How Devoted Are You?

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Wake up! We sent the same lawmakers back and expect different results. Well, maybe you are right. It can happen; it must happen. The question is: How do we expect it to happen?

Do we expect “the system” to fix itself? Hum. I personally have never seen it but it does happen in other places in the country and the world; so, yes, it could happen. But I don’t think it will unless we push the issues.

Have we had the conversations we need to have had to get the ball rolling? I haven’t heard them but I’m not in the “in” crowd. I can only hope that the influential have a clue and are listening.

Can we see we are at a crossroads and that it means making choices? I’m not sure that others do understand. And that really is a problem because it is the power of ordinary people coming together devoted to a cause that will bring about the systemic change we need.

You say you want solutions? But how devoted are you to looking for them?

 

Reform: Do Not Pass Go

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Missing something? Then, do not pass go. Instead, step back. Do an assessment of the state of education —a local, state, or nation level assessment.

Now ask yourself; to realistically evaluate and set the direction of reform, why are we looking to and at the same people with the same mindset that created the status quo? How will they create change? Will it be real education reform if it is based on the same principles that led to the same policy types and practices that have failed to show real and lasting progress on the “education reform” front?

It is insane to keep repeating the same mistakes. But it is part of our reality; face it. And face the fact that we must change the nation’s guiding principles of reform.

In Idaho, voters rejected education “reform” laws that lawmakers put in place…. But we sent the same lawmakers back for another round. Face the fact; we need new leaders.

Nationally, we saw congressional obstructionism lead to a downgrade of our national credit rating and overall the nation sent most of those same lawmakers back to face the same issues,… again.

People, there is only one way out — a plan that is Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Targeted — a SMART plan. And it is essential that it has NOT ONLY the consent of the people, but it MUST BE PUSHED by the people. DO NOT PASS GO; let’s push a plan that measures what matters most to us.

Our participation in governing is the only thing that can stop the insanity.

Get involved. Learn more about reform.

Reform: Where to Begin?

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It would seem obvious, you begin where you are. But to really know where you are with education reform, you do need some assessments—these assessments are not what you might think. To really assess where you are, you have to step back to get a wider view of what is happening and what has happened that contributed to producing what now exists as your reality.

Unfortunately, this first step appears to be where the first mistakes are made. We need to spend more time at this point because our assessment of our current state of affairs, the status quo, will play a huge role in determining the beliefs and assumptions that will guide our actions.

Whether you are looking at the local level with school improvement or at state and national levels with education reform law, you must have a very clear and accurate picture of the conditions that need changing and how they were created.

So my advice on where to begin is to assess not just the students’ scores on tests but to proceed with assessing where teachers, parents, and the business community believe we can improve. That input should then narrow the choices for further assessment tools that can be used. For every aspect of reform that you may be concerned about, there’s an assessment for that!

Then with our principles firmly cemented in our hearts and our assessments in hand, we are there – where we begin.

Reforms Should Honor Our Principles

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Here’s a little story about how reforms should honor our principles.

In a conversation with a young nurse the other day, she proceeded to tell me what she thought about public schools. She had been a school nurse while her children were in a regular public school and felt it gave her a different perspective. She then went on to volunteer the information that her children were now in the “charter system.” O.K., there’s a hook I couldn’t resist.

The conversation ran along these lines;

Me: “What did you see as the problem?”

Her: “There is so much waste.” (She didn’t elaborate and I didn’t press it.)

Me: “You see a big difference between the charter school and the regular public?”

Her: “Oh, yes. The kids are so much more respectful at the charter school. The behavior was terrible in the public school and the teachers had this idea that there was nothing they could do about it. And the parents were just as bad as their kids!”

…and the conversation drifted to sports and more bad behaviors. But her points were made; they have been made before.

People want public schools to be places of civility. Respect is a basic principle of real education reform. emmylou-harris-musician-quote-as-citizens-we-have-to-be-more

People want OUR government institutions to be as thrifty with our tax dollars as we working-class people must be with our own.

Reforms should honor our principles.

The policies and practices of education reform must be based on the fundamental truths and doctrines we believe in. So my advise is for us to consider that civility and thriftiness are good starting points for lawmakers as well as schools.

The Principles, Policies, and Practices of Reform

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Leaving my first meeting with Idaho Authors’ Community, two young women stopped me. They had overheard we were meeting and happened to have a friend hoping to become a published author. It was refreshing to be reminded of my own beginnings as a writer and the excitement of starting down a new path!

But the next day, I awoke recalling how difficult it had been for a “non-educator” to break into the education professionals publishing world and the struggle I faced with finding my first endorsers for my book. I felt it would be a waste of their time and mine to ask people to review something if it wasn’t even close to what they believed. So my effort included looking at a multitude of organizations and individuals and trying to decipher where they really stood on education reform principles, policies, and practices.

After much eye-blasting time at the computer and attempts to talk to live people, my conclusion was that the average Jane and Joe Q. Public can’t possibly sort out who really stands for what when it comes to “education reform.” I many times found myself having to dig really, really hard to find out who was the money behind many of these organizations. And the inter-connectedness of the influential was disturbing.

So how can we possibly expect the public to rise up and have their decisions lead us in the right direction?

And that is when I must remind myself why I wrote my book — in hopes of shedding light on the most important issue this nation must face — quality and equality for school children. If and how we get there will be up to the public.

