“Teachers don’t have time…”

I think this is turning into a series of posts on typical reasons why schools will say they can’t integrate social skills training into their curriculum.  It didn’t start out that way, but after the first post (“It’s not the school’s job…”) I had a reader ask the following question:

Some people think that teachers are too busy as it is, and should not be wasting time on social skills. How would you respond to this claim?

Good question…and it IS a common reason for why schools say they can’t take on “yet another curriculum.”

There’s no debate that teachers have a lot on their plates these days. There’s lesson planning and prep time, continuing ed time, “in-service” training days, meetings with school administrators and principals…oh, yeah, and then “teaching” time, too.

Which is what teachers are supposed to be doing. It’s what they were trained to do and it’s what they want to be doing.

We hear about how teachers have to spend too much time with meetings and planning and such, but what we don’t hear about is the thing that is taking more time away from them than all the other things combined — classroom disruption and dealing with student discipline.

It’s a significant issue that sadly doesn’t get nearly enough attention.  How much time is being lost? Well, depending on your source, it’s anywhere from 30-40-50% or more of teaching time.  Back in 2004, Public Agenda published a study that stated 43% of the teachers they surveyed said they were spending more time on managing classroom behavior and discipline than they were on teaching ( “Where Are We Now?” ).  Other reports set the amount of time spent on dealing with disruptive students at about 35-40%.

But, try to ask the teachers how much teaching time is lost on behavior management and the reports vary: many teacher’s instant reaction is to say THEY have no problem managing students.  Other teachers say it’s so bad that they are lucky to get 15 minutes of actual teaching time out of an average 45-minute teaching period because, in her words, she’s so busy “contending” with students’ behavior and issues.  You may say that this depends on the teacher’s ability and experience in managing student behavior, but the last comment came from a teacher who’d been teaching middle-school kids for over 15 years.

The challenge is that too often teachers are reluctant to admit how bad things really are in their classroom because they are worried about being labelled as “bad” or “ineffective teachers.” That it’s their problem if they can’t deal with the level of disruption in their class.  Other teachers have just become immune to the level of noise in their classrooms — they have just come to accept that this is normal, and that it’s just “kids being kids.”  But, it IS a big deal.  Just recently, The Apple published results of their study about the 7 biggest challenges teaachers face. Care to hazard a guess which was #1?  “Dealing with bad student behavior.”  The recent report from Public Agenda, too, backed this up when it showed that 40% of teachers were “disheartened” and classroom disruption and student behavior was the primary cause.

It does not need to be this way, and, frankly, it shouldn’t be this way. If 30% of time of productive teaching time is being lost, that is literally time that is being robbed from both teachers and students.

Let’s put it in perspective:  30% of the average 180 day school calendar is 60 DAYS. That’s 60 days that students could be learning, that teachers could be teaching.  When you juxtapose that with the other arguments about lengthening the school day or year, wouldn’t it just be easier to work on regaining some of that time we’re already losing.  I mean, do you think we’d have better academic outcomes if we could get back 30-45 productive days of those 60 we are losing? What about other “benefits” such as happier teachers, less bullying and anti-social behavior, fewer days missed to absenteeism (both student and teachers), and more?

Can’t be done, many will say. Yes, it can — and it’s been proven to work.  Let’s pretend for a moment that I ask you to spend one hour a week teaching social skills to students that works in a fully-integrated fashion in-step with academics?  One hour a week is the same as 36 hours over the school year (yes, I know not all school week’s are full 5-day weeks, but let’s keep this simple, shall we?).  That’s roughly the same as 6 days, over the course of a year, if you assume only a 6-hour school day. You’re presently losing as much as 60 days of the year, as it is. If you could “invest” 6 days out of the year to regain 25 productive days of teaching time, would that be worth it?  And, that’s what we’ve found — at 40% or more increase in student time-on-task when integrated social skills education is brought into the classroom.

So, when we talk about “gee, we don’t have the time” to teach social skills, I’d argue that we not ony HAVE the time ,we must offer it in order to make best use of the time we do have.  If we could cut down the level of disruption and poor behavior in the classroom, we’d have more time to teach.  Students who are paying attention instead of mucking around are more likely to learn — and they aren’t going to wreck the learning of those students who really do want to do their best. Teachers who are able to spend more time teaching and less time “babysitting” will feel more productive.  And the bottom line is, with the Race to the Top funding emphasizing “teacher effectiveness” it’s clear that many people are concerned about the same thing.

