~synthesis~

open accreditation services

Is learning is undergoing a transformation? From this article in the NY Times on the profusion of lectures available online, its implications on learning, and how that's changing the way students learn; to 21st Century Learning proponents, who claim that learning in this century is like no other, that students are actually different, and that institutions need to evolve their curriculum to match, you might think so.

I don't think the turn of a calendar's page changes the way the brain works, but what (if anything) is really different about education in this century?

It's not enough to say we have new technology today vs. yesterday, because yesterday they had new technology vs. the day before. It's not enough to say that we expect more from our students today than ever before (ibid).

What about this - could this be the century in which the business model of education changes? Is this the point where accreditation as we know it goes away? This isn't new in the history of learning, but it's something that hasn't happened in perhaps the last 150 years.

The mainstream public education system on this planet is authoritarian, discriminatory, built to make life easier for adults and regulators, and seemingly not even designed to make children great. The rules in most schools are all about what you CAN'T do. Oppression doesn't seem to be a good way to engage students and improve learning outcomes - does it?

How does the system become so authoritarian? Simple - they own the ticket to employment. I wrote recently about the tertiary education is becoming commoditized; I think things are getting even worse now. The most tangible benefit of staying in school and graduating is the piece of paper you get that says you attended, graduated, and are now employment-worthy.

If you have something hammer-like (the ticket), then it is easy to be lazy and use that hammer to assert power vs. truly engaging students - think of most country's border guards; they should be tourism advocates, but instead let their power get in the way. This is not universal, but it is pervasive.

Change in this case won't come from within. These days, more and more employers look beyond the accreditation to the person to assess whether they'd be a good hire. Ask any recruiter, hiring manager, employment consultant or counselor and they will confirm that where you went to school only helps if it's one of the top ten (or where the hiring manager went); otherwise it's more about the rest of you - who you are, what you've done, and how you did it that counts - take a look at your own resume - is education at the top or near the bottom?

Admittedly, most employers (today) won't let you in the door without the proper accreditation - that's still the first filter. But I believe this is changing. The number of "accreditation-free" people that get hired is growing rapidly, and the approach these hiring managers take and the quality of these hires will be the biggest determinant of the "value" of a formal education.

As these "alternate" candidates prove their worth in the market (likely at lower starting salaries as well), I think there will be a groundswell at both ends - hiring managers/recruiters becoming more open-minded, and students becoming more savvy.

Students are already skeptical about school; when the approach that these hiring managers use to select candidates becomes better known, it could begin to shape students' process for building a resume, the way they demonstrate knowledge, ability and experience, and the criticality of a diploma.

Imagine if you could describe your job-worthiness not in terms of a certificate, but as say a balanced scorecard, or as Seth put it, as your own quilt. It would not only be a huge help to hiring managers, but also allow much more of the candidate's broader value to be demonstrated.

Just as Open Education Resources (OER) is altering the nature of curriculum and teaching materials, I think we're about 10 years away from an Open Accreditation Service that enables students to score or quilt all of their achievements across the board.

The next revolution in learning then, is the outmoding of the existing business model. And as with the music, video, and print/TV advertising industries, education will try and hold on to the past, but at some point face reality, and focus on earning the opportunity to teach your child. I can't wait.

barriers

Barriers keep things away from other things - they might be levees that keep dangerous waters away from communities; they sometimes separate nations at border crossings; they might even be erected around buildings (as happened often after 9-11) to prevent wrongdoers from entering.

There are other kinds of barriers too - ones that aren't so physically tangible, but every bit as real. Consider barriers to entry for a company trying to get into a market or reach a demographic; consider also barriers to entry for a person trying to gain employment.

In this last case, there are a few ways that would-be employees can break through these barriers - I think it boils down to:

• Accreditation - a diploma or certification attesting to something you've learned that is of value to the employer
• Connection - someone you know either in the company or that the company wants to know
• Reputation - being proven or having a following that you bring to the table that improves the employers' ability to do something (attract new customers, build credibility, etc.)
• Experience - jobs you might have had, or work you may have done that is meaningful to the employer

Of these, the first two are most cited as likely to get you in the door, and the last two are the ones most likely to have them seek you out.

For most people starting out, having a piece of paper from the right institution accrediting their education is the only thing they have. In the past, you may have been hired solely for having a diploma, but today with the scarcities we face and the glut of prospective candidates, employers can be much more selective. It's not enough to have a piece of paper; what that paper represents is actually more important.

