T531 Summer 2012

Located in a low-income community in Chicago, Harper High School graduates just 40 percent of its 1,500 students. Meanwhile, about 35 miles away in suburban Naperville, Illinois, Neuqua Valley High School-a $65 million facility-graduates 99 percent of its students. In an experiment Oprah says was inspired by Rev.

I know have been posting a little too much in the past day, but in undergrad, we watch this documentary by Oprah that showed the difference between the urban and suburban school. I think the video highlights the inequality of schools better; however, the article still gets the point across. Being from around the Chicago-area, I see the differences all the time. Urban schools are in crisis. And it makes it even harder for these failing students when these students see the schools right down the road spending millions of dollars on gymnasiums and libraries.

"Grace says she wishes her mother, also a dropout, had more forcefully explained how much of a struggle life can be without a diploma. Grace says she now feels trapped. "There's no right or left way to turn to get me out of it. It's just constant." she says." This quote from the article stands out to me. I believe that parents have to become involved in the educational process in order to truly accomplish urban reform. While a great teacher can be pretty influential, they cannot always undo what happens or is reinforced/believed at home.

In case you have not heard of the Harlem Project or Geoffrey Canada, this New York Times article will give you a little background.

This article discusses how teachers who work to improve students test scores are leaving a lasting impression on their students. The more education they are getting by "good teachers" increases the students chances of succeeding. Teachers are working to improve these students test scores and while they are doing this the students are learning more than just what is needed to pass the tests. Schools need better teachers to help students in the long run.

"Mr. Jones might regularly help raise test scores more than Ms. Smith, but maybe that is because his students are from wealthier families, or because he has a harder-working class - factors that can be difficult for researchers to discern. " This quote stood out to me because it is similar to the argument against merit based pay for teachers in Indiana. We all know that students come to us with an array of prior knowledge, much of which is based on previous experiences and their environment. However, all students are capable of academic growth. What's the harm in evaluating teachers based on the growth their students made during the school year?

I knew I want to be a teacher since fourth and fifth grade when I had Mr. Cearfoss. He was one of those effective teachers who changed my life by making me feel successful on a daily basis and believe that I could be successful on a daily basis if I saw value in everything I did. Kind of deep for a fourth and fifth grade teacher, but I remember him attending my baseball games late in the evenings and calling home when he thought I was slacking. He made it clear to me, and the rest of the students, that while he cared about our education in his classroom, he cared even more that we used our education to make the right decisions in our lives after we left his classroom. The average effect of one teacher on a single student is modest. I did not find it surprising that, according to the article, "All else equal, a student with one excellent teacher for one year between fourth and eighth grade would gain $4,600 in lifetime income, compared to a student of similar demographics who has an average teacher. The student with the excellent teacher would also be 0.5 percent more likely to attend college." This is the power that vested, compassionate teachers can have on a student's life. While some of my students will say they like me and others will say the exact opposite, all my students would say that I care about them and care about their success. When a student feels that a person, especially a teacher, cares and believes in them, that student will strive to retain that faith others have in him/her.

The article brings up a good point about all the different efforts and fads. While on the one hand it's commendable that a number of initiatives are attempted to improve student learning and students' experiences (and they all likely have various degrees of success), this does beg the question of how much might be TOO much. For instance, if multiple efforts are piloted within a school district, how long is it before there is pressure at other schools to adopt one model that shows promise? If there is struggle with one pilot program, how long does it take before there is pressure to abandon it in favor of another endeavor? There are a variety of questions that can come up, and it can just add to the layers of complications that students and educators face. With the world of standardized testing, deadlines and results-based outcomes, I think there are times that certain initiatives may be hindered simply by the pressures of a certain expectation of immediate results that fail to fully take into account the students and educators properly.

Austin and Jenn- The immediacy for results is true. We are a nation of we want it fast, and we want it now; however, this is not possible nor is it reliable. The need for answers only causes stress and irritability in our school systems. Sadly, the pressure to perform on tests and other assessments negates students overall comprehension and engagement within a class. It also limits a teachers ability to teach. It is complicated. I do not think there is one answer. I don't think there is an easy answer. However, I do think that there needs to be a bigger fight for students. It is my belief that this fight starts with eliminating the presence of instant failure, otherwise known as standardized tests.