“We don’t have time” is another common reason we hear for why schools don’t think they can bring in social skills education. But, if we can turn wasted time into productive time — without increasing the number of hours or days students and teachers have to spend in the classroom — don’t you think this is time well spent? It’ll do more for you than trying, one more time, to drill math rules or grammar into an audience who isn’t focused and ready to learn. You can’t teach them until they are paying attention, not matter how good you are.  Let’s give our teachers a break and give them the tools to be effective, at the same time we are determined to grade them on that “effectiveness.”

If it were easy…

Today, I have to write a more light-hearted entry. One that has a little fun.

I was having lunch with a dear friend and top-notch marketing/branding expert to discuss SocialSmarts, how I am personally and professionally trying to make our public education system something to be proud of — somewhere we are PLEASED to send our children.

In the midst of our brainstorming she says to me, “Have you thought about approaching the Gates Foundation?”

Well, duh. Tell me who among us who are trying to do great things and change the world haven’t thought about getting connected with the single-biggest private foundation in the world?  Particularly if you are Pacific Northwest based?

But, it’s not as though it’s an original thought.  It’s not as though I can just pick up the phone, call and ask for an appointment to present.  I mean, do you realize how many other people are wanting to do the same thing?

It’s like Oprah. Again, can I tell you how many times I’ve been told, “Corinne, you need to get on Oprah!  You’re PERFECT for her!”  Got it.  Will just pick up the phone, call and ask to speak to Miss O, ’cause we know she’s just been waiting by the phone to talk to little ‘ol me! (Ok, well, maybe she hasn’t YET, but she SHOULD be, if only she knew, right <wink>).

Point is, it sounds so simple, but it’s not.  If it were easy, anyone could do it. And, frankly, if I had a nickel for each time I have heard those twin phrases, I wouldn’t need to be working at helping schools develop better cultures.  I would just have my moment in the sun at Gates or on Oprah, and could become another one of those “legends” that had success drop in their laps after they were discovered.

Again, it’s not that easy.  Trying to change the world takes work — lots of it.  And, while I’d be more than appreciative of a break, there’s nothing that replaces good old-fashioned elbow-grease. That, in of itself, is a great lesson we can all benefit from; working hard is the best guarantee of a reward. And the reward is so much sweeter when you’ve done something to earn it.

Having said that…if any Gates-ers or Oprah-ites are reading…I MIGHT be waiting by the phone in case you have an open slot:  866 405 4089.  We’d be happy to take your call!

“Race to the Top” requires improved teacher effectiveness

Everyone once in a while, the government does something that surprises me. Today was one of those days.

The Department of Education released its final rules for the “Race to the Top” competition. In the matrix were all the things they had been talking about including

• State Success factors including buy-in for reform initiatives
• Standards and assessments
• Data systems for instructional support
• Great teachers and leaders
• Turning around Lowest-Achieving Schools

These categories included all the things we were hearing about like states’ buy-in on education reform, initiating or expanding charter school programs, developing and implementing better data gathering systems.

But what really surprised me was this: the category of “Great teachers and leaders” was the single highest factor in the list.  At 138 points, improving teacher and principal effectiveness will be rated higher than improving data systems (possible 50 points) and turning around low-achieving schools (47 pts) — combined.

And, if you look at the sub-categories for rating, “Improving teacher and principal effectiveness based on performance” is given a possible 58 pts alone.

Now, this is great, but the devil is always in the details.  HOW do we make teachers more effective?  Some argue that pay for performance is the way, but we’ve already discussed how it’s not fair to tie pay to performance without giving teachers the tools to be more effective.

This runs right on the heels of an article published in The Apple this week that reported on the 7 biggest challenges teachers face.  The #1 challenge reported by teachers was “bad student behavior.”

We know that there is a high degree of time lost in the classroom due to unruly and disruptive students. At the same time, the Administration is tying improvements in teacher effectiveness to Race to the Top dollars.

I think there’s a sign here.

It’s back to my main point: we have to provide integrated education that gives kids those skills that allow them to be more successful in a classroom environment. At the same time, we give teachers a framework by which they can design, implement and enforce classroom management frameworks tied into what students are learning.  This way, teachers have the “master game plan” and are teaching kids crucial lifeskills that fit into that overall plan. Less disruption means more learning. More learning leads to better achievement and teachers are able to have more productive time in the classroom.