I wrote a while back about universities being at risk because of their steadfast commitment to keeping things as they were a century ago, but now we know that institutions do this at their assured peril.

I have written a ton about K-12 education and how it's being impaled into the ground, but a couple of thoughts stand out. I'm the first to agree that we are what we measure - but we should also know that if you lower the barrier to entry, people won't try as hard!! If you protect management from failure, they won't feel as accountable!! 

Seth Godin wrote this great post today about how career fairs are (my words) the aspiration to be average. He didn't need to prove it, but here's more proof of this - the NY Times reported that several states are lowering their high school graduation test standards!!

How often have you seen a person say - well if I only need to produce 10 widgets a day, and no matter what I do, I only get paid to produce 10 widgets, I'll produce 20 (or even 11) anyway, just because I can and I care?

What gets measured gets done - if you lower the standard, guess what, you've guaranteed that the students will learn less! These legislative charlatans are trying to put a better spin on things - Dr. Gerald Zahorchak, Pennsylvania's Secretary of Education in one breadth said that 20,000 2007/8 graduates required remediation at a cost of $26 million before they were ready for their next step - a pretty damning condemnation of current graduation standards. BUT in the next breadth, of their plan to lower the standards for testing, he said: I want more than anything to be able to say with confidence that every Pennsylvania student who receives a diploma is ready for the real world.

I am speechless.

I think Dr. Zahorchak and all of his peers must be required to face the tens of thousands of unemployed high school graduates in their state every day, and hear from each of them about how their 13-year investment in public school has failed them.

The school system in this country is in peril - there should be a sense of urgency that eclipses the post 9-11 fervor on national security for approaches that improve the potential of every child in the school, not lower the standards so some imbecile with a big office can look good.

The barrier we are missing is the one that requires politicians to have an IQ above that of a grape.

prodding the prodders

Education is a seemingly complex beast. Everyone knows it needs to be great, there's little argument on this point. Everyone knows that this is an investment with a sure return, there's also little argument on this point. America spends among the most per student in the world, yet student performance is declining there is no argument on this. Is it really that complex - everyone has these intricate views on how to affect change - are they right? Who (beside politicians and bloggers) complains the most about declining academic performance?

It's exactly the people that have caused this problem - our very own employers, colleges and universities! How? By valuing something that no longer has value.

The original business case for an education was simple - you needed one to earn a living. The nature of your living was largely determined by the person that taught you (the master taught the apprentice who worked beside the master and then eventually took over). As the world evolved, the path to employment shifted from proficiency in a craft to an accreditation of core skills. In America that's called a High School Diploma. It's important to note that the value of this "ticket" is not set by the primary/secondary school system, but rather the gatekeepers that guard a student's next steps - employers and post-secondary schools.

One of the reasons parents send their kids to school (and willingly pay the taxes) is because it is the one step that they believe will help their children create a better life, that education is the path towards prosperity. They believe this because it is how they got to where they are, or how they saw others get to where they wish their children to be. They also want their children to be best-equipped to survive and thrive no matter what life or the world throws at them.

Employers have decided a high school diploma is critical, and will prefer candidates that have one. Colleges and universities have decided to accept students based on their high school (plus related standardized test) performance and will rarely if ever take a candidate who doesn't have one.

But. Colleges and universities complain that they have to spend millions (if not billions) to remediate students because secondary schools are not adequately preparing them for tertiary schools. Employers say the same thing - that a significant percentage of high schools students are poorly prepared to enter the workforce. Together both bemoan that fact that even when students have some basic skills, they aren't able to function well in a team setting, deal with complexity and ambiguity, communicate effectively, etc.

ASIDE:

There are schools that can and do prepare their students for the real world, and their graduates are eagerly sought out.

My two favorites - High Tech High (HTH) and Seattle Girl's School (SGS) are among these. Ask Larry Rosenstock at HTH and he will tell you this - creating a great engineer or scientist absolutely doesn't imply that you must sublimate the arts and humanities. To the contrary - it requires that you treat students like one, let them behave like one, and compel them by how much fun it is to be one. To do that, you must immerse them in the sciences and the arts and the humanities - why - because that's what real people are. You accomplish this with an integrated, project-based approach to teaching, where students are committed, respected, engaged, and critical participants in the process. Ask Marja Brandon at SGS and she'll say the same thing.

Graduates of HTH or SGS are "ideal" for colleges, universities and employers alike - they will and do run after them. Their diplomas are not generic.

