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WE ARE A WORLD OF EDUCATION
In today’s world, so much has been made of the notion of the global
marketplace and the need to prepare students for a 21st century
global economy. One beneficial aspect of trade flowing freely from
hemisphere to hemisphere is the exchange of ideas and cultural
practices. Currently, there is a great international bazaar of
education, a flourishing and bustling agora occupied by thousands of
traditions, theories and practices devoted to the universal need to
teach each generation. Education, then, represents something more
than mere goods and services because it represents the future,
writes Owen Edwards in Edutopia. This new edition includes vivid
images and stories of how students are taught across the globe, from
the Tyrolean Alps to Mumbai, Chile to Japan, New Zealand to Russia,
and many other exotic locales. With every example of instruction and
generational growth comes, at the very least, a reminder that, in
the end, all humans are connected through the global, and noble, act
of passing along knowledge.
VOTERS SEE IMAGINATIVE EDUCATION
CRITICAL TO IMPROVING SCHOOLS
A new national survey by Lake Research Partners of 1,000 likely
voters finds that they believe education geared toward fostering the
imagination is a critical missing ingredient in improving public
education. The poll shows that 30 percent of American voters have
grown dissatisfied with the increased focus on "core" subjects. In
addition, a majority of those surveyed understand the importance of
quality public schools, and share a common concern that United
States schools lag behind what is offered around the world. These
likely voters see the U.S. as devoting less time to developing the
imagination, creative skills and innovation, with 88 percent of
respondents indicating that education in and through the arts is
essential to cultivating vital skills. When viewing this skill set,
63 percent of respondents see building the imaginative capacities as
just as important as "core" subjects, and 91 percent of respondents
believe imaginative learning should be considered part of the
basics. Celinda Lake, president of Lake Research Partners, said
"these are surprising results that indicate a strong set of shared
public values are not being detected by public leaders."
Also:
http://www.theimaginenation.net/resources/tinresources_nationalpoll.ppt
(poll)
TEACH THE WONDERS OF THE UNIVERSE
WITH THEATRE
Dancing through science class and singing through math is how 20
Flagstaff (Ariz.) Unified School District teachers hope to enthrall
students with learning, reports Rebecca Schubert for the Associated
Press. The teachers were encouraged to think creatively when
crafting lesson plans by Keeping Score, a program that teaches
innovative ways to incorporate music, dance, drama, poetry and art
into core curriculum courses. For instance, one third grade class
explores the solar system by impersonating the celestial bodes,
while one group of students reads lines as if in a play, and yet
another interprets the words through movement, mimicking orbits and
rotations on axis. In addition, teachers from around the country can
post ideas and share successful lesson plans on the Keeping Score
website.
STANDARDIZED TESTING: IS IT REALLY
STILL ALL THE RAGE?
No Child Left Behind (NCLB), being the signature federal education
policy, has brought standardized testing to the forefront of policy
discussions. At a recent workshop on multiple measures of student
achievement sponsored by the National Academy of Sciences, David
Gitomar of the Educational Testing Service noted that federally
mandated accountability systems were psychometrically weak. As Nancy
Flanagan writes in Teacher Magazine, the systems are predicated on
mistrust between the actors (teachers) and the system. Gitomar added
that the field has little to no idea as to what it means to be
‘proficient,’ and in the absence of this wisdom, the field relies on
single-number or composite-number metrics. Leaving Capitol Hill, the
Minnesota Council of Teachers of English has awarded Peter Henry its
annual essay prize for his work titled "The Case Against
Standardized Testing" (second link). In the article, Henry takes a
comprehensive look at the relative pitfalls to testing as an
instructional, pedagogical and educational strategy. While weighing
the pros and cons of testing, Henry found that the current form of
standardized tests, which are typically multiple choice and lacking
in breadth and depth, tend to measure low-order thinking skills.
This doesn't quite jive with a future economy focused on creativity,
whole analysis, complex reasoning and critical problem-solving.
Another detriment of testing is that it results in a kind of "drill
and kill" pedagogy that has been proven mostly ineffective. Lastly,
Henry argues that high-stakes tests are not good measures of
academic excellence because they center on a narrow band of logical
sequence operations which are useful only for taking further exams.