It sounds so simple; you’d think everyone would be doing it.  But, it’s the toughest “sell” you’ll ever have.  It takes an enlightened administration to admit that they need to try something new.  Particularly when they are used to seeing “solutions” in terms of what they know. And, it stands to reason that “more effective teaching” has something to do with better funding, more programs, more teacher in-service days or smaller classrooms.

But we’ve done all that and it hasn’t helped.

Before we start throwing another nearly $5B at the same old problems, in the same old way, let’s really take a look at what is causing the problems. Until we do that, we can race all we want and find we get no closer to the finish line.

“It’s not the school’s job…”

Tell me if you’ve heard this argument:  the principal or administrator says social skills/character/values education shouldn’t be part of school curriculum because it shoul be taught in the home.  “It’s not the school’s place.”  Okay…then what about…

• In this country, we have a policy that children will be taught in the English language. But, what if they can’t speak English because their parents are from another culture or country? School: ” Well, we HAVE to teach them English because without it, they’ll be behind academically and socially. Besides, if we don’t teach them, where else will they learn it?”
• Too many children are overweight and unfit — because of poor diet, lack of exercise, other unhealthy habits and behaviors.  Teaching them about nutrition and the value of healthy living should be the parents’ jobs, right? School: “But so much of their learning and being a successful student depends on making good food choices, watching their weight, and getting appropriate levels of exercise.  If the parents don’t practice good nutrition, where else will they learn it?”
• Food programs — why is it the schools’ responsibility to offer meals at free and reduced costs to kids?  Isn’t it the parent’s job to make sure their children are fed?  School: “Well, if the parents are unable to feed their kids, we have to provide meals because so much of the child’s abilities to pay attention and function in school is hampered if they haven’t eaten.  If parent’s don’t provide for their kids, where else will they get it?”

These are just a few examples of other “non-academic” programs that are offered daily in our nation’s schools, yet technically should not be the responsibility of the school system. Yet, we do it…because, in essence we MUST.  The health and success of the child academically, phyically, socially DEPENDS on it.

Yet I get this “it’s not the school’s job” argument regularly about social skills and character ed.  Hey, I am the FIRST person who would agree that it SHOULDN’T have to fall on the school’s shoulders to teach these “life skills” but the reality is that the schools suffer in all areas because kids lack appropriate school-readiness skills.

Social skills are the #1 factor in our children’s personal and professional success. Kids that come into school without adequate school-readiness skills start off behind their more socialized peers academically,socially, and emotionally. Without effective intervention or education, they are likely to remain behind, and will exit the school system inadquately prepared for either college or the job market.

More significantly, poor social skills affects not just one individual learner or subject, but every aspect of the student’s learning and the educational environment as a whole.  A student isn’t more likely to fail academically just because he or she is overweight.  A teacher isn’t likely to quit her job if a few of her students aren’t proficient in English. A student won’t start a smackdown with his peers if he doesn’t know the components of the FDA Food Pyramid. But, all these things are direct or indirect results of appropriate social skills.

Schools have so much to lose (and ARE losing) if this area isn’t addressed. Taxpayer dollars are wasted, teachers are demoralized, school violence continues to be at epidemic levels, students underachieve and the achievement gap for low-income and minority students remains high.  Yes, teaching social skills and character HAS become the school’s job because we can no longer depend on students coming to school ready to learn and participate in a classroom environment. As one teacher recently said, “with all the interruptions and disruptions in the classroom that stem from students who aren’t respectful of teachers and peers, don’t appreciate their educational opportunities and can’t get along with others, when is the real teaching supposed to happen?”

School’s necessary response: “If the kids don’t learn good social skills outside of school, where else will they learn?”

40% of teachers are “disheartened”

I’m saddened, but not surprised.

Public Agenda released a report yesterday (“Teaching for a Living: How Teachers See the Profession Today“) that provided some fascinating insight into what teachers are thinking and feeling about their jobs and education in general.

Approximately 900 K-12 teachers were surveyed and the questions were extensive.  What Public Agenda found is that 40% of those teachers are “disheartened” and disappointed about their jobs. While many will review this data and immediately say, “Great, but 60% are content!” that’s not a fair statement.  It’s significant that nearly half are unhappy.

