Education as Commodity
Jim Ellsworth has posted an excellent response to last month’s rant about the commodification of Education. He and I are substantially in agreement actually. Jim points out:
Clearly, standards are important. America’s strength is built on the concept that every child–regardless of ethnicity, creed, or socioeconomic status–is worthy of a quality education. We have a moral and ethical obligation to achieve predictable outcomes–where those outcomes comprise the knowledge, skills, and attitudes the world will require of our graduates in the workplace (or college) and the community–to the maximum extent possible. And we have a fiduciary responsibility to apply “‘research-based practice’ contributing to the certification that a codified set of outcomes are being achieved.”
My problem is in the “one-size fits all” implementation.
I maintain the the current target outcomes do not comprise the knowledge, skills, or attitudes that the world will require. They consist of the easily measured and the lowest common denominator. They assume that every person — child, teen, adult — is ready at the same time to learn whatever the State has deemed appropriate for their age bracket — and will take no more than the alloted amount of time to learn it — regardless of their developmental state. Added to the drive for accountability — another topic that Jim and I agree on — and we have a situation where the implementation focuses on an outcome that is un-realistic and perhaps misguided.
Here’s an example from California’s grade 11 and 12 Language Arts Standards.
Students read and understand grade-level-appropriate material. They analyze the organizational patterns, arguments, and positions advanced. The selections in Recommended Readings in Literature, Grades Nine Through Twelve illustrate the quality and complexity of the materials to be read by students. In addition, by grade twelve, students read two million words annually on their own, including a wide variety of classic and contemporary literature, magazines, newspapers, and online information.
On its face, this doesn’t seem like such a bad thing. Except … Why two million words? It’s a nice round number, but what scientifically sound research based practice is that number a result of? Wouldn’t one million do as well? Or perhaps three million would be better? Two million words represents about 40 50k word novels at a rate of a little less than one a week. I can’t argue that this is not a valid standard because I have no data to refute it and, on its face, it looks like what we would like to have every high school senior in the US doing. The list of readings in the Recommended Readings in Literature, Grades Nine Through Twelve is pretty non-descript — Asimov but not Gibson, J.D. Salinger but no Pierre, Wharton but no Wittig, Dostoevsky and Solzhenitzen but no Marx or Lenin. About what you’d expect from a politically driven list of readings — but not what I want, necessarily, as a limit on my kids’ reading.
The problem is that every high school senior isn’t a standard variety, middle to upper-class native English speaking student. Some of them have full time jobs to keep their little brothers and sisters in food. Where do THEY get the time to read “two million words annually on their own, including a wide variety of classic and contemporary literature, magazines, newspapers, and online information”? Some students read a million words a month! How does this standard help them come to grips with that deluge of input? Some students get to high school and, while proficient in their native language, are ESL students struggling to pass an English based test, which through no fault of their own, of their parents’, or of the school’s, they are ill equipped to even attempt, let alone pass. Where is the value there? What does this arbitrary rule really provide?
It provides an easy benchmark to meet by requiring that students keep reading logs. It’s something that’s easy to count and — on its face — nobody can argue against its being a “good thing” because “everybody needs to be literate” and “literate” means you read a lot.
But it doesn’t take the needs of the student — this student here or that one there or a different one in another town — into consideration. It assumes that everybody needs to know exactly the same things in exactly the same proportions. “You can have any color Ford you like … as long as it’s black” is not, in my mind, a valid standard. It’s a commodity and THAT is what our educational standards have become.
Education is a toaster that is being tuned to produce more and more toast of a uniform color, density, and texture. We take a variety of breads, feed them in, and require that we get exactly the same toast out. We take bagels and make toast. We take filet mignon and we make toast. We put every flavor, variety, and possibility into this toaster and we damn well expect to get toast — and nothing more — out.
Now, take that One-Size-Fits-All set of educational standards and punish schools that do not shoehorn every single student into that standard in the name of accountability. Let’s not worry about the SES of the community or the tax base supporting the schools. Let’s not consider that a lot of communities may actually GET the schools that they’re willing to pay for — to the lifelong detriment of their own children, and grandchildren. Let’s not consider that a lot of communities are trying to teach their kids in the face of crumbling schools, 40 year old texts, and razor wire fencing to keep the armed gangs out. Let’s keep punishing schools in Watts by comparing their performance to schools in Beverly Hills. Neither standards NOR rules of accountability consider the context of the education but focus strictly on the outcomes.
