Drape's Takes

I don't habitually quote USA Today, but the ideas published yesterday by Michael Wolff are brilliant:

It is something of an impossible, or tragic, or existential predicament, coming to grips with your own obsolescence: Technological astuteness or intuition or cool is less a skill set than a culture or language or temperament — it is also, more and more, a market expectation.

Non-tech people, no matter their good intentions, can't do tech, at least never as well as tech people do it. This is something ever-more evident to people steeped in daily digital life, as most Americans are...

How do important American institutions — pillars of government, media, health care and business — compete with, and serve people, accustomed to, ever more remarkable, easy-to-use, high-performance and empowering new technology?

Most can't.

Dan Meyer, quoting Freddie deBoer (bracketing and emphasis mine):

I've said this before: let's have an academic decathlon... I would bet the house on my team [of privileged demographic], and I bet if you're being honest, you would too. Yet to accept that is to deny the basic assumption of the education reform movement, which is that student outcomes are a direct result of teacher quality.

Second, teacher quality is one of the few variables actually within our control. Therefore, if student outcomes can't be directly improved by improving teacher quality, then why would we ever make such an investment in teachers, at all? Surely nation-wide daycare can be procured at a much cheaper rate than the amount we're spending on pre-service endorsement programs and in-service professional learning.

Following deBoer's line of thinking, maybe our best solution really is to employ as educators "those" unteachable, poverty-stricken drop-outs such that they might too fail at improving student outcomes so clearly outside of their control. After all, in our "system of massive entrenched inequality," isn't failure the rightful destiny of all under-privileged students?

Teacher quality does make a difference, and educational failure is not an option. As educators, we have little control over what our students do when they aren't in school (and rightly so). However, when they are in school, we have the critical responsibility to make every minute count, every day, for every student - regardless of their demographic.

As educators in an imperfect world, ours is the responsibility to be our best; because for some of our students, receiving a quality education is the only chance they've got.

Last week, Scot McLeod finally published the article he’s “always wanted to write.” In an open letter to educational leadership professors across the United States, he raised several issues and posed a variety of important question to the field. Namely:

• Our world is changing quickly.
• These changes dramatically impact learning.
• Schools have largely failed to respond to these overarching societal changes.
• This failure to quickly respond is dramatically damaging our profession.
• We, as educational leadership [and by extension, all within the profession], must do better.

I agree completely with Dr. McLeod and have also said these things before. I think his article was very well researched and will play an important role in motivating many within the field toward a more intentional focus on contemporary needs and skills - while highlighting the role teachers and their behaviors play on influencing and preparing those that enter the profession. Because his article was published in a printed journal, I also think it has the potential of reaching a population of stubborn professors who may not have yet heard this message before.

Many, nevertheless, have heard this message - on a number of different occasions - and I believe the time to move beyond mere motivation has clearly come. Until we strategically attack each of the barriers that hold so many back, we will continue to move slowly, our schools will continue in (relative) irrelevance, and the faces of many-an-ISTE-goer will proceed through every shade of blue imaginable while singing this same sad tune. Additionally, I think some cultural circles will simply never adopt technology as a primary tool for instruction.

To be clear, I think looking to the knowledge gained in other fields, at this time, can drastically help ours as we continue to battle the sociocultural and other issues that obviously plague our population. Just as Dr. McLeod has called on his peers to clue in on "the largest transformation in learning that ever has occurred in human history," I call on these same peers and others to:

1. Consider carefully Everett Rogers' five intrinsic characteristics of innovations that influence an individual's decision to adopt or reject an innovation. Is the technology we're expecting teachers to embrace during instruction adequately compatible with the curriculum they're expected to teach and the learning environments they're required to inhabit? If not, then what needs to change, and how? Is the technology's trialability sufficient and are teachers able to graciously learn from their mistakes? If not, then why are we really pushing so hard?
2. Analyze the processes and procedures followed by engineers while constructing dams or other structures designed to divert the current flow. In this set of photographs (for example), taken while the Flaming Gorge dam was under construction, note the use of a diversionary tunnel - painstakingly created to allow the traditional flow of water while construction of an eventual regulation of water flow was under way. What might we learn from this practice, and how might we apply it to our field?
3. Contemplate diligently the role of sociocultural evolutionism and its parallels to the changes we hope take place in schools. Defined as "the creation and change of social roles through new knowledge that changes and creates social rules," sociocultural evolution "alters and enlarges a society in the two dimensions of social structure and culture." In other words, with new social rules (i.e., we must change our traditional pedagogical practices in order to better prepare students), which essential social roles might schools be lacking, such that more members of traditional education cultures will more easily evolve? Surely these roles must consist of more than mere motivators. (A combination of Break-fix and Ed-Tech support roles has begun to work very well in our new District!)
4. Recall how a gardener facilitates change in the plants under her care. While some plants never react well to external stimuli guiding growth and others respond only after extended periods of time, a willingness to trim and scaffold, where needed, will often produce amazing results!
5. Like the gardener and the selection of plants with which she has to work, accept that in many areas of curricular focus, technology simply isn't the best avenue for providing beneficial instruction. Trust me: there are many.
6. Alternatively, explore the viability of punctuated equilibrium in the evolution of school cultures. While I remain unconvinced that our society is headed toward an intellectual event horizon (beyond which the future becomes impossible to comprehend), I do think that the cultural evolution in schools also exhibits a type of punctuated equilibrium. Is it not plausible that after a lengthy period of evolutionary stasis (i.e., the last hundred years), we'll eventually experience a dramatic and rapid shift? Are we not currently in the midst of that shift? Moreover, if this be the case, is there really anything that can be done to prevent these phenomenal transformations from eventually taking place? If not, then why are we still trying so hard to make people change?

Sometimes I think we work too hard to push (force?) those along who will eventually - and very naturally - be left behind. Sometimes I also think that if we're really serious about making change happen more quickly in our schools, then we need to do a better job of understanding and helping the culture within these schools to change. Change a culture, and you've changed the future; for better or for worse.

• Why do you think change happens so slowly in education?
• Which barriers to change might we most easily overcome?
• Ultimately, what does it take to transform a culture – and is it even feasible on this scale and at this magnitude?

One of the great ironies of the 21st Century education reform movement lies in how teachers have spent their lives trying to become obsolete and unneeded by the students they serve.

Now, they're ultimately being forced to fight from becoming obsolete and unneeded by the very society they've successfully built.

Tom Hoffman helps us identify the motives behind certain recent moves, giving me an updated glimpse of the future. Following Karl Fisch's lead, I call this Darren Draper's 2020 Vision.

Many continue to think that education is - and should be - a game, bought and sold to the highest bidder. I, for one, am tired of it.

Bill Gates is more dangerous today than a three-year-old playing with matches at a gas station; but not any less naive.

Even though I don't always agree with Ira Socol, I've grown to appreciate his presence as an honest and straightforward thinker in my network. He threw this nugget my way the other day.


My response: Of course, but with balance. The truth is that when community is embraced without the grounding qualities of science, then we're often left with the consequences of groupthink.  One such consequence rears its head when when "group members try to minimize conflict and reach a consensus decision without critical evaluation of alternative ideas or viewpoints."

A less-than-positive example of this groupthink phenomenon can be found in the comments of this post. Sadly, many members of our community have no idea what it really takes to write a dissertation or to complete a Ph.D. The pedagogical problem, nevertheless, arises when knowledgeable members of the community, for whatever reason, fail to steer the community in the right direction. As a result of this in-community learning, pockets of the community persevere in ignorance, while a hierarchy of true authority eludes existence. Just as the idea of social media mobs can be leveraged for arguably positive social benefits, such mobs can also irrationally spin out of control. Therefore, more than mere community is needed for an effective schooling system.

