I think this is a legitimate question, but you tell me.
I read a tweet this morning stating that the evidence is against charter schools. I also read a tweet of an opinion piece about districts preventing the replication of successful charter schools in New York. The main evidence that was mentioned refers to state test scores, but most of those who write against charter schools also write against high stakes state testing. In other words, we stop successful charter schools. We judge those that are not successful on measures that we don't even like to begin with. It seems to me that while those who support charter school policy are being accused of supporting an ideology without evidence that those who oppose charter schools are just as guilty of supporting ideology.
So my question is how can charter school opponents use a measure that they do not even agree with to say that charter schools aren't successful? If education is something besides performance on standardized tests, then why don't we measure all schools on those other standards rather than measuring charter schools based on a faulty standard?
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Academics and Athletics can mix
As the father of a college soccer player on the eve of an important NCAA tournament match, I have to reflect on the real significance (or not) of Division II college sports. As important as this game is, and has hard as the women work on their soccer skills and conditioning, the Colorado School of Mines Orediggers are all outstanding students. All are majoring in some sort of engineering and have been admitted to a very selective school.
From what I can tell, the women put in as many or more hours studying than they do on their significant time commitment to sports. There doesn't have to be a dichotomy between sports and academics. The fact that many of the athletes in the upper ranks of Division I sports get away with non-academic pursuits is tragic. The number of student athletes who will go on to make significant money playing professional sports is a fraction of the total of even the top athletes. Instead those "student" athletes may be out on the street with no degree or a degree that has little value after their four years of athletic eligibility.
So, as I cheer for my daughter and her team, I'm going to try to keep in all in perspective, realizing that as fun and exciting as college athletics is, that these women have much more going for them than just the excitement of athletics. They are proving that academics and athletics can mix.
From what I can tell, the women put in as many or more hours studying than they do on their significant time commitment to sports. There doesn't have to be a dichotomy between sports and academics. The fact that many of the athletes in the upper ranks of Division I sports get away with non-academic pursuits is tragic. The number of student athletes who will go on to make significant money playing professional sports is a fraction of the total of even the top athletes. Instead those "student" athletes may be out on the street with no degree or a degree that has little value after their four years of athletic eligibility.
So, as I cheer for my daughter and her team, I'm going to try to keep in all in perspective, realizing that as fun and exciting as college athletics is, that these women have much more going for them than just the excitement of athletics. They are proving that academics and athletics can mix.
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
An important question
An interesting piece was published on The Answer Sheet by Matthew Di Carlo. I found it interesting because while not an endorsement of charter schools, it makes a very important statement about successful charter schools. Di Carlo's summary of the research on charter schools is that for the most part charter schools are very average or even bad. This is not really new information. I've discussed the implications here more than once.
Di Carlo concludes that the real insights to be gained from the research is that there are pockets where charter schools have been very successful over time. In other words, we need to study what those charter schools are doing that might be able to impact other schools (public or charter).
One of the real truths is that charter schools will not go away soon. Opponents of charter schools (and the real number is probably less than they would have us imagine) fight a lot against charter schools. It's right to fight bad ones. They should go away or be better managed (just like bad public schools). However, everyone should be happy when charter schools show good results with students and should try to emulate what they can about good charter schools. Unfortunately, it seems that research is still to be done or has not been well publicized.
It's also clear that for some districts admitting that they have emulated successful charter school characteristic would be like admitting defeat. It is as if districts who oppose charter schools would rather continue in mediocrity or adopt less effective new methods rather than admit that a neighboring charter school has found some answers.
It's important that as charter schools continue to exist and to increase that non-charter public schools also work to investigate what works in those good charter schools to assist in their own development. The theoretical discussion about whether charter schools should exist may continue, but the fact of charter schools existence is here.
Di Carlo concludes that the real insights to be gained from the research is that there are pockets where charter schools have been very successful over time. In other words, we need to study what those charter schools are doing that might be able to impact other schools (public or charter).
One of the real truths is that charter schools will not go away soon. Opponents of charter schools (and the real number is probably less than they would have us imagine) fight a lot against charter schools. It's right to fight bad ones. They should go away or be better managed (just like bad public schools). However, everyone should be happy when charter schools show good results with students and should try to emulate what they can about good charter schools. Unfortunately, it seems that research is still to be done or has not been well publicized.
It's also clear that for some districts admitting that they have emulated successful charter school characteristic would be like admitting defeat. It is as if districts who oppose charter schools would rather continue in mediocrity or adopt less effective new methods rather than admit that a neighboring charter school has found some answers.
It's important that as charter schools continue to exist and to increase that non-charter public schools also work to investigate what works in those good charter schools to assist in their own development. The theoretical discussion about whether charter schools should exist may continue, but the fact of charter schools existence is here.
