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DRUG TESTING...WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR-
NOT CURBING DRUG USE
Apparently, when it comes to drugs, testing is incapable of creating
the desired action in teen athletes -- just like constant testing in
math and reading hasn't exactly affected student achievement the way
some would hope. In fact, not only does random testing not do a
reliable job of keeping student-athletes from using drugs, but the
mere presence of drug testing actually increases some risk factors
for future substance abuse. The findings are part of a study done at
Oregon Health & Science University’s, which is the first-ever
prospective randomized clinical trial to assess the deterrent
effects of drug and alcohol testing among high school athletes. The
study notes that while drug testing did not appear to reduce sport
participation, it also did not reduce past 30-day drug use or a
combination of drug and alcohol use. Further, according to
researchers, drug testing only intermittently lowered past year
substance use. Shockingly, athletes at schools with testing policies
felt less athletically competent, perceived school authorities to be
less opposed to drug use and believed less in the benefits of drug
testing. The culture fostered by testing seems to run counter to the
very reasons policies were put in place.
SCHOOL CHOICE NOT THE SILVER BULLET
OF EDUCATION REFORM
A study released by the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute suggests
that school choice, or vouchers, are not the powerful tool for
righting educational inequities in Milwaukee, reports Alan Borsuk in
the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. The study concluded that only 10
percent of Milwaukee Public Schools’ (MPS) parents made school
choices by considering at least two schools and seldom did they look
at a school’s academic performance. Additionally, the report seems
to indicate that parental involvement in MPS schools is low, with
about 34 percent of parents considered highly involved in their
children’s schools, even though parental involvement in guiding
schools is a key component of school choice. Perhaps even more
surprising than the results is that the organization releasing the
findings is a conservative think tank that has long supported school
choice. The reality of the more than two decade-long school choice
movement in Milwaukee is that there are still bad schools and there
has been little change. Still, some ardent supporters of school
choice believe the purest version of the idea -- which includes
little government oversight and allows parental decisions in a free
market to dictate which schools thrive -- has not come to fruition
in Milwaukee. Howard Fuller, perhaps the most prominent supporter of
voucher and charter schools in Milwaukee, said empowering parents to
make good choices, improving student performance and creating good
schools were proving to be much harder than many once thought. In
addition, Fuller has come to believe that voucher proponents
oversold their ability to raise student achievement.
"WHAT IS SCIENCE-" THIS SHOULDN'T BE
A PHILOSOPHICAL RIDDLE
It probably was not a good thing when third-graders looked puzzled
when asked what they like best about science. And it is certainly a
bad thing that when asked "What is science-" a seven-year-old
answered "science is like art." This implies that science, like art,
is something students don't get much of these days in elementary
school, reports Nanette Asimov in the San Francisco Chronicle. This
statement is supported by a new survey of 923 Bay Area elementary
school teachers conducted by the University of California at
Berkeley and WestEd. The survey indicates that 80 percent of
teachers said they spent less than an hour each week teaching
science, and 16 percent said they spent no time at all. Most of the
16 percent were in schools that had missed math and reading
benchmarks. In contrast, a national study conducted seven years ago
found elementary science instruction averaged more than two hours
per week. While science might not be an absolute necessity at the
elementary level, understanding science does help children learn to
think and solve problems while questioning the world around them.
Further, it is hard to imagine that high school students are being
adequately prepared for the rigors of science courses, which in turn
can negatively affect college admittance as colleges require
applicants to have taken and passed science in high school.
RESILIENCY STRATEGIES CAN CHANGE THE
CULTURE OF DROPOUT FACTORIES
Every nine seconds, another student drops out of school in America.
The most recent national statistics peg the national high school
graduation rate at only 69.9 percent. These sobering statistics have
astonishing implications for our economy and our ability to compete
globally, not to mention the daily lives of those dropouts and their
communities. According to a new report, authored by Kelly Hupfeld, a
research associate at the Center for Education Policy Analysis at
the School of Public Affairs at the University of Colorado at Denver
and Health Sciences Center, research shows that decreasing the
dropout rate can only happen on a student-by-student basis. Hupfeld
says that the focus must be turned to individuals, because students
drop out for a myriad of personal reasons. Consequently, the best
dropout prevention strategies lock on to students as individuals and
engage them in school and teach them the skills they need to cope
with difficult times. Resiliency-based programs, which help students
develop the skills and relationships they need to succeed inside and
outside the classroom, can be incredibly effective in preventing
high school dropouts. Still, there is no foolproof method to
identify students who will drop out of school, as dropping out seems
to be a function of multiple factors across multiple domains. Based
on this research, the National Dropout Prevention Center concludes
that predictions as to who will drop out are more accurate when
multiple risk factors and domains are considered. It is imperative
that schools institutionalize resiliency strategies as the world can
sometimes do its best to beat down students. It would be great if
schools, rather than contributing to the problem, could help enrich
and improve students’ lives.
