My first non-standardized teacher was Bob Williams. He stood about 5 foot 5 if he tiptoed, was an ex- Navy Seabee, a chain smoker and the best English teacher I ever had.
On the first day of class, Mr. Williams announced that he was a male chauvinist pig. He argued that there was a place for women and there was a place for men and that’s all there was to it. Men, according to Mr. Williams, were to have the possessions of power and authority while women were not. Our arguments with him, while impassioned and thoughtful sounding to our ears, went nowhere. With skill and practice he countered, dodged, and parried them all. Thus was our introduction to 7th grade English class.
For the rest of the year we read poetry by Adrienne Rich, Langston Hughes, Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, and Maya Angelou. We read short stories, essays, and novels. And we wrote, all the time. What was always in the background, always underneath, always on the periphery, was the argument that we were having with Mr. Williams about sexism and fairness. He was the first teacher I remember wanting to talk about outside of class.
Mr. Williams, and teachers like him, are an incredibly endangered species.
Recently, the Los Angeles School Board voted to do away with what had been a cap on charter school growth and to now allow 250 “failing” schools to be taken over by charter companies. In addition charter companies will be permitted to open schools in the 50 brand new multi-million dollar campuses that are currently under construction.
By their very nature, charter schools are more beholden to the content standards and standardized test results than public schools because they can lose their charters and very easily be shut down. To waylay this, many, if not most, charter schools have strict curriculum guidelines and periodic assessments, which force teachers to teach the same topics, the same way, at the same time. This phenomenon is in public schools as well. There have been, and will continue to be, acts of resistance, both overt and covert, in an attempt to subvert and end this policy. But with the resounding vote of the Los Angeles School Board, it seems that the one pedagogy, one curriculum, one approach to education has won a major victory and will be accelerated.
And so, I eulogize Mr. Williams and all those like him. I eulogize him with sadness, rage, and hope. Mr. Williams was not a model of tolerance, but he was an individual who worked in a system that allowed him to be an effective educator.
My desire is that all our acts of resistance can manifest themselves into a frontal assault on the lock step teacher corps that is being forced into existence, a teacher corps that is made to march to a numerically created meaning of what it means to be educated.
When I allow myself to truly dream, I dream of a school board that votes to create systems that encourage collaborative independence and pedagogical and curricular experimentation, a system that supports teachers collaboratively struggling to truly create an education worthy of their students.
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What an unfair, wholesale
What an unfair, wholesale indictment of charter schools.
The simple truth is that some schools -- charter and not -- ARE failing our children. When an elementary school turns out a rising seventh grader who's reading at a 3rd or 4th grade level, that school (and its faculty) have failed that student. When it is systemic -- when more children come out of that school reading well below grade level than not, it often affects children of color and those in poverty MOST.
Our end game can't be some ideological battle about teacher freedom. Our end game is teaching children. Sure, we lose some flexibility with the use of more scripted curricula, AND most administrators and teachers know that, to reach kids where they are and to lift them up, you can't use a one-size approach, even within the confines of a core curriculum. Teachers CAN have flexibility within those programs.
And, our end game can't be some ideological battle about whether charter schools should exist. They do. And, as you note, they are much easier to close down than traditional schools. In this way, the stakes are higher for them to reach and teach, and to do so more quickly and more profoundly. (I'd agree that we get into potentially troubled water when charter companies aim to make a profit off of children's education -- when they are for profit, rather than nonprofit -- but that's a point not raised by the writer.)
All schools, charter and not, need to be learning communities where the adults charged with nurturing students hearts and minds are willing to learn themselves -- change and adapt curriculum, pay attention to disparities and so forth, always be assessing themselves. That's the problem in all of our schools. Our schools ARE failing children, children of color and those in poverty most of all. That's the reality, and ideological battles don't serve them well. Such battles merely keep adults consumed with something other than the work and love of teaching.
Ironic... I think both the
Ironic...
I think both the article and the comment ("What an unfair wholesale") are flawed...
I will say I very much agree with the point of the article in what is being lost in classrooms across the country as teachers lose their ability TO TEACH... and I will also say I was very disheartened at the slant the article then took towards charter schools - a little blanketed?
However, in the comment attacking it, the statement "Sure, we lose some flexibility with the use of more scripted curricula" shows such a sweeping disregard towards the real issue, such misunderstanding - and I will even say - ignorance. No child can be truly taught within a program, and scripted curricula? (Does anyone else see the tremendous danger in this?) I was sad to be left wondering what knowledge the person writing this really had about these "programs" and their effects on children.
I think what's most sad is that the ones who keep getting lost here are the children - what they need, and what they are not getting - as this chokehold gets tighter and tighter.