The change agent - just say "no":

I've argued in the past that we must federalize education, that students are the customer, that we measure the wrong things. I must amend one of these - students are not the customer - they are the fodder. The real customers are colleges, universities and employers. Sadly they are not using their power wisely or effectively.

What if the Chamber of Commerce and Association of American Colleges and Universities decided not to accept high school diplomas anymore? What if they only employed or accepted students from schools they felt did a great job of educating, and not from all schools? Would parents happily agree to fund schools via taxes knowing that it wasn't buying their children enough?

We could start with America's largest employers - the Federal Government (including Defense), Wal Mart and McDonalds. That's only three CEOs (well, two CEOs & a President) to convince.

What if they issued high schools a once-cyle (4 years - grades 9-12) ultimatum? If the incoming grade 9 class in the high school system was not transformed this year (9-10 in Y2, 9-11 in Y3, and 9-12 in Y4), they would cease to accept a high school diploma'ed candidates. This would create an automatic ripple effect to elementary and middle schools.

Faced with dramatic cuts in funding, would schools feel the impetus to change and follow a better path? Money is a powerful catalyst. Just look at how "open" to compromise and negotiations management, partners, dealers and unions alike were when faced with the reality of GM/Chrysler bankruptcy?

The education system is not feeling similar pressure right now. We need it to. Let's all rally the biggest employers in our countries, states and towns and have the leaders of those three or four organizations help us create the change we need.

standards-schmandards

A great friend and brilliant educator recently shared this frame for learning with me - it is about observation, reflection, documentation, and exhibition. This is powerful. It fits well with the beginnings of learning, where each master taught their student according to that child’s unique shape, ability and needs. He or she realized that their pupil would eventually replace them as master, and acted and taught accordingly. Each apprentice paid attention, was engaged and focused, because this was the real world, and they easily saw themselves as adults doing this work. Learning happened.

In time, the shape of learning "evolved" to the point where “schools” were built. They may have begun teaching religion or language, but they soon expanded to contain many masters, each tasked with creating proficiency in their particular subject. As schools grew, overseers defined “a complete education,” and students were required to complete a rigorous and structured process, accomplish a specified result, and then “credentialed” to move forward – either to further education, or the workplace.

This new shape of learning was deemed “better” because it allowed teachers to reach many students at once, and it freed the “value creators” (the original masters) to focus on their work without the "distraction" of apprentices. In time, the politically-anointed “overseers” of the these schools identified “core” skills that could be "extracted" from original subjects, and taught independently of any craft or discipline (carpentry, medicine, farming, etc.). These core skills, literacy and numeracy (which in a bizarre fit of illiteracy are referred to as the "3 Rs"), were deemed of greater importance to educational success (both institutional and personal) than proficiency in a given craft.

The present day education system has "progressed" to the point where teaching is highly specialized, a big part of curriculum is focused on these "core" skills, and in the spirit of scale and mass production, school systems also have an objective and common way of assessing proficiency. Relative performance is deemed to matter more than individual need, ability, or potential; and schools, teachers and students alike are measured on the basis of student performance. "They" have found a "fair" way to do this - it is called Standardized Testing.

Standardized Failure

Each State in America for example has its own standardized tests to judge aggregated student performance. This then translates to how schools get funded, and how teachers and administrators get paid. As anyone would, teachers are forced to make sure students are taught exactly how to do well on the tests. Moreover, the State overseers, knowing that Federal funding depends on performance, have lowered the bar to raise pass rates. The result is embarrassing; students have "passed" these standardized tests, but not learned anything. More than a third require remediation if they are even able to get accepted into college or university in the first place. Worse, despite lowering standards, student achievement has not improved, class participation and attendance are declining, and most of the students and even some of the parents no longer respect the institution.

In effect, teachers are required to treat students on a "micro" basis, so that they have the specific tools to pass their test. There is very little scope or latitude for the teachers in the mainstream school system to create a complete, integrated learning experience with project-based outcomes, like High Tech High for example where students actually publish books, owning all aspects (writing, photography, editing, layout, production, etc.), or Seattle Girls' School, where the students conduct a full simulation of a mission to Mars (from the press conferences to space station docking to landing on Mars), and what many other charter and choice schools do around the country. This "macro" idea of treating a student as a complete person, building an integrated curriculum that develops core skills but also does so much more (create a broader, real world context and deeply engage the student) is simply not possible in the micro-brained-standardized-testing public school system.