ADD CURRICULUM FLAVOR BY INCREASING
INSTRUCTION TIME
Hours of test preparation, especially in struggling schools, have
left little time for electives or even some of the un-tested basic
subjects, reports Ellen Delisio in Education World. One solution to
a watered down curriculum is to add time to the school day, which
has already helped some schools improve their scores and enrich
course taking. There has been a movement across the country, from
Massachusetts to Miami, to create schools that have longer days and
more of them. In another decade or so, the six-and-a-half-hour day
and 180-day school year could be as extinct as quill pens and black
slates. One key to successfully adding school instruction time is
ensuring the time is spent fleshing out the curriculum and not just
more drill-and-kill. At some schools, expanded days allow for
classes like ham radio, forensics, band, chorus, robotics and
martial arts. These classes can provide a necessary break for
students from the standard math and reading. When working toward
creating a longer school day, the two major obstacles are inertia
and funding, as it is easier to maintain the status quo and do what
one did last year. At Kuss Middle School in Fall River, Mass., the
increased school day has raised teacher salaries, which in turn led
to an increase in applicants. Just three years ago, Kuss was labeled
a chronically failing school and had all electives stripped away to
make room for more math and reading. Last year, the school applied
to be part of the Expanded Learning Time Initiative, which extended
the school day by almost two hours. Now in its second year in the
program, attendance is up, tardiness is down, and students are
engaged in electives throughout the day. Maybe it’s time for the
antiquated school calendar to go the way of the dinosaurs.
IF YOU PAY THEM MORE, THEY WILL COME.
WELL, MAYBE
By offering performance bonuses to teachers working in New York
City’s most impoverished neighborhoods, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg
had hoped a large enough incentive would be created to get the best
teachers to work in high-needs schools. However, as educators begin
to assess the plan, some said it probably did not offer enough to
lure teachers with good positions into the most challenging
classrooms, reports Elissa Gootman in the New York Times. In fact,
many educators think the results will be more subtle and harder to
peg at the moment. Educators think the incentives might provide
enough for teachers in struggling schools to stay put, might cause
teachers to turn against flailing colleagues and might encourage
more schoolwide collaboration -- the key word being ‘might.’ The
plan also is not a straightforward arrangement, in that bonuses
equivalent to $3,000 per teacher are given to schools that meet
overall performance standards, and a four-member "compensation
committee" at each school decides how best to divvy up the money. It
is hard to tell how the prospect, but not the guarantee, of earning
more income will affect decisions and behavior. One teacher who came
from a high-needs school said "there are just so many other things
going on besides test scores, I just found it overwhelming." Yet
another teacher found the plan "an insult to my intelligence...these
teachers are giving all they have." This step toward performance pay
was won as the result of a landmark agreement with the city’s
teachers’ union. Yet, the actual effect it will have on teacher
retention and quality and consequently student performance remains
unclear.
MAKING THE SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK! TEACHING
CORE SUBJECTS THROUGH MUSIC
For years, researchers have studied whether music education raises
IQ points, test scores, spatial sense and math and verbal skills,
reports Michael Alison Chandler in the Washington Post. Definitive
results are scarce, but experts agree that music sparks memory. Just
think of what wonders the alphabet song has accomplished over the
decades. And as music classes are squeezed out of many schools in
order to permit more time on math and reading, teachers are looking
for new ways to integrate music into classrooms. In the past three
years, nearly 200 artists have contributed to a Michigan-based
website, http://SongsforTeaching.com, which offers music for the
core subjects, but also for foreign languages, special education and
classroom management. One Loudon County, Va. teacher, Eric Chandler,
writes his own songs, finding his inspiration in the Virginia
Standards of Learning. Chandler embraced musical pedagogy after
learning about the teaching method called Quantum Learning, which
encourages music to keep students engaged and focused. According to
Chandler, after winter break each year, a handful of students come
in with new guitars wanting to learn class tunes. Other students are
simply happy to sing, and learn, along.