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Parents organize and will cooperate with unions
Parents in LA have begun to organize. They say they want to work with unions to improve education. However, one of their goals is to eliminate lay-offs based on seniority. I'm not sure how they'll get the unions to cooperate with that one. If they can, that will be a major success for them and for their kids.
Monday, November 14, 2011
Strategic Planning: Lessons learned from leading seminars
I've now led two sessions with charter school leaders on strategic planning. Here are a few things that I've learned.
1. writing a good mission statements is more difficult than some people think.
Strategic planning takes work, discipline and objectivity. I hope that my sessions have been helpful to schools as they make their strategic plans.
1. writing a good mission statements is more difficult than some people think.
- Teams writing the statements are too big and everyone wants to have their pet phrase in the statement, and no one wants to say, "no."
- Teams want to included everything about their school that anyone would possibly want to know. Because of that, they include things that are not mission. They include goals. They included the ways that they will complete the mission. In other words, it's as if they are creating a summary of their strategic plan's executive summary.
- The schools don't complete a strategic plan, so they try to make their mission statements a summary of their strategic plan.
- On the other end, the mission statements doesn't include enough and ends up being more of a vision statements. It's idealistic to the point that it doesn't specify what the organization will accomplish.
Strategic planning takes work, discipline and objectivity. I hope that my sessions have been helpful to schools as they make their strategic plans.
Friday, November 11, 2011
Who pays the price for the charter school experiment?
A frequently tweeted topic last week was the fact that in order to have successful charter schools some bad charter schools also have to allowed, at least for a while. The tweet from those who do not like that fact was "Who pays the price?" Of course, the answer they give is that the children do with the implication that it isn't acceptable.
However, who pays the price for the continuing existence for inadequate traditional public schools? The answer is, again, the kids. That isn't acceptable either.
In other words, in this dichotomy, you have choose which is the least of bad of the bad options. Here is why I choose charter schools.
First, an alternative to both of the bad options is to "simply" improve the public schools. The reason that's not an option for me is that public schools have had more than enough time and money to try to change and improve. Their actions have not worked. Our schools continue to graduate students from high school who cannot fulfill even some of the basic jobs that their parents could with the same education, sometimes from the same schools.
Second, any school can fail children. How much of a failure can it be? When we look at charter schools that are worse than their public school counterparts, how much worse are they? How much damage is done? How much of that damage is irreparable? Let's compare this to alternative medicines or even alternative diagnoses by different doctors. There are times where the treatment is not clear for a particular diagnosis. In those cases, the patient gets to choose a solution. In fact, there are cases that a doctor says that nothing is wrong, and the doctor is wrong. The patient may die of this misdiagnosis. It's highly unlikely that any student will die from going to a bad charter school. It's even less likely that a student will learn nothing. The price does not seem that high to me and is obviously not too high for the parents who choose those schools to try something different. In a life threatening situation, you can't blame a patient for choosing and alternative medical treatment, if that's all he or she has left. In a situation in which the public schools are very bad, you can't blame a parent for trying something different, especially if there is hope that it might work. After all, if a child is three or four grades behind in reading because of social promotion in a school district, will the child really be harmed if he or she ends up three and a half or four and a half years behind. This is the situation in some of the cases.
Third, while I haven't seen all of the data, I would guess that some of the schools performing worse than their district schools are in good districts in which the "poor" performance is still well above national averages and is still good. In other words, students are likely in situations that would not be difficult to remedy.
If I examine the worst case of each position, it seems to me that allowing charter schools is far better than the alternative of not having charter schools. The fact that there are many high performing charter schools and that charter schools are disproportionately represented among the best high schools in the U.S. should show that charter schools have something to show traditional public schools around the country.
I'm not looking to save American education. In some areas it's not terrible, but in other areas, it's as if it's already dead. It won't be revived. The only answer is to do something new and different. There is little incentive for schools to get better on their own. Charter schools may not be THE answer, but they have to be allowed to try to find the answers.
However, who pays the price for the continuing existence for inadequate traditional public schools? The answer is, again, the kids. That isn't acceptable either.
In other words, in this dichotomy, you have choose which is the least of bad of the bad options. Here is why I choose charter schools.
First, an alternative to both of the bad options is to "simply" improve the public schools. The reason that's not an option for me is that public schools have had more than enough time and money to try to change and improve. Their actions have not worked. Our schools continue to graduate students from high school who cannot fulfill even some of the basic jobs that their parents could with the same education, sometimes from the same schools.
