Imagine you’ve been made responsible for making dramatic improvements in our public schools…but with the stipulation that you must choose one point of attack and focus almost all of your energy and resources on that.

What would you choose? Pre-school? Teacher training? Professional development? A longer school day and year? More technology? More sophisticated assessments? Greater parental involvement?

The list of possibilities is intriguing and daunting. On one level, this is a parlor game, but it’s also a serious question because policy-makers make choices like this all the time.

Recently five Chicago principals-in-training, a college professor, the President of Catalyst and I were relaxing after an evening celebrating the 25th Anniversary of Catalyst {{1}}. Wanting to take advantage of all that brainpower, I posed the question, but with a twist: once someone had chosen an option, that one was off the table, and the next person had to select–and argue persuasively for–a different way to improve schools.

I should have taken notes on what ensued because it was fascinating. I was surprised that no one focused on technology or a longer school day and year. In fact, the primary emphasis was on teachers, perhaps not surprising because just about everyone at the table had been a public school teacher (including me, years and years ago). The participants argued for more professional working conditions for teachers, for improved teacher preparation and for relevant professional development (lots of scorn for what is now offered in PD). Preschool and early childhood programs were also eloquently supported, and one principal-in-training argued for fewer but better assessments of student learning.

When my turn (8th and last) came, seven ‘good’ and ‘obvious’ choices were off the table. No matter, because it gave me the chance to speak in favor of a change that would, I believe, transform the way we run schools. It would be inexpensive to boot, although most teachers would need training (and some would need a full makeover).

I proposed that, to bring about major improvements, at least half of the school year should be devoted to project-based learning. Not ‘some’ but at least 50%, and in every subject.

Doing that would mean a complete makeover; it would mean that teachers in different subjects would have to collaborate, as you see them doing in my colleague John Tulenko’s superb report about Portland, Maine, a few years ago. The best projects begin with a question that the teachers do not know the answer to, so they become genuine searches for knowledge. Many projects will be strengthened by the use of today’s remarkable technologies, and virtually all of them will require teamwork, data analysis, careful writing and a public presentation–all skills that young people will need as adults. This change would put schools in the ‘deeper learning’ camp, which is where they belong, in my view.

Yes, better training, more preschool, and greater parental engagement are fine ideas, but they do not get at the heart of schooling’s problems.  Today’s schools are out-of-date, horribly antiquated.  Because young people swim in a sea of information, 24/7, they need to learn how to figure out what information to trust and what to reject.  They need the exact opposite of the ‘regurgitation education’ that most schools now offer. Genuine exploration through a project-based curriculum is the best way I know to provide what kids need.

Now it’s your turn. Where would you put your money and effort?

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[[1]]1. A remarkable publication that has consistently pushed Chicago to improve its education system. http://catalyst-chicago.org/ [[1]]

I had planned to devote time to Alexander Russo’s critique of my reporting for the PBS NewsHour about students “opting out” of the Common Core States Standards tests. However, we have too much going on {{1}} for me to spend excessive time looking back.

So, quickly, here’s the backstory: Alexander emailed education reporters to say he was writing an analysis of media coverage of the Common Core tests and asked for interviews with anyone who was covering the subject. I agreed to an interview, which–because we were in different cities–took place by email. He sent questions, which I answered. No other reporters cooperated, he acknowledged in his short online article.

Mr. Russo took me to task for ignoring the number of tests that were successfully administered, for not providing accurate counts of the numbers of students who ‘opted out,’ and for highlighting student protesters in Newark. I addressed these issues in my written interview, but that apparently did not meet his standards of journalism.

In his critique, he cites as authorities an individual who works for the Gates Foundation and another whose organization has received millions in contributions from the Foundation. He accepts without question reports from Pearson and others that the tests have gone well, even though a modest degree of skepticism would lead one to wonder what ‘going well’ means. A spokeswoman from PARCC, one of the two test developers, told me that it meant ‘without technological failure,’ but she did not know how many students might have been flummoxed by the technology, et cetera.

Even though the tone of some of Mr. Russo’s questions made me think he’d made up his mind before he began his reporting, I answered him in detail. Here is my complete, unedited response, with his questions underlined:

Alexander,
I am answering your questions on the assumption that you are writing about media coverage and not just about our piece. If you are doing the latter, then I choose not to participate and am declaring the material below to be ‘off the record.’ Fair enough?
John

1. Are there any particular aspects of reporting the Common Core testing/opt-out story that are particularly challenging or unusually complicated?

