Posts, Not Postal

What shall I say on this my 125^th post?  My posting frequency has declined as one might suspect of an 86 year old woman.  My passion has not.  Now as ever I love this nation, I love our civil liberties, I view democracy as so much more important than commerce, fellow humans more important than corporations, and public schools as the bastion of this democracy.  Ah yes, I am an endangered species: an Anglo Texas female liberal.  I rage against the forces that would undue our rights for the sake of profit or their own personal belief systems, and I rant against the forces that would attack public education because those forces resent taxes and hate the notion of educating all kids.  I shall not stop that raging and those rants.  I do not believe I am crazy, though that may be the major attribute of crazy people. 

And yet I grow weary of our failure to learn: 

Election to office does not endow humans with omnipotence or expertise, and yet we allow elected non-experts to continue to craft public education policy influenced by billionaire experimenters and wealthy testing companies when those legislators have absolutely no business doing so.  Would they write the specs for asphalt or cement for Texas highways?  No, and yet they do so for public education, a much more sophisticated and complicated and important realm than highways.  (It is interesting to me that the specifications for a highway are outlined in a document published in 2004, have not changed since and was written by experts in the field.  Education specs, on the other hand, are amended every time the Legislature meets!) A highway flaw is patchable, children not so much.

The same is true of amassing a fortune.  Because a person is worth a billion dollars does not make that person worthy of writing policy in areas where they have no expertise.  Knowledge, wisdom and understanding are not income-based in a way that more money in the bank automatically increases expertise.

Civil liberties remain the most important distinction of this democracy and other governments.  There is absolutely nothing unusual on planet earth today or in all of human history for the ruling group and/or the majority to force its beliefs and will on the citizens.  The conflict in the mid-east is grounded in belief systems where religious fundamentalists insist that their belief system become the law of the land, and worse, that anyone who does not subscribe to their beliefs is pagan and punishable.  We approach that same scenario here with clear adoption of Christian beliefs supported by our government.  It is now ok to pray to a Christian God prior to public meetings of elected officials.  It is ok to discriminate against homosexuals and the same time it is heresy to say anything discriminatory about a racial group.  I do not get it.  We should have the right to believe what we choose to believe.  We should not have the right to act on those beliefs if they harm others.  The government should never imply one belief system is supported while others are not.  You may be a bigot.  You may not discriminate.  You may be anti-gay.  You may not discriminate.  Period.

When will we recognize that if everyone in this country who was eligible registered to vote and actually voted our nation would be led entirely by Democratic rather than Republican officials?  Hence the Republican effort to make voting and registering so much more difficult.

When will we recognize that if you earn less than $400,000 or so Republican policies hurt you?

When will we recognize that every time Republicans have controlled the federal elected branches and acted in ways to deregulate industry we have headed for terrible recessions as the top 1% prosper more and more?

When we will recognize that when we allow corporations and wealthy individuals to donate money to elections without limit we are allowing our government to rule us via a philosophy of wealth generation and protection, not philosophy of all men are created equal?  The rich have already won economically and seek to win even more by controlling our government.

It appears we will not learn.  Hence I feel it is my calling as a retired educator to continue to seek to teach.

I shall continue to post, to vote, to contribute to political campaigns that seek to implement the kind of government our forefathers dreamed about, not the kinds of governments they fled.

I grow weary.  My flesh is weak though my spirit is strong.  I shall take a nap and engage again in another instructional episode.  I shall maintain my passion, I shall maintain my anger and my frustration, I shall post, but I shall not become violent.  I shall post and not go postal.

School Reform and Jumbo Shrimp

I must be getting old.  I just read the CNN reader’s poll for best TV in 2013.  I am aghast.  It appears to me we have lost all our ability to think critically and discern reality from fantasy.  Where is George Carlin when we really need him?  I recall my hysterical laughter the first time I heard his routine on jumbo shrimp and the inherent cognitive dissonance of such a term.  His ability to identify oxymorons remains unsurpassed: military intelligence, holy war, death benefits, hot water heater, etc.)  Today there apparently remains no end to our ability to butcher our language.  Here are my current irritants.

Reality TV.  Never has a phrase been developed that more captures cognitive dissonance than the phrase reality TV.  Unless you are viewing a documentary, the Weather Channel’s coverage of a hurricane, or live coverage of a high speed police chase you are not watching reality on TV.  You are watching a fantasy production on TV.  Worse, each of these so-called reality shows seems to celebrate the lowest end of human accomplishment and wallow in joy at the rejection of some of the participants.  Why would we want to watch such an event?  It is beyond me.  If you enjoy quality dancing then dancing with the stars is not the show to watch.  If you enjoy quality singing, then American Idol, The Voice, etc. are not the shows to watch.  If you enjoy watching the pain of rejection and defeat, then tune in to a sporting event which comes much closer to reality TV than reality TV.  As for me, TV, books, movies, and video games are wonderful escapes from reality.  Each of these platforms has the ability to transport us to other places, times, clear fictions, reflections and fake blood.  If reality TV is in fact reality then I suffer from delusional thinking.  There is enough competition, rejection, and poor performance in my reality that I feel no need to seek it out on TV.  And until Robert Redford, Jennifer Aniston, Tom Cruise, Helen Mirren, Tom Sellick, Gwyneth Paltrow, Halley Berry, Sandra Bullock, Jennifer Lawrence and/or Zoey Saldana appear on the show, the very title “dancing with the stars” is false advertising.

