Mediocrity in Education

That was the topic of discussion with my son-in-law and I this last weekend. We didn't get far in our answers, we mainly tried to define it and then I whined about it and then we went to Jumer's Casino. (A solution for everyone's woes, right?)

But he had a point. His sister-in-law is a teacher, his mom was a first grade teacher, his dad an elementary principal and then there's me! Isn't it wonderful that he and his brother talked about mediocrity in education? Their point was that the good teachers get the difficult kids/assignments and then their test scores go down, while the not-so-good teachers get the better kids/assignments and their scores go up. Thus isn't education promoting mediocrity?

A point well taken.

And there is no solution, no easy solution.

So quite coincidentally I listened to a repeat conversation with Mike Rose on Speaking of Faith. I read his book, Lives on the Boundary years ago and I believe he has a great message. If you don't want to listen to the SOF podcast, there is an excerpt from one of his books, Why School, Reclaiming Education for All of Us.

I've copied some parts that resonate with me:

On standardized tests:

Tests embody definitions of knowledge, learning, and teaching. A test that would include, say, the writing of an essay, or a music recital, or the performance of an experiment embodies different notions of cognition and instruction than do typical tasks on standardized tests: multiple choice itmes, matching, fill-ins. I have given both kinds of tests, both have value, but the get at different things, represent knowledge in different ways, might match or be distant from a school's curriculum, can require different methods of teaching. When one kind of test dominates and when the stakes are high, the tests can drive and compress a curriculum. What is tested gains in importance and other subjects fade. Math is hit hard while art and debate are pushed to the margin—if they survive at all.

What's actually happening in the classroom -

A teacher I know tells this story. In response to the NCLB mandate to focus on all children, this teacher's district issued a page-long checklist on each student to be used in each class the student took. Every teacher was to mark every time he or she assisted a child, asked if the child understands, noted a behavior problem, and so on. This requirement applied to all students, every class—though principals, in an attempt to keep instruction from collapsing under the regulation, told teachers to pay special attention to their students who were most at risk. The intention here was a good one, but the means by which it was accomplished was so formulaic and cumbersome that it devastated teaching. It can be ridiculed as a thoughtless local response to good legislation, but the pressure to comply is great, and when there are no funds available to mount professional development, or changes in the size and organization of schools, or other means to foster attentive and cognitively rich instruction, then districts—in the context of a high-stakes, underresourced environment—will resort to all sorts of draconian and, ultimately, counterproductive solutions.

What drill and kill do to targeted students -

This concern about the nature of a school's response to high-stakes pressure is especially pertinent for those students at the center of most reform efforts: poor children, immigrants, students from nondominant racial and ethnic groups. You can prep kids for a certain kind of test, get a bump in scores, yet not be providing a very good education. The end result is the replication of a troubling pattern in American schooling: poor kids get an education of skills and routine, a lower-tier education, while students in more affluent districts get a robust course of study.

Now, assessment is integral to learning. Good teachers give a wide variety of tests and assignments, make judgments about student work, and probe students' thinking when their answers miss the mark. Standardized tests can well be part of this constellation of assessment, but should not overwhelm it. It's important to remember how far removed standardized tests are from the cognitive give-and-take of the classroom. That's one reason why there is a debate among testing specialists as to whether a test score—which is, finally, a statistical abstraction—is really an accurate measure of learning. Yet the scores on standardized tests have become the gold standard of excellence.

Advocates of NCLB argue that to raise questions about testing is—as former Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings put it—to water down accountability, find loopholes, avoid it. True enough, wily school officials might well hide behind the complexities of testing. Let's be clear: accountability is central to any public institution. But simplified, single-shot accountability mechanisms will yield simplified compliance, and therefore they need to be scrutinized.

And this is what we are saying ALL the time. It's not just what happens in the classroom that creates the environment for learning:

What NCLB has exactly right is the assertion that children's cognitive potential is influenced by much more than their income level. But it is likewise naive or duplicitous to dismiss the devastating effects of poverty on a child's life in school. Yes, there are a number of cases of poor children who achieve mightily. But their stories are never simple, and, as any teacher who follows her students' lives will tell you, their achievement can be derailed by one bad break.

He ends his chapter, as all the pundits do, let's hope this sparks a conversation. If the powers that be, the ones who can REALLY make the changes, the administrators at the local level, the state legislators and finally the national Congress, if THEY went to the schools and actually ASKED, the would find there is PLENTY of conversation.

This irks me the most. Those of us in the trenches, those of us coaxing and pleading and standing on our heads to insert new material, create practice, and the spark of learning are NEVER asked. Everyone who has EVER been in school assumes to know how it works. TODAY. Because the assumption is that all students are the same. The same learning curve and student behavior exists for students today as years ago.

Not true.

Teachers need to find the voice. Teachers need to share the truth. And not through our unions, there is an established political bureaucracy to make much forward movement.

But teachers are busy and teachers are tired. And I understand why they can't speak out.

So we keep plugging along and mediocrity reigns.

So, Brad, I think I know WHY we have mediocrity, but I don't know HOW to make it go away.

Let's hope this sparks a conversation....