Chris Vance has a two-part article on Crosscut about the failure of Washington state's education reforms, which he co-sponsored in the legislature in the early '90s.
Part 1 -- "The WASL test: What went wrong"
Part 2 -- "How to fix Washington's graduation standards"
Read the whole thing, it's an interesting and enlightening study of the failure of political institutions to actually deliver the services they promise. But the leap of faith in the conclusion makes me roll my eyes:
In 1993, as I stood in the wings of the House floor in Olympia, watching the final moments of the final debate on H.B. 1209, I was sure we had accomplished something that would fundamentally change public education. ... Unfortunately, I am also confident that many other kids continue to move through our schools unprepared for the world after high school. We had the right vision 14 years ago. It's time for this generation of politicians to firmly and finally finish the job.Politicians can successfully solve some problems, but there's little evidence to suggest that organizing schools is one of them. The problem is not this or that "generation of politicians", but the expectation that politics is an appropriate process for administering institutions that are supposed to deliver satisfactory services to the public. To expect a new generation of politicians to make communized schools perform well is as foolhardy as expecting a sharp new generation of communist bureaucrats with really good central planning tools to do a bang-up job of putting food on the shelves of Cuban grocery stores.
Privatization, competition, parental choice and market-based incentives will improve schools. Foregoing these in favor of other "reforms" that leave schools in the hands of politicians and central planners will only prolong disappointment and lousy outcomes. Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at September 19, 2007 12:36 PM | Email This
(never mind that when Castro needed major surgery he went to SPAIN to get it.....)
Posted by: Michele on September 19, 2007 01:35 PMBut then look at the private schools that exist. They consistently deliver better results for their cost, because they have real customers and real expectations. It costs far less to send a student to a good private school in Seattle or Tacoma than taxpayers pay for each public school student. That's a crime.
All we get from public schools are excuses and requests for more money, and Vance was pretty naive to expect that government could have helped in the first place. That's what you get from Republicans in a state full of Progressives. You play in the same sandbox as the Progressives long enough, and you can't help but be infected by their unrealistic ideas.
Posted by: Jeff B. on September 19, 2007 01:47 PMWhat works is local control, and the more local, the better. The ultimate in local control is privatization. Choice and competition work better than any program Republican Vance could come up with.
The solution is to give a means tested voucher ONLY to the poor that can be used at any school. It is absurd to give a taxpayer-funded voucher to the rich and middle-class. Allow the government to decertify schools (from the voucher program) for cause, and provide an appeals process, so that schools are innocent until proven guilty.
If the voucher goes to the parent, then there is no church/state separation issue with parochial schools.
If the poor are the bottom 20%, that leaves 80% to the free market. It also drastically cuts the biggest chunk of our property taxes, which will partially make up for the fact that people will now have to pay tuition. As time goes on, private charities should gradually assume the role of funding the vouchers.
The further away from the local level you get, the more "one-size-fits-all" and ungainly the legislation will be. State control is better than federal control (which is unconstitiutional) and city/county control would be even better. But the best would be total privatization. The worst is crap like GW Bush's No Child Left Behind. The WASL isn't much better.
The separation of church and state is what has given us religious freedom, and is a major reason why religion is so vibrant, diverse and successful in this country. The ultimate goal in education should be a separation of school and state for the same reasons.
Posted by: Bruce Guthrie on September 19, 2007 01:57 PMAs a local businessman, I took several afternoons out of my schedule to meet with my local high school at about this time. We were going through the curriculum and identifying which classes someone needed to take to go to college to be a nurse, doctor, accountant, lawyer, etc. Well, duh.
However, it was the interaction with the teachers, whom were forced to meet as compared to spending time grading, which were the best part.
There was one elementary teacher there who said, "watch out! we are teaching great things in elementary and by the time they graduate, they will at least know how to balance a checkbook".
Then, there were my favorites- the teachers that were opinionated, and like posters here, aren't afraid to express them.
They called it. This exercise was going to fail and would continue to fail because the kids they were getting didn't care. They had gangs, drugs but the real problem was the "don't care" attitude they had to deal with. I could tell it was draining the teachers desire.
That was ten or so years ago. Nothing changed.
Now, my seventh grade daughter is caught up in the newest "greatest" thing. Folks, it ain't going to work either.
Discipline, discipline and more discipline.
Posted by: swatter on September 19, 2007 02:17 PM2. One sytem is Belguim where parents are given the choice to direct the state allocation to any school they choose which includes private and parochial schools. Guess what, everyone is focused on education achievement because parents can choose to go to a school and if they are not happy they can choose to leave.
3. The WASL is just one test. Let's change the term test to assessment of education achievement, the kids would probably still do poorly. What many are not receiving is a good basic education.
Check out Jay Leno's Jaywalking some evening, it literally will make you laugh till you cry.