But it's actually worse than this - the process of teaching (again a reaction to the tests) is also an issue. Because each teacher is measured on the performance of the student in their class, they in effect compete for the students' attention against other teachers in the school, making the student the victim of this mess. The teacher does this against their better judgment because they understand that rote/memorization/etc. is not true learning, but it is the way their curriculum is developed, and what they're told is the way to create students that pass tests.

Standardized tests are arbitrary judgments that move based on political and economic will and not academic efficacy or the best interests of the student. They force a micro-mentality that is not dissimilar to worst of the commercial world.

Shape of Things to Come?

Is the American education system unique? How about the American automobile industry? Their equivalent of standardized testing is the EPA and trade protection. Knowing that the Big Three couldn't compete directly with foreign companies given their manufacturing (in)ability and the burden of their union contracts, they changed the nature of environmental protection (ostensibly safeguarding best interests of their citizenry) to deem "light trucks" (which are the most profitable segment of the Big Three's portfolio) exempt from emission standards! By allowing the Big Three to blithely continue to produce badly-engineered products and marry them to incentives to make them even more attractive, they solved a problem in the short term, but as the last months have shown, the lasting effect is bankruptcy, job loss, and a massive increase in the nation's carbon footprint.

This cutting your nose off to spite your face approach is a mirror to standardized testing. Combine recent studies that show how uncompetitive American students are vs. their counterparts abroad; the relative power of the union bases; the ease with which politicians "game" the system by altering standards for convenience; and worst of all, the de-funding of schools due to the economic downturn, and you have a perfect storm that is portentous of a dire and ominous fate for Edu Americana...

"I'm not dead yet!"

Want more proof? Can you think of the most pervasive implementation of standardized testing in America? I say it's drivers' licensing. Theirs includes both a written exam and a practical street driving test. Almost every American over the age of sixteen has taken this particular test.

How successful do you think it's been? Do you think Americans are good drivers? Are they safe drivers? Are you TOTALLY confident as a pedestrian, passenger or driver that all the other drivers on the street are completely safe, trustworthy and predictable because they successfully completed their standardized test?

Life and Death is NOT Standard

Now think of your police or fire department, the military, and even your physician. What does their training look like? Are randomly-created and arbitrarily judged standardized tests their approach to creating successful graduates? Emphatically no! They are all required to observe both theory and practice, reflect and understand how things actually work, document their understanding and insight, and then extensively exhibit their proficiency in simulated or real-world settings that provide their masters with the ability to not only judge success, but also fine tune to create proficiency.

When it really matters, we do have a pretty good way of educating people for certain disciplines. There are schools that work this way in this country. Two that I've had the pleasure of visiting are High Tech High in San Diego and Seattle Girls' School; there are others (though not enough others). If you are nearby do visit them - you will be blown away.

Why then are all our children not educated this way? Why then do we resort to standardized tests that are proven failures? We must all rise together to emphatically decry this approach to education "oversight" and implore our politicians to finally do the right thing.

Are there better ways, I think so. This, this and this are where I would start.

gauntlet of girth

I was watching Pixar's brilliant film Wall-E again today, and got to thinking about how the spaceship was built in the movie. The well-intentioned designers decomposed every anticipated act into a process and then automated it. This certainly created a more efficient, streamlined, and predictable system, one that did exactly what it should when it needed to. It did this to the point where every micro action had a pre-defined reaction, and success was measured by that micro actor's ability to do what it was supposed to. Of course the best example of this in the film is "Mop."

In the end, the result of all the problem decomposition, process management and operational efficiency was a profoundly well-managed and controlled environment that worked, provided everything happened according to plan. Over time, in the controlled environment, the system worked well enough that humans (the original constructors and source of inspiration) became superfluous - there was no need or expectation for them to do anything, be anything, or act in any way. With the system meeting every need, people became lazy and dull - aspiration-free. How horrible. How frightening.

Ironically, it took a machine with a soul to rekindle man's soul and give it purpose. The predictable, programmed, precise (but soulful) machine became the random act that re-ignited aspiration and re-awakened humanity.

As organizations in our reality mature, growth rates are harder to maintain because the revenue base keeps getting larger. A natural reaction for many is to prioritize operational efficiency, process management and business predictability vs. new growth opportunities. Why? Because at least you can control what's inside and maintain (and potentially grow) profitability by being a "better-run company."

There is no doubt that size does matter - the markets have proven that. There's equally no doubt that size is not an assurance of success, the markets have certainly proven that. There is also this truth that when organizations get bigger, they seek something (perhaps vindication?) that requires or results in ...girth.

