A Ghost Story Told Among The Teachers

Colleagues:

“The English teacher turned left on Majors road after leaving school, determined to keep up his new fitness regime of walking home from work.  At school late grading, it was dark and windy, but a full moon would light his way home.

As he turned he saw a figure of a man walking in front of him. He thought he recognized him.

‘Hello,’ he called out.  The man turned.  ‘Hey, aren’t you the new teacher down the hall?’

‘Yeah, thanks for helping me with online grading program.’ ‘No problem,’ he replied, ‘Hey, are you walking home, too?’

‘Yep, if you don’t mind, I’d like to walk with you.  I am kind of new to this world.  I can go with you for a bit, but I bet I have farther home to go than you do.’ 

‘Sounds good,’ the English teacher said. His new traveling companion pointed. ‘Do you mind if we cut across that cemetery? I like reading the old tombstones.’

‘Ok…Hey, I never got your name…,’ said the English teacher.  His companion said, ‘I don’t mean to be weird, but I really like reading these old names.  See, look at this one:  “Whole Language.”  Wonder when he died?’

That is a weird name, thought the English teacher.  He read a few himself, “Back to Basics…IDEA…Nation At Risk…Working on the Work…”’ He continued to read, ‘Digital Natives…Professional Learning Communities…Writing Across The Curriculum….”

“…No Child Left Behind…What?!?”

They had stopped and his companion had his back to him facing the open yard.  The wind whistled through creaking trees.  Dry leaves stirred on the ground.

Looking over the gravestones, his new friend replied, ‘Glorious, isn’t it?  It is the last resting place of all the educational reform movements.  Each of them rises up, born from the laboratory of mad bureaucrats and roams the earth in search of teachers to feed upon.  But eventually, after they have sucked and drained their fill, they return here.  Having left education unchanged, the only evidence of their glorious reigns are these sad crumbling stones….

‘What? A graveyard for failed educational reform movements?  That’s crazy!”

‘Not crazy at all,’ his companion replied, still looking out upon the lonely bed of dead trends, ‘in fact, about this time of year—if there is a full moon—they say that these relics of educational movements rise from their resting places to walk the night and again seek to devour educators across the land…”

The English teacher started hearing a murmuring coming up from the ground.  “raising expectations…standards based…student engagement…”  It got louder and louder.  ‘What’s going on?!?’ shrieked the English teacher.

His traveling companion slowly turned.  His eyes now glowed green.  As he smiled, the English teacher now saw him transformed from the human being that he had helped with his grades into something altogether inhuman and not contributing to student learning at all.  His smile now revealed long fangs.

‘You’re one of them!’ screeched the English teacher, ’You’re one of the failed educational movements that is coming back to life!!! Get away from me!!!

‘No,’ the figure calmly replied, growing and transforming into his true shape. ‘I don’t live here.  I have yet to die…’

‘Let me re-introduced myself.  My name is… Pay for Performance” His hands started to grow into large claws.

In a cruel mechanical voice, he hissed…‘Have you completed your Teaches Keys Effectiveness System online forms?....’

The teacher’s screams echoed through the night, and could have been heard echoing on state road 141.”

Book Review-

Supertest: How the International Baccalaureate can Strengthen Our Schools by Jay Mathews


Co-written by my nemesis, Jay Mathews. Mathews formerly reported on education for Newsweek and made the famous public high school rating system based on how many AP or IB tests per number of students. The rationale was research that correlated success in college with taking AP and IB classes (With the new emphasis on sitting in the class and not on scoring well on the test, I think these classes do not prepare students as well as they did when I started teaching). He co-wrote with Ian Hill, the Deputy Director of the IBO. The bias, which is admitted, does not a completely undermine a detailed history and explanation of IB. Mathews alternates between chapters on history/current issues with anecdotes of one low income school instituting and growing an IB program. Mathews reports and addresses controversies and criticisms about IB, suggesting but not stating they are unfounded. Despite the bias, I recommend this book because the specificity of the information explains IB very well in terms of history, theory, and experience.

Vote "no" against the Georgia charter school amendment, Amendment 1.

I am for charter schools because I think innovation and change can help education. Charter schools can, in theory, experiment with new institutional parameters that may, in theory, produce better results. I may want to teach in a charter school one day and I may want my kids to go to charter schools.

BUT, the amendment as written is deceptive. The amendment mentions "local" control. But it is the opposite: a state bureaucracy will approve charter schools initiated by people outside the school district. The main lobbying and advertising is from private charter school companies, the majority of which are from outside of Georgia.

The way charter schools are set up now is the epitome of local control and democracy. The local school board sets up the terms of the contract---"the charter"-- with whatever entity wants to set up an innovative school. The locally elected official releases local funds and holds the charter school accountable for the education of the children in that district.  Democracy isn't perfect, but you know a school board election can be won by 30 concerned parents. 

That is better than a state commissioned bankrolled by private corporations (maybe corporation make better schools, maybe I want to work for one, but I don't like their political influence--some of the best performing charters have been started by parents or alliances of parents and teachers). We already have 200 charter schools in the state of Georgia and new ones are opening up every year, all created by school boards.

That is my main argument.

BY THE WAY, across the country charter schools have so far not out performed public schools. There are anecdotal success and failures but studies show no statistical difference in aggregate.

That is surprising because charter school should perform better because they have two huge advantages over public schools:  first, a pool of families who care enough about education to take the initiative to self-select into them and second, they don't have to face the staggeringly crippling local, state, and national bureaucracy that chokes public education every day.

But I am in favor of charter schools because, in theory, they could be centers of more choice and innovation in education. Maybe I want to start a charter school one day. But I want to work with a locally elected school board.

Irony:  People usually against big government are in favor of moving to local control away from state bureaucracy. The committee deciding charters would be appointed, not elected, and would cost at least a million dollars. Eric Erickson, in his 10/18 broadcast, stated that we need to take local control away from local government because local government isn't working. We need intervention from big government? 

Sigh:  most of the advertising and radio personalities supporting the charter school amendment focuses on only one possible innovation of charter schools- the ability to fire teachers.  There are tons of bad teachers out there, but that is not one of the main problems, in my opinion.  But promoting the idea that I am lazy and incompetent in my job seems to be the best way to sell the idea of the state charter commission. Isn't time to a have a real conversation about public education?

On Having A Blog

My primary motivation for having a blog is curiosity. I am aware of two kinds of blogs: personal live journals and web logs of social and political commentary. I know about live journals from my students. I have always thought that is was strange to post your intimate thoughts on the World Wide Web but at the same time I see the appeal. Reading political blogs, I am impressed with the amount of opinions available but equally amazed at the lack of thoughtfulness. There is a lot of "heat, not light" as Dr. Vicky Weiss might say.

I am not sure if the practice of publishing one's thoughts and feelings is self-expression or narcissism. And I am not sure if I want to bear the responsibility of transmitting my e-personality around the world. What if I don't have anything important to say? And there is the small issue of the halo I must wear as a public school teacher.

--Tizzzle