Castro 'admitted to Spanish hospital'
Last updated at 22:11pm on 2nd January 2007
Fidel Castro was rumoured to be having hospital treatment in Spain.
According to internet reports, the Cuban dictator is staying in a restricted wing of the Gregorio Maranon Hospital in Madrid
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=426119&in_page_id=1811
Progressives of all types, like the do as say not do program.
It’s not completely reasonable to compare the performance of public schools to that of private schools. I know a tremendous amount of money is wasted in the public school system, but private schools have significant advantages over public schools. For one, they don’t have to accept everyone who applies. You don’t get kids with “learning disabilities” because the private schools will not tolerate it. You also tend to get parents who are more involved in the private schools because they are the customer. Study the relationship between customer, service provider, and service receiver and you will understand why public schools and health care are failing. Competition through vouchers, school choice or any other free market means that put parents in control of where and by whom our children are educated and the problem will be solved.
If that's the case, why is it that school teachers are complaining they have to stop teach everything else and "cram" for the WASL. Shouldnm't the basic learning be part of the curriculum already?
Having done a lot of my early schooling in other than an American school system, I guess I always wonder where the priorities in the grade schools. There's just so much that the schools seem to think is so important to teach that I find funny.
Just to throw one out example out there, I'll use dinosaurs as a for instance. My daughters knew all there was to know about dinosaurs before they could do some very basic things that elementary kids should know. I asked around it turns out EVERY kid in public school does the same thing. Why is it so important to teach kids about a group of creatures that haven't lived on earth for millions of years and which (if we're really honest) we know next to nothing about that isn't based on fragments of bones and impressions left in sediment?
(My gut tells me it's just secular humanists working hard to plant the seeds of discontent with christian kids, but that's an admitted knee jerk reaction.)
But back to my point - if WASL is supposed to teach the basics, why is it so disruptive to teachers? All I ever hear them do is complain about it!
What we're seeing is the 3rd (or maybe 4th) generation collectively pissing away the luxuries earned by the hard work of our grandparent's generation.
The big problem is that it won't take too many years until the under-educated become the largest voting block in this country and we will revert to unapologetic socialism through our collective stupidity and political pandering.
If we had managed to keep the Federal government in check by harshly limiting it to the letter of the Constitution, it would have made it impossible for our country ever to go socialist. But, thanks to Lincoln, Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Reagan, Clinton, and the Bushes, we now have a federal government that runs nearly every aspect of our daily lives. 99.9% of everything you do, touch, eat, or watch is federally regulated.
Caring about eduction is great and noble. We should immediately switch to vouchers so that the parents and kids who care, can free themselves from the quagmire that is public education. It is the only humane thing to do. Without vouchers, the school system will continue to spread the stupid, equally to every kid.
But in the long run, the real fix is to roll back the Federal government so that it is impossible to go socialist and therefore force our under-educated kids to either sink or swim. The ingenuity of our grandparents and great-grandparents was born out of the depression.
As it stands, we're at the cusp of either restoring the Republic to its rightful balance or plunging headlong into post-American socialism and/or police-state. The grand experiment is almost over.
If Clinton or Obama wins in '08, with the gleeful Democratic congress, we will certainly have post-American socialism before the election in 2012. If any of the Republicans except for Congressman Ron Paul get elected, we'll have a post-American police state before 2012.
Seriously, the only real choice is to vote for Ron Paul. Restore the Republic. We'll get better schools out of the deal too. :-)
Posted by: Joe on September 19, 2007 05:41 PMI can answer this. I hear parents complain more about WASL than teachers (for the record, I am a parent, not a teacher).
Taxpayers are being duped into believing WASL is teaching basic skills and represents "high standards". The test is so distruptive because it takes WEEKS to administer and ALL CLASSES and students must come to a stand-still during WASL time.
Just my nickel's worth.
Posted by: tc on September 20, 2007 07:58 AMThis question goes to pay for performance teacher salary, too.
In the early grades, I think there is too much emphasis on coloring. I think a bit more drill on the basic math and basic reading would be appreciated. But, how do you keep the attention span of today's youth?
