Community Based Learning
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Yesterday, we published our conversation with Christopher Cross about the Broader, Bolder Approach (BBA) Campaign’s new accountability recommendations. Today, we’re releasing an interview with another member of BBA’s Accountability Committee: Diane Ravitch, who followed Cross as Assistant Secretary of OERI during the administration of George H.W. Bush.
Like Cross, Ravitch requires no introduction. A long-time supporter of standards-based reform, she has become one of the nation’s most vocal critics of No Child Left Behind. Here are her thoughts on the BBA recommendations:
PUBLIC SCHOOL INSIGHTS: You have argued that "a few tweaks here and a little tinkering there cannot fix" No Child Left Behind. How do BBA's accountability recommendations depart from the NCLB model?
RAVITCH: NCLB is a punitive approach to school improvement. It mandates that test scores must increase or else! If they don't go higher, schools will be sanctioned, and the sanctions will get more onerous with each year that the schools fail to meet their targets. Each year, the targets get higher, and the number of schools that slip over the precipice increases. As schools fail, they are threatened with closure, restructuring, staff firings, or other consequences that may or may not improve the school.
In contrast, BBA suggests accountability that goes far beyond test scores. Test scores matter, but so does student engagement in a broad range of academic subjects, as well as students' health, well-being and civic behavior. Where NCLB is punitive, BBA seeks constructive ways to measure the condition and progress of ...
Editor's Note: Yesterday, Hollywood producer turned Montana educator Peter Rosten sent us the following remarks about his school's innovative filmmaking program:
Greetings from Montana!
A friend of mine, Jan Lombardi, is the education policy advisor for Montana’s Governor, Brian Schweitzer. Recently Jan forwarded me a “Learning First” newsletter and pointed to an article titled “Learning in the Community: Teen Filmmakers Talk About Their Work and Its Impact on Their Lives”.
After reading this inspiring story, I reached out to Claus von Zastrow. Perhaps he’d be interested in a pretty cool media program here in the Bitterroot Valley in 
rural Western, Montana.
In 2004, we created MAPS: Media Arts in the Public Schools. (Be sure to visit our website and Youtube page.) The initial goal was to educate under-served, rural students in the media arts--and since ‘movies’ are cool, there was a healthy and eager response. ...
Fatalist and pseudo-scientist Charles Murray believes that IQ is immutable, that efforts to close achievement gaps are wasted, and that programs to level the social and economic playing fields drain life of meaning.
He would do well to examine the achievements of Say Yes to Education, a remarkable program that has dramatically changed the odds for disadvantaged urban students in several U.S. cities:
The Say Yes promise and supports begin when a child enters kindergarten and continue through high school and beyond. The range of services Say Yes offers across its Chapters include everything from after-school and summer programming, mentoring, tutoring, and school-day academic support to family outreach, scholarships, and social work/ psychological services. Additionally, Say Yes partners provide high-quality health care and legal assistance.
Students in Say Yes communities have high school graduation, college-going and college completion rates similar to those of suburban students.
Not that any of this would change Charles Murray's mind. He's a slow learner. ...
Sally Broughton's middle school students have had a greater impact on their rural community than do many people three or four times their age. The Montana Teacher of the Year has helped her language arts and social studies students successfully advocate for policies to improve life in their school and their neighborhoods. In the process, her students at the Monforton School have strengthened their grasp of history, civics, mathematics, research, writing, and public speaking.
Broughton's remarkable achievements have earned her the American Civic Education Award from The Alliance for Representative Democracy. She recently told Public School Insights about the indelible mark her students have left on Bozeman, Montana. They have much to show for their work: public restrooms downtown, a school-wide bicycle helmet policy, a community playground, and a sophisticated early warning system for local residents living near a vulnerable earthen dam. And the list goes on....
President-Elect Obama is urging Americans to devote themselves to civic and community service. Sally Broughton's students in Bozeman can show you how it's done.
Download our full, 16-minute interview here, or listen to just over five minutes of interview highlights:
You can also read a transcript of these highlights:
PUBLIC SCHOOL INSIGHTS: I've heard quite a bit about these very, very fascinating projects that you've done and that have actually managed to change public policy in your community. Could you describe how you go about this, and how these projects support broader academic goals?