Obamacare.  The Affordable Health Care Act passed in the first two years of President Obama’s first term is an incredible piece of legislation.  The law makes patient health care more important than insurance company profit.  It eliminates the ability of insurance companies to deny coverage based on previous conditions, it expands coverage to dependent children, etc., etc.  It creates a national health care exchange forcing insurance companies to bid down health care.  On and on.  Yes, the act requires everyone to get health care coverage much as we currently require everyone to have automobile insurance and to wear seat belts.  To refer to this law as Obamacare is another twist on the use of the English language.  The act has nothing to do with the health care of the President.  The act has nothing to do with support and/or providing care to the President.  To call the law “Obamacare” is clearly a slur that has no meat, and yet is almost universally used.  If we can stomach this term, why not refer to the GOP fiscal policy as Millionairecare, or the Common Core as Pearsoncare, or vouchers and charters as Wealthycare, or all the proposed laws regarding Christmas, homosexuality, teaching religion in schools, female reproductive rights, etc, etc. as Christiancare.  This act is not about Obama.  It is about Americans who could not get nor could they afford health care.  If we want a nickname we should call it Everyonecare.

Selfie.  The Oxford Dictionary’s word of the year is equally confusing to me.  I understand that a selfie is a digital self-portrait taken typically at arm’s length.  I am not sure of all the boundaries of the word.  If I put a camera on a tripod, set a timer, and retreat to sit in front of a selected backdrop, is that a photo or a selfie?  If I take a picture of you with my cell phone is that a Youie?  Is the word so limited as to only apply to tilted, poorly lit, non formatted self photos?  If so, why not have a more specific term like, Vainey, or Tackie, or Shortarmshot?  Can there by definition be a candid self portrait?  Don’t I always know when I will click the shutter?  So, is a selfie my best foot forward?  The reflection I want the world to see of me?  If so, are commercial photographers worried?  If not, why would we do such a thing to ourselves?  Is it only because we are simply burning erasable mega pixels and we do not have to pay for film or development anymore?  I remain confused that we engage in such behavior, and if so that we share it.  Do we share it with anyone who does not know how we look?  Why would we do that?  Once we share a selfie, once seen by others, has a selfie automatically lost its claim to the term?  What shall we call a shared selfie?  A Groupie?  Is it OK to tag myself in a shared selfie?  How narcissistic can we actually become?  I am so confused.  More so because we could have chosen a word of the year that no one really understands like hashtag or twerking.

There are more.  One cannot buy a wall at Wal-Mart nor a garage at a garage sale, happy hour is always more than 60 minutes, livestock are raised to be killed, and why when there are only 3 possible times during a game to actually kick a ball do we call the sport football?  We should call it Tackle.  Likewise Dribble, and Pitch.

I have long irritated friends who would email me and ask things like, “Do you know so-and-so’s email address?” to which I would simply reply, “Yes.”  We become more obscure and obfuscating the more words and phrases we invent.  We should seek clarity.  Especially as our communications become instant and everyone has abandoned pen pals which required time and thought and reflection and effort. The same is not true of Instagrams, Tweets and Facebook which only require gizmos, not thought.

Which leads me to school reform.  Really?  Reform the school?  “Reform” implies changing or improving something that is wrong, something that is immoral, something that is corrupt.  Do we believe schools are in need of reform?  If so, what part of schools is immoral and corrupt?  I assume we are not talking brick and mortar, sidewalks, cafeterias and gymnasiums, though we might be in some cases.  Surely we are not talking about children.  They do not come to us corrupt.  If they become corrupt it is at the hands of the adults in the culture wherein they are raised, not the school.  Are we talking teachers, aides, principals?  No one tolerates corrupt adult practices in public schools.  When a teacher engages in inappropriate behavior with a student it makes the headlines.  When an administrator steals money it makes the headlines.  It makes the headlines because it is, quite frankly, so rare.  Fender benders and weekly burglaries do not make headlines as we have grown so accustomed to those multiple, immoral and harmful acts that they appear in list format somewhere buried in the bowels of the paper.  No, corrupt school people make headlines.   

So what must be reformed?  I would argue two things:  it is “school reformers” who are attempting to make profit from public tax dollars at the expense of kids and are therefore the corrupt component of schools.  Or, we have it backwards.  We really meant reform school, not school reform, for children who cannot behave.  As with jumbo shrimp, there really is not a school in America in need of reform or the elimination of corruption and greed any more than there is a whale-sized shrimp somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico.  In fact, a jumbo shrimp is more likely than the need for school reform.  And it is in the private sector that we continue to discover immoral acts.  The market has no sense of morality.  I could have been comfortable with “school improvement” on the assumption that all organizations can improve and that the only real improvement is inside-out, not outside-in.  But no.  Reformers want school reform outside-in.  They will fight to the death to ensure the government does not reform their private practices any where near the extent they wish to the government to control public schools, especially for their own monetary gain.  For me, this is the ultimate oxymoron and we should be clear about that with the multiple morons who promote such.