But the “why” is even more telling.  Those teachers that reported being discouraged, nearly 75% of them blame discipline and behavior issues.  And, over 60% of them cite lack of support from their administration as another factor.

For years I’ve been saying that teacher satisfaction depends a great deal on their working environment.  When you recognize that too much time that should be spent on teaching goes instead to “discipline and behavior issues,” it’s not hard to connect the dots for why teachers are having a tough time.  Imagine ANY other “business” where you were losing 30/40/50% of your “work time” on dealing with other people’s behaviors or discipline problems — it just wouldn’t be acceptable.  You’d get frustrated because you couldn’t get your job done, and you’d feel completely dragged down at the end of the day.

Let’s put it in the teacher’s perspective. I happened on another site yesterday where there was an Op-Ed from Michelle Obama on teachers — how valuable and important they were, recalling with nostaligia the teacher who always stood out.  One teacher’s comments were particularly interesting (I’m paraphrasing, but I’ve retained the general gist):

“…it becomes extremely difficult to teach the core subject areas when the idea of character and life skills are not being taught at home. I feel like I am constantly addressing “life” skills and teaching the students how to act appropriately, before the actual teaching begins. There is simply not enough time in the day to give lessons on lifeskills then manage to actually teach them something academic. Additionally, there is CONSTANT interruption in the classroom because students do not know how to respect themselves, their teacher, or their classmates, which takes another portion of the day to give lessons on this. When does the actual teaching begin?”

This is not an isolated case, as the Public Agenda study shows.  This teacher goes on to advocate character education teachers in the classroom, as a separate but standard course of study, subject-matter experts like math or science. That part I don’t agree with because isolating it as a separate subject continues to treat it like an unrelated skill.  Our character, our values, our behavior should be a constant, no matter whether we are at PE, on the playground, learning math, at the library.  It IS what and who we are. 

But the general concept is valid. As she continues:

“If the government treated Character Education as another core subject area, then I feel that behavior would improve and student respect for learning would increase.”

And, as we know, when we integrate social skills education into the core, other good things happen — test scores go up; bullying disappears; absenteeism goes down; teachers, students and staff are happier and more satisfied. These problems can’t be fixed in any other way — not by applying more money, creating smaller classes, or building more charter schools.  All those things, in absence of addressing classroom discipline issues, won’t be enough to turn the ship around. It really IS at the core of the problems in our schools, and now we have another study that helps support what I’ve said in the past: the 3Rs aren’t enough.  It’s the missing Rs (Respect, Reliability, Responsibility, Resourcefulness, Resilience) that our kids aren’t learning that’s hurting everyone.

The Power of Positive Energy

Ever have one of those meetings where you just “connect” with another like-minded individual and it just helps validate what you’ve been doing?  I had the amazing pleasure of having coffee yesterday with Liv Finne, the Director of the Center for Education for the Washington Policy Center.  Now, I’d had the opportunity to meet Liv before — first at the launch of Scott Oki’s book, “Outrageous Learning” (I’m sworn to secrecy on the circumstances of that first meeting), and a few short weeks later at the AWSP/WASA Summer Conference in Olympia, WA.

Liv is another no-nonsense, “where is the practicality in the solution?” kind of person.  She is highly passionate about helping our education system become what it needs to be to better serve the children and the families in the State of Washington. And, this is one of the things I respect so much about her: for her, it IS about the kids.  It’s not about agendas, about “feel goods” or (as I call them) “dere dere’s” (i.e., ” ‘dere ‘dere, why don’t we talk about HOW we FEEL  when someone slams us up against our locker because they don’t like the color we chose to wear this morning? Maybe if we talked about how the color grey was a problem for the bully, we could understand why this reaction took place.”)

Liv, (pronouced “LEEV” just like “Corinne” is “CoREEN”) is highly motivated to cut to the chase about what works in education and doesn’t — and WON’T.  I appreciate that, because, as I explained to her in our meeting, I have this nasty habit of examining every “solution” or proposal in light of the annoying question, “Ok, but what problem are we trying to SOLVE? And, how will this get us closer to our goal?”

I’m excited.  I like organizations like the Washington Policy Center who, instead of just falling into predicatable rhetoric and prognostication, actually examine FACTS to reach their conclusions. They really approach issues with an eye toward common sense: what’s real here, what’s not, what’s practical, what’s sustainable?

