Variables of Reform

I am constantly amazed to hear lay people talk about what we need to do to improve schools.  I used to laugh.  Now I cry because they have gotten themselves elected to office and they are implementing their theories.  They are doing so with no real comprehension of the complexity of schools.  Worse, the model they promote is the private sector model of competition, money motivation, accountability, choice, etc.  The problem with the private sector model is that approximately 64% of the companies in this country will fail in their first two years.  Choosing this model for student success is beyond ridiculous, it is criminal and outright stupid.  Nevertheless, they have the power to destroy public schools and have set about doing so.  But I drift.  To really improve schools and understand their complexity requires the understanding of a very simple formula, one I made up:

x + y + z = 100

The mathematically inclined will quickly recognize that the solutions to this equation are infinite.  One could choose any number at all for x.  One could then choose any number at all for y.  Once having chosen a number for x and for y, z becomes fixed if we are to have the equation equal 100.  But there remain an infinite number of solutions to this equation.

Let’s say that “x” represents a kid in public school.  Any kid.  Boy, girl, rich, poor, two parents in suburbia, homeless and orphaned, any ethnicity, any kid.  Each kid brings his or her characteristics to the classroom, whatever they may be.  Some are very bright, some not so much; some come from homes that value learning above all, some from homes that value athletics above all, and some from broken homes without any congruent values with school systems.  Some arrive ready to learn, some not.  Some arrive hungry, some not.  Some are chauffeured, some ride the bus, some walk, some drive, and some still ride a bike.  The “x” variable and the complexity of that variable are infinite.  Every single child is uniquely different. 

There cannot be a fixed number for any x.  There are two many attributes within the variable.  Put 20 x’s in a room and you have really escalated the inability to quantify x.  Way too many variables.  In a school, in a school district, in a state the mathematical implications are mind boggling.  We cannot assign a number to x.  The numbers are infinite.

Let’s say that “y” represents any teacher in public school; any teacher, elementary, secondary, male, female, experienced, or rookie.  Each teacher brings his or her characteristics to the classrooms.  Some are truly gifted.  Some are highly motivated. Some are merely compliant.  Some have deep understanding of the subjects they teach, some just superficial knowledge.  As one looks down the hall of a school and the teachers at every door one sees the infinite variables of teachers who will work with the infinite variables of students.  Teachers do this in the context of a school, where “y” expands to include community expectations, resources, administrators, curriculum, instructional support and climate.  The “y” variables are infinite in each school.  Each school and each teacher is uniquely different, and those elements combined are infinite.

There cannot be a fixed number for any y.  There are too many attributes within the variables.  Each teacher varies day-by-day, a faculty more so, an entire state is beyond comprehension.

Let’s say that “z” is the actual instructional process and program that the y’s implement for the x’s: any program, every program, CSCOPE, software and idiotware, textbooks and iPads, and on and on and on.  The other component of “z” is the context in which y and x interact.  Will it be competitive, will it be cooperative, will folks implement in good faith and good humor or under high pressure and stressful circumstances?  The z is critical.  The z is chosen.  The z is prescribed or selected.  The z is the petri dish in which all the y's and x’s interact. 

If someone outside the school mandates the value of z (programs), there is no flexibility for either x (kid) or y (teacher).  They must conform to a new limited range of attributes to make the equation work.  If someone outside the school further mandates the attributes of y, then the x’s are stuck.  They can have only one value and they must all be molded to fit that value. 

The goal of the equation is for each child, each x, to be successful.  For each child to achieve a 100, to be college ready, career ready, future ready, self-learner ready, acculturated with societal values, able to accomplish critical thinking, and to not be obese.  Currently all measured by a state standardized test.  The ludicracy (I know this is not a real word, but it should be.  Better than ludicrousy.) of this model of legislative reform, private sector reform is beyond fathomable.  It is tantamount to asking doctors to prescribe the same treatment for every patient in a context where the merit of the doctor is determined by mortality rates.  Ludicrous!  (A real word.)

That is the problem with mandates.  That is the problem with decisions being removed too far away from the school, the classroom.  That is the problem with lay people arbitrarily superimposing their philosophy and mandating a z.  The simple act of doing so does not create choice, it reduces it.  It does not promote learning, and creativity and experimentation.  The imposition of the external z fixes every other variable.  Teachers must teach to the test.  Students must place their personalities aside and learn to learn only in the ways likely to result in positive scores on the single measure.  The system is constricted, conflicted and choked while the pressure increases.  One cannot be a creative y.  One can not be a creative x.  Not if z is predetermined elsewhere.