Please pass the cocktail sauce, not for my cocktail (which would make sense), but for my 2 inch jumbo shrimp.

An Antonym for Fundamentalism

As a little grey-haired lady and former school person I watch these days half amused and half angry. It is the end of May and schools conduct fun days, award assemblies, and banquets. It appears to me that one of the side-effects of high stakes standardized testing is that once administered, teachers and kids feel as though the year is over. That perhaps explains the large number of video options in libraries, hard drives and networks. The role of teachers and administrators morphs in these final days from instructional leadership to crowd control. But, I digress.


This is Texas, and with the closing of this school year, as with every odd numbered year, the Legislature remains enthroned in Austin, wrestling with finance and public schools. We always seem to be the very last thing out of the hopper. As demagogues pontificate and amend proposed bills I am floored by the positions many of those in leadership assume. It is clear to me they deeply believe they have been to the mountain top and descended with the truth carved in stone regarding public schools. They are not to be swayed in this belief. They have a view of schools and a view of how to improve schools that is rigid, not to be swayed by logic, science or professional experience. They are fundamentalists.

I Goggled “antonym for fundamentalism” and though there were a lot of hits, each one I opened said “no antonyms for fundamentalism.” I found a host of great synonyms like die hard, extremist, fanatic, intransigent, reactionary, zealot, stick-in-the-mud, right-winger, etc., but no antonyms. I think this noun or adjective needs an antonym. I am here to argue that the antonym of fundamentalism is “educated”.

I shall not spend much time defining fundamentalism or fundamentalists. There are plenty of references for this way of thinking, and the synonyms above should help. The bottom line for a fundamentalist is that they have a belief system that will not vary, will not be swayed by logic, learning or science. They believe what they believe is a fundamental truth and will not budge. My connotation for fundamentalists includes an evangelistic component: not only are fundamentalists intransigent in their thinking, they are committed to both converting everyone else to their way of thinking and remain totally intolerant of different ways of thinking. I bet you know some folks like this.

We should talk about what an educated person is like. An educated person knows there are multiple ways to address any issue, any problem, and that is blasphemy to reformers, Pearson and standardized testers in general. An educated person seeks to learn those multiple ways and in a given context select a position or strategy that best suits the circumstance. An educated person relies on creative thinking, problem solving and research to explore those multiple options. To say to an educated person that there is only one view is the source of laughter and disdain. Clearly there are multiple views. An educated person believes because they know it to be true, that there is no one right way of thinking or believing, and that our beliefs must be informed by our science. If we have evidence that our belief is flawed, we should modify the belief in light of what we now know. An educated person’s thinking evolves. An educated person’s tolerance of other ways of thinking is very high. An educated person’s evangelistic instinct is to promote the development of other educated people, not to embed in law their own particular thoughts or beliefs at this given moment. It is for all these reasons that the fundamentalists tend to win debates with educated people. Fundamentalists believe they are right, and an educated person is willing to recognize and tolerate their belief.

Let’s begin with something simple like religious beliefs. Many folks in our nation have read the Bible, or at least some version or translation of the Bible. If before, during, and after reading the Bible one concludes this is a holy book and is literally and fundamentally the truth, then one is a fundamentalist. It does not matter that we know the earth is more than 6,000 years old, it does not matter that we know evolution is a valid scientific theory, it does not matter that we know the earth is not the center of the solar system or the universe, a fundamentalist will cling to the written word in the Bible as fundamentally true regardless of a host of evidence to the contrary. On the other hand, an educated person will read the Bible and find great truths, wonderful lessons, and seek to discern the overall message of the text though thousands of years old. An educated person will proceed to read the Koran, the I Ching, the Book of Mormon, Tripitakas, and the Bhagavad Gita, and other "holy books." The educated person might even read the God Delusion or other atheistic postulates in order to grasp the full dimension of human beings and their religious belief structure. Not the fundamentalist. The very thought of reading such texts is a threat to be banished. It violates what is fundamentally correct and must be purged. Should we find references to these texts in school we must exorcise them for fear that learning of other belief structures may diminish the fundamental belief structure.

The same is true of political beliefs. Fundamentalists tend to believe the government budget should always be balanced. They tend to believe that the taxes from those who have money should not be spent on providing basic services to those who do not have money. Educated folks think about all this differently. It is contextual. In certain times it is critical for the government to deficit spend and at other times it is critical for the government to balance the budget. If an educated person learned any lesson at all from reading a host of religious texts, he or she will know that the consistent message is love of our fellow humans and doing all that we can to help those in need.

Now to a complex question, assuming religion and politics are simple. Public Schools. Should we as a nation support and fund public schools or should education be an individual pursuit determined by the values and resources of individuals? Should we as a nation have compulsory attendance, or should we simply say anyone who wants an education is welcome to come, but if not, just stay home? Should we think about public schools in the same way as we think about the private sector, that is, competition motivates higher performance and greater reward? Or, should we think about public schools in the same way we think about other public functions such as law enforcement, food inspection, and water and sewer service? Should we think about public schools as complex social entities driven by relationships, or should we think about public schools as an education factory where we measure the products and hold the workers accountable? Should we think about public schools from the viewpoint of the state or national capital or from each local school system and the communities that support them?