Also:
http://www.mcte.org/journal/mej07/3Henry.pdf
BIG BUSINESS IN "DRILLING AND
KILLING"
While the use and structure of standardized tests has come under
fire, it is hard to overestimate the importance of standardized
tests in public schools today, reports Pauline Vu for Stateline.org.
Since NCLB was signed into law, funding earmarked for testing has
dramatically increased. In 2001, states collectively spent about
$423 million on tests, but for school year 2007-08, states will
spend about $1.1 billion. Some of this is subsidized by the federal
government, which gave states $407.6 million to help pay for
testing, but states claim that falls short. The funding issue is
important because it directly relates to test quality. For example,
some states employ fewer questions that test writing skills since it
can cost a thousand times more to score an essay question than a
multiple-choice question. While inadequately funded tests can have
an impact on difficulty, how difficult a test is can be measured in
multiple ways. Even if it is proved that the test questions are
challenging, a test’s difficulty can be misleading if a state sets a
low cut score, i.e., the number of questions a student must answer
correctly to be deemed proficient (which it appears no one has
really be able to define accurately).
PAY-FOR-STUDENT-PERFORMANCE GAINS
TRACTION, IMPACT STILL A QUESTION
Adding fuel to a recent trend, the Baltimore school system plans to
pay high school students who improve test scores up to $110 each,
reports Sara Neufeld in the Baltimore Sun. Under the plan, students
who failed at least one section of the state exit exam will earn $25
for improving test performance by five percent. If they improve an
additional 15 percent, they will get $35 more, and 20 percent
improvement on top of that earns $50 more. While funding for a
similar pay-for-student-performance plan in New York City comes from
private donors, the Baltimore plan will draw dollars from the
settlement of a dispute over a federal audit. In all, the system
will spend $935,622 on student incentives, which comprises part of a
$6.3 million plan to help struggling students pass the Maryland High
School Assessments. Down I-95 a bit, 40 students in the Fulton
County (Ga.) school system will be the first to try the "Learn &
Earn" program, in which students will get paid to attend
after-school tutoring programs. Students will receive approximately
$8 an hour and be eligible for bonuses if their grades improve,
reports Michelle Shaw for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (second
link). The program is funded by a local nonprofit foundation and
intends to determine if paying students to study will improve
classroom attendance, grades and test scores. To that end, an
unrelated recent study by C. Kirabo Jackson, a professor of labor
economics at Cornell University, found that when students and
teachers in disadvantaged Texas public schools were offered up to
$500 for each passing Advanced Placement (AP) score, participation
and scores rose. Though the cash awards were limited to AP tests,
student achievement was not, reports Scott Cech in Education Week
(third link). Comparing college-entrance-exam scores at schools
before the program and three years afterward, the study notes an
average 33 percent net increase in students scoring above 1100 on
SAT or 24 on the ACT. This gain was above increases that the schools
would have expected to see otherwise. Move over textbook companies.
Apparently, there is another burgeoning big business growing within
schools.
Also:http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/northfulton/stories/2008/01/22/studentpay_0123_web1.html
http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2008/01/16/19collegecol.h27.html?qs=Tying+Cash+Awards+to+AP-Exam+Scores+Seen+as+Paying+Off
DOWN WITH FRACTIONS, SQUARE ROOTS AND
LONG DIVISION -- KIDS ECSTATIC
In a speech a few years ago, Dennis DeTurck, an award-winning
professor of mathematics at the University of Pennsylvania, said in
today’s digital world that fractions "are as obsolete as Roman
numerals." This year, DeTurck is publishing a book that not only
derides the teaching of fractions in favor of decimals, but also
takes issue with long division, the calculation of square roots and
multiplication by hand of long numbers (echoing every students’
belief that they will always have a calculator on standby). Still,
DeTurck does not want to abolish the teaching of fractions and long
division altogether, repots Maureen Milford in USA Today. He does
believe that fractions are important for high-level mathematics and
scientific research, but thinks the study of fractions should be
delayed until the concept can be fully grasped. One of Deturck’s
peers, George Andrews, a mathematics professor at Penn. State
University, thinks the proposals are bad pedagogy because "math is
hard. The idea that somehow we're going to make math just fun is
just a dream." Its possible elementary school kids can agree with
both professor’s sentiments.