NEW EDUCATION PLAN: "WORK HARD. BE
NICE. NO SHORTCUTS."
All too often in public schools, zip code is destiny, reports Bill
Weir for ABC News. Kids from poor neighborhoods are six times less
likely to graduate from high school than their middle-class peers.
While attempts to close this gap have been the source of exhaustive
research and expensive battles, a pair of teachers has quietly spent
the past decade developing a program that sends low-income kids to
college at an astounding rate. The program centers on just six
words: Work hard. Be nice. No shortcuts. Those words make up the
pillars beneath the Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP), which was
developed in 1995 by two idealistic Teach For America fourth grade
teachers. Their response to a decaying school system was to foster
"better teaching and more of it." Their ideal school day runs from
7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., and classes are held every other Saturday for
three weeks during the summer, so a student in this program spends
60 percent more time in class than a peer in a typical public
school. The first two KIPP schools were so successful that the
Fisher family donated $15 million to bring KIPP to other needy
districts, and now KIPP schools are in 17 states and the District of
Columbia. Most students enter KIPP schools two grade levels behind,
but in just three years, most go on to elite prep or magnet schools,
and 80 percent go to college.
YOUR SCHOOL LACKS RESOURCES- START AN
EDUCATION FOUNDATION! NOW!
When a teacher at Tuloso-Midway High School in Corpus Christi, Texas
needed a visual projector, she didn't bother going to district
administrators, reports Israel Saenz of the Corpus Christi (Tex.)
Caller-Times. Instead she went to the Tuloso-Midway Education
Foundation. Area administrators have noticed that educators have
grown increasingly dependant on fundraising education foundations
for classrooms needs. Since 2005, the Tuloso-Midway Foundation alone
has disbursed more than $94,000 in grants. However, because
foundations are private, there is no way to ascertain how many exist
in the nation, or how many dollars are donated to public education
systems each year. Unfortunately, while growth in the numbers of
foundations has increased recently, it doesn't appear there is
enough. For example, the Corpus Christi Independent School District
Foundation received 90 applications for grants and could only award
19. It is a sad state of affairs when public schools have to prop
themselves as charity cases to their citizens. The fast growth of
education foundations signals a lack of value placed on public
schools, which deserve the requisite money needed to provide all
children with a quality public education.
TEACHER INDUCTION PROGRAMS: THE
INVESTMENT THAT KEEPS GIVING
Surprise, surprise, when investments are made in high-quality
support programs for new educators, there are significant gains for
teachers, schools and students, according to a new study by the New
Teacher Center (NTC). In fact, for every $1 spent on a high-quality
teacher induction program, a return of $1.66 is seen in just five
years. The profit is the result of enhanced student learning and
reduced teacher turnover costs. The NTC analysis results demonstrate
that induction programs are effective at both lowering the numbers
of new teachers leaving the profession and, for those who stay,
providing better instruction to students. Study results also
indicated that it is vital that the induction programs are high
quality, which means the program supports teachers for at least two
years, there is rigorous mentor selection and training, and
dedicated time is allowed for mentors and new teachers to interact.
Providing teachers with a solid support structure improves learning
and saves education dollars, and that is the quintessential win,
win. Also, if more teachers are retained, less has to be spent on
hiring their replacements, which means more can be spent on
high-quality materials and facilities.
NOT ALL PRAISE IS GOOD, BE CAREFUL
WHEN TELLING KIDS THEY'RE GREAT
Educators commonly believe that praising student intelligence builds
confidence and motivation to learn and also that intelligence is the
major factor involved in scholastic achievement. Unfortunately, as
Carol Dweck writes in Educational Leadership, the first belief is
false and the second can be potentially harmful. While praise might
not serve the role educators believe, it is intricately connected to
how students view their intelligence. Some students believe their
intellectual ability is fixed, and students with this fixed mind-set
become excessively concerned with their level of intelligence.