The reformers have answers to all these questions and they are placing their answers in policy. They are fundamentalists. They have a view of what public schools are and should be. Educated people know better. They have read the research. They know the private sector, competitive industrial model does not apply to public schools. It is few and far between where such private sector experiments are successful. Educated people know the terrible impact high stakes testing and punitive accountability models have unleashed on public schools. Educated people know that diversion of funds to private sector experiments like charter schools and vouchers diminishes the possible positive impact of public schools. Educated people know that schools are much more like churches than they are like Wal-Mart or Microsoft. Educated people understand the thinking, the motivation and the actions of the fundamentalist reformers, but educated people know it is the wrong mental model.

Sadly, we are planning, funding, mandating and measuring an educational institution via a fundamentalist mind set, rather than an educated mind set. The hypocrisy of these efforts is devastating to current and future generations of children, and possibly our nation.

Yes, education is the antithesis, the antonym and the cure for fundamentalism. The earth is older than 6,000 years, men and dinosaurs did not walk the planet at the same time, and we orbit the sun and not vice-versa. To understand democracy we must look at other forms of government. To understand the free market we must look at other economic models. This is not blasphemy. This is education. One wonders how the fundamentalists gained control of the hallowed, noble institution of public education when in fact they appear to oppose its very existence.

There is no fun in fundamentalism. I pray that education survives this current mind set. I believe the only hope of that is education.

I hope your school year has been good and ends well.

Will Someone Please Take the Mike Away from Daniel Scott Goeb?

As I age and reflect on Texas politics, especially those laws and policies related to public education, I never cease to be amazed at the elected officials we choose to allow to shape the future of so many children. There should not be a more important committee assignment than the education committee of both the House and the Senate. But alas, politics being what they are, folks get assigned to these committees as a result of their bias, their party and their opinions, not their knowledge or experience or background. Hence, we are always at risk of policy via demagoguery. We are in such a risky place right now.


You may not know Mr. Goeb. He was born in Baltimore, Maryland in 1950 where he grew up in a blue collar neighborhood. He was an only child of a man who worked for the Baltimore Sun for 31 years. I do not know where he went to high school, but I would bet he went to a public school. After high school he went to the University of Maryland where he achieved a degree in English, and was the first member of his family to earn a college degree. He was married, then divorced, then married his current wife in 1976. First job on record was in 1977, which says to me either college or high school took longer than usual, or he was working his way through school, or his early employment is unknown. That job was working in Scranton, Pennsylvania as a TV broadcaster. He did the same gig in Washington DC, and then moved to Houston as a sports broadcaster. At about that time he officially changed his name.

Mr. Goeb loves the mike and the camera, and has made a small fortune as a result of that romance. He bought his own radio station and started his own talk show. It is for that talk show that most Texans first knew him. The talk show was very conservative, which is bizarre considering his background of blue collar neighborhoods, divorce, name changes, etc. But, he is a conservative. Very much so. He founded the TEA party caucus in the Texas Senate. The really nice thing about being a talk show host is that you really do not have to know anything; you must just be glib with your opinions on everything. Meet Mr. Goeb.

Mr. Goeb is now chair of the education committee in the Texas Senate. He is pro-charter schools, pro-vouchers, pro all conservative causes. He has absolutely no background in any of these areas. His entire resume prior to the Senate is in front of camera or just a microphone. He is now shaping Texas Education policy from a position of belief, not fact or reason. He is articulate, the camera loves him and his ability to posture before an audience is truly gifted. But his arguments are shallow and not at all in favor of public education, though he seeks every microphone he can find to espouse his opinions.  Asking Mr. Goeb to draft educational policy is akin to asking an atheist to pick the next Pope.

Will someone please take the microphone away from Mr. Goeb? He is dangerous when it comes to education.

He is now known as Senator Dan Patrick.

Happy Anniversary to Me and You

This is the third anniversary of this blog.  That is a long time.  I am thrilled by the numbers of folks who check in to read my posts, the comments, the feedback.  Thank you.

As long as I am able, I shall post my thoughts on the topics prescribed.  I have not been boiled in oil, yet.  That gives me hope for the future of this country.

I received a tweet yesterday that really touched me and help summarize at least some of my beliefs:  "If you do not want your tax dollars to go to help the poor and needy, then stop saying you want a government run on Christian values."

Amen.

What Do You Expect?

I went to see “Die Hard” with an octogenarian friend yesterday. I was terribly disappointed. Turned out it was a Bruce Willis action movie. I had been told it was a risqué movie set in an old folks’ home where the male residents fatally overdosed on Viagra much to the pleasure of the female residents. My expectations were not met, and I found the movie boring compared to what it could have been. No one else in the theatre seemed bored. They were on the edge of their seats. But they did not have the expectation I had. They came to see stuff explode, people get beat up, and Officer McClain escape from situations that defied the odds. Ho Hum. I lived through the Depression, World War II and the Korean War and such Hollywood special effects mean little to me.