This is THE interesting question because there are multiple players with different agendas. It makes answering the ‘W’ questions very difficult, particularly Who and Why. Opting Out is seen by these groups as their chance to change the course, although they do not agree on a new direction. The protesters, whatever their politics, have been, as I see it, marginalized in the coverage, partly because of habit and partly because it’s difficult if not impossible to judge the strength of this (or any) grassroots movement. Most media, it seems to me, tend to echo the official line and present the usual faces. So the ‘left’ part of Opt Out is dismissed as tools of the union (as your third question suggests), which is a convenient story line but not accurate, as far as we could determine.

It’s a difficult story in another way: the response of the establishment has been over the top, especially if they truly believe that it’s just a few disgruntled folks and union pawns. But that story doesn’t get told (and it’s not in our piece). But you might ask why no reporters are asking why Arne, the Chamber, Mike Petrilli et alia are going nuclear. I think of Gertrude, ‘Methinks the lady doth protest too much.”

2. The connection between the Newark sit-in and opting out of the Common Core seems pretty thin — why’d you include them in the piece so prominently?

Thin in what way? Many of those kids were also part of other, specifically anti-CC testing events, and the proliferation of testing was one of their issues at the sit-in. Because they had more than one issue (quite a few, actually), does that disqualify them from being in the piece?

3. Why no mention of the NJEA, whose opposition to the future uses of the Common Core tests is behind at least some of the concerns and opting out that’s taking place?

The NJEA began running ads as the testing approached, but we did not see strong evidence that the union was calling shots or pullings strings. The NEA has provided small amounts of money to United Opt Out, according to Peggy Robinson {{2}}, but again the financial scales are so heavily tipped the other way. {{3}} Let’s just talk Gates for a moment: The Gates Foundation has played a major role in the Common Core State Standards. Between January 2008 and November 2010, it contributed more than $35 million to the Council of Chief School Officers and the National Governors Association Center; it gave Achieve $12.6 million in February 2008; $3 million to ASCD, and another $1 million to the National PTA to organize parent endorsement of Common Core. The list goes on and on. “It is not unfair to say that the Gates Foundation’s agenda has become the country’s agenda in education,” said Michael Petrilli, vice president for national programs and policy at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute in Washington, D.C., which itself has received nearly $3 million in Gates Foundation grants. (and those numbers are somewhat out of date because I wrote that paragraph a while back…and Mike Petrilli has become even more prominent as a supporter of the tests and the CC, along with Peter Cunningham, another recipient of Gates largesse (and other foundations)).

So, if you want a story, why don’t you compare spending and then analyze the language of the reporters and the reporting (starting perhaps with the assumptions behind your question???)

4. How did you protect against exaggerating or overstating the breadth and depth of the opt-out movement? Would it have helped to indicate the number of tests administered or kids tested as of the time of the broadcast?

We fessed up to not being able to provide numbers, even ended the piece with that question, “How strong….?” But we also reported that there were anti-testing events every night of the month, often multiple events. And we tried to capture the diversity of the folks speaking out. We tried to give the audience a sense of how difficult it would be for kids to step up, and I feel we did not do an adequate job there. Quite a few school districts put up obstacles, gave misleading information and established a threatening ‘sit and stare’ policy that would make opt out kids feel like outcasts among their peers. In short, they did a lot to prevent opting out. I don’t think we captured the guts it must have taken in quite a few districts.

Re numbers, the districts weren’t releasing any, and Pearson wasn’t responding, and we were of course not willing to report the counts provided by bloggers with an axe to grind. You no doubt saw that Pearson released numbers favorable to its position, which some media simply xeroxed and reported, but those numbers don’t provide adequate information. (Q for you: why isn’t the NJ Department of Education on top of these numbers? Does the Department have a responsibility to address the spreading of misinformation, for example?)

5. Do you feel like your peace (sic) was as balanced and contextualized as you wanted, or are there things you wanted to do or would have done to make it better?

Alexander, I work for the only place on television that will give a story like this 8 minutes, and I am eternally grateful for that privilege. But do I wish we had 10 minutes, or 15, or 20? Of course I do.

The points above are ones that we would have loved to tackle in the piece, but cooler heads prevailed down in Washington. However, I have a hunch that very few reports have given this much time to those opposing the tests, which is odd considering that it’s a story about ‘opting out.’

