to aspire to greatness. Greatness, not compliance. Inspiration, not bureaucracy. Achievement, not excuses. That's the path that Oregon needs to take, and I don't see anyone at the state level breaking trail. We need to decentralize. Scattered outbreaks of inspiration would be a vast improvement over standardized mediocrity. And today mediocrity is the only SMART goal that ever makes it through the Continuous Improvement Planning Proccess.
This cannot continue.
O.K. This isn't about Corbett. At any rate it's not just about Corbett. Or maybe it is, but it's also about education in general and about Oregon education in particular.
Nearly two decades after the passage of the Oregon Educational Act for the 21st Century, education statewide is experiencing a peculiar malaise. I say peculiar, because it is characterized by an almost hyper-activity regarding initiatives, programs, trainings, policies and promises all aimed at improving student achievement. Never have so many adults been so busy at 'improving' schools. But student achievement isn't budging. The achievement gap isn't appreciably narrower than it was five years ago. Where passing rates appear to have improved, most of the change is due to the State of Oregon having lowered 10th grade standards in Reading and Math, garnering what appeared to be a 10 point bump in passing rates in both of those subjects in 2007. That same year, the State increased the cutoff score for Science (the subject that doesn't count for AYP calculations) by 1 point, and passing rates have remained stable. Overall, 10th grade passing rates might be creeping upward at a rate of 1-2% per year. With the State assessments in a continual state of flux, I don't put a lot of stock in even that meager 'gain'.
So what do we, as a state, intend to do differently next year? Well, nothing at all. That doesn't mean that we won't see new initiatives, new grants, new buildings, new funding proposals, and new promises. We will. In droves. And each new idea, regardless of its merits, will be subjected to a process that has, to date, prevented any really good idea from being implemented to any significant effect. What is this amazing 'sterilizer' through which every promising idea must pass lest a good idea might survive intact? It is the ironically-named Continuous Improvement Planning Process. What does it do? It limits vision, sets parameters on 'acceptable' goals, and virtually guarantees a very safe mediocrity.
What is the alternative? What ought we to do?
What Oregon needs, and what the education establishment in Oregon will never tolerate, is outrageous aspirations. We need impossible goals, audacious undertakings. Because getting even partway to something really worthwhile represents far more progress than meeting an utterly pedestrian 'SMART' (yes, it's a real acronym, but I've never cared to know what the letters stand for) goal. What I do know about SMART goals is that they are small, cheap, easy, achievable in no time at all, and the total result of 10 years of Oregon schools meeting annual SMART goals is virtually no improvement at the high school level. We are stalled out, with plans in place to repeat this process until the federal grant money runs out.
I believe that Charter Schools represent the only possibility for rapid, meaningful school improvement. Although Oregon law goes a long way toward trying to tame the wild energy that Charters often possess, there is enough breathing room for charters to aspire to greatness. Greatness, not compliance. Inspiration, not bureaucracy. Achievement, not excuses. That's the path that Oregon needs to take, and I don't see anyone at the state level breaking trail. We need to decentralize. Scattered outbreaks of inspiration would be a vast improvement over standardized mediocrity. And today mediocrity is the only SMART goal that ever makes it through the Continuous Improvement Planning Proccess.
This cannot continue.
Monday, October 5, 2009
Talented or Gifted, Part II
The twin practices of grade leveling by age and of teaching to standards create the need for special programs like 'Talented and Gifted' by imposing on each successive age cohort of unsuspecting students the convenient (for the grownups) assumption that all children should learn the same things at the same rate .
The result is the delivery of a chaotic and largely ineffective educational experience to all but the 30% of students who are reasonably close to this imaginary 'average'. The 70% of students who fall hopelessly below or ridiculously above this 'ideal' trajectory experience everything from discouragement to boredom to outrage at the misalignment of their abilities with the curriculum. The majority of students are willing to troop along, stay out of trouble, and enjoy those classes and activities that tend to be geared toward achievement (athletics, music, various clubs and competitions) rather than age or grade level. Those on the more extreme ends of the 'curve' (for lack of a better word) tend to wind up in the hands of special programs where it often feels like more hours are spent planning and debating than instructing.
One important (though largely unconscious) function of special programs is to legitimize the mainstream programming the creates the need for them in the first place. They imply that there must be something amiss with the student and never call the general classroom practices into question. So far it is working like a charm. There are raging debates about how much special education costs, and wars within special education regarding best practice. There is constant litigation regarding the rights of parents and the obligations of schools. And what none of this furious activity ever gets around to is questioning the practices that create 90% of the need for special education in the first place.
The same dynamic is a play with Talented and Gifted education, minus the money and most of the litigation. The would-be Talented and Gifted lobby lacks the emotional appeal and the sheer weight of numbers to prompt much political action, but there is little question that the general curriculum in most schools is as inappropriate to the intellectually capable students as it is the those who are the least able. Feeble, unfunded legislative suggestions (it would be hard to call them mandates) hint that something ought to be done if only anyone had some notion of how to proceed.