Second, any school can fail children. How much of a failure can it be? When we look at charter schools that are worse than their public school counterparts, how much worse are they? How much damage is done? How much of that damage is irreparable? Let's compare this to alternative medicines or even alternative diagnoses by different doctors. There are times where the treatment is not clear for a particular diagnosis. In those cases, the patient gets to choose a solution. In fact, there are cases that a doctor says that nothing is wrong, and the doctor is wrong. The patient may die of this misdiagnosis. It's highly unlikely that any student will die from going to a bad charter school. It's even less likely that a student will learn nothing. The price does not seem that high to me and is obviously not too high for the parents who choose those schools to try something different. In a life threatening situation, you can't blame a patient for choosing and alternative medical treatment, if that's all he or she has left. In a situation in which the public schools are very bad, you can't blame a parent for trying something different, especially if there is hope that it might work. After all, if a child is three or four grades behind in reading because of social promotion in a school district, will the child really be harmed if he or she ends up three and a half or four and a half years behind. This is the situation in some of the cases.
Third, while I haven't seen all of the data, I would guess that some of the schools performing worse than their district schools are in good districts in which the "poor" performance is still well above national averages and is still good. In other words, students are likely in situations that would not be difficult to remedy.
If I examine the worst case of each position, it seems to me that allowing charter schools is far better than the alternative of not having charter schools. The fact that there are many high performing charter schools and that charter schools are disproportionately represented among the best high schools in the U.S. should show that charter schools have something to show traditional public schools around the country.
I'm not looking to save American education. In some areas it's not terrible, but in other areas, it's as if it's already dead. It won't be revived. The only answer is to do something new and different. There is little incentive for schools to get better on their own. Charter schools may not be THE answer, but they have to be allowed to try to find the answers.
Thursday, November 10, 2011
City forces unwilling residents to pay for public schools
How about that for a headline. I was reading just a few minutes ago about charter schools begin forced on unwilling city residents. Of course the claim is thoughtless. Public schools are not universally accepted, which is why people go to private schools, home school and have voted to allow charter schools.
Private school and home school parents perhaps have the greatest claim of having public schools forced upon them. It's really only been recently that many areas have accepted home schooling. I recall about 15 years ago when my daughter was home schooled for a few years that people sort of looked at us funny, even in a community that was above the national average for home schooled students. These parents do not use the public schools system and would not vote for it if there was a vote (now wouldn't that be interesting) and yet they pay the same taxes as those who use the public schools or support public education.
In the same way, charter schools are legal and have been voted on my the general populace or their representatives. Charter schools have not been forced on anyone and certainly not anymore than public schools are forced on those who oppose them or don't want to send their kids to them.
The nature of a democracy is that some of my money is going to go to something that I do not support. It's called tolerance and compromise. It's called working within the democratic system. When that's lost, then we have either anarchy or else totalitarianism.
Private school and home school parents perhaps have the greatest claim of having public schools forced upon them. It's really only been recently that many areas have accepted home schooling. I recall about 15 years ago when my daughter was home schooled for a few years that people sort of looked at us funny, even in a community that was above the national average for home schooled students. These parents do not use the public schools system and would not vote for it if there was a vote (now wouldn't that be interesting) and yet they pay the same taxes as those who use the public schools or support public education.
In the same way, charter schools are legal and have been voted on my the general populace or their representatives. Charter schools have not been forced on anyone and certainly not anymore than public schools are forced on those who oppose them or don't want to send their kids to them.
The nature of a democracy is that some of my money is going to go to something that I do not support. It's called tolerance and compromise. It's called working within the democratic system. When that's lost, then we have either anarchy or else totalitarianism.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Charter School Strategic Planning #6: Setting Goals
So what happens once you know your mission and vision and have done your SWOT analysis?
It's time to develop your goals. These should be succinct and measurable goals. A school will need goals for a number of areas. At minimum, you should think about:
Your goals should be measurable and clear. You should also limit your goals to the achievable. They can be stretch goals, but they should not be unobtainable. I heard a board member recently that said, "We'll never really attain those." If that's the case, then they aren't good goals.
Also, the goals should derive from your SWOT analysis toward fulfilling your mission. For example, you may look at some weaknesses that need to become either strengths or at least neutral in order for you to complete your mission. Create a measurable goal for eliminating that weakness. Not every weakness needs to be eliminated. Even more, not every weakness needs to be eliminated over the same time frame. Goals should have a completion date attached.
Goals can also be overcoming threats and taking advantage of opportunities. A school that I work with has identified an opportunity of becoming the model in their sector of charter schools. The next step will be to define what their goal is and in what time frame exploiting that opportunity will be achieved.
It may seem odd at first, but goals can also relate to strengths. It may be that a school will want to increase and area of strength or take actions to ensure that the strength remains a strength. Strengths that are key to the school's successful completion of its mission should be maintained or even enhanced. This may be having an effective teaching staff. It may be the school's ability to make students feel welcome and inspired. Whatever it is, it's likely that at least one or two strengths will need bolstering, and the strategic plan will need to include goals to accomplish that.