Typically, these students will seek tasks that prove their
intelligence and avoid ones that will not. Other students believe
their intellectual ability is something they can develop through
hard work and education -- commonly called a growth mindset. These
two different ways of viewing intelligence create two psychological
worlds. In the fixed mind-set, students do not recover well from
setbacks, and when they are challenged they tend to decrease their
efforts and consider cheating. By contrast, those of the growth
mindset see effort as a positive thing, as it ignites their
intelligence and causes it to grow. Through Dweck’s research on the
effects of praise in children ranging in age from four through
adolescence in urban, rural and suburban settings, she has found
that praising students’ intelligence gives them a short burst of
pride, but ultimately is followed by a long string of negative
consequences. In fact, praising a students’ intelligence forms a
vulnerable fixed mind-set, instead of the intended motivation and
resilience. Rather, educators should focus on providing effort or
"process" praise, which fosters motivation by telling students what
they have done and what they need to do to continue to be
successful.
RAISING TEST SCORES BY GETTING
STRUGGLING STUDENTS TO JUST GO AWAY
The easiest way for a high school to raise its test scores is to
transfer low-scoring students to an alternative school that reports
scores separately, according to Joanne Jacobs, current blogger and
former San Jose Mercury News op-ed columnist and editorial writer.
Alternative schools began in California when the state started
ranking schools by student performance on state exams. Sometimes
alternative schools are so small that their scores don't have to be
reported, but scores tend to be very poor when performance is
tracked. A new law passed in California will require test scores of
alternative schools to be counted for the original school. However,
the law will not go into effect for four years. It seems likely that
when alternative school scores begin to be tracked back to original
schools, the alternative programs will be brought back to the school
for closer monitoring. It is hoped that the new policy will force
schools to only shift students to alternative schools when it is in
the student’s best interest. It is a good thing policies will be in
place in four years that ensures schools think of what is best for
their students.
PENNY HARVESTING: BOLSTERING THE
COMMUNITY ONE CENT AT A TIME
Last year, Washington state students collected roughly five tons in
pennies or $41,543.31 that they donated to community groups, reports
Linda Shaw in the Seattle Times. The Penny Harvest Program is a
great fundraising tool, but it also teaches leadership skills and
shows children that they can have a positive effect on their
communities. Aside from collecting pennies, students in many of the
participating schools served on committees to decide where to donate
some of the proceeds, which included researching and interviewing
potential grantees. It appears in this instance that a penny saved
is more than a penny earned, as students also accumulate valuable
life skills.
WHAT WORKS, WHAT DOESN'T FOR EARLY
CHILD INTERVENTIONS
The U.S. Department of Education's What Works Clearinghouse recently
reviewed 17 early childhood interventions (curricula and practices)
aimed at children three to five years old in center-based settings.
Each review covered six domains, including oral language, print
knowledge, phonological processing, early reading/writing, cognition
and math. The Clearinghouse found that, when looking at oral
language, only one program demonstrated strong evidence of a
positive effect with no overriding contrary evidence, while one
other program had potentially positive effects. For phonological
processing, three programs were found to have strong evidence of
positive effects, while an additional four programs showed
potentially positive effects. The Clearinghouse does caution that
intervention reports provide just one component in the
decision-making process, and thusly should not be used as the sole
source of information when making educational plans.
DON'T LEAVE THE ENVIRONMENT BEHIND
EITHER
U.S. Senator Jack Reed (D-R.I.), Congressman John Sarbanes (D-Md.)
and many education and environmental organizations have called on
Congress to pass the No Child Left Inside Act, a new initiative
aimed at strengthening environmental education programs. The act
would authorize $500 million over five years in federal funding for
states to train teachers in the environmental education field,
support outdoor education programs for children and develop model
environmental curricula. The goal is to improve the teaching of
children about their environment and the challenges it faces. An
added bonus is getting children out of the classroom and
experiencing and learning in their natural world.
YES, WE HAVE THE SAME STUDENT
ACHIEVEMENT PROBLEMS IN BRITAIN TOO
Chief Inspector Christine Gilbert of Great Britain’s Office for
Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills has warned
that poorer children still have tremendous "odds stacked against
them," and were achieving at lower levels than wealthier children.
And, as is true in United States, deprived areas were much more
likely to account for persistent numbers of struggling schools than
wealthier neighborhoods. This news comes despite government
interventions aimed at tackling social inequality in schools as the
relationship between poverty and outcomes for young people is stark.
Still, the link between low family income and low achievement in
school is not entirely straightforward, as gender and ethnicity
plays a part. For example, white, working-class boys make less
progress in school than those from other socio-economic groups. |
