How much do you expect of me?

How much do you expect of me?

Teachers are human beings.  No surprise there.   Most teachers like their work and enjoy the interactions with the students and colleagues.  So why are so many teachers leaving the field within the first few years?  Teachers are happy to tell us why but those in authority just do not listen.

The Center on Education Policy did a poll across the country.  What it found was that teachers are growing weary of the continuing demands being placed on them and their inability to have their voices heard.  In fact 94% of those surveyed said their voices were not taken into account on the state or national level.  They felt there was a hypocrisy at work.  Teachers are expected to differentiate their teaching in the classroom.  They are repeatedly told, one size does not fit all.  But when it comes to the standardized testing requirements, all students take the same test.  A majority of teachers feel students spend too much time taking these tests and preparing for them.  There have been strikes and sick-outs in some of the nation’s largest school districts, Chicago, Detroit and even in higher education in the University System of Pennsylvania.  The later strike has put over 100,000 of higher education students out of school.

Given the way the teachers feel, it is hugely to their credit that many are still in the classroom.  Why is that?

Teachers who stay will tell you they love the work and the kids.  They love being part of making a child’s future.  Many have probably read Robert Fulghum’s “All I ever really needed to know I learned in kindergarten”.  They have learned to hold hands and stick together, with their colleagues and with their students.  They have tried to live a balanced life.  They have tried to keep their eyes on what really counts day-to-day in what they do.  Some of the older teachers remember the first words that Dick and Jane taught them:  Look, Look.  They have tried to keep that sense of wonder that comes from teaching children as you participate in the learning and that thrilling feeling when a child “gets it”.

Another lesson we learned in kindergarten is to clean up our own messes.  If we were smart we would turn the problem of teacher retention over to the teachers.  I’ll bet they could figure it out.  They know how much should be expected of them and they would give the children even more.

How Much is Good Enough?

How much is good enough?

Ever since 1975 children with disabilities have been promised a free, appropriate public education (FAPE).  The question is, what exactly does that mean?  The courts have pretty much decided that free means at no cost to the parents.  Therefore, schools cannot charge back to a parent’s health care policy the cost of related services such as speech or occupational therapy that might look like a health care cost that is covered by the parent’s health care insurance.  In doing the charge back, the parent’s benefits under that policy could be diminished; thereby, incurring a cost to the parent.

One of the bigger issues has been, what exactly equals appropriate.  There is no question but that is a kind of wishy washy word.   One parent’s appropriate is one school system’s over the top expectation.  Consequently, parents have done what Americans always do, they have gone to court.  The courts have all agreed that to be appropriate the child must receive educational benefit from the education.

However, even the courts cannot agree on what exactly is educational benefit. 

In Endrew vs. Douglas County School District, the Justices of the Supreme Court have agreed to take up this very question.  The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10^th Circuit, in Denver, ruled last year that a Colorado student with autism had received “some educational benefit” from his Individual Education Plan (IEP) before his parents withdrew him over a dispute with the school district.  However, at least one other federal appeals court has adopted a standard requiring that the IEP provide a “meaningful benefit” in order to provide FAPE.  Of course, meaningful is not exactly measurable either but it does give parents some leverage over the word "some" that could mean anything at all.

The Obama administration has said that the interpretation of the 10^th Circuit is out of synch with the text, structure and purpose of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).    Now it will be up to the Supreme Court to decide.  The Court is working with only eight Justices so that will also have a bearing on the outcome.

If the Court decides to go with the higher standard, many school districts across the country are going to be impacted.  One of the criteria for children receiving paid tuition in non-public approved schools is the failure of the local school district to deliver FAPE.   If the Court comes down on the side of “some” a lot of kids are going to be shortchanged.  But if the Court goes in the other direction, good enough will also need to be meaningful.

Guilt by Color

Guilt by Color

You know I am getting a bit tired of the drumbeat that has been going on for multiple years.  If you are African-American you are ipso facto, low achieving and need lots of special help to reach grade level.   Sure that is true of some African American students.  And it is also true that some Asian students are bad in math.  The assumption that African American students is synonymous with low achievement isn’t just low expectations, it is NO expectations.  These are the worst kind of stereotypes masquerading as caring educators.

Let’s look at a couple of cases on point.  A recent article in Education Week discussed the dangers of the Every Student Succeeds Act because it does not disaggregate data in such a way that the scores of African American students are pulled out for separate analysis.  The article cites a school that is now majority minority.  In order to have the school maintain its reputation as a top quality school, “the principal has asked staff to help all students but with a special emphasis on low-income students and those of color.”  REALLY!   So we know that all the African American students are going to need special academic assistance.  How do we know that?  Are ALL the African American students in the school having academic challenges?   Why am I thinking that a number of those kids with darker skin are doing just fine academically. 

Another school, this one in Maryland, has also become majority minority.  That principal is cited as being proactive to narrow the achievement gap between “all students and African American students.”  So in this case, the high achieving African American students are included in the “all students” numbers and contributing to the gap. 

Wouldn’t it make much better sense to concentrate on low-achieving students?  What if schools looked at the lowest achieving 20-25% of ALL students and concentrate remediation on those kids.  Could be that there might even be some white, Asian or who knows what color kids among that group.

There are lots of branded named programs out there that would make a marketing company proud. These companies are marketing their programs to help schools serve African American kids.  This behavior is one of the basest forms of insults to minority kids.

Wouldn’t it make better sense to look at the freshman class and identify,  regardless of ethnicity and socio-economic status, the lowest performing quartile and concentrate special recovery efforts on them? It might indeed turn out that a disproportionate number of that group is of a particular race or socio-economic status.  So be it.  But at least the kids in the remedial group would have earned their place by needing remediation- not by their color or economic status.