SOLUTIONS FOR THE U.S. EDUCATION
SYSTEM FROM SOME OF THE BIGGEST STARS
Education has taken over the "Solutions" opinion page of Forbes
magazine, as Editor David Andelman has put together commentaries on
reforming public education from 18 luminaries. Bill Gates, the
Microsoft and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation guy, started his
piece by remembering Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, which proclaimed education to be a fundamental human
right. He then shifted his focus to the unique ability of technology
to enable today’s limited educational resources, making it an
essential ingredient in any effort to transform education. John
Chambers, chairman and CEO of Cisco Systems, continued in Gates’
vein by stating the necessity of creating a new model for how
educators use, teach and interact with technology, while fellow
businessman Craig Barrett, the chairman of Intel, sees the major
problem as the lack of a systematic, coordinated approach to
education reform. In his mind, achieving real, sustainable progress
requires a more holistic strategy. Moving to the political arena,
U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings begins with a very
Forbes message, namely that America’s competitors are improving the
ways they nurture human capital, and that, even at the elite level,
the U.S. is losing ground. However, she quickly moves to the main
thrust behind the No Child Left Behind Act: closing the achievement
gap. The U.S. is getting only half of its minority students out of
high school on time, she writes, while 90 percent of the fastest
growing jobs require post-secondary education. U.S Rep. George
Miller (D-Calif.) lent his voice to the increasing fervor for
improving early childhood education. As he sees it, every dollar
spent on early childhood education makes the U.S. economy stronger
and more competitive. With perhaps a unique view on the problems
facing education, Col. Dean Esserman, chief of police in Providence,
R.I., adds that it is no surprise to members of his profession that
small, neighborhood-based schools perform so much better than bigger
regional ones (must be music to Gates’ ears). He offers some
interesting solutions (putting schools on wheels to keep kids
together) rooted in his view that schools are anchors of the
community.
PENNY FOR YOUR THOUGHTS: U.K. PARENTS
WANT KIDS TO LEARN FINANCE
According to a survey of 613 parents and 771 primary and secondary
school teachers in the United Kingdom, 93 percent of parents support
the teaching of personal finance in school, with half believing it
should be compulsory, reports the BBC. In fact, parents ranked
personal finance lessons ahead of traditional subjects like
geography, music and religious studies. The survey also revealed
that more than half of parents believe their own financial positions
would be healthier if they had been taught personal finance in
school. Likewise, almost two-thirds of parents welcome some form of
training for adults, in part so they can pass the benefits on to
their children.
HOW CHARTER SCHOOLS AFFECT
NON-CHARTER STUDENTS
It has long been argued by proponents of charter schools that the
existence of charters will provide incentives for non-chartered
public schools to expend more energy focused on improving student
performance. Nevertheless, it remains unclear whether schools
respond to competition in this way, while at the same time other
mechanisms may counteract any possible competitive impacts. In a new
paper, Scott Imberman, assistant professor of economics at the
University of Houston, investigates how charter schools affect
behavior, attendance and test scores for students in non-charter
schools. Imberman first looked at three methods (school
fixed-effects, school fixed-effects combined with school-specific
time-trends and instrumental variables) for calculating a charter’s
effect on public schools. Results using school fixed-effects suggest
that the impact on test scores is statistically insignificant in
levels models, but significantly positive in value-added models. On
the other hand, instrument variable results indicate consistently
negative, and often statistically significant, impacts of charter
schools on test scores in both levels and value-added models. At the
same time, Imberman finds large and statistically significant
improvements in discipline in schools facing charter competition,
also differing from the fixed-effects estimates. Unfortunately,
Imberman cannot establish why his results suggest improved
discipline in the middle/secondary schools and worsening test scores
in primary schools. His results do, however, signal that previous
work possibly suffers from substantial selection bias.