The organizational equivalent of human girth - aka cellulite - is groups like HR, Legal and of course MBAs. As with cellulite, these elements seem to have an innate ability to multiply and expand at the expense of the value-creating parts of the company. At their best, HR, Legal, MBAs, etc. manage to create micro-successes, and cause companies to bias and measure micro-outcomes on the assumption that they are additive or multiplicative, and will result in macro success. Business processes form around the micro, funding and resources become contingent on the micro, performance is rewarded based on micro behavior, and most sadly, those who wish to innovate and transform cannot do so without first running the gauntlet of girth.

So what's my solution for corporate liposuction? I think there is at least one way for organizations to form and be lead so that they maintain the adaptive, sense and response essence that characterized their initial trajectory of success.

It is possible to be great and be lean. It is possible (though shocking to many I'm sure) to successfully run a company where PowerPoint and McKinsey analysis are not the lingua franca. It is possible to do this, but not easy. It requires one to flaunt the laws of girth-gravity. Who among us is able?

ability, trust and chemistry

Dean Shareski wrote a fantastic open letter to his students - I'm convinced the majority of teachers would wholeheartedly agree with him - it, plus the comments are worth a quick read.

I bet that most teachers would LOVE to embrace the ideas that Dean espoused, flaunt the arbitrary grading requirement, and bemoan the fact that graduating today proves only that you were able to successfully navigate the school system during your twelve year journey.

I also had this recent conversation with Tony Wagner where we talked about his book and the survival skills students should be developing through school. Again, there was violent agreement about the rightness of this, and like Dean's post, there was virtual unanimity that this is precisely the stuff our children should be learning in school - grades be damned - we want our children to be equipped for the real world!

Finally, David Warlick reacted to US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan's view that to compete with India & China, we should teach school six days/week, eleven months/year by suggesting that we just put them all in jail. Judging from the flurry of comments on David's blog, there's even more violent agreement here:)!

So - what's really harshing on our collective mellow??? I think it has nothing to do with what happens in school, but everything to do with the the world outside school.

Here are some hurdles students must overcome to call their learning a success:

• Parents - who at the end of the day still focus on the grade/GPA and relative performance of their child(ren) - parents it seems are more competitive than students
• Universities/colleges - who still filter students largely based on grades or SAT
• Employers - who still prefer students that went to the "right" schools, ranked higher or achieved better grades

Until these three alter their behavior, there is really no way for the public primary/secondary school system to move away from what Dean, Tony and David railed against. The measure of a child's performance during school should be much more about their best outcome and less about arbitrary standardized assessments or grades.

It is rare that academic achievement is the only determinant of workplace success - there are so many other factors that go into it. I wonder whether the hiring managers of tomorrow will get sucked into the same morass that prevails today, or whether they will be able to rise above it and realize that looking at the whole person (attitude, team spirit, integrity, ability, passion, tenacity, intellect, academic proficiency) and their complete portfolio of "work" is so much more critical to the hiring process.

During informational interviews for prospective employees who might be working for me, I review the three things I look for - ability (can you get the job done?), trust (will you trust us, can we trust you?), and chemistry (will you be a part of our family and make us better?). Of these the first is how you get through the door and into the interview process in the first place - it is the easiest to judge. The second and third are what our team will evaluate when we meet with you, these are incredibly difficult to discern, but I trust our team's judgment and instincts.

It is really critical for us to get it right, and when we do, the team/family is better, and our ability to achieve greatness is strengthened. I've never cared whether a candidate went to a "good" school, and have never checked their grades.

But if it's the right person for our team, we are destined for success.

F-Edu-reform?

Kalman R. Hettleman wrote an interesting article in the Washington Post about the five myths in education reform:

1. We know how to fix public schools; we just lack the political will to finish the job.
2. Teachers know best how to teach kids; policymakers should leave them alone.
3. The federal government meddles too much in the affairs of local schools.
4. Teacher unions are the enemy.
5. There's no place in education for politics.

He refuted all of these very well.

I read another article by Dave Clinefelter of Rethinking Higher Education on college tuition. Dave's first data point is sobering - median family income has risen by 5% over the last decade, but college tuition has risen by 65%. He cites many reasons for this, but the big one is that State funding has fallen off dramatically, and the schools can't keep up.

A key factor in both cases is how much local vs. state vs. federal involvement there is or should be in education.

