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 →

What’s Innovation? Clear Goals, Training & Accountability Are a Good Start

November 24, 2009 John Merrow Op-ed, teaching, technology, WISE education, goals, innovation, john merrow, measurements, qatar, Teaching, training, wise

I’ve just returned from Doha, Qatar for the first-ever WISE, the World Innovation Summit for Education. For three days we talked about innovation. Is technology an essential component of innovation? I found myself wondering what produces innovation in education—in teaching actually. And it occurs to me that, unless one happens to be sadistic or off the charts antisocial, all of us are, on certain occasions, innovative teachers. At those moments, we are wonderful role models of what our education system ought to be striving to emulate. And our motivation is a combination of self-interest and basic human decency.

Driving Directions You’re not a teacher, you say? OK, neither am I by profession, but sometimes we are put in that role. Imagine you’re walking in your neighborhood when a stranger stops her car, rolls down the window, and asks for directions to a local restaurant. You know the place she’s asking about, so you immediately begin figuring out how to explain it to her.

You are, for the moment, her teacher, she your pupil. 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 →

Public Schools Need a Wake Up Call!

September 8, 2009 John Merrow Op-ed, school reform, teaching education, education speech, john merrow, K-12, kids, president obama, schools, Teaching

“Every single one of you has something you’re good at. Every single one of you has something to offer.”

President Obama’s speech to students, September 9, 2009

Those lines imply support for a progressive, child-centered view of schooling: educate through the strengths a child possesses.

President Obama gives education speech But the President went on, “And you have a responsibility to yourself to discover what that is. That’s the opportunity an education can provide.”

And when and if a child discovers those interests and abilities, what happens? Are classrooms set up to work with individual kids and nurture their talents, or do other pressures force teachers into cookie-cutter behavior?

Kids want to believe. Visit any elementary school on a morning of the first few weeks of school, and you will see joyful youngsters cavorting, laughing and shouting with glee. Their giddy anticipation is palpable and infectious, because they are actually happy to be back in school. “This year will be different,” their behavior screams. “This year I will be a great student, I will learn everything, and teachers will help me whenever I need help.”

However, this celebration, a child’s version of the triumph of hope over experience, is generally short-lived, and for most children school soon becomes humdrum, or worse.

What goes wrong, and what can be done about it? Continue reading →

Re-evaluating Teacher Evaluations

August 26, 2009 John Merrow Op-ed, teaching classroom, evaluations, john merrow, K-12, teacher observations, teachers, Teaching

What prompted this post was my discovery that only 15 of the 714 Chinese drug factories get inspected every year. On average, foreign medical factories that bring products to the US are inspected once every 13 years. Our 300+ ports receive 18.2 million shipments of drugs, cosmetics, food and devices a year, and the Food and Drug Administration has only about 450 inspectors. Do the math!!

Teacher Evaluation That got me thinking about teachers and how they are ‘inspected.’ For a few months now I have been corresponding with teachers I know. Here’s what they told me, with a few of my own thoughts stuck in here and there.

In the old days, teachers closed their doors and did their thing, for better or for worse. As long as things were quiet, administrators rather bothered to open the door to see what was going on, and teachers never watched each other at work. That’s changing, sometimes for better, sometimes for worse. In some schools today, teachers are actually expected to watch their peers teach, after which they share their analysis. In other schools, however, principals armed with lists sit in the back of the class checking off ‘behaviors’ and later give the teacher a ‘scorecard’ with her ‘batting average.’

No Child Left Behind was supposed to close what is called ‘the achievement gap’ by forcing schools to pay attention to all children. Unfortunately, the gaps persist: Only 14% of Blacks and 17% of Latino 4th graders are proficient in reading, compared to their Asian American (45%) and White (42%) counterparts on the 2007 National Assessment of Educational Progress. NCLB’s critics claim that the law has narrowed the curriculum to a single-minded focus on reading and math, eliminated programs for the gifted, and turned schools into ‘drill and kill’ factories, and those claims are, in some places, supported by facts.

NCLB’s biggest change may be in teaching itself. For better and sometimes for worse, what teachers used to do behind closed doors is now scrutinized, often on a daily basis. That is, someone, often the principal, drops in regularly to watch the teacher at work. Whether these observations are diagnostic in nature and therefore designed to help teachers improve or a ‘gotcha’ game is the essential question. The answer seems to vary from school to school.

What were ‘the good old days’ like? Continue reading →

Getting Parents Involved

June 1, 2009 John Merrow Op-ed, parents, teaching family, john merrow, parents, Teaching

Full Text:

Parents getting involved When it comes to parent involvement, too many educators love to play the blame game. And if they’re not carping, they’re probably emitting hot air. It’s fundamentally arrogant, based on the assumption that parents don’t get it.

Here’s the pattern I’ve observed: Schools and districts appoint committees and task forces to organize parents or to study the issue. Some schools make parents sign contracts promising to come to meetings. Some set up classes for parents to teach them how to be involved in their children’s education. Perhaps they change policies so that parent teacher meetings can be held at more convenient times. They might even provide baby-sitting services at ‘back to school’ night.

If schools began involving parents at the most basic levels in the early grades, things would be different. And not with high-falutin’ pedagogical concepts and principles–but with real stuff.

Continue reading →

Sometimes It’s Better to Get Caught

May 27, 2009 John Merrow Op-ed cheating, john merrow, taking note, Teaching

Text:

“Did you cheat in school when you were my age?” My 12-year-old niece looked at me as she asked the question, then turned to her father, my younger brother. cheating

We were talking about her school, a gymnasium outside Munich. Because I knew about the intense pressure at these elite German schools, I wondered whether German students cheated as much as their American counterparts. In surveys of American students, more than 70% admit to cheating on an exam at least once in the past year, with close to 50% admitting to cheating two or more times. My niece confessed that once she ‘helped some friends’ on a test by giving them answers, and that other kids did the same thing.

And now that she had ‘fessed up, she was turning the tables on us.

Continue reading →