There’s too much buy-in happening along party lines and popular opinion these days.  I can’t say how the conclusions and and recommendatons of the Washington Policy Center will weigh in against those areas, but based on what I’ve seen so far, their direction seems to make SENSE.

Which is a rare commodity these days, if you ask me.  Common sense is altogether uncommon, and frequently isn’t sensible.

BTW…if you’re interested in checking out Liv’s blog on education issues you can find it at:  http://washingtonpolicyblog.typepad.com/washington_policy_center_/education/.  If you’re a Washingtonian with any interest in what’s going on (really!) in education, I encourage you to check it out.  Heck…it’s probably even valuable and relevant to folks outside the Emerald State, too, ’cause chances are the same litanies are being recited in your state — that’s been MY experience at least.  Repeat after me…”underfunded, classes too large, teachers need more pay…”  (heavy sigh)

Longer days do not mean better learning

It’s happened again.  Once again, you’re hearing that our kids need to be in school LONGER.  That they just aren’t spending enough time in school.

This is not a new proclamation.  There are several factions that believe our kids aren’t in school an adequate amount of time.  Today, however, in an AP article entitled, “More School: Obama would curtail vacation” Libby Quaid outlines our President’s beliefs for why kids should be in school longer. And, it just doesn’t make sense.

The argument seems to always go that our kids do not have enough learning time to learn everything they need. That more hours in a school day, more days in a school year, and/or fewer breaks and vacations would lead to increased academic achievement. Sounds good, right?

But what we don’t talk about is WHY our kids don’t have enough learning time.  As the article pointed out, in the US our kids spend more time in school than do kids in Asia — the ones who are consistenly out-performing our students in critical areas such as math and science. The Asian kids do have more actual days in school, but the time they spend learning in school is less than what our kids currently experience.

Care to hazard a guess why?  Well, when studies consistently show that our kids in US schools are losing 30/40/50% or more of what should be productive learning time to classroom disruption and behavior issues, it’s no wonder they aren’t learning. To put it in perspective, losing 30% of learning time, on average, is the same as losing 60 actual DAYS of instruction on the typical 180-day academic year.

Without dealing with that underlying issue, if we lengthen the school day or year, we STILL are losing a third of more of that now-longer time. Instead of 2 unproductive hours in a 6-hour learning day, we can waste 2.6 hours if we lengthen the day to 8 hours. Too much time lost.

And it’s not only time…it’s MONEY.  Never mind what the loss of productive time actually costs in terms of dollars (but if you want to see what I’m talking about, go to our interactive calculator at http://www.socialsmarts.com/cost_calculator.cfm and plug in your own numbers).  Longer school days would mean we need more money to pay teachers for the additional time. We’ll need more administrator compensation because the schools would remain open longer. Oh, that also means heating/air conditioning/facilities costs go up because schools are serving students longer or for more days. More breakfasts and/or lunches will need to be prepared, and you’ll need to pay the servers more, too for their additional time.  Do you get my point?  Schools are already talking about how they don’t have the money they need to do what they need to do in their current year…how are they supposed to do MORE?

We do, however, have a way of solving this problem, and we can do it NOW. Simple.  Reduce the amount of productive time lost on behavior and discipline.  If we cut the amount of time lost from 40% to 20%, not only do we regain more than 20 days of productive instruction time, we’ll see improvements in overall class/school behavior, we’ll be able to more easily recruit and retain teachers, we’ll see gains in student achievement.

And, that last part is PROVEN.  CASEL is about to release a study that shows students who receive instruction in social skills (social/emotional learning) generally score 11 points higher on academic tests than do students who do NOT have that kind of learning.  We’ve seen that: schools that have integrated our programs into their curriculum report a 43% increase in students’ time on task, and they significantly outscore those schools that have not used our program, in a side-by-side comparision.

The point here is, it’s not so much about how LONG students are in school as it is what they do with the time they are there.  If we can work on adopting programs that increase the amount of productive learning, that’s an immediate pay-back to everyone in the school: the students, the teachers, the staff…and the community.  It doesn’t require additional budget and it doesn’t detract from the academic objectives. Our kids shouldn’t have to spend “full-time” in schools — they should have time to be “just kids.” That is also another form of learning, but we can’t overlook the well-being of the whole child just because we think “more academics” will lead to better outcomes.