The issue is expectations. We feel joy when our expectations are met or exceeded and disappointment when they are not. Settings in which we are consistently disappointed are not where we want to be. Hence, if I have two bad experiences at new restaurant, I am done. If I have years of positive experiences at a restaurant and then have a bad experience, I am likely to come back and try them again.

So, let’s look at this from a 16 year-old point of view. I am a 16 year-old boy, I have access to my family car and several 16 year-old females. I have a computer. I have a smart phone. And I have an X-box connected to my TV. I have instant communication with all my friends, I can surf the web, and I can play exotic, erotic, visually stimulating games on my TV, and I can watch blu ray movies in HD. I live in a world of digital connections, instant answers to every question, and amazing digital entertainment. I unplug, power down and go to school.

There I find one adult female standing in front of a group of other 16 year olds telling me stuff that came out of a book. A book for Hector’s sake! No pictures, no click here for more info, a bound piece of dead paper that will be just the same tomorrow as it was today. The teacher expects me to sit quietly and listen. She does not want me to interact with my peers. She does not want me to go on-line to gather information about the topic of the day. She wants me to absorb. She would rather me be a sponge than a person. I barely survive the boredom until the bell rings, I quickly power-up and catch up with the real world, then power-down to go to another room with another adult female who expects the same thing of me as the first adult female, except this one is talking about another subject. Subjects? What is that all about? The world is connected, not subdivided into little knowledge compartments. Issues flow across social science, science, math and the written or texted word all the time. This deconstruction must be for the adults because it makes no sense to me.

And I do not get this notion of cheating at all. If I do not know an answer and the teacher tells me that is not cheating. If I do not know an answer and I look it up on my smart phone that is cheating. How do you figure that? Isn’t all learning cheating and then remembering the answer? OK, sometimes I figure out the answer by myself, but I use technology when I do that. Why must I perform individually based only on my own memory when no one does that in the real world? There is just too much to know. But I have a gizmo in my pocket that knows everything!

I am bored and I do not want to be here. I do my time, and then escape to a real world, an exciting world of friends and information on the digital highway. I am having fun until I power-down again tomorrow and go back to school. I am a 16 year-old boy.

No wonder kids do not want to go to school. We are way behind them in technology, way behind them in the speed of information processing and discovery. Way behind them in the ability to multi-learn, not multi-task, but from a given digital page learn a host of information by following links, clicking buttons, etc. No textbook can compete. No teacher can compete. We are boring and our information is static. No kid expects to come to school and learn in ways that are exciting, vibrant, flexible, digital, and interactive. They expect to be bored. They get what they expect. They become problems for teachers who sit in the lounge and wring their hands about today’s youth. This hand wringing is more severe than in the past because today’s youth know more than teachers do and they know how to learn faster than teachers can spit it out. The best a teacher can do is slow them down long enough to listen. They are probably pocket texting while it appears they are paying attention.

Die Hard was not what I expected it to be. School has become what kids expect it to be: a mandatory structure where they are at the mercy of adults who don’t get it and will not allow the kids to get it. If we keep the confirmation of this expectation going much longer we will not have any real learners at school, just compliant kids. Time to rethink how we teach and how kids learn. Forcing them into the model we experienced will not work. Let’s surprise our kids and make school interesting, stimulating, interactive, self-learning, collaborative learning citadels of digital excitement! That would be so cool.

Yippee Ki Yay.

School Boarding

I journeyed to the neighborhood theatre with another octogenarian to see Zero Dark Thirty. We created quite a site: two little old white-haired ladies in a suspense and action packed movie where most of our fellow attendees where quite young and dressed in camo. I found it to be an excellent movie, though some scenes made me squirm. I hated the torture scenes, and though my patriotic heart was proud at the end, I did not like seeing the violence. Guess I am getting old. Older.

If you have not seen the movie I recommend it. If you have not seen the movie then the following includes some spoilers.

The scenes where we saw water boarding of prisoners to gain information were especially hard for me to take. I know these were enemy combatants of the US. I know we had to get information. I am appalled that we used violence to extract information from those who commit violence. The inherent cognitive dissonance resonates with me even today. I wonder at the times we have resorted to such strategies with other human beings what makes our cause more noble, more just, and promotes the US as a superior culture for the rest of the world to emulate? Are we the good guys if we practice the same strategies as the bad guys? I took away several messages from those scenes: The ends justified the means; under torture truth will be told; and place someone in enough pain and they will do what you want them to do.

I found it fascinating that in the pursuit of killing Osama Bin Laden that we were in no way lacking resources. The men, machines and technology necessary to accomplish the mission were all provided. These men were supported by a large group external to the mission who very much wanted the men to be successful and accomplish their mission. Interesting. Especially when I think about what we are doing to public schools.

Public school people are being tortured. Admittedly it is more psychological torture than physical torture, but it is torture none the less.

The so called school reformers are doing the following to public schools: they are constantly raising measurable standards while promoting both a decrease in resources and redirection of resources to other forms of education. They are constantly seeking new ways to demonstrate that we are failing to achieve our mission and rather than promote and support they punish and belittle. They have placed every public school person in a double bind: Do more with less while being held accountable for ever rising standards. That is organizational torture, and it is being committed by our elected officials against public schools.