6. Anything else about the assignment, development, or editing of the piece that you think readers (especially other education reporters) should know?

It’s a tough story to report. We filmed in Florida at the National Opt Out conference and used maybe five seconds of that. We filmed at a school in NYC whose principal is opting out her own kids in NJ but has to devote days to test prep in her school…and is seriously conflicted about that contradiction—and that story didn’t make the piece either.

(When I retire, someone is going to get a hell of an archive of raw tape!!)

Mr. Russo, who seems to be trying to position himself as an independent judge or referee of education journalism, assured me that he would be analyzing other coverage, although it turns out that no other reporters cooperated with him. There must be a lesson in there somewhere.

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[[1]]1. Including our new film, “School Sleuth: The Case of the Wired Classroom” and two pieces for the PBS NewsHour. [[1]]

[[2]]2. My error here. The founder of United Opt Out is Peggy Robertson, not Robinson[[2]]

[[3]]3. I not only got her name wrong; I apparently misinterpreted what she told me on the phone in January. My notes say ‘small support,’ which I incorrectly interpreted as ‘small amount of money.’  Peggy (Robertson) assures me that United Opt Out has received neither dollars nor encouragement from the National Education Association. I apologize for my error.[[3]]

No need for you to do a close reading of the paragraphs below, which are taken from the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts for 9th and 10th graders. Just pay attention to the words and phrases in bold type, which include “initiate,” “participate,” “work with peers,” “actively incorporate others into the discussion,” and “thoughtful, well-reasoned exchange of ideas.”

These particular standards encompass skills we want young people to develop: assimilating and analyzing information, speaking persuasively, and working effectively with others. However, these ‘soft skills’ are impossible to test for by means of either a computer-based exam or a paper-and-pencil, fill-in-the-bubbles standardized test. These are judgement calls, which must be made by qualified teachers.

So here’s today’s question: What are the odds that these essential skills are being stressed by teachers in states and districts that plan to use Common Core test scores to play “Gotcha” with teachers?

That’s not really a question, of course. Teachers who know they may be fired or demoted based on their students’ scores are going to behave rationally. They are going to emphasize what they know will be on the test…even though they are fully aware that the soft skills listed above are essential for success beyond school. (And they will be supported by their principals, whose jobs also may hang in the balance.)

Some readers may not agree much of the Common Core is praise-worthy, but I believe we need to expect more of our children. While in some areas of the country these new standards may be too low, in most regions higher standards are a darn good idea.

Yes, these particular standards are too detailed. Yes, they may actually harden the practice of age-segregation. Yes, they were foisted upon a largely unaware school system. And, yes, the Common Core State Standards are ridiculously text-biased and do not even begin to acknowledge the power of today’s technologies to liberate learning; instead they over-emphasize text while ignoring the multi-media reality that today’s young people inhabit.

However, those flaws are forgivable and/or fixable. The issue that must be addressed immediately is the inane, insane policy of playing “Gotcha, teacher” with the student scores.

I think the solution is straightforward: Because our current geniuses-in-charge do not trust teachers and because we cannot easily replace 3.1 million teachers, we need some new geniuses.

Preferably ones who do not think “I am a genius” when they look in the mirror.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.1
Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grades 9-10 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.1.A
Come to discussions prepared, having read and researched material under study; explicitly draw on that preparation by referring to evidence from texts and other research on the topic or issue to stimulate a thoughtful, well-reasoned exchange of ideas.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.1.B
Work with peers to set rules for collegial discussions and decision-making (e.g., informal consensus, taking votes on key issues, presentation of alternate views), clear goals and deadlines, and individual roles as needed.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.1.C
Propel conversations by posing and responding to questions that relate the current discussion to broader themes or larger ideas; actively incorporate others into the discussion; and clarify, verify, or challenge ideas and conclusions.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.1.D
Respond thoughtfully to diverse perspectives, summarize points of agreement and disagreement, and, when warranted, qualify or justify their own views and understanding and make new connections in light of the evidence and reasoning presented.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.2
Integrate multiple sources of information presented in diverse media or formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively, orally) evaluating the credibility and accuracy of each source.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.3
Evaluate a speaker’s point of view, reasoning, and use of evidence and rhetoric, identifying any fallacious reasoning or exaggerated or distorted evidence.
Presentation of Knowledge and Ideas:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.4
Present information, findings, and supporting evidence clearly, concisely, and logically such that listeners can follow the line of reasoning and the organization, development, substance, and style are appropriate to purpose, audience, and task.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.5
Make strategic use of digital media (e.g., textual, graphical, audio, visual, and interactive elements) in presentations to enhance understanding of findings, reasoning, and evidence and to add interest.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.6
Adapt speech to a variety of contexts and tasks, demonstrating command of formal English when indicated or appropriate. (See grades 9-10 Language standards 1 and 3 here for specific expectations.)