Use time wisely because we never have enough time to waste.

“Civility” becomes trendy?

The last 10 days have been a banner day for proof why civility and social skills need to be taught in schools.  Joe Wilson’s shout-out during the President’s address, Kanye West’s outburst, Beyonce’s reaction — where HAVE your manners gone, people?

And, suddenly, “civility” is a buzzword. Everyone is talking about it.  How disgusting and shocking these undisciplined (or rehearsed, to hear some say) acts are.  However, it shouldn’t come as a shock, particularly to those of us who have been crusading for a return to a more decent way of interacting with one another.  Over the past few decades, we have been sliding down an increasingly slippery slope where our society expects media figures to shred each other publicly, argue incessantly on camera without giving the other side their turn to talk, kids who bully because they believe that in order for them to be “more” they need to make others “less,” and where we are entitled to our creature comforts merely because we can fog a mirror.

Civility has gone the wayside along with those other “old-fashioned” character traits of honesty, respect, trustworthiness, compassion and consideration. “Integrity” has come to mean being really, really sorry when we are caught doing wrong, instead of that principle that keeps us from DOING wrong in the first place.

Essentially we are reaping what we have sown for 30 years or more.  What we see now is the product of generations of young people who were not taught what is decent, right, and respectful, where we learn everyone may have an opinion but that doesn’t mean it’s the right time or place to share it.  If ever there was a call for teaching these kinds of skills – yes even in schools – these recent incidents have helped justify it.  We cannot guarantee that our children will learn them in any other way, and it has a significant impact on their personal and professional success, not to mention our communities. 

Many people would like to lay the blame for this rude, crude and indifferent new society at the feet of the parents.  We can debate this forever because, while I do accept that there are too many parents who AREN’T teaching these things to their kids, there are also many parents out there who are trying, or who may come to this country from a different culture, who themselves may not have been taught—or kids who don’t have parents or good role models to teach them. Rather than play the blame game, let’s focus on fixing the problem. Again, it’s likely going to come down to schools.

There is no good reason not to be kind, decent, compassionate to one another.  A society that doesn’t believe in and operate by some form of the Golden Rule will not survive.  Without consideration for one another, you don’t have a community — you have anarchy.

I’ve long held as my personal mantra that I’m “Putting ‘civil’ back into ‘civilization’.”  I’d love it for many more to join me in that mission because there is NO downside.  It’d be great if we could turn the buzz word of “civlity” into the buzz of action!

What if schools were run like a business?

Lately, there’s been a lot of discussion again of school funding, expenditures, stimulus dollars and “sacrifices” schools and districts have to make because of the economy.  While I recognize that there are many factors that go into decisions made by district and school administrators, sometimes the choices and tradeoffs that are made seem arbitrary and questionable.  I have this unfortunate tendency to views these cuts and expenditures through the eyes of a business-person and I often ask myself, “Why?  How does this contribute to the overall mission of the school or district?”

Children are our future.  What they learn today, they use tomorrow as adults.  They represent our future doctors, engineers, researchers, skilled labor, service pool, lawyers, politicians, and even our future teachers.  What we teach them today provides rewards to us tomorrow as they mature and replace today’s adults in the workforce.

It is for this reason that I wonder why we as a society do not put more energy into improving our schools.  Yes, I know we pour $Billions into our education system each year, and on a per capita basis, no country in the world spends more on each student to provide an education.  It is therefore discouraging to me, and should be to all Americans, that there is no direct correlation between money spend per child on education, and the value of the education they receive (if you doubt this, check out my previous post, “Underfunded” for more).  Nearly all schools would be “out of business” if they were held accountable “like a business.”  They would all be bankrupt because the “product” produced would be inferior to the expectation, if traditional commercial “value paid for value received” measures were use.  The shareholders (taxpayers) would have pulled the plug on their failing operations decades ago.

If only it were true.  The cost of educating our children would be reduced, the quality of the education they received would be considerably higher, and our future workforce would be properly prepared to compete in a competitive global marketplace.

I think it’s an interesting argument to consider how things might be different if you ran schools like a business.  Here are some examples to ponder. 

