Somewhere Near You

     Somewhere in a school near you, students are transferring from other schools with services mandated that they won’t receive. They can’t learn the way other kids do. They don’t have the ability to focus and work in large groups. They get frustrated and act out. The services might include a portion of the day in a quieter setting with fewer distractions, to get help getting through the work. For the most challenged, it could mean a person assigned to them-just to help them learn to cope and get through the school day with their peers- getting as much done as possible; doing as many of the same things as possible. School budgets are challenging these days. There are fewer teaching staff, and larger class sizes. The school will delay and avoid the expense related with providing the service, and trust that the teacher will find a way to cope.

     Somewhere in a town near you, a family has to move. A job is lost, a parent has made a bad decision, a family is in turmoil… The kids are already experiencing stresses that damage chances of long term success, this is one more. The families that still feel school is a priority hope the school will give their kids what they need. More than that, they hope the new teacher will understand their child.

     Somewhere far away, people with a lot of money are trying to figure out how to make more. They have realized that education, like war, offers the chance for private interests to profit from public money. They publish tests and create data. They participate in a campaign of privately backed policy and politicians, and the acquisition of no-bid contracts. They are largely soft-handed, privileged, and far removed from real public schools, the people who do real work, and the very real financial insecurity experienced by most. Step one in their plan to exploit this situation is to target schools. It starts by blaming teachers.

The First Day of School

The first day of school this year was like none I remember. The school climate has been changed by the “reform” movement- guided by sound surface principles but playing out more like an assault because of hidden agendas and bureaucracy.  It’s normal for day one stress to include anticipation, with just a dash of worry over the students and the year to come, but it’s a positive, excited kind of energy. The stress this year is more a result of frustration regarding unrelenting attacks on a profession and process coming from a small, insulated group unfamiliar with what it really means to stand in front of a room full of children and lead. Their focus is on evaluation and elimination of teachers and schools first with a suggestion that it will lead to more effective instruction. Along with those concerns is concern for the impact that impersonal, data oriented schooling will have on the neediest children from already challenged families-starved for personal connections and social education, not even more measurement and judgment.

As always, teachers will work harder, work longer and work together to meet demands for increased student achievement. Their job, after all, is to teach and support students toward this goal. Districts, administrators and educators are in the same boat and in the best situations they are joining to face new challenges cooperatively. These are the people who know their communities, schools, the kids, know the families, and often band together to help each other in a time of need. They’re not just educators; they are a support system that provides more than a test score can measure. Often, a student’s change in attitude toward school as a result of that support system is more significant than an impersonal data point. In the end, though, there needs to be more efficient ways to align and pace curriculum, then assess student progress and react to the information assessments give. This reform is the type we should be focused on, and who better to help make this happen than the people most familiar with the students, the schedule, and the challenges of guiding modern-day students through a school day?

 Given the chance, teachers and administrators could surely give significant and useful input towards coming up with a better system-one that is easier to execute and gives more useful information. Reformers have instead taken an approach that portrays teaching professionals as the problem, instead of an important part of the solution. The major players in the reform movement are outspoken personalities funded by private interests involved in publishing, testing technology, and charter school organizations. The business model has not served the whole of society well, because the focus on competition for profit weakens our obligation to each other and country. Before we buy in to all of the reform rhetoric and plans, we have to think seriously about what we want for our students, and what we want for our future.

Reformers united-at all cost

In response to Joel Klein's high praise for Steven Brill's op-ed piece "The school reform deniers".

Mr. Kleine,

   Your gushing praise for Mr. Brill causes me to further question your own credibility (beyond the self-promotional interests you have in the “reform” industry). The teacher is on the front line, there’s no denying it. But why the absolute denial of any other factor in the “battle” to educate children? More to the point: why the unconditional support of reformers comfortable in criticizing with such a narrow scope? It would be one thing if the out front reformers were experienced teachers saying “Here are things teaching real kids, in real classrooms has shown me…” but this is not the case. It would be another if these reformers said “our teachers sacrifice a lot to meet ever increasing demands and do what they can for students- even our most challenging. Now is the time to join them in reforming education.” This is not the approach taken.

     Reformers, many with no significant experience in a classroom, are allowed credibility they haven’t earned. Their arguments have assumed weight they don’t deserve. Teachers not only work together to meet ever changing and often unfunded mandates from above, they give their hearts, souls and spend a considerable amount of their own wages to make the most needy feel cared for, safe, valued and capable. While outside of school the “free market” rages on, victimizing most families and imposing great negative influence, teachers still push students to prepare them for the future.

   The reformers do not mention the societal differences between America and the countries we supposedly compare poorly to. They don’t mention the well paid, qualified and unionized teaching forces that prepare kids to become adults in more equitable societies. It is easier to point at schools and teachers than have their backs, pitch in and join in turning eager young kids into capable citizen. Teachers have always stepped forward, volunteering to climb that hill and take the offensive. We should look at who has stepped back, looked away and weaseled out of their responsibilities.

Get Involved. It's Your Right and Your Responsibility.

