I love you but I won't hire you

I love you but I won’t hire you

Here is the truth.   Lots of businesses will generously donate to a charity that supports people with disabilities.   Some are even extremely generous.   And that is wonderful, especially if you are an organization that is providing service to children or adults with disabilities.

 Here is another truth.  People with disabilities are among the most unemployed and underemployed people in our country.  Why is that?

We live in a capitalist country.   Almost all businesses are operating to make money- no surprise there.  Even non-profits are in business to make money, just not necessarily big profits.  

Businesses that serve the public want to put a “pretty face” to their business.  They do not want someone representing their business that might make a customer feel uncomfortable.  So if the business depends on customer interaction, people who look differently- whether it is a hair style, piercings or facial traits that might indicate a disability- are generally not sought after as employees.

Then there is the issue of how much ability does someone need to have to work in my business.  Most business owners think it takes a lot more ability to do the work of the business than it actually takes.  So it is hard for them to believe that someone with a disability could do the job.   They also don’t want to be involved with government regulations that might protect people with disabilities but that aren’t there for plain workers.

Many employers worry that people with disabilities will not have the stamina to work a full schedule or they will be sick a lot driving up heath care rates.   In fact, people with disabilities are very grateful for their jobs so they usually have better attendance.  And data show that they are no more often sick than their counterparts.

So what is the solution?   Mostly the solution is in proper training of people with disabilities.  We need to make sure that people with disabilities do not grow into adulthood with a sense of entitlement that “people will understand I have a disability”.  Mostly they won’t.  And if they do “understand” it is less likely that they will employ you.  Additionally, we need to help people with disabilities develop the stamina to work full or part-time.  We need to make sure the soft job skills are in place.   As professional educators we can do this, but it is not easy.  Our job is to teach employers, “you don’t need to love me, you need to give me a chance at a job”.  You will be pleased and maybe surprised at how well I do.

Oh NO! Not Common Sense

Oh NO!  Not Common Sense!

For years we have been fed the fantasy that higher test scores mean a better school.  We have also been told that we need to have research based methodology for everything.  Here comes some research that a lot of these “raise standards, raise test scores” folks are going to have to explain away.

In a large study of over 150,000 students in every one of Chicago’s public high schools, research has found that students from schools that build social-emotional qualities do better than schools with high test scores.  How can that be?

The researchers found that the kids who went to schools that taught the ability to resolve conflicts, the motivation to work hard, and to have empathy are getting better both short-term and long-term results than schools with high test scores.  Specifically, schools that made a point to develop these so-called soft skills had students with higher grades, fewer absences and fewer discipline problems.  Later, students who attended these high schools went on to college at higher rates.   They even graduated at higher rates.

This is good research.  The findings were presented at the conference of the National Center for Longitudinal Data in Research Education, an organization noted for its significant follow-up research and credibility.  

Data were gathered by the researchers by interviewing students individually and through some survey data.  Data were collected at 9^th grade and again in the final year of high school.  Students who went to schools that were good at developing soft skills had higher grades, better attendance and fewer disciplinary incidents.  They also had higher graduation rates and were more likely to attend college.

We sometimes are afraid of terms like “social-emotional” skills but we will probably see “grit” as becoming a goal for educational facilities.  And that is not a bad idea.  Into each life a little rain will fall, and if we can prepare our students to persevere, they are more likely to be successful regardless of their endeavors.  The schools with the higher social emotional scores from students did not follow a particular curriculum.  Instead, they were staffed by adults who treated students with respect, fostered a sense of community and encouraged everyone to work hard regardless of academic skill level.

Oh, please do tell me that this teacher skill set will replace the demands for higher test scores.

So which is it?

So Which Is it?

The supporters of the tax increase to pay for the Kirwan Commission’s recommendations will tell you that education in Maryland is really struggling and that we need to make this 32-billion dollar investment right now to save our educational system.   But USA Today has ranked Maryland’s educational system as the 6^th best overall among the 50 states.  Some people will tell you Maryland needs to spend more money, but we are already spending $500 more per student than are most states and we are 9^th overall among the states.

On the other hand, we have spent a huge amount of money on high stake tests and on the Common Core standards, but achievement on those tests has not really moved up in the last several decades.  So what is that money being used for?

The United States ranks 9^th among first world countries in reading but 31^st of 79 in math.   It is being suggested that one of the reasons for this fall in math abilities is the “geometry sandwich” where kids have algebra 1 in 9^th grade, geometry in 10^th and then algebra 2 in 11^th grade.   Math experts say this is the wrong way to teach mathematics.  That these are not separate and distinct areas and that instead we should teach math 9, 10 and 11 and integrate all 3 of the foregoing courses as they are actually used in mathematics.  School districts in the U.S. who have tried this new approach have found that the number of students needing remedial algebra in college has dropped from almost 80% to only 8%.   Sounds like something that makes sense.