I think education should not be funded locally or at the state level - it should be all federal. If for no other reason than a state's local economy should not prevent any student from getting the best possible education. The second reason - a child should not be penalized for living in a state where the education leaders are ...not clear thinkers. Third, if students who graduate (whether to go into tertiary education or the workforce) are compared nationally, standards (curriculum, assessments, etc.) should be described nationally, and be consistent across the country - an even playing field. Finally, salaries for educators should (with regional cost-of-living accommodations) be equal across the country.

I'm not however saying that the Feds should tell teachers how to teach. Instead they should define the outcomes that schools are expected to create, and then develop standards that judge the quality of schools relative to each other based on the quality of their graduates. As I wrote before, I believe we must know what the goal is and that you are what you measure.

By the same token, I don't think that all teachers are prefect or even universally effective. I wrote about a number of teachers that don't seem to have their students' best interests at heart - I don't think that is acceptable either.

This is controversial, I know. Many believe that education is a local issue, should managed by those that can accommodate the unique requirements of their locale, and that it should be funded at the local level. I don't agree. This is too important to be random, to be left in the hands of those who are might take a whimsical approach to education, or bow to tough budgetary times. It is not acceptable for our schools, teachers and most critically, our students to be compromised.

Advanced Student Learning

Joel Klein and Al Sharpton published an open letter on education to President-elect Obama in Monday's Wall Street Journal. In it they spoke about the disparity between white and non-white academic performance, the generally poor performance of schools that are "racing to the bottom" in efforts to teach students to pass increasingly dumbed-down assessments.

Klein and Sharpton are co-chairs of EEP (Education Equality Project), whose mission is to bring equality to education and ensure that only measures that help advance student learning are passed. They support charter school options as well as a rethinking of the teacher union tenure and compensation plans.

In the letter, they ask President-elect Obama to develop national standards and assessments for student achievement, and re-purpose the $30-billion spent federally in K-12 education to support the recruitment and retention of the best teachers in under served urban schools.

I disagree.

First the money. The one (and only) carrot the Federal Government has with education is their $30 billion. It must be used to guarantee student learning advancement. If it is used to fund teacher salaries, then it doesn't assure the outcome they want. Putting their $ into payroll turns it into an entitlement, not possible to move it, ever. That doesn't make any sense. 

I absolutely believe that teachers should be paid like doctors and lawyers, and more importantly get the respect they've earned, but this proposal sounds like a totally unmanaged activity and I don't think we should spend anything much less $30 billion that way! How do you control where the funds go and whether a given teacher's work merits an increase in pay? Finally, it's the job of the States to cover payroll not the Feds.

Second, the assessments. Their own letter says that assessments are a huge problem, and have always failed. Why go back to the same place over and over again? I believe we should not spend time and energy trying the same failed approaches to solving this. We know that every child is different, so standardized assessments are implicitly unfair. We also know that bureaucracies are not agile. Why then make assessments, which take years to put together and even longer to adapt to changed times the cornerstone of improving student learning? It doesn't make any sense to me.

If you're interested in what I'd propose, I've written about this here, here, and here.

And if you want read even more, here's my suggestion of what the President-elect's inauguration speech should say about education.

I love what EEP stands for (improved student learning), but don't think this letter and their request of the new administration reflect that ideal.

The Worldwide Innovative Teachers' Forum

UPDATE #2:

Here are pointers to video recordings of some of the teachers' showcases.  Here are three that I was inspired by, and finally the link to all of the videos that I found.

1. Sarietjie Musgrave - South Africa
2. Nathan Kerr - New Zealand
3. Tom Fitzsimmons & Ciaran McLaren - Northern Ireland

To see all the videos click on any of the above videos and below the video you will see a link "WWITF" that will take you to the rest.

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UPDATE:

To learn more about the incredible work the teachers did, and to join, click Innovative Teachers Forum.  Once signed in, go to the Communities page, and join the Worldwide Innovative Teachers Forum 2008 - Teacher community.

Enjoy:)

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I'm in Asia this week attending a most fantastic conference - the 4th Annual Worldwide Innovative Teachers' Forum in Hong Kong. 
This evening (in about 45 mins actually) marks the end of an absolutely AWESOME week - we are about to leave the hotel for the gala dinner, where (per the link above) we will celebrate the accomplishments of the wonderful and inspiring educators that participate in the Innovative Teachers' Network, and recognize the winners of the best exemplars of Collaboration, Community and Content.  There's a fourth category, Educators' Choice as well.

We also witnessed the election of the new President of the United States this week (not sure if anyone noticed that:)), and it was so wonderful to see the global interest and heartfelt support for the new President-Elect. Knowing that Education and Educators is one of Barak Obama's top five priorities as he takes over is wonderful news.