1. Let’s start with money received being tied directly to the product produced.  “Ship” a great product, expect to get top dollar for it.  Ship a poor product, expect that few will be buying.  Those responsible for the production would be held accountable for the quality of their work.  There would be no tenure – the best at what they do would be recruited, and rewarded, for their work output. They would be expected to continue to output good product, and if they didn’t, would be expected to improve, or find other employment.
2. Budgets would be carefully scrutinized, and wasteful practices would be reduced or eliminated.  One of the first budget items to get the ax would be top heavy management.  Too many managers managing too few teachers is currently a norm in most school systems.  Management would be reduced to the minimum level required to effectively maintain a quality work product.  Facilities would also be scrutinized, and instead of continually asking for more and smaller classrooms, teachers would be rewarded for being able to manage larger classes, in fewer classrooms.  Commercial companies do this all the time, continually looking for ways to produce more, at a higher quality, with fewer expense dedicated to overhead.  Those managers who are successful in making that happen get promoted, and get rewarded.  Today, however, it appears “success” in public education is measured by how big the budget is, and how many sites are being built and managed, how many teachers are employed, or how large the school is.  The priority is 180 degrees out-of-sync and makes little sense.
3. Continuous improvement techniques would be in place, and weekly, monthly and quarterly scrutiny of data would confirm that all students are progressing as expected.  In the manufacturing world it’s a known fact that the earlier you find a flaw in the “raw materials” used to produce a product, the less costly it is to fix the problem before final production.  How often do we just move the product (the students) down the production line without ever putting in the corrections that would assure a quality product at the point of shipment (graduation)?  In Washington State, during a recent re-election campaign, the incumbent State Superintendent of Public Instruction boasted that “92% of our high school seniors graduated ‘proficient.’” Imagine if our airplane, automobile, medical equipment, or food suppliers just “passed the product along” even though they were aware that 8% didn’t meet quality requirements?  We would be outraged.  Yet we allow the school system to move our kids from grade to grade, and even graduate students without their learning even the most basic math, English, civics or science to be able to succeed in the workplace.  That SHOULD be unaccepatable and we should all be outraged
4. If we ran schools like a business, all employees would understand who they work for, and would be required to provide excellent customer service.  In addition, they would be required to know just who the customer is, and it is NOT their union, their Principal or the school district.  A focus on the student’s welfare and education would be of prime concern. The recent strike in Kent, WA was proof that the “customers’ welfare” (the students) was not first and foremost. Regardless of whose side you were on — district’s or teachers’ — the reality was that the kids were the ones suffering because of the strike.
5. Prior to making ANY changes — whether additions or cuts — there would be a tough analysis of how this would contribute to the mission of the “business.”  For example, the custom school-branded planner that parents are “required” to purchase for their students — how does THIS improve the students’ education over a $5 generic planner they can buy at the local office supply?  Will cuts in transportation truly add money back into the system that can be used to improve education, or is it just a line item to be reduced at the potential risk of student safety? You have to be willing to examine everying with the perspective of how it supports the objectives, and when you look at the “penny-wise but pound-senseless” changes that are being made, it makes you wonder whose objectives are being met.
6. Finally, there’s one more important difference between schools and businesses.  In business, when you see reductions in revenue, you start analyzing expenses.  While both schools and businesses DO cut expenses, there appears to be one significant difference: businesses generally don’t beg for bailouts (I say, generally, because this has become an alarming trend in too many businesses of late).  The most common practice for businesses experiencing budget shortfalls is to take a hard look at where money is going and seeing first what can be cut and second, where you can decrease waste or increase efficiency.  It takes a very enlightened district to look at areas of waste and really take pro-active steps to increase productivity.  That doesn’t mesh with the “more money, smaller classrooms” paradigm.

Ultimately, if schools were being run like a business, there would be true accountability for successes and failures, and rewards for exceptional work would be readily meted out, instead of finger-pointing or excuses for why “we can’t achieve our education objectives.” We’re not talking about merit pay only for teachers, but for everyone in the educational food-chain. Everyone would have a vested, direct interest in the outcomes of the students and continuous product-line improvements would be encouraged, regardless if it was “within the cycle” to consider new options.

If only it were true.  The cost of educating our children would be reduced, the quality of the education they received would be considerably higher, and our future workforce would be properly prepared to compete in a competitive global marketplace. And our schools would be something to be proud of, where parents looked forward with confidence to sending their children, and the end product was the best it could possibly be.