BROUGHTON: Absolutely. We do something called Project Citizen. During that time, the children find a problem that can be solved by public policy and they investigate it. ...
Phi Delta Kappa, International has just released the results of the 40th Annual Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup Poll of the Public's Attitudes Toward the Public Schools. It makes for fascinating reading.
The Big Headlines
The press will no doubt focus on the following findings: ...
On Tuesday, we pondered the concern that the community schools approach recently championed by Randi Weingarten of the AFT could turn schools into "social service agencies of last resort" while driving education to the margins. This is indeed a danger, we argued, when schools must use their money to "fill the void" left by cuts to essential social services. ...
Addressing the American Federation of Schools convention after her election as president, Randi Weingarten urged the dramatic expansion of the community school model:
Can you imagine a federal law that promoted community schools — schools that serve the neediest children by bringing together under one roof all the services and activities they and their families need?…Imagine schools that are open all day and offer after-school and evening recreational activities, child care and preschool, tutoring and homework assistance. Schools that include dental, medical and counseling clinics.
Robert Podiscio of the Core Knoweldge Blog worries that such schools could relegate education to the margins while becoming "social service agencies of last resort." This is definitely a danger--if schools lack the resources and support to carry out their broader role. Pondiscio thoughtfully describes what often happens when schools must redeploy their existing resources to fill the void left by policymakers who blithely de-fund programs for communities in greatest need. ...
Over the past few weeks, Public School Insights has been interviewing signers of a recent statement calling for a "Broader, Bolder Approach to Education"--an approach that combines ambitious school improvement strategies with out-of-school supports for student achievement--such as early childhood education, after-school programs, and health services for children.
A few days ago, we had the privilege of interviewing Nobel prize-winning economist James Heckman, a signer whose recent work on topics such as graduation rates and the benefits of early childhood education has attracted close attention from education advocates. ...
The Public Education Network has just released its "Civic Index for Quality Education," a tool to assess and improve community support for excellent public education. According to the good people at PEN, the Civic Index "identifies and measures the level of involvement across 10 sectors of the community...:
- Education leadership of local elected officials
- Commitment to the values of tolerance and inclusiveness
- Active parents
- Strong civic organizations (parent, philanthropic, civic/religious organizations)
- Utilization of school performance data to improve school quality
- Youth involvement
- Partnerships with higher education
- Knowledge o, and voting for, the school board
- An active business community
- Media coverage
"These [indices] reflect 10 key conditions that must exist outside of schools--and complement those conditions we know from Standards Based Reform must be present inside schools--to ensure student success." ...
Luajean Bryan is a star.
Just ask her principal at Walker Valley High School in Tennessee, the students who flock to her advanced math and science classes, or the people at USA Today who named her to their 2006 all-star teaching team.
Bryan recently spoke with us about the innovative teaching practices that have won her local admiration and national attention. Her emphasis on hands-on learning is exciting students and swelling enrollments in higher-level science and math classes. With support from the NEA Foundation, for example, she accompanies students into caves and on untethered hot-air balloon trips to help them learn first-hand about mathematic and scientific principles that govern the world around them. ...
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A Village Route to Early Childhood Education
In the 1990s, we at Davenport Community Schools noticed a trend: Children were coming to kindergarten unprepared to learn. A troublingly low number of our district’s children (more than half of whom receive free or reduced price lunch) had preschool experience. Recognizing the importance of early childhood education in ensuring students are ready to succeed in school and life, we developed the Children’s Village, which includes formal preschool classes and all-day, year-round programming serving children from six weeks to five years old. Today, when a Children’s Village student arrives for the first day of kindergarten, the teacher can say, “This child is ready to learn.”
With early childhood education, students learn more, teachers accomplish more and taxpayers get more for their education tax dollar. But it takes all our students, teachers, staff, administrators, parents and partners to make the Children’s Villages a success. Indeed, it really does take a village to ensure quality early childhood education. Read more
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