The Super Bowl, A Sea of Media and Control

February 2, 2010 John Merrow Op-ed, parents, teaching indianapolis colts, john merrow, learning matters, mathematics, Michelle Rhee, new orleans, paul vallas, saints, superbowl, superbowl 44, teach for america, teachable moment, TFA

Several seemingly unrelated subjects have been floating around in my head lately. The first involves New Orleans, a city that’s gone crazy about its football team’s first appearance in the Super Bowl on Sunday, February 7th.

Saints

Some school districts and private and parochial schools around New Orleans have canceled school for the Monday after the game, reasoning that most students would be partying hard all weekend and wouldn’t show up anyway.

Call me an old fogey, but I find closing schools to be irresponsible behavior on the part of the adults. Are the 2nd, 3rd and 4th graders going to be worn out from partying? What are working parents supposed to do, or are they also exempt from going to work?

Worse, however, the educators are bypassing a remarkable teachable moment, a chance to connect learning with the city’s obsession with the Saints. Continue reading →

5 Ways to Change the Status Quo: Interview with Phillip Kovacs

December 16, 2009 John Merrow Op-ed, school reform education, Higher Education, john merrow, learning, learning matters, nclb, philip kovacs, race to the top, reform, schools, taking note, Teaching, university of alabama-huntsville

If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you know that I’ve been interviewing a lot of folks who are well known in education, Debbie Meier, Margaret Spellings, Diane Ravitch, Pat Callan and others. Many readers have posted comments, which I read with interest. Sometimes I wonder about the writers, and sometimes I reach out.

This post came from my interest in one reader’s comments to my recent post on innovation in schools. His name is Philip Kovacs, and he’s a former high school English teacher who now teaches would-be teachers at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. I also know that he has a PhD in Educational Policy Studies, a 6 month-old son, and some strong convictions about public education. (The latter is the focus of the interview, although the proud new Dad manages to work his son into the conversation a couple of times).

The Interview

So tell me what you believe, and why.

In my dissertation I argue for keeping public schools public, but after four years working with local public schools, I’m open to alternatives. I am now working on starting a project-based lab school.

How did you find Learning Matters?

The More things Change It was research into the Gates Foundation that brought me to your website in the first place. The Foundation funds an unbelievable number of projects, some of which argue against one another, though the larger of the funded organizations agree on key points, none of which, in my humble opinion, are very innovative. I do not, for the record, think Bill Gates is controlling your content!

I am now editing a book about the Gates Foundation’s involvement in educational reform. I am 100% sure that the edited volume is going to anger the educational “right” and “left.”

You sound as if you want to anger both ends of the spectrum.

I guess I do, now that you mention it. Three years ago I helped about 30 scholars, teachers, and other concerned individuals create and post a petition calling for an end to No Child Left Behind. Continue reading →

The Road Not Traveled: Tracking Charter Schools Movement

December 1, 2009 John Merrow charter schools, Op-ed, school reform caroline hoxby, Charter Schools, education week, evaluation, john merrow, learning matters, new york city

On the back page of Education Week this week is my essay about charter schools, including a trip down memory lane back to the meeting in Minnesota in 1988 where the dream took shape. I hope all of you will go over to Ed Week’s website to read it (subscription required), but, before you do, bear with me because the ground keeps shifting under this movement, even as many things remain the same.

I’d like to raise two issues: 1) quality control and 2) persistent opposition.

Charter Schools & The Roads Diverging

For one thing, the Obama Administration is embracing charter schools (or ‘chartered schools’) with great enthusiasm. Now, it’s true that Education Secretary Arne Duncan adds a qualification, saying that they support ‘good charter schools,’ but that strikes me as, for the moment anyway, an empty distinction, largely because of an absence of ways of measuring quality.

It’s true that egregiously bad charters get shut down, but mediocre ones keep plugging along, doing just as much damage to kids as mediocre public schools. But what the charter school proponents don’t seem to realize is that these mediocre institutions are also damaging ‘the movement.’ I’ve heard them (and you know who you are!) say that mediocre public schools aren’t punished, as if that justifies not closing mediocre charter schools! It doesn’t, precisely because the charter school advocates are claiming to be different.

I think that charter schools risk becoming like schools of education if they aren’t careful. How many of the 1400 or so schools and colleges of education are excellent? Continue reading →

Off to Qatar for WISE

November 16, 2009 John Merrow Op-ed, teaching, technology doha, education, innovation, john merrow, learning matters, qatar, technology, wise

http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=7648358&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=cc6600&fullscreen=1

I’m headed to the first World Innovation Summit on Education in Doha, Qatar. Hundreds of education innovators, policy makers and experts will be gathering there and I plan on recording video, audio interviews and filling you in on what’s happening there as it unfolds. This week, expect a post a day from me until Thursday, when I return.

To learn more about the WISE conference, visit their website: http://www.wise-qatar.org.

Leonore Annenberg: A Tribute

September 29, 2009 John Merrow Op-ed education, foundations, john merrow, learning matters, leonore annenberg, philanthropy

More than 1,400 people gathered last week at the Academy of Music in Philadelphia last Thursday to pay tribute to Leonore Annenberg, who died in March at the age of 91. Her passing brought together dozens of luminaries including Supreme Court justices, governers, mayors, and reporters. A central theme of the tribute: Lee Annenberg cared deeply about democracy and treated all she encountered with dignity.

“Lee was forever young and ageless,” Andrea Mitchell, NBC news correspondent, told the audience. “Her legacy will certainly live on in the educational institutions she benefited.”

Learning Matters is part of the Annenberg legacy, but our connection came about in an odd—but certainly not unique—way. I never met Walter Annenberg, Mrs. Annenberg only once in passing, but they supported our work for nearly a decade.

And if my answering machine had malfunctioned, it might never have happened. Continue reading →

The Sources of Innovation

September 14, 2009 John Merrow Op-ed, school reform, teaching classrooms, innovation, john doerr, john merrow, learning matters, newschools venture fund, Teaching, the new teacher project, widget effect

What produces innovation? Why does there seem to be such an abundance of it in serious fields like medicine and computer technology and trivial ones like online dating, but so little in education, arguably the most important of human activities?

First, let me support my premise, that schooling is largely bereft of innovation. A doctor or an auto mechanic from the 1950’s, if dropped into today’s hospital or garage, would be baffled. A teacher from the 50’s, however, would feel pretty darn comfortable in today’s classrooms. Maybe the desks wouldn’t be attached to the floor, and perhaps the blackboards would have been replaced by whiteboards, but there’d be bells every 50 minutes or so, attendance to be taken, and interruptions by the principal. I rest my case.

Back to why: The thirst for money, prestige and fame are reliable spurs of innovation. Living in Silicon Valley as I do, I’ve seen plenty of evidence of that. Unfortunately, public education is not the road to travel if your goals are money, prestige and fame.

Another spur to innovate is a supportive but challenging environment, one in which failure is seen as an opportunity to learn, not a stain. Does that describe most schools? I don’t think so.

John Doerr’s New Schools Venture Fund is working to recreate in education some of the conditions that have spurred Silicon Valley’s growth. That’s an uphill battle with a number of hurdles standing in the way, including a ‘one size fits all’ mentality and a glut of ‘experts’.

Education’s ‘one size fits all’ approach to evaluating and paying teachers has to dampen enthusiasm for trying new approaches. Why bother if you aren’t going to be rewarded? Continue reading →