“Education is not indoctrination” – Obama’s Address to Students

Those were the words spoken by Michael Medved at the end of Hour 3 of his show yesterday.  By some strange coincidence, I happened to catch the intro to his broadcast as I was driving to pick up my kids from school. What I heard left me chilled.

Before you assume that this is a “liberal vs. conservative” discussion or is a rant about political positions, it’s not.  I can tell you that I would have problems with what’s happening regardless of who was behind it, what their political leanings are…or agenda.

Mr. Medved was interviewing a teacher who was resisting her district’s “encouragement” (pressure) to suspend her normal class activity and lessons so all her students could participate in President Obama’s planned Address to Students scheduled for September 8, 2009.  This planned address coincides with many schools’ first day back on campus.  While I don’t have the details of the exact content of the address, per the White House press release (you can find a public copy of it at http://service-learning.blogspot.com/2009/08/president-obama-to-deliver-nationally.html) indicates that Pres. Obama plans to talk to students about the importance of staying in and succeeding at school.

Sounds like a good, positive message.  Problem 1) The release is dated August 21st, and yet no one really seems to know much about it.  I’ve talked to several parents whose kids are already in school for the year, and they don’t know anything about it.  Schools generally have trouble getting any extra-ordinary programs sanctioned by their administration or districts that take away from learning time; suddenly we have time for ALL kids to cease what they are normally doing to get a message from the White House? What will be covered? Is it appropriate for students in grades Pre-K through Grade 6(target audience for this message)?  But, there even appears to be a lesson plan developed for teachers to work with their students before/during and after to “explore” the topic of the President’s message (http://www.docstoc.com/docs/10582301/President-Obama%E2%80%99s-Address-to-Students-Across-America-September-8-2009). There are several teachers across the country who are choosing not to include their classes in this planned televised event, and apparently those teachers are being called un-American and “non-conformists.”

Further issue:  as a parent, I like to know what my kids are being taught when they’re in school. I’m led to believe that schools want this, too, because we are always hearing how “parents need to be more involved in their kids’ education.”  Yet, last year, my middle daughter was shown Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” in school under the premise that this was a documentary proving the fact of Global Warming.  We had no idea it was going to be shown until after our daughter came home and told us about the horrific scenes of drowning polar bears. Parents need to and SHOULD be told what’s being shown/taught in schools.

But, that’s off point — somewhat.  Let me get back to it.

While this issue of the Address alone is worrisome, this is only the latest in what seems to be a push to indoctrinate our young people at earlier and earlier ages.

Some of my comments were featured last week in the US News and World Report article on the DLC’s plan for “A Kindle in Every Backpack” — the second time I’ve been asked to share my views on this topic in the media. Along with other issues I raised, part of my concern is the ability and potential, with such a device, to manipulate or tailor the content students will be consuming electronically. I’m not saying this will happen, but what does it say when we are looking to obsolete the printed word in favor of dynamic-content devices — and claim this is for “budget” reasons?

This comes on the heels of the recent push for a national set of curriculum standards, and the linking of Obama/Duncan’s “Race to the Top” funds to schools that agree to embrace specific federally-encouraged initiatives such as charter schools and merit pay for teachers. Now, today, you hear that California is suspected of changing their education objectives just to make themselves a more attractive candidate for education funds through “Race to the Top.”

None of these incidents, in isolation, are of significant concern, but when you examine them as a whole — and consider these are all sprouting up in the last three months — you have to wonder what’s REALLY going on. At the same time, why do schools/districts continue to pump money into initiatives that don’t work, won’t work this time (like Capital Gains) — rather than actually doing something to make things better?

Again, I don’t KNOW what’s behind this — is it a drive to infuse a certain political agenda or position on our young people? But I worry whenever it appears that the Federal government is overstepping its bounds.  Education is supposed to be the responsibility of the States, with support from the Federal Government, sure. But not to issue edicts from “on high” that say, “We will be addressing the young people of America at such and so time and we expect everyone to drop everything and watch.”

If this is about improving education, as the release says it is, then don’t TALK about it…DO it.  These kids are really too young to understand the speeches that are being made, but they aren’t too young to see the results of bullying, harassment, and schools that don’t have regular textbooks, never mind the fancy Kindle that is out of reach for most of the students in this country.  Actions speak louder than words — they always have. And, the action I DO see is making me uncomfortable.