COMMON SENSE SHOULD TELL YOU TO STAY
IN SCHOOL
Fourteen-year-old Harley Rye has become one of the leaders of a
Mississippi Department of Education dropout prevention teen summit,
reports Jimmie Gates in the Clarion (Miss.) Ledger. Rye, who is one
of 20 students on the summit’s advisory board, is an apt choice
because he thought about dropping out after his girlfriend got
pregnant. He chose to stay in school, though, because "you...need a
good job to take care of a child." In Mississippi, on average of 36
students drop out every day, including early a third of all high
school students who leave school each year. The hope is that
students participating in the summit will go back to their high
schools and towns to start their own dropout prevention programs. In
addition, the state will hold another summit to get community and
business leaders involved in lowering local dropout rates.
UNEVEN FUNDING LEAVES NEEDIEST
STUDENTS WANTING
The Education Trust has released the latest edition of their annual
report, "The Funding Gap," finding that many states spend less money
in school districts that educate English language learners (ELLs),
low-income students and students of color, than more affluent
districts. In fact, the funding gap between high- and low-poverty
districts grew between 1999 and 2005 for 16 states. In Vermont, for
instance, the gap grew by more than $2,000 per student, even as the
state was under a court order to provide equitable funding to poorer
districts. Also, in eight of the 16 states where the gap grew,
high-minority districts received at least $1,000 less per student
than districts with lower percentages of minority students. Still,
during that same time frame, 10 states increased funding equity by
decreasing the gaps between their high- and low-poverty districts.
Moreover, three states reverses the gaps by providing more funding
to their highest-poverty districts and high-poverty districts in
five states receive $1,000 more per student than their more affluent
counterparts.
Also:
http://www2.edtrust.org/NR/rdonlyres/21242216-A535-4E51-9383-32A6BF85D470/0/FundingGap2007SP.pdf
(Spanish version)
MILLIONS OF CHILDREN STILL LIVE IN
POVERTY & THE NUMBERS ARE CLIMBING
Nearly 13 million American children live in families with incomes
below $20,000 a year, which is below the federal poverty level for a
family of four. Unfortunately, the number of children living in
poverty increased by more than 11 percent between 2000 and 2005,
meaning an additional 1.3 million children lives in poverty today
than in 2000. Furthermore, research has consistently shown that
families, on average, need an income of about twice the federal
poverty level to make ends meet. And 39 percent of children in the
U.S. (or more than 28 million in 2005) live in families with an
income below this line. Still. What’s worse is that, according to a
recent report from the National Center for Children in Poverty, the
current U.S. poverty measure is widely acknowledged to be
inadequate, yet the political will necessary to implement an
official change is lacking. Data collected in the 1950s indicate
that families spent about one-third of their income on food, and
poverty is still measured by multiplying food costs by three.
However, in present day, food comprises far less than a third of an
average family’s expenses as housing, child care, health care and
transportation costs have grown disproportionately. Additionally,
the poverty measure does not adjust for the substantial variation in
the cost of living from state to state and between urban and rural
areas. A potential growing problem with the current poverty measure
is that eligibility for many public benefits are based on this
"official" measure.
DASHBOARDS PROVIDE SNAPSHOTS OF
EDUCATION IN EVERY STATE, NATION
One of the main by-products of the implementation of No Child Left
Behind Act has been the creation of vast amounts of data. To make
better use of these data, the U.S. Department of Education has
released two-page "dashboards," one for the nation and every state,
that includes statistics on National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP) scores, graduation rates, schools making Adequate
Yearly Progress (AYP), highly qualified teachers, parents taking
advantage of choice and supplemental educational services, and more.
The individual state summaries provide information for anyone trying
to get an overview of the state of a state’s education system.
NEW WEBSITE AIMS AT GROWING
POLITICALLY INVOLVED YOUTH
ServiceVote has launched a new, interactive website intended to
engage young people in the 2008 elections by providing news and
information on the candidates paired with key issues. The site also
allows for peer interaction and ongoing conversations through a
discussion forum that enables youths to post videos, images and
audio files. The hope is to increase the numbers of young people
taking action in the election and in the policy process. |