We lost a giant with the passing of Fr. Theodore Hesburgh, the former President of the University of Notre Dame, on Thursday, February 26. “Father Ted” was a national leader and not simply the head of a major university. He had the courage to challenge a sitting U.S. President, his own Catholic church, and even big time college football. He won two out of three.

After Father Hesburgh spoke out, President Richard M. Nixon backed away from his plan to use federal troops to quell student demonstrations. After Father Hesburgh insisted that the purpose of Catholic higher education was to search for truth and not merely to propagate the faith as the Vatican maintained, his Church backed off. However, big-time football proved too formidable an obstacle for this courageous man, and football’s sorry pattern–low admission standards, lower graduation rates and unacceptable (often criminal) behavior in pursuit of television money–continues unchecked.

The obituary in the New York Times captures the man’s greatness. It notes that “Father Hesburgh was for decades considered the most influential priest in America. In 1986, when he retired after a record 35 years as president of Notre Dame, a survey of 485 university presidents named him the most effective college president in the country.” For more of the story, see the University’s website.

Father Hesburgh advised Presidents John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Baines Johnson, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter, but proximity to power did not prevent him from speaking truth. As Chairman of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, he battled the Nixon Administration over busing for purposes of desegregation and other civil rights issues; he eventually resigned from the Commission, a black eye for Nixon.

Will we look upon his like again? That seems questionable, at least in American higher education, where ‘leadership’ seems to be focused on raising money to put up new buildings on campus, and not our pressing social problems.

I hope you will read or re-read “A Deafening Silence,” my blog from May 2012. I wrote it after a 15-year-old New Orleans student we had gotten to know was gunned down–executed– merely because some other kids suspected that she might be able to identify them.

Toward the end of the piece I raised this question:

I want to know where all the leaders have gone. Where are the university presidents, once moral and ethical leaders of our nation? Remember Clark Kerr, Fr. Theodore Hesburgh, James Bryant Conant, Fr. Timothy Healy, Bart Giamatti, Kingman Brewster and Robert Maynard Hutchins? The nation once looked to them for counsel, and they were willing to speak forcefully on the key moral issues of our time.
We are living in an age of economic inequality that is unprecedented, but have the Presidents of Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Chicago or Princeton spoken out? They must be aware that nearly 25% of our children are growing up in poverty and being denied a fair shot at what we used to call The American Dream, and yet they are silent.
Gun violence is tearing our urban centers apart, and the blood that’s most often shed seems to be that of promising young children. Why the deafening silence from our leading campuses?
I was on the campus of Notre Dame earlier this week and had the privilege of spending 30 minutes with Fr. Hesburgh, now nearly 95. ‘Father Ted’ happens to be one of my heroes, but this was the first time I’d had the opportunity to shake his hand. Though hampered by failing eyesight, he is as bright, strong and forceful as anyone I know, and I walked away from our meeting inspired by him — but depressed by the resounding silence of those occupying university presidential suites today.

Remember, this was seven months before the Newtown massacre, another preventable tragedy that was also followed by a deafening silence most of from American higher education. I wrote about it in early January, 2013.

Neither of these pieces is an anti-gun rant, although I believe we are crazy to make it so easy for just about anyone to get a gun. This is about leadership, or the lack thereof.

But perhaps we will look upon Fr. Hesburgh’s like again. A candidate, in my view, is Dr. Freeman Hrabowski III, the long-serving President of the University of Maryland–Baltimore County. He was one of the few Presidents who spoke out forcefully after the Newtown murders, and he has been a consistent, eloquent and effective force for opportunities for students of color, particularly those from low-income communities. His book, “Holding Fast to Dreams,” crossed my desk yesterday in ‘uncorrected page proof’ form. It will be available in May, and I hope many of you will read it and reflect upon the leadership lessons.

Meantime please, a prayer or other appropriate expression for Fr. Hesburgh. Rest in peace….