Education Declaration to Rebuild America - real reforms?

[Trar]

http://educationopportunitynetwork.org/e...ouncement/

"As a nation, we’re failing to provide the basics our children need for an opportunity to learn. Instead, we have substituted a punitive high-stakes testing regime that seeks to force progress on the cheap. But there is no shortcut to success. We must change course before we further undermine schools and drive away the teachers our children need.

"All who envision a more just, progressive and fair society cannot ignore the battle for our nation’s educational future. Principals fighting for better schools, teachers fighting for better classrooms, students fighting for greater opportunities, parents fighting for a future worthy of their child’s promise: their fight is our fight. We must all join in."


Basically this. I liked what I saw, and I signed it. Maybe this is a step in the right direction, guys!

[no]

Perhaps just empty rhetoric of people who want to do the same thing with different words.

Perhaps not. We shall see.

[xcriteria]

(tl;dr: If you want to see a change in education, educate yourself. Hack through the wall of text, consider the points I hit on, and ask some relevant questions.)

Trar's link is from the pro-school, pro-educator lobby. They're for schools and against the impact of high-stakes standardized tests. This is understandable, but it's not about addressing the problem of those of us who have struggled in traditional school and want alternatives.

For example, consider this paragraph:

"Discipline policies should keep students in schools. Students need to be in school in order to learn. We must cease ineffective and discriminatory discipline practices that push children down the school-to-prison pipeline. Schools must use fair discipline policies that keep classrooms safe and all students learning."

The first premise there is that students cannot learn outside of teacher-led classrooms. Then, the paragraph addresses the problem of student misbehavior being dealt with through as a criminal offense. Of course, locking kids in prison isn't the answer, but locking them in classrooms is not the only way for them to learn.

So, what are the teachers to do?

The problem is that, as many of us have experienced, being locked in subject-bound, grid-schedule, one-size-fits-all classrooms is often not the most conducive approach to learning.

Lisa's article gets at the problem: What's a teacher to do?

She describes dedicated teachers who struggle with this problem:

Quote:"in my morning Algebra 1 CP classes? I'm drained. I'm exhausted. I just want to help them learn. I just want them to ask questions when they need to. I just want them to understand. I just want them to want to learn. I just want them to care."

Lisa goes on to explain: But as our friend Roger Schank reminds us, "Learning happens when someone wants to learn, not when someone wants to teach."

...but...

Quote:...this doesn't solve the problem that Ms. Kirch and my friend are having. They are paid to do a job whether their clients, the students, want it or not.

So...

What's a teacher to do when students have awoken to the fact that they don't need you to learn what they care about and you're not in a position to care about what they want to learn?

That is the problem that the pro-educator lobby leaves unaddressed.

But, what about this paragraph from Trar's link?

"Learning must be engaging and relevant. Learning should be a dynamic experience through connections to real world problems and to students’ own life experiences and cultural backgrounds. High-stakes testing narrows the curriculum and hinders creativity."

That all sounds good. Learning *should* be relevant. Learning should be a dynamic experience through connections to real world problems. It should link to students own life experiences and backgrounds. High stakes testing focuses on very specific measures of learning.

However, what about the real world problem of the litany of complaints about school that so many bored, disengaged, alienated, fleeing students have? Where are those addressed in Trar's link? They aren't, because the link is primarily about the interests of teachers in the context of their existing job structure, rather than the needs of students who need to learn in a different way.

[Trar]

Very good points. We need more support for the problems that students face, not just teachers. Perhaps that is where we might come in one day, if we can muster enough clout...