Ultimately, while leading from both the narrowed lens of science and the wide lens of community might be difficult, a wide range of public schools have been transitioning toward the science-plus-community model for many years (my own District, in its limited existence, included).  When we're tasked with serving an extremely diverse public school community - as each of us in public education is - we often have no choice but to accomodate (to the best of our abilities) the needs and desires of our patrons, however complex they may be. Complex and diverse communities prize complex and diverse outcomes.

When I consider the current reform movement in education:

1. I agree that educators should be leading, instead of being led by politicians and ignorant philanthropists. The aspirations of many currently leading the charge may be well-intentioned, but merely attending school as a child has never meant that you have any idea about what it takes to run a school.
2. I'm constantly reminded that balance is still key. While arguments that fill the reform space may appear polarized to the point of paralysis, not every side holds every answer. We must be willing to give and take - for kids first, then adults.
3. I do feel that standardized students and silenced teachers fly in the face of American ideals.  Ignoring the effects of out-of-school factors and soldiering on with cut-throat academic standardization can never ensure the kinds of differentiated learning environments and life-saving interventions that most of our students will need. Again, balance is still key.
4. Honestly, I think some teachers have every right to be upset and am saddened that teachers have somehow become the enemy. "It’s hard to think of another field in which experience is considered a liability and those who know the least about the nuts and bolts of an enterprise are embraced as experts."
5. I agree that parents should have a strong voice in the direction of future reform efforts, but only when that voice has been adequately informed of the realities occurring inside our schools.
6. I think we'd all do well to consider carefully the advice of Paul Thomas when he states:

Once again, the caution of evidence - advocacy is the enemy of transparency and truth.

Like medicine, then, education and education reform will continue to fail if placed inside the corrosive dynamics of market forces. Instead, the reform of education must include the expertise of educators who are not bound to advocating for customers, but encouraged, rewarded and praised for offering the public the transparent truth about what faces us and what outcomes are the result of any and every endeavor to provide children the opportunity to learn as a member of a free and empowered people.

Education "miracles" do not exist and market forces are neither perfect nor universal silver bullets for any problem - these are conclusions made when we are free of the limitations of advocacy and dedicated to the truth, even when it challenges our beliefs.

Through all of this talk of reform, nevertheless - and barring severe economic or environmental catastrophe - I remain unconvinced that significant and rapid change can take place in public schools across the country under the current climate. Are we really talking about an educator revolt, and if so, then a revolt toward what? Public school educators are not yet unified in their beliefs about reform and remain ultimately powerless in their caring, but selflessly-focused state.

Yes, through all of this, I'm reminded that one of the primary reasons teachers and public schools endure and have endured the barrage of insults and harsh conditions is because of our caring natures. As individuals and professionals, we remain willing to adapt to the conditions we're dealt; not because we think it's right, but because of our deep-rooted convictions that molding the future by creating a responsible and capable citizenry is essential to maintaining a civilized and progressing society. As individuals and as professionals, we know that teaching is the most important profession! We've known it all of our lives, and are merely reminded when doctors and astronauts and presidents and literary giants and even YOU return to our doors to thank us for efforts we put forth.

If positive reform is to take place in our nation's public schools, nevertheless, then many things must happen first.

To begin with, transparency and public relations must become priority one. If public trust really has been lost, then it must be the goal of every teacher, administrator, secretary, and lunch worker to regain that trust through openness and through honest dialogue. To that end, rigor, relevance, and relationships must extend beyond the walls of our schools and into the lives of parents, business leaders, community members, and other voters. As rigor is employed in building lasting relationships with community stakeholders, then the programs and focus of public schools can - and will - be relevant to all. Finally, in becoming a truly public education system, we need not hide the problems that abound within our walls. Instead, I believe that by helping others see the competence and tireless efforts put forth by our forces, we'll all gain a new appreciation for just how far we've come.

Maybe then, the right people will begin to stick up for every child and the profession that matters most.

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Thanks for the push, Ira. Naturally, I welcome your feedback.