It will begin with understanding what real education reform means, clearly facing facts, and moving forward focused on the goal.

All is Not Lost

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Across the country, people are rising to the challenge of beating back wrongful “education reforms.” The movement against high-stakes testing got rolling with 545 local school boards in Texas adopting a resolution against standardized testing. Other states including Florida, Oklahoma, Ohio, and Virginia have followed suit with many parents joining in by opting their students out of the testing in states such as New York, Washington, California, and Colorado.

And from education funding to education “reform” laws, the fate of public education is being placed before voters through state ballot measures in numbers not seen for 20 years. My state of Idaho is one of those states. Much is at stake.

In general, our lawmaking process has been corrupted by money and our minds have in the past been swayed by propaganda. We have been used in ways we may not realize until it is too late. But even as we acknowledge that money is a very, very powerful influence, we need to place our faith in the American people that they will rise up to this opportunity to support public schools. All is not lost.

At a rally here in Idaho yesterday, these were some of the parting words spoken: “Support quality education in Idaho.”

And that is what will be extremely important. When we have defeated what we know is wrong, we must be there to promote and support what is right.

Where Are The People?

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I have trouble understanding why the public doesn’t insist that we provide quality education to all children. I believe that deep down we Americans share some common values. I’m pretty sure they include freedom and liberty. I thought they also included justice and fairness.

So, after over a decade of being ruled by an education law that has proven itself failed and detrimental, why has the inaction of our congress not moved the country to engage in a conversation about the nitty-gritty of No Child Left Behind?

It isn’t hard to draw parents with school-aged children into that conversation. If they have kids in a less than excellent school, they see how the law has bound too many of us to a teach-to-the-test mentality that is sucking the joy out of teaching and learning. How have parents responded?

It used to be that teachers looked down on the idea of teaching to the test; have they now bent down in servitude to a false symbol of quality, the test score? What will it take for them to rise up?

Now, what about the others — the 75 to 80% that are not directly involved in public schools — the general public that claims education is important? Why have we not demanded an explanation of why the law failed and why it hasn’t been changed?

It’s worrisome. Where are the people that should be behind pushing this issue in the right direction?

Central to Progress: Conversations

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Previously in Actions Set the Standard, I discussed what should be seen as the ultimate of school reform conversations – the one that takes place between the primary adult in a child’s life and the child’s teacher. How it works out for the child depends on how well these adults can converse.

I’m afraid that art is going by the wayside. And without practice, we will not master the art of conversation and our society will suffer because we won’t be able to effectively put our heads together to solve problems.

I will be the first to admit that even after learning about some of the do’s and don’ts of dialogue and debate, I have trouble using what I know. When it comes to the topic of education reform, my passion gets in the way and I start to feel like I’m arguing instead of conversing. At those moments, I become part of the problem.

Education reform is all about a problem solving process that requires collaboration, cooperation, and the communications necessary to make those things happen.

I remember seeing a team shirt once that had the Henry Ford saying “Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success.”

Conversations are the essential glue which binds us together. Without them happening at all governing levels and in between …well, look what has happened…no child left behind? Right? Our so-called representatives have proved themselves incapable of taking the first step of coming together for the sake of this nation’s children.

When this year’s political pandering is history, we citizens need to have a serious conversation with each other and our representatives.

Essential to Reform : Cooperation/Collaboration

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In addition to the word communication, we really need to consider some other very important “C” words — collaboration and cooperation — which both mean the same thing, “to work together.” Those in education circles tend to use the word “collaboration” which can also mean “working with the enemy.” And I think most of us regular folks use the word “cooperation” more often and it also has an expanded meaning, “to combine so as to produce an effect.”

Right now, our differences divide us. We can’t work together when we continue to allow barriers to stop our progress.

Anyway you look at it, working together is a proposition easier said than done probably because the basis of it goes back to communications. We struggle because of differences in our use of words, the way we interpret words, how we relate them to our experiences, our body language or lack thereof in cyberspace, and a whole host of other communications related problems. Many of these things could be clarified if we would just ask questions and converse more often.

We have to remember, it isn’t about us; it’s about them. Real education reform will only happen when we work together to do what’s best for our kids. That is the page to start on.

An Instrument of Reform: Communications

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People can be an amazing source of information and inspiration. And there is something to be said for the old saying, “two heads are better than one.” But it only rings true when the two heads are able to communicate. After all, communicating is referred to as the science of transmitting information.

Communications is a much more complicated process than most of us tend to realize and I’m afraid we are so busy that miscommunications are occurring more than we recognize. It took observing children and seeing their perplexed looks over something misunderstood to draw my attention to the topic. And the difficulty of communicating became crystal clear when I took to writing and began questioning how my words would be interpreted.

So when we begin to look at school improvements, or education reform, we need desperately to learn to communicate better with each other. We not only need to share our knowledge and perspectives with others but we have to use each others’ input to solve problems — that’s a lot of communicating! It’s a big quagmire where many an education reform has gotten sucked in and died.

Until education reformists learn and practice the art of effective communications, we will continue to stumble where reform is needed most. Schools with large concentrations of poverty don’t tend to have many people considered “influential.” As individuals, they aren’t heard. So more often than not, group action is required.

We all have to be able to communicate – with each other and the influential – to be effective.