All students deserve public schools where they can make progress toward literacy, numeracy, fluent writing ability, an appreciation for society, and responsible, engaged citizenship. But what it takes to create such schools is hotly contested.
My broad-brush summary of the contested theories is this:
One theory (standards and testing) is that if we tell teachers what to teach, and test students on what they should have learned in a given year, more students will learn.
Another theory (incentives and data management) is that if we offer students more incentives to do well on tests, teachers more incentives to focus on preparing students for tests, and principals more incentives to manage based on test data, more students will learn.
A third theory (professional teachers know best) is that if we hire professionals who are skilled at reaching students from all kinds of educational backgrounds, and give them the resources they need to assess students' learning needs and create engaging learning environments to address those needs, then students will learn.
Public schools in the US seem to be trapped in the first model -- standards and testing. My sense is that I don't need to explain to most DailyKos readers why that model is not working for all our students. The arguments have been made by other Kossaks. (Links chosen almost randomly from my long hotlist.)
Yes, plenty of students learn, most schools are not failing in their mission... but I would argue that schools and teachers succeed in meeting students' needs in spite of standards and testing, rather than because of it.
The second model is one increasingly advocated in education. A couple of diaries have been written over the past few days about the influence of AIG CEO Eli Broad on new reform efforts that are based on incentives. (Those diaries include this one by chemtchr, and this one by teacherken.) There's little data to suggest that these approaches will work, but there's plenty of research and theory from psychology to suggest that getting people to perform in exchange for money is dangerous. It can actually decrease individuals' enthusiasm for engaging in the activity for its intrinsic pleasures. Do we really want students to learn that learning is only worth doing when there is a reward?
I don't.
The third model, of developing professional teachers and giving them all the resources they need to help students learn -- to build on what they already know, every day, and engage them in pursuing their curiosity so that they can learn more -- that's the model I'd like to see dominate discussions of educational reform. It would require that experienced and effective teachers play a much bigger role in preparing the next generation of teachers, and in coaching one another for continuous improvement.
How can we make that happen? Where are the advocates for this approach? Who are they? How can we make sure they are heard?