What is the primary need of Talented and Gifted students? It is to be unfettered from grade level expectations all day, every day, without the need for meetings, plans, tears and threats. They need to be able to walk through the door and access their own appropriate 'next steps' in their educational journey. How did this become a mystery and why are we always only on the verge of solving it?
There are only two barriers, as I see it, to the vast majority of gifted students accessing a great public school education.
First, the culture of public education is such that all students are 'supposed' to undergo the same age/grade-level curriculum at the same time unless the proper forms and filled out, meetings attended, consensus reached, authorizations issued and documents signed. Gifted children need more than anything else to spend time in a room with someone who is versatile, able to create on the run, think on his or her feet, innovate, make rapid and sound judgments. Instead Suzie gets a clumsy committee process that has nothing educational to offer except to those students seeking the patience of Job. The end result of the process varies from place to place and from parent to parent. It almost never leads to higher achievement but tends to focus on 'enriching experiences'...experiences that would be enriching for almost all children and have little to do with the particular needs of Talented and Gifted children.
The second barrier, which sometimes supports the first in a destructive way, is the discomfort that some teachers experience in the presence of an extremely intelligent student. This results in limits to what a gifted student is able to achieve within the structure of the school environment. The result is that a gifted student is hampered by the need to find a mentor, an outside expert, to provide guidance outside the school setting.
It is my experience that multiage classrooms and multiage teachers easily overcome both of these barriers. And because they dismiss the grade level myth out of hand, they are inclined to support whatever sorts of learning beyond the standard curriculum are appropriate to each child. Multiage practice is extremely demanding, and teachers who embrace this practice are risk takers. They are thinkers...planners...schemers...often dreamers. They delight in work that takes an unexpected turn and that exceeds all reasonable expectations.
I believe that the Corbett School and Corbett Charter School are intellectual playgrounds for gifted teachers and students. This is equally true at all grades, and it takes a unique twist at the high school level. Corbett students can complete a year or more of their college education without ever leaving the high school campus and without sacrificing the companionship of their classmates. And their classes are taught entirely be those teachers that they already know and who know them.
One quarter of the high school students in Corbett School District are taking AP Calculus this year. This number includes about a half dozen 9th graders. None of these students were placed Advanced Placement classes as the result of being "Identified" as Talented and Gifted (it occurs to me that you don't have to be 'identified' if people already know you!) or attending committee meetings. It was just their next step. In the case of the 9th graders, they took Algebra I in elementary school, Algebra II with a middle school teacher in 7th grade, precalculus with the high schoolers in 8th grade, and just kept moving along with no particular fanfare. It's just school. Corbett students progress in reading and writing according to the same logic and students have done advanced work in English, Science and History as early as 9th grade when it seemed like a good fit.
40% of Corbett's graduating class of 2009 earned AP Scholar designation (they passed three or more AP exams) prior to graduation. In most Talented and Gifted programs, earning AP Scholar recognition would be a reasonable goal for the participants. But obviously 40% of the class wasn't identified as TAG! So with all of this going on, how can you tell the Talented and Gifted students from the rest? My own strategy is to look more closely at results. 40% of the class passed three or more exams with a score of 3 or higher.
The top 10% of the class (more than would typically be identified as talented and gifted) passed an average of 10 exams each, placing them in the top fraction of 1% of the Advanced Placement program participants. I don't know if that Talented and Gifted, but it will do.
Giftedness often doesn't feel to parents like a 'gift' at all. It is tempting for students to wish (and I've hear more than one do so out loud) to just be 'normal'. Schooling can't alleviate all of the hassles that can come with possessing exceptional ability while attending schools that are preoccupied with 'meeting standards'. But schools can be organized so that the most able students benefit from, rather than having constantly to fight against, the status quo.
Highly able students walk away from Corbett Schools with evidence of exceptional achievement and with the support of an expert adult community. They leave having gained admission to selective colleges and universities and with thousands (or tens of thousands) of dollars worth of earned credits. They receive significant financial aid in support of their undergraduate pursuits. And they leave with an extraordinary K-12 education.
Giftedness should be experienced as a gift and not as a struggle against institutional rigidity. Although there will always be challenges that come with seeing the world through the eyes of an exceptional intellect, schools themselves should be safe harbors and not sources of additional frustration.
The result is the delivery of a chaotic and largely ineffective educational experience to all but the 30% of students who are reasonably close to this imaginary 'average'. The 70% of students who fall hopelessly below or ridiculously above this 'ideal' trajectory experience everything from discouragement to boredom to outrage at the misalignment of their abilities with the curriculum. The majority of students are willing to troop along, stay out of trouble, and enjoy those classes and activities that tend to be geared toward achievement (athletics, music, various clubs and competitions) rather than age or grade level. Those on the more extreme ends of the 'curve' (for lack of a better word) tend to wind up in the hands of special programs where it often feels like more hours are spent planning and debating than instructing.