Every time you hear we have failed, that is part of the torture. Every time you hear that we do not need more resources, that is part of the torture. Every time you hear that teachers should be held accountable for the test scores of children, that is part of the torture. Every time you hear we need to raise standards and make the tests more difficult that is part of the torture. Every time you hear that what we need is more choice and the solution is to divert scarce resources to alternatives like charters and vouchers, that is part of the torture. We are being drowned by ever new accountability measures, expectations, standards at the same time our resources to accomplish those things are being reduced. We are blamed and belittled. We are cast as the enemy of student learning, not the dedicated professionals in pursuit of a lofty and noble goal.

School people are flat on their backs while the government pours more and more down our throats. This is not water boarding. This is school boarding. And it has to stop.

One wonders what the goal of this torture is. Do legislatures want us all to quit? Do legislators want data to show we failed? Do legislatures want to beat us into some kind of submission, and what would that submission look like? Or, is the real mission of school reform to end the notion of public education in the US? Is their mission to provide an educational system for the haves and forget the have-nots?

Zero Dark Thirty portrayed a mission accomplished via a vast array of human and technological resources devoted to the mission. State and federal legislatures, even the Secretary of Education and the Commissioner of Education in Texas, are contributing to the torture of public schools by doing just the opposite. If you want schools to do better and accomplish their mission then provide more resources, support the folks who are working hard every day to accomplish the mission. It is hard to imagine asking Seal Team 6 to accomplish this mission if they were constantly told they are worthless, incompetent and that they must accomplish the mission on their own with ever decreasing resources, or tell them that we are redirecting some of their resources to private military groups to give them a sense of competition. We cannot blame the people in the field, we must support them. We cannot reduce resources we must increase them. We cannot make our heroes the bad guys.

Stop the School Boarding!

Transformers

I liked the Transformers movies. I liked the toys and the cartoons. They remind me of a history of great mythology around changelings, all of which is fascinating to me. Wouldn’t it be fun to simply change to something else, or become someone else, or whatever? I know I’m a great grandma, but I can imagine a few people I would like to be able to change into if I had the Allspark. Not so sure I would want to become a car or a truck or a tank, but becoming Jennifer Aniston whenever I wanted could be really cool – unless she really is pregnant!

We hear a lot of talk today about school transformation and frankly, regardless of the camp, I am not impressed. Everyone is looking for the Allspark for public education. No one seems to be thinking outside the box. All the visions, plans, strategies, etc. are grounded in the current organization of schools by grade levels in little boxes with an adult per group of kids using the old industrial model and funded in the same old ways. Here are just a few out-of-the-box suggestions that I believe could radically alter public schools:

1. Churches and their ilk are all tax exempt. And yet, we know preachers preach politics. No telling how many Tea Party members get their political leanings from the preaching of the gospel of conservatism. Public schools are tax exempt and forbidden from lobbying. Isn’t that interesting? Why not do the same for churches? If a preacher takes a political position from the pulpit or in the Sunday school class, then he or she has violated the notion of the separation of church and state and that church begins to pay taxes. Revenue for schools goes way up, or preachers return to philosophical and theological discussions rather than political ones.

2. Implement a state income tax in Texas. Foolish that we do not have one. It could even be a flat tax, though I totally support the notion of a graduated tax. We would all save a ton of money on our federal income taxes if we paid state income tax.

3. Eliminate compulsory attendance. All the nonsense we hear about schools of choice, vouchers, etc. disappear if kids do not have to come to school. For the first time, public education would have the same choices regarding kids that charter schools and private schools have. If you do not study and do the work and behave we will send you home. We could eliminate charter schools totally as every school now becomes a school of choice. And, with the drop in enrollment, schools and taxpayers will save money. Public education will increase in value, still available to all, but not required of all. Professional educators will increase in status as they will have the ability to refuse service to anyone who does not value the gift of free education. To really make this work, all government subsidy programs to the poor would be contingent on whether the children of the recipient were enrolled in school if they are under the age of 18. If your child is removed from the public school then you lose your subsidy. Simple.

4. Change teaching to a year round profession and operate schools year round. Ideally, teachers would teach about half a day and plan and learn the other half. The additional expense would be funded by all the additional revenue and cost savings in numbers 1, 2 and 3 above. Teachers would be better prepared and outcomes, however we measure such, would improve. Teachers would be paid much more money, commensurate with their professional status. If we implement number 3, we will need fewer teachers for fewer students.

5. Stop playing I’ve got a secret with standardized tests and stop using the durn things for high stakes accountability. If teachers are in any way held accountable for what is on the test then they should see the test. Can you imagine teaching drivers’ education and the state does not let you see what your students will be asked to answer on the test? Ludicrous. I have ranted enough about why these tests should not be used for accountability and will not repeat it here.

OK, that’s my quick 2¢ on transforming public education. I may even have a nickels worth of additional thought on each of the above and other ideas to change the system from within. I believe these five simple ideas, however, would get the ball rolling and would radically transform public education. All schools could focus on preparing students to be successful adults and live in our democracy.

Sadly, all teachers cannot be Jennifer Aniston.

Well, that’s probably a good thing.