Professional educators get this.  They know that one cannot select z until one really knows the x’s and the y’s.  Z is the instructional prescription and climate and philosophy to achieve 100.  Z cannot be chosen in Austin, Washington, or in a central office.  It must be chosen by the professional practitioners in the field.  Well, it doesn’t have to work that way as we currently observe.  It can be prescribed elsewhere and eventually parents and educators will rise up and demand that those who prescribe such uninformed barbarism cease and desist.  Thousands did so in Austin this past weekend.  Hurray!

We are close to that day, but not quite.  We still suffer from the philosophically uninformed, those who know only one philosophy and would apply it to everything save their own family and their church.  A philosophy that really has not worked all that well for a host of entrepreneurs.  So sad.

Stop mandating school reforms outside-in or top-down with no sense of the complexity of the system with which you tinker and experiment.  It is time to free the z to save the x’s and y’s.  I deeply believe that is the only way to actually achieve x=100.

Organized Abandonment

A good friend and a great reading teacher has started a blog so that her students can respond to issues, share their thoughts on line, and so that she can promote her students’ literacy through digital media.  I love it.  And, I can’t resist.  She has two prompts and I weighed in on both.  I suspect she will block me soon. 

Her most recent prompt like a rock in a pond has triggered in me layers and layers of rippled thought.  The text used as a prompt is entitled, “Don’t throw out the old, just add the new,” from the book, When Textbooks Fall Short, by Walker, Bean and Dillard (2010).  I have not read the book.  But, I disagree with the premise. 

In my opinion we in public education have never experienced the generational divide between teachers and students to the degree we feel it now.  Never.  The core educational premise has always been that students learn content and process from teachers, go on to learn more, become teachers, and return to the classroom to replicate the experience for the next generation via the same basic instructional techniques and processes by which they learned.  That is no longer true.  For the very first time, many teachers are facing a student body who know considerably more than they do, and what they do not know they can quickly find via digital technology.  And that is very scary to many teachers.  It ends the cycle that has existed for almost 200 years in this country.

Worse, teaching is a scary proposition anyway.  I shall never forget my first day to teach.  I was petrified.  I had no idea if what I had planned would last the entire period.  I did not know the kids.  I lacked confidence and experience.  I somehow got through that first day, and many, many days afterward.  About my third year of teaching I realized I had a file folder for every unit I was going to teach, I had read the textbook, I had tests, I had handouts, I was confident.  Teaching was not scary anymore, but I was complacent.  I had grown comfortable in what I was doing and all that first year fear was gone.  I did not want that fear to return so I dug in more to insist that my teaching was great and if the kids didn’t learn it was their fault because for the previous two years they had learned.  I was so wrong.  It took a kick in the butt by a great friend and colleague to show me that I was stuck and would never get better.  I had to find new ways, new strategies, and new technologies to improve my instruction.  Once I started down that path I felt some fear as I was now doing things I had never done before, but I was also excited, and my kids learned more.  I risked returning to my first year of teaching to be a better teacher by my 5^th year and even better by my 10^th year.

I quickly learned that to add new to what was already a full agenda I had to give up some old.  I heard Larry Lezotte speak about Organized Abandonment, that is, teachers and schools are either asked to do new things each year or adopt new things each year and never stop doing any of the old things.  That is an impossible task as the school year becomes so full it rapidly becomes impossible.  The only way to survive is to pick those things, no matter how sentimentally significant, that do not contribute to learning today, and quit, drop them, abandon them, throw them away.  Man, is that scary.

More so now with the incredible advances in technology.  I have often heard that it took 30 years to get the overhead projector out of bowling alleys and into classrooms.  Some teachers resisted the overhead because they were comfortable with the chalkboard.  I took a course in audio visuals as part of my teacher preparation in which I learned how to use an overhead projector, a purple ditto master duplicating machine, a filmstrip projector, a slide carousel, and a 16mm movie projector.  All of those devices are now obsolete.  If we continued to require teachers to master that technology we would be wasting our time and theirs.  We do not.  We have abandoned them.  And we are better off.  However, I suspect that our students looking at the ways we teach now are reacting as though we are still using filmstrip projectors.

There are so many exciting concepts now available to us with the technology that is already out there.  Some districts are experimenting with BYOD, or, bring your own device, where students bring smart phones, tablets, laptops to class to augment instruction.  (Meanwhile, some districts are working hard to ban such devices from students.)  Some districts are experimenting with flip instruction, where the teacher produces a digital lesson posted on line that students watch at home.  Class time is then devoted to practice, extension, and application of the lesson the students have already received.