Posted by: swatter on September 20, 2007 09:03 AMTo say the schools teach the same material is a generality. If you say they teach math, english, science, etc., you would be correct. The problem, as I see it with my children, is not the subject matter per se, but how they approach teaching the subject matter. This is where there is wide variance, and it doesn't have to do with just the teachers. Yes, there are good teachers that could teach the subject, no matter the textbook or approach the school district choses, but these are the exceptions. Most of the teachers are boxed in by the school discrict to a set of textbooks (i.e., textbook series) that may or may not work for their students (for example the Integrated Math series). The teachers are then told that not only are the boxed in by the textbook series chosen by the district, whether they think it is best for their students or not, they have to also make sure their teaching of topics coincides with the WASL teaching schedule. The districts main concern is good test scores and there is not the concern about whether the curriculum and test goals really relate to how the teacher should best approach teaching the topic to their class (Math is a prime example). Districts that are good at teaching to the test, score higher. This however, has no bearing on reality and whether their students are any better than any other school. Private schools are not burdened by this "teach to test" mentality and thus their students are better prepared for life. This is the unfortunate fact of what the WASL has become and the over-emphasis on school performance as measured soley by test scores. The schools that are good at "rigging" the teaching system score higher. You may not experience this at your school district, but my children do experience this in there. The assumption in the school district is that it is one of the top notch districts with higher test scores and higher percentage of kids going to college. The unfortunate fact of the matter is that the graduates are no better prepared than a neighboring district, and in fact, the problems are being glossed over and the kids are the ones sufferring. There is too much pressure on the kids and thus you see, higher drug and alcohol usage (that never gets reported) and other serious behavior issues. The kids will be burned out before they reach college. Those that are lucky enough to survive will excel over their peers, but at what cost. What is the cost of all the "road-kill" along the way? What is the cost to the society of all those kids that couldn't keep up with the extremely high standards and teach to test mentality?
The effectiveness of schools can not be measured by current numbers. The effectiveness of schools can only be measured over time (say five to ten years out from schools). Over time you can measure whether a school's graduates were really prepared for life. You could measure how many were employed, what the average salary was of graduates, what the debt load compared to income level was of the graduates, how much additional courses the students needed to take, etc. Schools are not an end-all in and of themselves, there are a tool in society to help achieve a knowledgeable and educated workforce. We should step back and focus on the real need, not just in whether our Johnny or Susie is a 4.0 and High SAT student or not. We all live in a society where the education of the masses effects our lives whether we like it or not. An educated, well functioning workforce would ease the burden on social services and most likely reduce the crime level. Crime and dependence on social services is a off-spring of a poor functioning public education system. You can not separate this and it doesn't matter what the private sector provides as an alternative. Not everyone can afford private education and private education doesn't have to take everyone, but all of us are effected by the education of everyone around us, even the inner-city children. This is why public education is important, no matter if you have children in it or not.
Posted by: tc on September 20, 2007 10:23 AMI just got back from curriculum night at my son's school (7th grade). The math teacher gave his speech about how proud he is of the school's high WASL scores and how everything he taught would be lined up with how kids would expect to answer WASL questions. He went on to say that kids would be working in groups and would have to figure their 'own way' thru problems ('discovery math'). He also mentioned that math had changed since many of us were students (huh?). He even said that correct answers were really not important ( I almost fell over in my seat, I really had no idea how the guy could keep a straight face!)
So here is how he described a typical 40 min class. The kids would be placed into groups of 4 to 5. He would tell them to draw a graph depicting results of a relay race, and they would also have to collectively write a paragraph explaining what they had done and share it with the class.
Basically, the kids would come up with their own numbers and computations. He also emphasized that their written paragraph was the most important part.
Oh yeah, he also said that they would not actually be doing much math, but they would be doing a lot of talking about math.. Because explanation is a big part of the WASL!
They say Cuba's three big successes are education, health care and the arts. Cuba's three big failures are breakfast, lunch and dinner.
I don't go to Cuba, but since I spend some time each year in Mexico in a fairly affluent retirement community there, I have a lot of good friends who have been there. (No travel restrictions from Mexico to Cuba.)
I listen to their stories and take a look at the pictures they bring back and i don't see a lot that is artistic or beautiful. In fact, from what I am led to understand, once you get away from the beaches and the Canadian tourist hotspots, it's pretty bleak. Child prostitution, is about the only thing that is said to be flourishing in the whole country.
I guess there's a certain charm to seeing the old buildings (all built before Castro took charge and slowly crumbling but not replaced because the regime can't afford it) and the old cars (again, not replaced because the regime can't afford it) but I don't know where the "art" point comes from.
Does Cuba have a symphony I haven't heard of? Are there some famous musicians (other than Gloria Estephan, who fled the country as a child) or celebrated Cuban artists that I don't know about? I haven't read any great books from a Cuban Dissentant (all shot or jailed) nor have I seen any great cuban films. (Only propaganda and "educational" films.)
Not sure the "art" part applies.
As for education, I guess I have to ask what they do with it. No industry to speak of in that country. I guess it comes in handy for writing ads to attract Canadian tourists and their money.
On the subject of health, with no hope and no way out of the poverty, living longer and healthier only prolongs the pergatory.
Why do my friends go? Nice beaches and cheap booze. As the saying goes, it's a nice place to visit, but you wouldn't want to live there.
Posted by: johnny on September 21, 2007 11:01 AMWitness the liberal hogwash accepted by Washington voters that any intelligent person will reject out of hand. That my friends is what public education produces.
Posted by: Snuffy on September 23, 2007 07:31 PM