Last week I shared the information that Texas pretty much dictates what goes in K-12 textbooks—scary thought.

But change is in the wind—an amazing change that’s been a long time coming.

Math and English instruction in the United States moved a step closer to uniform – and more rigorous – standards Wednesday as draft new national guidelines were released.

The effort is expected to lead to standardization of textbooks and testing and make learning easier for students who move from state to state.

The support includes the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers so it may actually happen.

Unlike typical efforts that are diluted by politics and ideology, the new standards are fact savvy.

According to Chris Minnich, director of standards and assessment for the Council of Chief State School Officers, the foundation of the standards is hard research, instead of negotiation.

Unlike most efforts to revise standards at a state level, this document was not built on consensus, “We really used evidence in an unprecedented fashion.”

48 states are participating; three guesses which states opted out and the first two don’t count.

Right, Texas and Alaska. (Why am I not surprised?)

“Texas has chosen to preserve its sovereign authority to determine what is appropriate for Texas children to learn in its public schools,” Scott wrote in a letter to U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas. “It is clear that the first step toward nationalization of our schools has been put into place.”

Happily, this should break Texas’ de facto control of textbook content as well as those dreams of taking control of the government via a brainwashed next generation.

These standards were created with an eye to having kids ready for work or college, which is very different than just having them graduate.

The draft report also addresses the debate over how much should be expected from immigrants who are just learning English. An introduction to the standards explains that English language learners should be held to the same standards but should be given more time and instructional support to meet the requirements.

Students with disabilities should also be challenged to master as many of the standards as they can, the document argues.

It’s also different because Federal funding is involved, not just an edict.

The Common Core State Standards Initiative (CCSSI) has the entire draft up; read it and then add your thoughts.

These standards are now open for public comment until Friday, April 2.

Get involved. Have a say in the future. Do it now.

Image credit: HikingArtist on flickr

I love it when readers call me (360.335.8054), even when the caller is irate, as happened yesterday.

“Sue” called because she was extremely upset that I agreed with Dan Erwin’s comment that he raised his kids using the concept of ‘covenants’ as opposed to ‘standards’, because covenants can be renegotiated whereas standards are set.

Sue said that no society could function without some kind of absolute rules, the kind that gave continuity, and that if they changed at everyone’s convenience there would be chaos.

My response was that I disagreed with the absolute rules, but agreed with the second part of her premise.

After talking for awhile, Sue ended the discussion by saying that I wouldn’t have the nerve to put my opinions here, because if I did I’d lose all my readers.

I said that I doubted that, since I’ve never made my attitudes a secret and that she should come back today (Friday) and see for herself.

Foremost, I’ve never believed that homo sapiens are capable of speaking in absolutes, such as always and never. There will be millions of changes, both societal and evolutionarily, between now and forever.

Life changes, society changes, attitude changes.

In absolute terms, murder has always been wrong, but people have been renegotiating the definition of murder for centuries—and they still are.

When one part of a society decides a standard needs to change, they often (usually?) fight a war with the opposing side that doesn’t want to change—think North vs. South.

The wars aren’t always formal, gun-toting fights. Slavery may have been abolished in the South, but integration is still an upward battle.

Obviously, changes aren’t done by individuals, but with the agreement of a significant segment of the society, otherwise, as Sue said, there would be chaos.

But even when a significant number move for the change chaos may result. It often erupts and can be clearly seen, for example, in the generational shifts so beloved by the media.

If I hadn’t seen so many standards change during my life I might be less on the side of Relativism, but, as I said at the start, humans just don’t seem capable of absolutes.

If any other readers are upset, have great arguments in support of absolutes, agree with me more or less or just want to explain why I’m nuts click here and share your thoughts.

Your comments—priceless

Don’t miss a post, subscribe via RSS or EMAIL

Image credit: slavin fpo on flickr ideal standard

Or is it a pyramid?“A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that involves promising or paying abnormally high returns (“profits”) to investors out of the money paid in by subsequent investors, rather than from net revenues generated by any real business.”

“A pyramid scheme is a non-sustainable business model that involves the exchange of money primarily for enrolling other people into the scheme, without any product or service being delivered.”

This is what came to mind after reading CandidProf’s post yesterday; I finally decided that’s it’s both, making is a pyra-Ponzi scheme.

As CP described the situation it’s definitely a pyramid, his college is funded based on how many students are enrolled as are most K-12 schools in this country. Further, lowering standards and focusing only on retaining students in order to continue funding certainly fits the no service being delivered description of a pyramid.

The Ponzi element is seen in high promises from such initiatives as No Child Left Behind, which has done nothing to stem the downward spiral of learning—in fact, it has made it worse.

NY Times Op-Ed Columnist Bob Herbert quotes from a study published in the Notices of the American Mathematical Society that states, “The United States is failing to develop the math skills of both girls and boys, especially among those who could excel at the highest levels, a new study asserts, and girls who do succeed in the field are almost all immigrants or the daughters of immigrants from countries where mathematics is more highly valued.”