I just read a list of the jobs most likely to become obsolete in the next few years.  Amazing.  Those jobs include switchboard operators, assembly line workers, bank tellers, toll takers, librarians and travel agents.  All this work is being replaced by more efficient technologies.  We have already seen major shifts in education.  We rarely buy dictionaries or encyclopedias or subscribe to magazines.  Textbook funds may now be used for technology and not just textbooks.  I suspect within the next few years textbooks will be obsolete.  That will only be a problem for teachers and parents who were of the generation where textbooks were sacred dogma in each class.  That is no longer true.  Once published, a textbook is immediately out of date and there is no reason to remain shackled to such a book for ten years.

We have to re-think instruction.  We have to re-think the relationship between teacher and student and content and process.  We cannot make these leaps holding on to antiquated plans, processes, and physical materials.  We must practice organized abandonment and not have someone convince us we can add the new without abandoning the old. 

We know learning does not occur without teaching.  Teaching must evolve as the learners evolve.  I do not ever want to see “teachers” on the same list as bank tellers.  We must practice organized abandonment as we develop new and dynamic digital instruction.  My friend the reading teacher is well down that road and I am proud and impressed. 

The fear can be replaced by excitement.  We will support teachers in the transition.  But we must change.  Part of that change will be to abandon old ways.  So take a moment and grieve the trashing of your old transparencies.  Then, move on to much more exciting processes.

Organized abandonment is a good thing for kids.

Bullying Educators: CSCOPE (Part 1)

As I began this story I discovered that it would be too long for one posting.  Hence, Part 1.  This part discusses CSCOPE.  Part 2 will directly address the bullying.

The easiest way to stop bullying in a school is to shine light on it.  When kids or parents report bullying, we can deal with it and stop it.  As long as bullying goes unreported it continues.  It goes unreported because the victim is fearful of the consequences of reporting.  We must create a place for kids to report harassment of any kind.  Students must know that it will stop, if reported, and there are those who will protect them.  This is no big discovery.  What is new is the bullying educators are receiving at the hands of Legislators and right wing interest groups.  Can we report this without consequence?  Do we have a safe place to do so?  Will the bullying stop?  I do not think so.  Therefore, I’m going to report a recent incident of bullying even if I get beat up.  Time to shine a little light.

My assumptions, my deeply held beliefs, are important to this accusation of bullying.  I believe an educated person can look at issues from more than one side.  I believe we have an obligation to teach our students critical thinking and the ability to look at old assumptions in a new light.  I believe that in America the most important freedom is the freedom to think, to question the government, and to express one’s thoughts without fear of retribution.  I believe that encouraging students to look at issues from both sides is not indoctrination, it is education.  I believe that anyone who opposes that in fact supports indoctrination.  I believe that anyone who opposes the beliefs outlined above is neither about education nor freedom.   

CSCOPE.  OK, we are a CSCOPE district.  For those of you who do not know, CSCOPE is a digital, web-based curriculum management program with a scope and sequence for every core subject K-12 that is aligned with the state outline of required curriculum.  It purports to map each course in a way that ensures students are best prepared for the state high stakes standardized test.  It includes sample lessons and sample unit tests.  But the core of CSCOPE is that it maps instruction aligned with the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills, or TEKS, and links those requirements vertically and horizontally.  CSCOPE is written by educators, teachers, and service center personnel.  It is used by over 800 of the 1,000 some odd, (some not), districts in Texas. 

Our decision to adopt CSCOPE was not a top-down decision.  We had a cadre of Lead Teachers who were charged with developing our own scope and sequence, our own benchmark tests.  When implemented we showed great improvement.  Then we plateaued.  We gathered our Lead Teachers and asked what do we need to do.  They said it was now too much, too complicated to keep up with the state standards and expectations.  They suggested we look at purchasing a curriculum management system rather than trying to do it ourselves.  We set up days for various vendors of such management systems to come and share their wares with our Lead Teachers.  After all the presentations and descriptions, the Lead Teachers selected CSCOPE as the most comprehensive aligned system on the market.  We then took that to the District Team, and they agreed.  We became a CSCOPE district because our lead teachers and our district-wide collaborative decision making group chose to do so.  Unlike other districts where CSCOPE may have been selected centrally, our teachers chose it after looking at the alternatives.  We had very little opposition to the implementation of CSCOPE.