Goals should not simply come out of thin air. A school may have some goals that are not strategic goals, but that's another subject, and those goals must never take priority over the strategic goals. Goals must be based on the answers to two questions.
What strategic goals are necessary now to accomplish the mission?
What does our SWOT tell us about the highest priority areas to be addressed in order to accomplish the mission?
The idea of priority is key. There are many ways to get at this. Some are more efficient than others. An objective facilitator can assist in an organized brainstorming session that can lead quickly to agreement on priorities. This can be done without grandstanding or one person dominating the conversation. A skilled facilitator will not let any participants dominant the discussion nor will he or she allow participants to refrain from giving opinions. There are ways to ensure that all good minds contribute and that the most agreed upon priorities rise to the top.
Once you have your goals, the next step is to figure out how to accomplish them.
It's time to develop your goals. These should be succinct and measurable goals. A school will need goals for a number of areas. At minimum, you should think about:
- Academic achievement goals
- Community goals
- Discipline goals
- Attendance goals
- Enrollment goals
- Financial goals
- Facilities goals
Your goals should be measurable and clear. You should also limit your goals to the achievable. They can be stretch goals, but they should not be unobtainable. I heard a board member recently that said, "We'll never really attain those." If that's the case, then they aren't good goals.
Also, the goals should derive from your SWOT analysis toward fulfilling your mission. For example, you may look at some weaknesses that need to become either strengths or at least neutral in order for you to complete your mission. Create a measurable goal for eliminating that weakness. Not every weakness needs to be eliminated. Even more, not every weakness needs to be eliminated over the same time frame. Goals should have a completion date attached.
Goals can also be overcoming threats and taking advantage of opportunities. A school that I work with has identified an opportunity of becoming the model in their sector of charter schools. The next step will be to define what their goal is and in what time frame exploiting that opportunity will be achieved.
It may seem odd at first, but goals can also relate to strengths. It may be that a school will want to increase and area of strength or take actions to ensure that the strength remains a strength. Strengths that are key to the school's successful completion of its mission should be maintained or even enhanced. This may be having an effective teaching staff. It may be the school's ability to make students feel welcome and inspired. Whatever it is, it's likely that at least one or two strengths will need bolstering, and the strategic plan will need to include goals to accomplish that.
Goals should not simply come out of thin air. A school may have some goals that are not strategic goals, but that's another subject, and those goals must never take priority over the strategic goals. Goals must be based on the answers to two questions.
What strategic goals are necessary now to accomplish the mission?
What does our SWOT tell us about the highest priority areas to be addressed in order to accomplish the mission?
The idea of priority is key. There are many ways to get at this. Some are more efficient than others. An objective facilitator can assist in an organized brainstorming session that can lead quickly to agreement on priorities. This can be done without grandstanding or one person dominating the conversation. A skilled facilitator will not let any participants dominant the discussion nor will he or she allow participants to refrain from giving opinions. There are ways to ensure that all good minds contribute and that the most agreed upon priorities rise to the top.
Once you have your goals, the next step is to figure out how to accomplish them.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Using your GPS to manage your school
See my other posts about creating a GPS for your school.
Once you've followed my instructions for creating a GPS, then you need to follow it. Here are some things that I've found helpful while hiking.
You don't need to look at the GPS all of the time. You don't need to have it on all the time. If things are OK. Power it down. Enjoy the scenery. Take a few photographs. Relax.
In the same way, boards should use their monitoring mechanism for the strategic plan on a regular basis, but not try to monitor progress all of the time. Some goals are longer term goals and do not need to be constantly monitored.
In the same way, if the school has some minor deficiencies compared to the strategic plan, don't over react. AND agree with other board members or leaders on what the minor and major issues are. I've seen boards spend a lot of board meeting time on minor issues. The board chair needs to regulate this and be strong enough to NOT let that happen.
So, there you have it. The end of my GPS analogy. I hope that your school stays on course and gets home safely.
Once you've followed my instructions for creating a GPS, then you need to follow it. Here are some things that I've found helpful while hiking.
- Don't overuse the GPS. Enjoy the hike.
You don't need to look at the GPS all of the time. You don't need to have it on all the time. If things are OK. Power it down. Enjoy the scenery. Take a few photographs. Relax.
In the same way, boards should use their monitoring mechanism for the strategic plan on a regular basis, but not try to monitor progress all of the time. Some goals are longer term goals and do not need to be constantly monitored.
- Use the GPS for essential course corrections
In the same way, if the school has some minor deficiencies compared to the strategic plan, don't over react. AND agree with other board members or leaders on what the minor and major issues are. I've seen boards spend a lot of board meeting time on minor issues. The board chair needs to regulate this and be strong enough to NOT let that happen.
- Use the GPS objectively
So, there you have it. The end of my GPS analogy. I hope that your school stays on course and gets home safely.
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