The C&I Dog

I started teaching in the second half of the last century. Teaching was different then. We had to share overhead projectors as they had yet to finish the total 30 year transition from bowling alleys to classrooms. To duplicate materials we used purple ditto masters and cranked machines from which the duplicating fluid either made you high or sick. Xerox was around, but only in the principal’s office and only one copy at a time. Chalk boards and text books were the staple of the day and I went home each afternoon with a headache from the duplicating fluid and fingers covered in chalk dust, transparency pen ink and purple ditto ink. There was no standardized testing, there was no accountability for dropout rates, there was no state description of what should be taught, there was no state required system of teacher evaluation, and there was no universal state system of holding teachers, schools and districts accountable. There was no real curriculum. The curriculum was what the teacher said it was, period. Grades were what the teacher said they were, period.

I reported for work at the ripe old age of 23, was given a text book, teacher edition of same, and keys to my room. The principal wished me good luck. I discovered later that I was being evaluated by a check list that included how many kids I sent to the office, whether I called in sick too much, and whether I faithfully fulfilled the duties of turning in lesson plans and potty patrol. Women had to wear dresses and stockings, and men had to wear ties.

Ah, were these the good old days of public education? Kids who misbehaved were simply encouraged to drop out because dropping out was not a problem, it was a solution. Kids with needs and disabilities beyond what we were equipped to serve were sent home. Kids who chose their parents poorly and arrived at our door with the wrong amount of skin pigment were sent elsewhere. And there was absolutely no provision for the kids who arrived at the door not able to speak English. They sank or swam.

I digress.

I was fortunate to work in a district where some of the folks read professional books and journals. There was this growing notion about aligning curriculum, stating an objective, teaching to that objective and measuring whether your kids successfully mastered such an objective. Emphasis was on decoding the curriculum to identify the key learnings inherent in each discrete body of knowledge now known as the core subjects. Additional emphasis was placed on both planning lessons to meet and achieve those objectives and on developing assessments that in fact measured what one taught. In other words, I was very lucky to participate in staff development on the topic of curriculum and instruction.

I remember a large committee composed of parents, members of the community, principals, teachers and central office “experts” who convened to review my particular curriculum. The goal was to write our curriculum. We read authors about curriculum writing. We scoured research on our particular area, and we looked at the text book. As our curriculum took shape it became clear to all of us that the book did not cover all that we wanted, and the sequence of chapters did not match our own intuitive design. The book became a resource in my classroom. The curriculum became my guide.

But there were others who had years of files and folders to supplement the book and they had not participated in the process of writing the curriculum. I had ownership because I did. Others did not and simply wanted to be left alone. The blessing for me was that I now had some knowledge beyond writing the objectives I was required to write for lesson plans. I understood scope and sequence. I understood scanning research to identify the essential components of teaching this subject. I was thrilled with the new curriculum, locally developed and implemented, for the most part. I was just beginning to read books on instructional strategies and planning instructional episodes to maximize student success when after 10 years in the classroom I was bumped into administration.

Years and degrees later, I was hired as an assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction. Oh boy, I thought. Now I can get back to the classroom and instruction that I have always loved. The month before taking the job I read recent authors and former authors on curriculum and instruction, assuming if I were to serve as an assistant supe for C&I I ought to know the best thinking about C&I. I read Glatthorn, De Vore, Taba, Erickson, Levy, Wiggins, Costa, Jacobs, Marzano and Vygotsky. When I showed up for work I was ready. I was a C&I guru. I quickly discovered such expertise was not needed.

The state had assumed all the expertise for curriculum and instruction. Committees of folks in Austin had written Essential Elements (EE’s) of all the subjects taught in Texas. Step 1 in the curriculum development process. The state was mandating a standardized test to measure whether those essential elements were taught. Step 3 in the process. What the state had not mandated was the instructional episodes (step 2) to fulfill the goal of teaching the EE’s. The state also had developed systems to hold teachers, schools and districts accountable based on these tests, and accountable for dropout rates, and accountable for special needs kids and non-English speaking kids. The wisdom necessary to write such documents had clearly shifted from classroom and district to Austin. We now had a standardized curriculum and standardized testing to assess our kids and schools. I could be dumber now, because they state had gotten so smart.

We know the state is not so smart. We know that curriculum decisions in Texas are not made based on expertise, collaborative input and best practice. They are made for political reasons. The State Board approves our curriculum, now called TEKS (I pronounce that acronym TEX, though some, with a lack of English background I suspect, call it TEEKS). The State Board engages in huge political uproar over the TEKS, especially in science where we dare teach evolution and not creative design (yes, when we know truth we continue to subjugate truth to belief. Galileo would be right at home. Next, we’ll teach that thunder is caused by gods bowling – using an overhead projector to keep score.) In economics and government we must stress free enterprise for all the good that has done us, and the conservative interpretation that less government is best. There are level heads at the state level, but when those good people identify themselves they tend to be solidly defeated by those who have a given perspective and cannot tolerate anyone else thinking another way. God Lord, that would be democratic.