The high school graduation rate in Maryland is 87.6%.  That number is 12^th in the nation.  But it is falling.  It has now dropped to 86.9%.   Some school systems are blaming the decline on tougher graduation requirements including the Algebra 1 PARCC assessment.   Perhaps that is why the Maryland State Board of Education recently passed on raising the requirement from a scaled score of 3 (current standard) to a scaled score of 4, the standard Maryland was supposed to move to for the 2021 graduating class.   The graduation rate for students with disabilities was down nearly three percentage points to 63.5%.   The overall dropout rate for all students remained at 8.8% for both 2018 and 2019.

What is going on with education in Maryland?   Are we in dire need of a huge infusion of cash to improve?  Not according to USA Today.   Are kids dropping out because we aren’t offering appropriate programming?  Not according to the basically stable dropout rate.   Are students not graduating because the tests that were supposed to raise the standards are causing students not to graduate?  

It is no wonder folks are so confused and wonder why they should throw more money at education.  If only we could figure out what has become of the money the state with the highest median income in the country has already spent.  The message is confusing.

Why do you go to school?

Why do you go to school?

At age 26, most people have spent half of their lifetimes in school.   That is long-term confinement that doesn't even include post-secondary education. What is the point?  Originally, education was provided at public expense because the idea was that a democracy needed an educated electorate.   That idea has long since gone by the wayside.  Just over 30% of eligible voters vote and the majority of citizens can’t pass the knowledge test about government that new citizens are expected to pass.  So what is the point?

It is certainly high quality, if expensive, babysitting.   But what do the taxpayers expect to get out of the significant investment in the child’s time and the citizen’s money.

There has been a great deal of talk recently about improving standards, although what that means depends a great deal on whom you ask.  Some very forward thinking local superintendents from around the country are asking and answering that question in very different ways.   In Maryland raising standards seems to relate to how many students go on to college.  Few people bother to look at how many of those who start college actually finish with a degree and if they do, can they earn a living with that degree.

In Hamilton County Tennessee, the new superintendent is asking a different question.  He wants to know who is hiring in the area, what kinds of skills are employers looking to hire, and how many of those skills can kids garner while still in high school.   He calls his program “future ready institutes”.   These are schools within schools.  He is working on future readiness and determining what jobs require skill sets that can be achieved in high school or with just short term training and which need an associate or bachelor’s degree. He is matching those skill sets to what is needed in his geographic area so that graduates will be job ready or post-secondary ready when they graduate.  The attentiveness here is that kids are trained not just for jobs that are available but also that pay well.   It is also noteworthy that programs are individualized for kids so that not all college bound students take the same academic coursework.  Whether they take advanced mathematics, foreign language or more science depends on their career goals and talents not on some “expert” deciding what needs to happen to raise standards.

 At the local level in Maryland, the Kirwan Commission report is suggesting that there needs to be a career component in public school education.  The Commission is right about that.  What they are wrong about is pre-determining that these career training programs are only going to be for students who are academically competent.   There are lots of ways people can be competent and they aren’t all in the academic areas.   Someone needs to rethink exactly why it is we go to school today.

Want to spend a few billion?

Want to spend a few billion?

Marylanders are being asked to commit billions of dollars to improving education by a plan recommended by the Kirwan Commission.  It is still not clear where the legislature will get the money or even if they will.   Maryland is already one of the top states in the country when it comes to quality education.  Teachers are among the most highly paid with average salaries well above 50K.  Kirwan would start teachers at sixty thousand.  It has been estimated that the 3 billion dollar cost for Kirwan is just for the first year.  In ten years Kirwan could cost over 31 BILLION dollars.   Oh what fun it would be to spend that money on areas that really could do some good.

One might ask, is there a better way to spend all of that hard earned taxpayer money?   There just might be.   Here are a few thoughts.

First of all instead of throwing good money after poor teachers, why not use those dollars to hire more school social workers.   Or suppose we make schools into community centers.  In distressed neighborhoods, schools could be staffed after school with homework helpers, remedial teachers, athletic coaches, community organizers and even health clinic workers.  Kids could stay in-school and out of trouble.  

Families could go to schools to get advice on community services.  Government could have reps at a school once a week to guide families through all the available options to them.  Health care services could teach and provide reproductive health advice and supplies and how to avoid unwanted pregnancies.

We could help people not just get jobs but get TO jobs.  Right now mass-transit takes people from the hubcap of the wheel out to the rim.  But if you need to cross from one spoke to another, people need to go back to the hubcap and then out on another spoke.   This situation can make a 20 minute car ride take two hours by mass transit.  If you are in a low wage job and using mass transit your day is now twelve hours long.  Why not use some of those billions to create cross spoke mass transit routes to get people from the city out to the rim of the wheel where there are lots of jobs going begging.

Kids and young adults who are pushing drugs already get how capitalism works.  Why not teach them how to run a legit business that isn’t killing the community.  They are good at what they do, they just need a better product.