I have spent many of my research classes studying the effect positive parenting has on education. With all of the fad ideas that have come and gone, reaching parents has been an initiative that has made a significant difference. Now we come to the dilemma. Unfortunately, we can't control what happens to the students away from our care, so how can we replicate the same results? I have no doubt that reformers will continue coming up with new ideas to try.

Found this website while browsing. Thought I would share.

Their sway over policy and politics appears to be growing, especially at the state and local levels. A new generation of education advocacy groups has emerged to play a formidable political role in states and communities across the country.

Interesting article! I think that advocacy groups pushing for the interests of CHILDREN is something that has been long overdue to the reformation of urban education. Also, I read about Rhee in a different article, for anyone that is interested and wants any more background knowledge. Link is below: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1862444-1,00.html

I used the link to Indiana's Democrats for Education Reform and found information about a budget proposal for next year. They are discussing adding additional cost to states and districts that are already under economic stress! Democrats for Education Reform - Indiana: http://www.dfer.org/branches/in/

Grand Prize Winner Says Charter Schools Should be Like Cancer Contact: Boulder, CO (May 31, 2012) -- The National Education Policy Center (NEPC), housed at the University of Colorado Boulder, has announced via online video the winners of the 2011 Bunkum Awards -presented for the most compellingly lousy educational research for the past year.

NEPC might be an organization you are interested in checking out. They provide a unique service to the education community: they arrange careful and timely reviews, by the nation's leading scholars, of foundations' and policy groups' (among other groups) research reports.As can be detected from this headline, they are strategically intervening in the faulty pipeline that puts shoddy "research" results in the hands of policy makers, who often times don't have the background to view these exceedingly complex issues with a nuanced perspective like that we are developing.

You and Jenn must have been thinking alike when you choose this NYT article :) I liked the perspective and follow-up that the author provided. This article did tie into the Kennedy text and sparked some new ideas/perspectives. With the new RISE evaluation, it is hard to swallow that your students' performance of standardized tests can/will affect your teaching career/performance. My kids will never pass ISTEP but does that mean I'm a bad teacher? I know in my heart this is not the case. However, some people in their glass houses may think differently.

This article discusses how many urban schools struggle with the plague of inexperienced and/or ineffective teachers because teachers with experience, as well as those who have proven to be effective, are often drawn away from urban schools and into suburban/private schools. Additionally, this article states the if the goal is to give each student an equal opportunity to succeed in the classroom and in life, then teachers need to be evaluated based on their students' scores and not on years of experience so that each school can have effective teachers. 

It seems like most schools always want the teachers that have experience, but how are new teachers to gain experience if they are not given any opportunities? Schools need to work with new teachers that are unexperienced and help them gain the knowledge and insights they need to become a successful teacher in an urban school.

I can't help but wonder why teachers are drawn away from urban schools to suburban/private schools. Why did they teach in urban schools in the first place? While there is surely a wide range of reasons, I am reminded of an article I recently read about the "missionary" mentality, where a sub-group of teachers (as the result of their lived experiences) naively think that Black and Brown students need to be saved from themselves and their communities. As you can see, this mindset is the product of deficit orientations to what students know and are able to do. I continue to want to know what solidarity looks like between students and teachers, and how to develop that. It should be noted, too, that this is not just a White teacher thing. Though less attention has been given to it, I have seen Black and Latina/o teachers "other" their students of color. I'll save my explanation for why I think this happens, but the point is that we grow up and are socialized to strive for and attain a certain standard, based on a certain value system. When this doesn't align with others' values, we tend to make judgements about what is "right" and "best". Obviously, this is bigger than teacher preparation programs, but teacher ed. programs can offer different kinds of experiences that afford candidates opportuntites to see students, families and communities in a different light. Same with practicing teachers - I'm reminded of the Funds of Knowledge work our of Tucson, AZ (Norma Gonzalez, Luis Moll et al.) Definitely raised some good points, Randy and Jordan.