He ends by quoting “An article in Monday’s Times spotlighted some of the serious problems that have emerged in the No Child Left Behind law. Among the law’s unintended consequences, as Sam Dillon reported, has been its tendency to “punish” states that “have high academic standards and rigorous tests, which have contributed to an increasing pileup of failed schools.”

After reading CandidProf’s post, my Russian business partner, Nick Mikhailovsky, commented,

“Actually, the average education quality has significantly degraded over here as well. Although the reasons are different the outcome is the same and applies to both basic and higher education.

Our reason is simpler—low salaries in education.

Everyone who needed money or couldn’t bear living in poverty has left education. After 15 years of that, there are almost no good teachers or college professors left.  The old ones retired, and young people aren’t willing to live in poverty when they have plenty of other opportunities and all their life in front of them.”

Hmmm, Russia seems to be dumbing down by salary, but considering the salaries we pay our teachers we’re trashing US education from the top down and the bottom up.

Your comments—priceless

Don’t miss a post, subscribe via RSS or EMAIL

Image credit

By CandidProf, who teaches physics and astronomy at a state university, shares his thoughts and experiences teaching today’s students anonymously every Thursday—anonymously because that’s the only way he can be truly candid. Read all of CandidProf here.It’s all about the numbers.  Sadly, that is how many college administrators see the students: as numbers.

The college has an enrollment figure.  In my state, one of the key measures that they are now implementing to rate college performance is the increase in enrollment figures.

For a long time, as a public institution, we have been funded by how many students are enrolled, so the administration has been actively recruiting students.  It has not mattered whether or not the students are ready for college.  That was not important.  It did not matter if they had the skills to succeed.  That was not important.   Whether or not they enrolled was important, not whether or not they learned anything while here, nor even if they passed any of their classes.

Another key measure for the state is in access of college to minorities and Hispanics.  We are advertising in Spanish.  The college’s web site can be viewed in Spanish.  The registration can be done in Spanish.  But all of the classes are in English.

Students who don’t know English are up a creek.  They have little hope of passing the classes once they get here.  No matter.  They enrolled, they were counted by the state, and that was all that mattered.

Going hand-in-hand with enrollment is retention.  College administrators go to conferences with other college administrators, and they all talk about retention policies.

The idea is that getting students to enroll is not sufficient.  They want them to enroll again next semester.  So, if they flunk out, then they won’t be enrolling again.

The first strategy used by many colleges is to simply change the rules on what constitutes flunking out. When I was a student, a single F or D, or too many C’s, was sufficient to get a student put on academic probation.  If you repeated a bad semester, then you were placed on academic suspension.  That wasn’t meant so much as punishment, but rather to give you time to reassess your educational goals and strategies.  I never had to go through that, but I knew some students who did.

Now, you can fail a class every semester, and have a whole semester of D’s and C’s, and keep that up for semester after semester.  A depressing number of our students graduate with a GPA of less than 2.0.  But the students keep signing up for classes and that is all that counts.

The next step in retention is to put pressure on faculty to give higher grades.  After all, the administrators reason that if students get too many poor grades, they might get discouraged and drop out.  If they drop out, then they won’t be registering for classes and that means, of course, that there will be less state funding for the college.  So faculty are encouraged not to grade too harshly and to give higher grades.

This has been going on in the K-12 education for years, but it is now becoming more common in colleges. I have a number of colleagues who are teaching in a climate of that sort.  Many faculty just give up and quit upholding standards.  They just give out grades.  The students don’t learn. We have a few part time faculty here who do that, too, because that is expected at other places in the area where they teach part time.

But students who take the classes of a faculty member who just gives out grades without the students learning seldom do well in the follow-up classes.

Worse, this strategy makes a college degree pretty much worthless.

Holding to standards is hard, particularly when others don’t hold to those standards.

Holding to standards is hard when funding is tied to numbers that can be improved by relaxing those standards.

But an effective leader will hold standards, even if it is the hard thing to do.

I see this getting worse.  My state is now looking to change the funding formula for its public colleges and universities.  Rather than giving money for the number of students enrolled at the beginning of the semester, they are looking to fund the number of students enrolled at the end of the semester.

That changes things.  It means that simply getting students to sign up is not enough.  Now, we need to keep them in the class all semester. It is pretty obvious that there will be extreme pressure on faculty to limit the students dropping.

That means making the classes easier.

That means giving up on tough and difficult standards and setting the bar as low as possible to make it easy for students to pass without ever having to do anything.

That means giving up on teaching.

And this is what is coming down the pike from state legislatures all over the country.  They have done this sort of thing in K-12 education, making a high school diploma pretty much worthless.

Now they are working to make an undergraduate college degree worthless as well.

A lot of faculty are planning on retiring when these changes are made.  I have a few years to go until retirement, and I am not looking forward to what I see in our future.

Your comments—priceless

Don’t miss a post, subscribe via RSS or EMAIL

Image credit