After what appears to be constant revision of the TEKS we revise our standardized test that measures these itty-bitty curriculum bites. Pearson is thrilled because they are making a fortune revising, field-testing, administering and publishing the results of such tests. The content frequently changes and the test follows suit. Not only are C&I folks aiming at a moving target, they do so unarmed because the state plays “I’ve got a secret” with the test and no one knows what the questions will look like. A far cry from good instructional practice wherein teachers know what they want the kids to know, tell the kids, teach the kids, and then administer an assessment aligned with all of that so that no one is surprised.

The other really new component for C&I folks is private vendors. Yes, the free enterprise system wants to cash in on tax dollars aimed at public schools. (Wonder if they have really thought that through, however. If we continue to cut budgets we will have to cut vendors. One would think those who produce for and sell to the education market would be staunch supporters of increasing public ed. dollars. Nope, they vote and contribute to the group who wants less money and more accountability.) C&I people now have become software vendor evaluators and trainers. This company can teach your kids if your teachers cannot. This company can organize your curriculum if you cannot. This company can provide sample lessons if your teachers cannot. This company has a strategy that will improve test scores, etc., etc. I am amazed that newly hired C&I folks spend most of their early days on the job learning software, not C&I and not what goes on in the classrooms. That has become irrelevant. Though the issue should be instructional coaching, C&I people are more in the business of assessment and vendor product implementation. If you want to stump a C&I person when they make their next report at a board meeting, raise your hand and ask if they think the TEKS are philosophically more attuned to Glatthorn or Levy. If they know of these two fine researchers I would be amazed. One might also ask if we need C&I anymore given that all those functions are driven by the state. We need an assessment coordinator, we need a compliance coordinator, we need a federal programs coordinator, but what the heck does C&I do anymore? One person clearly cannot become the instructional coach for all subjects K-12.

All of this has led to the dummy down effect on teachers and C&I folks. If the state knows best what we should teach, and how we should teach, and how we should measure what we should teach, then where are my professional credentials and what are they worth? Teachers no longer engage in an analysis of their own content and struggle to write scope and sequences. They get trained in the state requirements. And since C&I folks have lost the real expertise implied in their positions they spend more time learning the state requirements than critiquing and standing up and saying this is poppycock and balderdash.

For political reasons the state has become head of C&I in Texas. It is the dog that leads us around. We blindly follow the C&I Dog.

Sadly, that dog don’t hunt.

Oxy and Other Morons

Consider the following fictional headlines:

“Jane Fonda named Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff”

“Sierra Club gains major share of American timber companies.”

“Greenpeace President named CEO of BP”

“Michael Williams named Commissioner of Education in Texas”

Oops.

The last headline is real. If you want to know why Texas educators are angry about Governor Perry’s pick for commissioner, perhaps the fictional headlines will help. Mr. Williams is not pro public education. He is in favor of vouchers, charters, reduction in funding, and higher accountability. Mr. Williams is philosophically diametrically opposed to the notion of public education. Naming him as commissioner is a huge slap in the face to the hundreds of thousands of public school educators in this state, and sadly, some of them, some of the good folks who show up every day to do all that they can to educate all kids, will support Governor Perry and his ilk.

Under the banners of “transparency”, “accountability” and “choice” those forces hostile to the notion of collecting taxes from everyone to promote the education of everyone have been in control in Texas for some time now. Each of the above banners sound great, sound reasonable, sound supportable. However, each of them is a buzz word for the slow process of making public schools look bad, finding ways to shift tax dollars to options other than public schools, and promoting the notion that public schools are too expensive to support as they currently exist. Frankly my dears, it is poppycock and balderdash.

We already know Mr. Williams’ ethical structure. If I were asked by Shell Oil to serve as head of their petroleum engineer division, I would decline. I am not qualified for such a position. If I were asked by NASA to begin training as an astronaut for the first human trip to Mars (notice I did not say “manned”) I would decline. I am not qualified nor will I likely live long enough to see it happen. (Besides, there are those who already accuse me of simply taking up space.) If I were asked to serve as interim superintendent in a neighboring district I would likely accept. I am qualified, I have such experience. Anyone who accepts a position for which they are not qualified and are hostile to the nature of the organization lacks ethical fortitude.

So, what should we (professional educators past and present and parents and communities who support public education) do about this philosophy and the kind of crazy policies and practices that we are seeing out of state government? How do we reveal to the general public what is really going on? I have a few suggestions and it is my hope that members of Texas media find an opportunity to ask such questions and print the answers:

“Mr. Williams: Once named Commissioner of Education let’s assume you do a stint as a high school building principal. Given state and federal funding formulas and accountability requirements, what would you start doing that has not been done, and what would you stop doing that is being done?’

“Mr. Williams: Same question, but this time you are a school superintendent?”

“Mr. Williams: It appears that you support charter schools, vouchers, school choice, etc. Those strategies only make sense in the context of compulsory attendance, the law that requires kids to go to school. If choice is so important to you, would you promote giving public schools the same choice that charters and private schools have by eliminating the compulsory attendance law?”

Three simple questions. He will not know the answer to the first two because he does not want to know and because he is not interested in public schools being successful. The most telling question for me will be the third. That will reveal what he really thinks and believes.

And, of course, we should vote in November.

Yes, Jane Fonda, Sierra Club, Greenpeace and Michael Williams. All oxymoronic appointments, only one is real. Please help us save public education from the oxy and other morons.