My first experience with this amazing community of educators (they number more than 1.5 million (yes, million!) from over 100 countries) was around this time last year in Helsinki, which is where the previous event was held, and I hope I have the opportunity to be wherever the next Forum is held.

These wonderful people are my heroes.  They prove to me in no uncertain terms that the single most critical element to ensuring that present and future generations of students are well cared for and prepared for their destinies is educators.

If every educator in the world (irrespective of wealth, urban, rural, social, political circumstances) is like the 100+ people I had the privilege to meet this week, our children and their children are in the best hands.

It is a crime that our society (with few exceptions around the world) cares so little for the men and women that put their blood, toil, tears and sweat into becoming teachers. We must do more, they deserve recognition, reward, and reassurance of our support and commitment to them and their work.

Who are we really protecting?

Roy Romer wrote today about Andres Alonso, CEO of the Baltimore City Public School District, and the challenges he's facing in not wanting to obfuscate the fact that today his schools are not turning out graduates who are ready for the next step in life (higher-education or the workforce).

This chart shows the gap in test scores for the Baltimore schools vs. the rest of Maryland (thanks to Trulia.com).  So let's set aside the question of whether standardized tests are the best approach to this, I wrote about this here. 

According to the Washington Post, Blair Ewing of the school board wishes to delay successfully passing the tests as a criterion for graduation by a year to give students a chance.  This despite the fact that the school system, parents and students have known about this requirement for many years now.

This is just wrong. Why?

First - knowingly graduating students who do not have the skills to move to the next stage in their lives is a HUGE disservice to the students. They will not be able to get meaningful employment or move to tertiary education simply because they are not ready, and will be rejected.  How does that help?  Moreover, because they are establishing the reputation of the Baltimore City School District, they're actually making it much harder for students that follow to get a fair shake, even if those students are at or above the required proficiency!

Second - isn't the whole point of a school to educate its students? If so, then how do you turn them out into the world without having done your job? 

Third - what of the teachers, curriculum and assessments that have contributed to this? Will any of that change in the year to come? It doesn't appear that Blair advocates doing anything about that.

Fourth - where is the accountability of the board to the parents and students?

Blair doesn't believe the students were exposed to the teaching required to have passed the tests, so let's just graduate them anyway!  Unbelievable!  Reading this we all know that the only thing Blair wants to do is protect himself, and his reputation.  He cares not at all about the students. For shame!

If I were a resident of the city of Baltimore, I'd demand his termination and removal from the board, and maybe even tar and feather him <-- actually that pleasure should go to the students that he is attempting to betray.

Kudos to Andres Alonso for his integrity, as evidenced by this quote: "The notion that it is worse to hold them back rather than pushing them through unprepared is criminal."

We can only hope that under his leadership the District begins to face its problems head-on, take accountability, and attempt to fix things vs. impale their heads in the sand.

You are what you measure

Does America really care about education? On the face of it, we seem to. We spend more money on it than anyone, it's in every candidate's platform, and parents for the most part seem to care as well.

But the results don't bear this out.  American students are nowhere near the top of the global rankings. So what's not working? 

There's this universal truth - you are what you measure.

And how does America measure education?  Standardized tests.

And here is where that's gotten us: 20% high school drop out rates, 1.3 million (yes, million) high school graduates in remedial classes to bring them up to the bare minimum readiness for university, 93% of American teachers with little or no science training, the list goes on. 

According to the NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress), Massachusetts ranks #1 in academic performance in the United States, and yet only 75% of her students graduate from high school.

If you're interested in how NAEP tests our children - give it a go - the tests are embarrassingly easy, seeming almost to be "rigged" to increase the passing rates, and yet we still suck.

So what have I/we learned?

1. Despite the appearance of being "designed" to maximize pass rates, we still fail 
2. These tests do nothing to improve two core measures - dropout rates and readiness for the next evolution (university or the workforce)
3. By measuring teachers on their students' ability to pass a test, we are making the teachers teach to the test and only to the test, and we can't even seem to do that well

What can we do?