I have been teaching for 17 years now. I have watched the critical thinking skills my students enter with decrease yearly - and am fighting harder than ever to help them regain them - even if that fight means fighting the system.
I can't help but find it ironic that we continue to shove the very thing down our students' throats that is making them sick in the first place - and expecting them to get better from it. Isn't this the definition of insanity?
I'm not sure we want to crowd the issues here. Charter schools can be good things, can even be wonderful things if used correctly (can be awful, too). Accountability, too, can be a good thing (but, likewise, can be awful as well).
Funny that we also lack the skills the students do to be able to break down the real problem....
Anyone else find that ironic?
Abby and Holly, I really
Abby and Holly,
I really enjoyed reading your responses and they truly made me reflect upon my perspective. It also led to a series of conversations and arguments with friends and colleagues over the past few days. I also think that we (all three of us) agree on much more than we disagree. Like all things worth investigating, discussing, and worrying about schools, schooling, and education are complex and incredibly complicated.
Re-reading my entry I understand how one could read it and come away thinking that I was anti-charter. I’m not against charters; some of the schools I truly admire might have been considered or might today be considered charters because they are public schools of choice. These include Central Park East Schools, Urban Academy, the Mission School, the Amy Biehl School, and the Francis W. Parker School to name just a few. Where I part company with Abby is on the issue of ideology. I don’t think that the argument over schools is about ideology so much as it is about pedagogy. The schools I mentioned above were all formed around a shared belief and pedagogy in what it means to be educated and what is the best way to educate a child. These schools were formed around that shared belief and formed with educational research and educational data in mind.
It’s hard to talk about charter schools in general because there are so many types, but the charter companies that I am familiar with in Los Angeles are run by and survive based upon test scores. They reason they exist is to raise students’ test scores and to graduate them. A student isn’t necessarily “educated” because they achieve the right number on the right test, on the right day, at the right time. This isn’t to say that some schools don’t have good teaching and good learning happening, it’s just the teaching and learning happens not necessarily to help students to use their minds well or help students gain wisdom but to get a numerical score on one particular test. This number is then supposed to mean that students are educated. I don’t blame the schools for this, the neighborhood schools or the charter schools, I blame the system that is forcing pedagogy, curriculum, and teaching to narrow to the point of anorexia, where all students, all teachers, all schools, and all classrooms look the same. We all know they don’t.
My issue with the LA School Board’s choice is that they know the rules under which are forced charters operate: get good test results or else.
Abby and Holly, Your comments
Abby and Holly,
Your comments about charter schools have gotten me really thinking, too. My own feelings about charters are both strong and mixed.
I had my first encounter with the charter school concept in the 1990s, when I was working as a newspaper reporter in Alabama. An advocacy group from DC came to town, pushing charters and vouchers as a "free market" solution to low achievement, and hinting that parents would be able to get government funding to send their kids to faith-based schools.
You'd think that would go over really well in a conservative state like Alabama, and yet there was actually a profound resistance to it. Turns out that small-town people actually like their public schools. The public school is a place to vote, it's a landmark that defines the community, and it will send a bus to pick your kid up at your door. Small town people want their schools, they just want their schools to be BETTER.
Later I moved to Florida, carrying with me the idea that charters were a bit of a scam. And I found out that there were actually quite a few charters in Florida that were doing a fantastic job of tailoring their methods to the needs of their audience. Charters could innovate, could listen to their students and their families, and could grow community without quite so much bureaucracy.
Today I'm a roiling cauldron of indecision where charters are concerned. But there are a few things I know for sure.
I know charters would have gone over better with teachers if they hadn't been sold to the public as another top-down reform. In America, education reform always seems to come from politicians, pundits, journalists and business leaders, who are full of opinions about how schools should be run, but haven't spent a day in the classroom. When the charter idea first came to Alabama, it came from people who talked about how broken everything was, how inherently flawed -- not about how GOOD schools can be and why we should be passionate about them. Shouldn't we trust reform to people who LIKE schools and teachers?
I know that where charters are good, it's because they're reforming from the bottom up. Small schools, new ideas, experimentation.
I know that where bottom-up reform is the norm, teachers will be treated with professional respect -- because bottom-up reform starts with the students and what they need, and teachers are the people who deal with those questions every day.
I know that when reform comes from the top down, the teacher becomes an annoying detail. So teachers wind up being scripted and stripped of professional status.
And I don't know, but I am pretty sure, that these issues of reform and teacher empowerment transcend public/private and traditional/charter lines.
Abby and Holly, I hope you'll keep commenting so I can learn more.