I agree that a rising tide floats all boats, but craft without bilgepumps have some serious problems and one cannot expect the tide to lift those boats unless you install and operate the requisite equipment.
What happens if a school fails to make the AYP goals? It’s closed. The students are free to go someplace else. Except, what if there isn’t someplace else? What if the next nearest place is a 4 hour bus ride? Or a worse school? Or a religious school run by a sect you do not believe in?
So what can a teacher do? Teach the students to “pass the standard.” They have to. It’s not a choice. High stakes testing requires the administration to make sure that teachers do not waste time on extra material — to work as diligently as possible to meet arbitrary educational goals over which they have little or no say or control. In Colorado, they compare the 3rd grade reading scores this year to the 3rd grade reading scores from last year. They celebrate when the average scores go up and they dispair when they go down. What they fail to consider is that every year they start from a different base because they start with different kids!
This is not fiduciary responsibility. It’s stupid.
And, what worries me more? It’s spreading.
May 3rd, 2005 at 2:51 pm
Nate,
Actually, a big part of my point is that the REAL standards–the ones enforced by the world–ARE going to be one size fits all. They won’t CARE about students’ individual differences: if you don’t have the competencies, you won’t get the job, or get into the college. Period. So by pretending that differences among kids or schools or communities affect the REAL standards one iota, we are doing nothing more than setting kids up for failure, once they leave the realm where our well-meaning compassion can shield them from reality.
Is it “fair” to apply the same standard to a kid who had no realistic chance of meeting it, because of the factors we have both discussed? No, of course not. BUT IT’S REAL…and therein lies the true value of standards: when students in our schools, districts, or communities are consistently unable to meet them, that alerts us that there is a problem. It gives us–the caring professionals–a chance to go in and dig deeper: to do additional research to FIND OUT that it’s lack of money, or inability to hire the best teachers because the school is considered unsafe, or maybe even because we’re spending too much time on tests imposed by layer after jurisdictional layer. And most of all, it gives us a chance to DO something about it–something constructive and supported by the research base–and to do it before more kids step down off the stage, diploma in hand, and into the unemployment line because we did not prepare them to meet the standards we need of our workers, our college students, our citizens and voters.
Now none of this is to say that we don’t have some fundamental points of agreement. The issue of valid methodology (including comprehensive stakeholder involvement) in the derivation of standards in the first place should be a prime concern–and is worth of a whole separate diatribe! The issue of what is done with the results is another: if (as the NEA notes with regard to NCLB) their primary use is to punish schools for failures whose causes lie outside their control–as opposed to helping them identify and remedy those causes–we have squandered standards’ diagnostic potential. And if we do not follow through with targeted application of real resources (money, personnel, political influence, etc.) to FIX THE PROBLEMS WE’VE IDENTIFIED, then we ARE being stupid.
But that’s not the fault of the standards…and pretending that it is, or that the same standards aren’t going to apply to all our students after graduation REGARDLESS of how fair it is or whether they are prepared to meet them, isn’t doing anybody any favors.
May 3rd, 2005 at 3:50 pm
You are going to make me think about this some more, aren’t you?! It seemed so cut and dried until you started pointing out all the holes in my argument.
There’s a lot of good stuff here, Jim.
I need to ponder it. I’m not arguing that without the requisite competency, one won’t get the job/post/college/whatever. There’s an issue with “everybody being required to know the same thing” that is bothering me. I need to figure out what it is.
It maybe my beef is less with the standards than in the enforcement.
May 3rd, 2005 at 5:12 pm
The one-sentence summary of my thesis here might read, “There is a set of baseline competencies that is necessary to be an effectve [X] in a global, information-based society,” where [X] is employee, entrepreneur, learner, citizen, or whatever. In my estimation, that assumption is at the very core of the CONCEPT of public education; it is the mission of our schools to prepare all students with that baseline. Because, by definition (if you accept my thesis), any student who graduates without having mastered those competencies WILL NOT BE EFFECTIVE in whichever of those roles (s)he selects. That is what I mean by “the world enforcing the standards.”