However, I had a lot of concerns about CSCOPE.  I feared the elementary math was not aligned properly.  I feared that the system was so big we could not influence it.  I feared that it was an approach to “idiot proof” instruction.  I was worried the social studies took too much of a traditional approach.  I expressed all those fears to all the appropriate folks in CSCOPE.  I was not happy with all the answers, but we moved forward anyway.  We decided we would use CSCOPE for 3 years then re-assess.  It is re-assessment year.  We agreed as a group to declare the scope and sequence non-negotiable, but make the lessons optional.  We wanted to use the unit tests, but we allowed teachers to modify them.  All went fairly smoothly except for the teachers who had a tough time abandoning the sequence and lessons they had used for years, and for the teachers who were teaching the textbook.  Regardless, we had a smooth implementation.

CSCOPE has glitches.  It is not perfect.  Some content areas are non-existent or out of date.  Some of the lessons are really poor.  Regardless, it is considerably better than what we tried to produce ourselves.  It is a tool to improve instructional planning.  That is why it was chosen.

So, what is the big deal?  Evidently, in many districts a superintendent or central office staff decided to implement CSCOPE without teacher input.  The administrators decided what components would be non-negotiable without teacher input.  In those systems there has been a lot of teacher push back and resistance, understandably from my point of view.  It pitted administrators against teachers and teachers sought a variety of forums to complain about CSCOPE.  There are websites and blogs and forums where teachers in the mandatory districts constantly decry the weaknesses of CSCOPE.  Our teachers talk openly about their concerns and we pass them on to the CSCOPE managers.  Bottom line, where CSCOPE was mandatory it is resisted.  Where CSCOPE was a teacher made decision, not so much.

Regardless, we chose it.  We will evaluate it.  We have attempted to modify when needed and provide options when needed. 

But, CSCOPE just changed dramatically this past week due to right-wing complaints and political bullying.  I totally resist and resent that.  Hence, Part 2.

Bullying Educators: CSCOPE (Part 2)

As I began this story I discovered that it would be too long for one posting.  Hence, Part 1 and Part 2.  This part discusses the Bullying.  Part 1 directly addresses CSCOPE.  I will restate the basis of my thinking prior to Part 2:

The easiest way to stop bullying in a school is to shine light on it.  When kids or parents report bullying, we can deal with it and stop it.  As long as bullying goes unreported it continues.  It goes unreported because the victim is fearful of the consequences of reporting.  We must create a place for kids to report harassment of any kind.  Students must know that it will stop, if reported, and there are those who will protect them.  This is no big discovery.  What is new is the bullying educators are receiving at the hands of Legislators and right wing interest groups.  Can we report this without consequence?  Do we have a safe place to do so?  Will the bullying stop?  I do not think so.  Therefore, I’m going to report a recent incident of bullying even if I get beat up.  Time to shine a little light.

My assumptions, my deeply held beliefs, are important to this accusation of bullying.  I believe an educated person can look at issues from more than one side.  I believe we have an obligation to teach our students critical thinking and the ability to look at old assumptions in a new light.  I believe that in America the most important freedom is the freedom to think, to question the government, and to express one’s thoughts without fear of retribution.  I believe that encouraging students to look at issues from both sides is not indoctrination, it is education.  I believe that anyone who opposes that in fact supports indoctrination.  I believe that anyone who opposes the beliefs outlined above is neither about education nor freedom. 

In the Woodlands and thereabout resides a den of serious right-wing conservatives from which multiple attacks on state curriculum have been launched.  These attacks have included a demand for intelligent design juxtaposed with evolution, found indicators of communism and socialism in a wide array of text books, and complained about the new math.  I suspect there has not been a history book written that they agree with as there is very little academic support for the history they wish had happened.  Regardless, this group is always looking for something sinister that is being slowly implemented in our schools to indoctrinate our kids with thinking rather than strict adherence to dogma.  They hit a real jackpot with CSCOPE.

In testimony before the Senate Education Committee on January 31, chaired by Dan Patrick (a supporter of vouchers, charters, standardized testing, etc.) a series of witnesses attacked CSCOPE.  The Fort Worth Star Telegram summarized the complaints by saying, “A string of witnesses before the Senate Education Committee criticized the program for promoting liberal values they said are anti-Christian at best and openly socialist at worst.”  Witnesses also complained that the content of CSCOPE was secret (as is all other proprietary software sold in this state.)  Sadly, one of our teachers circulated this article via email to everyone in the system as though it were gospel and as though it came from a reliable source.  The criticism came from the Woodlands.  Dan Patrick is from the Woodlands.

Shortly after the Senate Hearing on February 6, CSCOPE issued a press release defining the system and the process of developing the system.  They categorically said they did not promote Islam, they did not say the Boston Tea Party was an act of terrorists, etc.  They gave examples from the curriculum to show that these attacks were in the same vein as earlier attacks for years and years on textbooks.  CSCOPE also said they were working on a strategy to make materials available to the public.

