Lessons for Colorado Schools

Here is a follow-up on last week's commentary about the paranoia of school administrators in the nation's schools.

Let's talk again about genuine reform in education that can lead to real learning, not just 'testable' learning.

This past Sunday there were several letters-to-the-editor in the Denver Post in response to a couple of August 19, Perspective articles: "New schools, stronger leaders, more autonomy" and "Break the inertia with drastic measures". One letter in particular caught my attention; it is not online, so here it is:

Denver Post, Sunday, August 26, 2007

Reforming schools is challenging. Multiple innovations directed at the district, the curriculum, the test, the length of the school year, the community, etc., can make a difference. What makes the greatest difference, however, is the quality of teaching in classrooms.

Quality teaching occurs when teachers and principals engage in daily, collaborative, rigorous, professional learning focused on the learning needs of students in their classrooms and schools as part of their work day. Increasing student academic achievement and keeping students in school through graduation requires that teachers and principals work together, learn together and solve problems of practice together. Given the chance, professionals in schools can solve any problem they face if the conditions are right.

The conditions are simple. First, the school day allows for time for professionals to learn and work together to deepen pedagogy, plan instruction, examine student work, address different student learning needs, clarify student learning outcomes, and use the results of frequent classroom assessments to modify instruction. Secondly, everyone assuems collective responsibility for student and teacher success. Thirdly, teachers and principals have the know-how to work together. Collaborative learning is the hallmark of a professional and the major contributor to student results.

Joellen Killion
Deputy Executive Director
National Staff Development Council
Arvada

What? Have you ever heard such gobbldeygook? Go ahead and take a look at the National Staff Development Council web site, this page, for instance, 'Designs and Strategies'. You begin to understand why public education in the United States in in a state of paralysis after you try and decipher what these educrats are actually not talking about.

You also begin to understand from the above letter, along with the implementation of 'No Child Left Behind' and the hundreds and hundreds of state and federally mandated curriculum programs, why teachers are finding all kinds of reasons to leave the profession, as the New York Times article below reports.

What they are not discussing is the apparent success of a school like Cesar Chavez Academy in Pueblo -- it is the topic of David Harsanyi's column Monday in the Denver Post (link and excerpt below). Now, I am all in favor or collective bargaining and support teachers unions ... Harsanyi implies that it is the concept of the union itself that is the problem, I disagree, unions are important to keeping middle class salaries and benefits for teachers in Bush's low wage NAFTA America. However, if the union is fighting teaching innovations like the ones used at a school like Cesar Chavez, then it is wrong and the union needs to get back to workplace issues and get out of the educational philosophy field.

Here is the 'About' page for Cesar Chavez Academy. Note:

The Core Knowledge curriculum, a demanding world knowledge scope and sequence system developed by E.D. Hirsch, will serve as the basis for subject area studies. The Insights curriculum and Investigations Everyday Math, developed by the National Science Foundation and the Educational Development Corporation, will supplement the Core Knowledge curriculum.

Well, there it is.

My support for the basic idea behind 'core knowledge' makes some of my more liberal, politcally correct friends uncomfortable. But I think there is plenty of room for diversity and inclusion inside 'core knowledge'. And, in fact, this curriculum is inclusive and multicultural, as the answers to these 'Frequently Asked Questions' demonstrate.

The broader point is that we are seeing an increasingly stultified educational bureacracy, increasing top-down administration, more and more creativity taken away from teachers -- resulting in more unsatisfactory results, ie., children not acquiring important knowlege and learning skills.

It is time for big changes in our education system in this nation ... and we cannot let the whine of "more money" become the supreme theme under which all other reforms must be subservient.

Link: With Turnover High, Schools Fight for Teachers | New York Times

The retirement of thousands of baby boomer teachers coupled with the departure of younger teachers frustrated by the stress of working in low-performing schools is fueling a crisis in teacher turnover that is costing school districts substantial amounts of money as they scramble to fill their ranks for the fall term. ...

... “The problem is not mainly with retirement,” said Thomas G. Carroll, the president of the National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future. “Our teacher preparation system can accommodate the retirement rate. The problem is that our schools are like a bucket with holes in the bottom, and we keep pouring in teachers.”

The commission has calculated that these days nearly a third of all new teachers leave the profession after just three years, and that after five years almost half are gone — a higher turnover rate than in the past.

All the coming and going of young teachers is tremendously disruptive, especially to schools in poor neighborhoods where teacher turnover is highest and students’ needs are greatest.

According to the most recent Department of Education statistics available, about 269,000 of the nation’s 3.2 million public school teachers, or 8.4 percent, quit the field in the 2003-4 school year. Thirty percent of them retired, and 56 percent said they left to pursue another career or because they were dissatisfied.

The federal No Child Left Behind law requires schools and districts to put a qualified teacher in every classroom. The law has led districts to focus more seriously on staffing its low-performing schools, educators said, but it does not appear to have helped persuade veteran teachers to continue their service in them. ...

Link: Charter School Merits Imitation, Not Resentment | David Harsanyi/Denver Post

When Cesar Chavez Academy opened its doors seven years ago, enrollment was 240. Today the number stands at 1,100.

Other things have changed as well. These students - most of whom are Latino kids from low-income neighborhoods - are now some of the highest achievers in the entire state.

Lawrence Hernandez, founder of the school, says 3,000 students are on the waiting list to attend.

That there's a single kid on that waiting list is a travesty.

The U.S. Department of Education will honor Cesar Chavez Academy for its success in closing the achievement gap among Latino students.

The school was one of six charter schools nationwide to be recognized. It was one of only two picked to be featured in a documentary about successful schools to air nationwide Sept. 18 on PBS.

In Colorado, Cesar Chavez already has a sterling reputation. High marks come from nearly every corner of the educational establishment. Incredibly, this success comes, according to Hernandez, by operating with 40 percent less money per student (after paying for their own building and other expenses) than the typical public school does.

With all this success, one wonders why Cesar Chavez Academy, and similar schools, are constantly struggling to overcome barriers laid in their way by local and state governments. ... MORE