     It would be interesting to get clarification from, or hear more debate with, conservative pundits and columnists crying "class warfare" at the suggestions that a small, wealthy minority could stand to "share the sacrifice" themselves-you know, maybe pay just a little more back into the system they have benefitted from so significantly, in order to address the financial crisis we are apparently in. Class warfare began long ago,  led by both sides of the aisle (although one side is more tightly connected to these special interests). Remember when the wall of defense began to go up around the uber-wealthy game players that banked, mortgaged and invested our economy into the red? A diversion campaign began, laying responsibility for the nation's fiscal woes, on public employees. It is their "lavish" salaries, pensions and benefits that we just can't afford (no talk about why we suddenly couldn't afford it). It was at this time "shared sacrifice" was first used by the protectors of the privileged (noteably any contributer, e.g. Sarah Palin, on FOX) as the right thing for public employees to do. Don't they understand? We just don't have the money!...and so on. Basically "take one for the team".
     This is why it's more important than ever for people to pay close attention to politics and their rights as voters. The scope of big government has grown, and republican or democrat doesn’t really seem to matter because they have both joined in protecting the very wealthy and powerful people who crippled our country’s economy. The investment and finance sector that played monopoly with pensions and investments risked or ruined the livelihood of many, and these greedy folks still manage to escape responsibility. Not only that: their wealth and influence continue to rise while their victims continue to fall into debt, unemployment and despair. Change is clearly overdue, but don’t expect conventional processes to bring it.  Consider the emergence of potential challengers for the presidency-even the president himself. President Obama has made some weak attempts to draw attention to the undeserved trust and respect given to Wall Street and “fat cats”, but his references are lazy shots over the enemy’s bow without any substance or specific suggestions for change. His challengers and their media PR arm (fair, balanced and unafraid) parrot the version of “shared sacrifice” that labels middle class workers as “overpaid”, their pensions as “entitlements”, and the wealthy game players as “job creators”. They even go so far as to put out fervent, heartfelt Christian prayers that our government will free these enslaved wealthy from their regulation bondages-thus reaffirming our “American Exceptionalism”. Even republican candidates suggesting a more grounded conservative approach (Ron Paul, Buddy Roemer) are dismissed by these deluded extremists.

Greatest Teaching Challenges

     As a teacher, my first challenge is spending enough time with my students and in my classroom. Wanting to be with my kids and in my school more than I already am doesn’t make me an exception. I would say it's the rule with good teachers-which most of us are in one way or another. There is just so much to do when you are charged with moving a wide spectrum of developing personality types, in an orderly fashion, through curriculum demands that continuously change. It isn't just the primary goal of content that drives each day's schedule; it’s consideration of the needs of individual students: Where are they at academically with this particular subject? How can I work this lesson for them specifically? What other students should I have them work with, and which ones should I absolutely NOT have them work with? What goal can I hope to reach with them today-and down the road (this week, this month, this marking period…this year)? Put with this the actual reflection, grading, feedback and adjustment of instruction that needs to happen and it’s easy to see how the end of the day, as precious as it can feel when it comes, can come too soon.
     The second challenge is the differentiation of instruction that needs to occur to target individual learners. The term “differentiation” has become more popular in teaching practice over the past decade or so because students are so different from each other, and different in general than they were “not that long ago”. When I was in third grade, my class had thirty (plus or minus) kids in it. As many as that seems compared to today’s standards, it was an orderly crew. In part, that was because my teacher was a seasoned, experienced teacher-the kind that the recent “reform” movement often targets because of the pay and pension hard work and time have earned them. It was also orderly in her room because students were different then. In a room of thirty or so, you might expect 3 or 4 kids that could be a challenge behaviorally. Go to a real public school today, especially in an area where families struggle with financial and social challenges the eroding economy has brought and ask a teacher if they think thirty is a good class size. I’m pretty sure of what they would say. Common sense, research, and a teacher would all tell you “no”. Kids are different today.
     The third challenge is staying civil and positive despite the criticisms cast in the direction of my profession. Teachers battle every day to help students learn and grow into a culture and society that over time has held promise (“The American Dream”) for fewer of them. The growing gap in wealth between those who have more than they would ever need, and those who don’t have enough, has accompanied a correlative gap in academic achievement. This erosion of economic stability in this country has brought with it instability in the families of students. How can a teacher know for sure that a parent will be available to see notes, check homework, or come in for a conference? How can a teacher make sure that students get plenty of sleep, a decent meal and a home that is safe and nurturing? A teacher can’t stop in to turn off the TV or video game. There are so many things that impact a young mind before it gets to school and once it leaves its hallways and classrooms, but the current reform movement is in denial of those inconvenient truths. The suggestion is that the profession is just missing the miracle worker, a “superman”. Superman is already there, performing miracles. Kids are being saved and inspired every day despite destructive policies teachers and families have no control over. Critics forget or overlook that because it doesn’t support their agenda, and it places responsibility on those unwilling to accept it.
     The fourth and maybe greatest challenge for me is to save enough of myself to be the husband and father I want to be at the end of the day. Teaching isn’t just a skill, talent and aptitude (and it is those things and more), it’s a labor of love. I have, at times, fallen short of being that leader and that model for my own family by saving some of that love for them. Some days can sap your well of patience and it is a feat to keep the unflappable teacher face on all day, and then “keep it together” when I finally get home. But I’m not “superman”, superman is make-believe. I’m a teacher, I’m real and there are a whole bunch of us out there saving kids every day.