1. Define more pragmatic and relevant measures of success (suggestions below)
2. Pay for performance
3. Recognize that resistance to #2 is likely to come from the institutions as well as the unions that represent interested parties
4. Get the next President to care and make one of his top 3 priorities
5. Participate - all of us must be pushy and demanding
   

Suggested measures of success:

1. Reduction in dropout rates: every (100%) student in this country must graduate high school by 2025
2. Replace SAT and other standardized tests with performance-based assessments: every tertiary (post high school) school (university, college, community college, etc.) should be required (starting with the Sept 2008 incoming class) to report on student performance in their school based on the high school where they graduated:
   • Ranking #1 - each high school is ranked based on the percentage of students that require remediation (ex. if 20 out of 100 students needed remediation, that school's ranking is 80%); the goal is to be at 100%
   • Ranking #2 - each high school is measured on their students' performance vs. the all-up average student performance in that year (if there are 500 students in the freshman class, 10 from your high school, and your first year grades (as a group of 10) were 5% better than average, then your high school's ranking is 105%; the goal is to get as big a number as possible
   • Ranking #3 - the last four years' rankings are published to demonstrate the school's sustained performance ~over the trailing Gr 9-12 period<-- this is for high school, we can do the same for elementary and middle school
     
3. We will invest to bring, and incent to keep every school up to a "university-ready" standard, and give bonuses to schools that improve beyond that based on the performance of their graduating students at the end of their freshman year
4. Rather than create a teacher-based performance/incentive model, I prefer an institution-based one, to foster a sense of team + reflect the fact that the student learns from the whole school
5. There can be teacher-based incentives at the local level, just not at the national level
   

This is just 30 minutes' work to jot this down.  I imagine there are many people much smarter and more knowledgeable that could come up with a SIMPLE and CLEAR way to measure school performance, and then a simple and effective way to incent the desired behavior.

The 21st Century Imperative

Scott McLeod has a very interesting conversation going about a 21st century learning system.  One person asked a great question - why all of a sudden is it different?  How are this century's children different from any other century's and why does learning have to change?  Since innovation has occurred in every century, why is this one different?

All great questions. So why is this century different and why does it require a special and new system? I recently saw a great presentation by Martin Beanof Microsoft, where he talked about some interesting perceptions over the ages:

• From a teacher's conference in 1703: "Students today can't prepare bark to calculate their problems. They depend on slates which are more expensive. What will they do when slate is dropped and breaks? They will be unable to write!"
• From a principal's publication in 1815: "Students today depend on paper too much. They don't know how to write on a slate without getting chalk dust all over themselves. They can't clean a slate properly. What will they do when they run out of paper?"
• From the National Association of Teachers Journal 1907: "Students today depend too much upon ink. They don't know how to use a pen knife to sharpen a pencil. Pen and ink will never replace the pencil."
• From the Rural American Teacher 1928: "Students today depend upon store-bought ink. They don't know how to make their own. When they run out of ink they will be unable to write words or ciphers until their next trip to the settlement. This is a sad commentary on modern education."
• From the PTA Gazette 1941: "Students today depend on these expensive fountain pens. They can no longer write with a straight pen and nib. We parents must not allow them to wallow in such luxury to the detriment of learning how to cope in the real business world which is not so extravagant."
• From Federal Teachers 1950: "Ball point pens will be the ruin of education in our country. Students use these devices and throw them away. The American values of thrift and frugality are being discarded. Businesses and banks will not allow such luxuries."

:)  Interesting that in every case, the institution was skeptical about a better enabler of communication. Today, the skepticism is about a better enabler of access to communication, and more specifically, how communication enables profound access to information.
 
This is where the game changed. Historically, teachers/academia/libraries held exclusive domain on knowledge. They chose to impart it on their terms, and the system (pedagogy, assessment, curriculum design, etc.) were all based on this bottleneck.
 
But now, anyone and everyone has access to information, lectures, assignments, tests, etc. And it's pretty much unfiltered (and indeed un-vetted).  This was exacerbated by the current No Child Left Behindpolicy, which bases academic accomplishment solely on arcane testing. How sad.
 
So - where is the teacher's power today? Where is the institution's power? Other than the mere ability to bestow diplomas, it's all in the hands of the teacher, whose ability to control information has been eliminated. Those teachers that can't cope, those teachers that can't engage students, those teachers that can't be the inspiration for their students, to help them:

1. Learn how to effectively find what's relevant from all sources.
2. Understand principles and basic concepts.
3. Learn how to combine all of this and turn it into analysis and then insight.
4. Effectively and persuasively communicate their insights.

I guess the real essence of 21st century learning is not in the hands of the students or the institution, but the educators. It will be their ability to capture, motivate, inspire, compel that will rule the day. In this sense, it's not that different from any other century.
 
The only difference is how obvious poor educators will be. Let's hope more than less have the sense to retool or retire.