I am so sick of writing about health care (goddam that Dennis Kucinich!) that I could spit. But, Obama has taken up another issue that has the potential to make my head explode, reassemble and explode again: education reform.
Disclosure: I am a public school teacher, teachers' union member and have been involved in one form or another of education reform for my entire career. I teach in a state that has among the highest academic standards, and toughest standards-based assessments in the nation; by most measures in the top three. My students take a very rigorous test in the spring to judge their learning, and my job performance.
I teach in a school that usually measures 80 - 85% poverty (based on qualification for free or reduced priced meals), has a high population of English as a second language students, and a 25% migrant student population. We are just under 50% white, just over Hispanic.
Based on that, you can probably guess that we score low on standardized tests. And we have. NCLB (No Child Left Behind) has been a disaster for my school, and the district I work in. NCLB has done one good thing - it has forced public schools, and frankly, members of my profession, to pay serious attention to the achievement gap separating white and non-white students. But it did so with an unfunded mandate, laden with draconian penalties, and with the intent of destroying public education and turning all that state money over to the private sector. The testing industry alone rose from under 300 million dollars per year before NCLB, to over one billion dollars per year now.
When I voted to elect President Obama, I had high hopes for positive reform to NCLB. However, Obama's first speeches on education left me with a bad taste in my mouth. I have blogged before about the Race to the Top grants, and how they punish teachers, weaken collective bargaining and resegragate the public schools. He seems so ready to throw my union under the school bus that I listened to the last few day's proposals with a grim face.
I must say though, I have a little bit of hope. Although his proposals still contain objectionable items that I will fight against, he had some good proposals too. And, I liked the way he framed the educational mission of America. He is bringing a 21st century vision to education with his recent statements.
Obama has called for a change in the goal of K-12 education. He stated that the goal should not be to "graduate," but to be prepared for college and career. The question for students changes from "are you going to graduate?" to "are you ready for a career, or for higher education?" Achieving credits for an end goal of a diploma, often based on state-mandated, rote recitation of facts disengages students. Careers and college as the stated goal, and focus of the system leads to much more student interest and choice, thus higher engagement with their academic progress.
He has also called for states to have more flexible, though not less rigorous, standards. And, he has called for judging progress by measuring growth, not rigid, standards-based tests on a given date. This is good for students, teachers and the school districts.
As a teacher of many migrant students, a fair number of my students miss chunks of the school year traveling back and forth to other states, or to Mexico. By the time they see me in middle school, this can add up to a year or more of missed instruction. Sometimes considerably more. To expect a 14 year old who enters 8th grade reading at fourth grade level to pass an 8th grade reading test in the spring is quite a stretch. Many will fall short of the standard. But, not too far short. With effort, we can regularly gain two and sometimes three years growth, and the students should be praised for that, not labeled by the school and the state as failures.
At my school, we have implemented more testing, but shorter assessments at regular intervals. We have also involved the students in monitoring their own growth, and setting their own academic goals. They take some ownership in the testing, and the results now. It is not some onerous thing dropped on them by state bureaucrats, but a measurement tool that is meaningful to them, as well as the school.
So, I like this direction. But, if this talk is not backed by cash money, it is all for naught.
We have state mandates, along with the federal ones. One mandate is how reading should be taught to students in various levels, based on testing. Our student population, according to the state's rules, and based on our students' test scores, should have three times the language arts teachers that we do. Our building would need at least four more classrooms too. And this is not ambiguous, the math is easy to do. And speaking of math, our test scores call for an additional seven math teachers - based on the states rules. But the state also gives us our money. We are definetly NOT funded for an additional 13 teachers. In fact, due to the poor economy, we will lose a teacher next year.
My state has researched best teaching practice, and determined what we need to do. But the state doesn't even come close to funding it. So, where does that leave us?
Unfortunately, it leaves us fighting or the dollars. And one proposal that Obama has not let go of is to go after the teachers unions. Teachers' unions are NOT the enemy of education. They are the mechanism by which teachers fight for a decent standard of living. Tight fiscal times is when we need our unions the most, and this is precisely when Obama is trying to weaken them.
Are there "bad" teachers? Sure. But this is like saying we can fix health care by getting rid of bad doctors. We know the problem is bigger, but it is easy to dump on people who are not powerful individually (in the political sense). Just ask the air traffic controllers. We only have power collectively, and that power is in danger of being taken away by a Democratic president.
And then we come to charter schools. They come up in every speech Obama makes on education. Can charter schools be innovative approaches to education? Of course they can. And they can be very effective at serving their students and families. So, what's the harm?
First, not every innovation works out. Some charter schools are a waste of time. But even if they are great, the real harm comes to the rest of the system. Charter schools cherry-pick supportive families and enthusiastic students from the rest of the buildings in a school district.
Those families who would be serving on PTA boards and other parent groups, who would be fundraising (yes, public schools do LOTS of fundraising) and volunteering their time in all the buildings across a school district become concentrated in one place. This leaves the struggling schools with even less community support when they need it the most.
But I could even live with that. Part of our job is to engage parents and the community. Public schools already compete with one another, where they can, for volunteers and community support. But what we can't do is say "no" to failing students. Every charter school I have ever researched does just that.
Charter schools that I have read about, visited, watched videos on or heard presentations from are opt-in programs. Students and parents sign a contract based on academic effort and behavior standards. Students who fail to do their work, or who disrupt class can be exited from the charter school. And since schools are judged on test scores, students who threaten this bottom line are kicked out.
And where do they go? To the school where I teach at. Because, even though we implement plenty of innovative programs, we do not have the charter school label. We are a public school, dammit, and don't say no to anyone! Of course, the law says we can't say no unless there is another free, public funded education program to send the student to.
So, one school gets to choose students and families based on their internal standards and ideals, and the other, by law, takes the community it serves without exception. And then, the two are judged side by side, based on a single annual assessment. Gee, I wonder which school looks more effective?
I say that schools should be freed up to try innovative programs, but ones that will help the communities they serve, not ones that attract already motivated students and families from around a school district. I am not against innovation, I am against the current charter school model. Obama does not make this distinction.
Let unions do what they are supposed to do - protect workers' rights, and let schools innovate on an equal playing field, and I'm in. I could gripe about other aspects, like grant-based funding, but hey, at least it's federal cash going where it is desperately needed.
C'mon Obama, don't "health care" education reform.