I assumed all was well, the waters were growing calm, and the nuts were headed back to the Woodlands.  Not so.  On February 8^th I received a letter on Dan Patrick’s stationary announcing “Sweeping Changes” to CSCOPE including opening lesson content to the public and ending CSCOPE’s non-profit status which it had because it was produced by service centers.  (CSCOPE just got very expensive.)

Wow!  I am not saying that some of these changes may improve CSCOPE.  What I am saying is that a Senator has taken it on himself to change the operational procedures of a widely used curriculum management tool.  He did so because he heard crack pot testimony.  I can think of nothing scarier than a Senator taking over our curriculum management procedures.  I am amazed that CSCOPE agreed to this, especially after I read their press release on February 6.

And then I got it.  CSCOPE got bullied.  The professional educators who develop CSCOPE and the governing body of CSCOPE were somehow convinced to change their posture in a matter of 2 days.  I do not believe this change occurred due to some epiphany.  I believe it occurred via the wielding of political clout and threats.

I do not love CSCOPE.  I see flaws.  I have some problems with it.  But “dad gum it,” let the educators work this out free of political ploy and right-wing propaganda.  To find that the rules for an internal curriculum management system developed, supported, and improved by Regional Service Centers has been forced to change operational procedures by a Senator, horrifies me.  I feel bullied.

I feel bullied when we cut the state budget for education at the same time we raise the budget for Pearson, the test maker.  I feel bullied when the state promotes charter schools.  I feel bullied when the state mandates the entire curriculum we teach.  I feel bullied that I am held accountable for the outcomes on a test that none of us have seen.  I feel bullied every time another local decision is removed from districts to reside in Austin in the hands of non-educators.  In other words, this is not the first time I’ve had my lunch stolen.

There is no safe place for me to report this.  There are no procedures to investigate and interrupt this bullying process.  The dialog is held within the political confines of one perspective.  Every other perspective is deemed worthless. 

If Senator Patrick reads this, or Commissioner Williams, or Governor Perry then I will get beat up after school.  I hope it is not Perry.  He has a concealed handgun. 

Regardless, I hope I have shined a little light.

We Need a New Penal Code

I am thrilled that Judge Dietz ruled that our current process of funding public schools is unconstitutional.  He declared the system “Inadequate, inequitable and that it constitutes a state property tax.”  Even more impressive was the story the judge told about playing chess in the valley and how that relates to public school funding.  Bottom line, education costs money but ignorance costs more money. You can read his comments here: 

http://www.tasanet.org/sites/tasa/files/gr/2013/dietz-comments.pdf

Edna ISD was a party to this suit, so we are on the winning side.  We sued the state of Texas to prove that the school finance system was unconstitutional.  We won!  But, it is not over yet.  The state, who lost, will appeal, and then the Supreme Court of Texas will have to rule.  The Legislature is currently in session and they have an excuse now to do nothing but wait for the court to tell them what they must do.  Even so, I should be happy.  As I think about it, however, I am not happy.

It is incredibly sad that school districts must ban together to sue their own state to get adequate and equitable funding.  It is incredibly sad that a state judge looks at our school finance system and rules that it is unconstitutional.  The current finance system was put in place after the court ruled in 2005 that the system was unconstitutional.  In 2006 the Legislature created our current system which we now know to be unconstitutional.  The judge highlights that it is unreasonable to raise standards and increase the rigor of the tests while reducing state money.  I totally agree.  And it is incredibly sad that our Legislature did just that.

We elect these people to go to Austin and make decisions that will benefit our citizens and our state.  They have not done so.  And I wonder what the consequences are.  Clearly, if a felony was committed there would be prison time; if a misdemeanor were committed there would be jail time and/or a fine.  But what if the law that was broken was the very constitution that gives the Legislature the authority to do anything in the first place?  Is there a higher law in Texas than our Constitution?  And yet for years and years our elected officials broke the Constitution and are getting away with it.  We would not tolerate it if they broke campaign finance laws, the selling of influence, etc., etc.  Why do we tolerate this?

We need a new Penal Code.  Anyone who in whole or in part agrees to violate any clause in the Constitution of the State of Texas is removed from office immediately and is required to teach in a public school system of Texas for a period not less than five years. 

That would send our Governor, Lieutenant Governor, and most of the Senate and most of the House to our schools to do some real work in behalf of the kids of Texas while empowering our remaining elected officials to do not only what is right, but what is constitutional.