Kirwan is offering education for three and four year olds.  That is great.  But the cost of infant care is keeping lots of women out of the work force, including women earning professional salaries.    Some of those billions could go toward lower cost infant care.  Some of the women with infants could be trained to help provide the infant care. 

Maryland is already doing a good job with education.  And, while granted, it would be great to get even better education, there are many areas besides education that would support getting the benefit from the education we do provide.

If there are a few extra billions lying around we could throw that good money after some other problems.

Teaching Has Changed

Teaching has Changed

Teaching has changed in the last ten years and not necessarily for the better.    Back in 2010, there were states that were adding a “pay for performance” policy whereby teachers received an increase in salary if students did well on exams.  Or, a significant consequence if they didn’t.  After several prominent cheating scandals by teachers and upper level administrators those policies have largely fallen out of favor.

Teen suicide rates have increased dramatically in the last 10 years.  Social media usage has led to an increase in cyberbullying and teachers are expected to intervene in those situations.  The opioid epidemic has taken its toll on school communities as it has the rest of the country.

How to respond to the horrific school shootings in Sandy Hook, Connecticut and Parkland, Florida have fostered serious debate.  Active shooter drills have become ubiquitous and there is disagreement over whether these incite or reduce anxiety.  Some states have addressed the issue by allowing teachers to carry guns.  On the other side of the equation, teacher unions have come out against the active shooter drills as fostering anxiety and in some cases chaos.

Regardless of why, there has been a confluence of events which have led to fewer people enrolling in colleges of education creating persistent teacher shortages.  Most recently teacher strikes have happened again, leading some teachers to run for public office and thereby gaining the political control for themselves.  

Of all the changes, the increased testing and teachers being held accountable for test scores rather than the students themselves have created a sense of insecurity among teachers.   One college professor has said, “Once you make a person’s livelihood dependent on the success of someone she’s trying to help succeed, it changes the focus of what we are trying to do.”

In 2009, only 15 states required student-growth data in teacher evaluations.  By 2015, there were 43 states that required student test score data as part of the teacher evaluation.  That situation was partly due to the financial incentive to school systems offered by the Obama administration.  But after 2015, states moved back from that posture.  The financial incentive ended and the Every Student Succeeds Act stripped the power to determine how states grade their teachers from the U.S. Secretary of Education.  At the same time states began to receive backlash from their constituents.  The number of states linking student test scores to teacher evaluation has now dropped back to 34.

Not only has teaching begun to feel more rigid to teachers, but the public opinion of the teaching profession has also taken a hit.  In 2009, 70% of families said they would like their child to become a public school teacher.   By 2018, that percentage has dropped back to 46%.   Families cite inadequate pay and benefits, student behavior, lack of discipline and the feeling that teaching is a thankless job.  To make matters worse, a full 50% of teachers responded to a poll indicating that in the last couple of years they have seriously considered leaving the profession.

School children need quality and committed teachers in the classroom.   Over the last ten years teaching has changed, and not for the better.

Whatever Old is New Again

Whatever is old is new again!

Long ago and far away we had a program for students who were not interested in going to college or whose talents were more in the trade areas than the academic ones.   These students were taught in beautiful modern facilities by people who were experienced and licensed in the trade areas they taught.   They did not have college degrees but did receive a short training program to add the skill of teaching to the trade skill.  This program worked very well for many years providing excellent entry level skills to students ensuring that they would be able to earn a solid middle class living as people licensed in the area .

But along came standards and progress.   In the mid-60’s, it was decided by people who had never worked a trade job in their lives, that the teachers should all have bachelor degrees.   Within in months of these new teachers hitting the vocational areas, tools were put away, text books came out and there were written tests instead of practical ones.

Then in the interest of full democracy, it was decided that everyone like it or not, needed to go to college.  So these programs gradually shriveled up with limited support.

Now we have the Kirwan Commission which is strongly advocating for a career technology program that would parallel the college preparatory program.  My GOODNESS!   It is a wonder no one thought of that before!  Oh wait they have.  But these new programs will have entry level exams.  Supporters say the entry standards are necessary because the career path should not be mistaken for the shop classes of the past designed for students who struggled academically.   So it is wrong to have alternative programs for kids who struggle academically?  Instead these career programs are for “competent” students who want to graduate from high school with marketable skills but haven’t decided if they want to go to college or not.   Can’t we just admit that there are human beings who are not academically talented but whose skills lie elsewhere?

Critics argue that these students will not make as much money as a college graduate over his/her lifetime.   The situation is that only about 39% of people entering a 4-year college graduate in 6 years.   What is the lifetime earning ability of a college drop-out who has limited saleable skills?   Those kids who are plumbers, electricians, auto mechanics, video editors, computer technicians and networkers and/or appliance repair people will be earning a good living.  Probably a lot better than the 61% who dropped out of college.  Sometimes the old ways of doing things were working just fine until they were fixed.