One important (though largely unconscious) function of special programs is to legitimize the mainstream programming the creates the need for them in the first place. They imply that there must be something amiss with the student and never call the general classroom practices into question. So far it is working like a charm. There are raging debates about how much special education costs, and wars within special education regarding best practice. There is constant litigation regarding the rights of parents and the obligations of schools. And what none of this furious activity ever gets around to is questioning the practices that create 90% of the need for special education in the first place.
The same dynamic is a play with Talented and Gifted education, minus the money and most of the litigation. The would-be Talented and Gifted lobby lacks the emotional appeal and the sheer weight of numbers to prompt much political action, but there is little question that the general curriculum in most schools is as inappropriate to the intellectually capable students as it is the those who are the least able. Feeble, unfunded legislative suggestions (it would be hard to call them mandates) hint that something ought to be done if only anyone had some notion of how to proceed.
What is the primary need of Talented and Gifted students? It is to be unfettered from grade level expectations all day, every day, without the need for meetings, plans, tears and threats. They need to be able to walk through the door and access their own appropriate 'next steps' in their educational journey. How did this become a mystery and why are we always only on the verge of solving it?
There are only two barriers, as I see it, to the vast majority of gifted students accessing a great public school education.
First, the culture of public education is such that all students are 'supposed' to undergo the same age/grade-level curriculum at the same time unless the proper forms and filled out, meetings attended, consensus reached, authorizations issued and documents signed. Gifted children need more than anything else to spend time in a room with someone who is versatile, able to create on the run, think on his or her feet, innovate, make rapid and sound judgments. Instead Suzie gets a clumsy committee process that has nothing educational to offer except to those students seeking the patience of Job. The end result of the process varies from place to place and from parent to parent. It almost never leads to higher achievement but tends to focus on 'enriching experiences'...experiences that would be enriching for almost all children and have little to do with the particular needs of Talented and Gifted children.
The second barrier, which sometimes supports the first in a destructive way, is the discomfort that some teachers experience in the presence of an extremely intelligent student. This results in limits to what a gifted student is able to achieve within the structure of the school environment. The result is that a gifted student is hampered by the need to find a mentor, an outside expert, to provide guidance outside the school setting.
It is my experience that multiage classrooms and multiage teachers easily overcome both of these barriers. And because they dismiss the grade level myth out of hand, they are inclined to support whatever sorts of learning beyond the standard curriculum are appropriate to each child. Multiage practice is extremely demanding, and teachers who embrace this practice are risk takers. They are thinkers...planners...schemers...often dreamers. They delight in work that takes an unexpected turn and that exceeds all reasonable expectations.
I believe that the Corbett School and Corbett Charter School are intellectual playgrounds for gifted teachers and students. This is equally true at all grades, and it takes a unique twist at the high school level. Corbett students can complete a year or more of their college education without ever leaving the high school campus and without sacrificing the companionship of their classmates. And their classes are taught entirely be those teachers that they already know and who know them.
One quarter of the high school students in Corbett School District are taking AP Calculus this year. This number includes about a half dozen 9th graders. None of these students were placed Advanced Placement classes as the result of being "Identified" as Talented and Gifted (it occurs to me that you don't have to be 'identified' if people already know you!) or attending committee meetings. It was just their next step. In the case of the 9th graders, they took Algebra I in elementary school, Algebra II with a middle school teacher in 7th grade, precalculus with the high schoolers in 8th grade, and just kept moving along with no particular fanfare. It's just school. Corbett students progress in reading and writing according to the same logic and students have done advanced work in English, Science and History as early as 9th grade when it seemed like a good fit.
40% of Corbett's graduating class of 2009 earned AP Scholar designation (they passed three or more AP exams) prior to graduation. In most Talented and Gifted programs, earning AP Scholar recognition would be a reasonable goal for the participants. But obviously 40% of the class wasn't identified as TAG! So with all of this going on, how can you tell the Talented and Gifted students from the rest? My own strategy is to look more closely at results. 40% of the class passed three or more exams with a score of 3 or higher.
The top 10% of the class (more than would typically be identified as talented and gifted) passed an average of 10 exams each, placing them in the top fraction of 1% of the Advanced Placement program participants. I don't know if that Talented and Gifted, but it will do.
Giftedness often doesn't feel to parents like a 'gift' at all. It is tempting for students to wish (and I've hear more than one do so out loud) to just be 'normal'. Schooling can't alleviate all of the hassles that can come with possessing exceptional ability while attending schools that are preoccupied with 'meeting standards'. But schools can be organized so that the most able students benefit from, rather than having constantly to fight against, the status quo.
Highly able students walk away from Corbett Schools with evidence of exceptional achievement and with the support of an expert adult community. They leave having gained admission to selective colleges and universities and with thousands (or tens of thousands) of dollars worth of earned credits. They receive significant financial aid in support of their undergraduate pursuits. And they leave with an extraordinary K-12 education.
Giftedness should be experienced as a gift and not as a struggle against institutional rigidity. Although there will always be challenges that come with seeing the world through the eyes of an exceptional intellect, schools themselves should be safe harbors and not sources of additional frustration.
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