A valid (in my opinion) standards process is not about CREATING (or enforcing) the standards; it’s about DISCOVERING WHAT THEY ARE, accurately assessing how we’re doing on them, and taking appropriate action before the “performance gap” does our students harm after they graduate to the environment we THINK we’ve prepared them for!
May 3rd, 2005 at 8:17 pm
THAT is perfect.
I agree whole heartedly with Jim’s thesis about what standards SHOULD be. My problem is that I don’t think that’s what we have. And he’s forcing me — against my will and inherent biases — to consider that everybody needs the SAME baseline.
My rant on commodification began with the perception that the current educational standards (particularly in K-12) are geared not to provide a baseline education for any “effective [X]” but rather to turn out a product that has, at it’s core, reliability. The idea that we’re striving to turn out high school seniors who can read 2mill words a year — that every high school senior can read and understand at that rate. That the GOAL is not to prepare them to become “effective [X]s”, but simply to validate that they can read 2 mill words a year.
And this brings back the larger issue. Why 2 million? Why not 3 million? What relationship does reading 2 million words a year have with being an effective [X]? The assumption underlying this is that ALL possible effective [X]s, regardless of the nature of the X should be able to read 2 million words a year and that 2 million is some kind of baseline effectiveness that cannot possibly be attained by — say, 1 million — and for which 3 million would be overkill.
Personally, I think it might be MORE effective — and perhaps more efficient — to teach them to find and read the 500,000 words they need to be the most effective [X] they can be (which will be different words for each X). Under this standard literacy becomes observation, analysis, problem solving, finding adequate and appropriate resources, evaluting those resources, applying them and analysing the results. But it’s a Platinum Plated PITA to try to teach this skill set — never mind prove that the students possess it.
I know I’m focused on this one little standard out of a whole collection, but if we look at each standard with the same critical eye … what does it tell us? Do ALL K-12 standards apply equally for every X? At what point do we differentiate for intended specialty? Where do talent and skill fall?
Maybe I’m confusing this with the accountability issue. But if we veiw accountability as a kind of standards assessment, then we’re holding schools accountable for teaching skills and knowledge, but avoiding the messy issues of attitudes. Moreover, we’re holding schools accountable (in inappropriate ways) for upholding standards which are — arguably — not even the skills that students will need in the future.
And this is a whole DIFFERENT rant, I fear.
May 20th, 2005 at 8:11 pm
“Personally, I think it might be MORE effective — and perhaps more efficient — to teach them to find and read the 500,000 words they need to be the most effective [X] they can be (which will be different words for each X). Under this standard literacy becomes observation, analysis, problem solving, finding adequate and appropriate resources, evaluting those resources, applying them and analysing the results”
This is a brilliant idea!!! Assessing this could be achieved by making a 4000 to 6000 essay on the topic mandatory for graduation. The International Baccalaureate Diploma Program requires students to write several long essays to graduate. However, one could argue that they are being required to regurgiate what their classmates are. BUT, the idea of requiring students to find and read what THEY need to be most effective and then write about it is brilliant!
I hear you all saying now, “Who will read all those essays at the end of the year?”
Isn’t that a teacher’s job?
Jonathan Higgins
May 21st, 2005 at 6:17 am
It all comes down to not what’s worth teaching, but rather what’s worth learning. The whole metaphor of schools as delivery systems (makes them sound like either UPS or a saline driP) has failed. The two million words is classis post-hoc logic. I saw programs like this in middle schools where I taught eighth grade only it was called Accelerated Reader. Students would read books, take tests over the books (always multiple choice, T/F, matching) and then earn points. More points was always better. Kids who already loved to read (and there were never very many of these in my school) uniformly hated the things. It reduced a joyous act into a numbered one. The kids who didn’t love to read (for whatever reason and there are many) just said, “Screw this.” and opted out–failed. The vast middle of “strategic” students simply figured out how to game the system and did so. Those who succeeded were the extrinsically motivated “achievers” who learned that the purpose of reading is to pull out facts for a test. That’s really what most of what we do in school amounts to–showing students how to prepare themselves to be the perfect piece of toast.
And I believe that search for a set of standards is a chimera. I think that the process of helping students become ready for the future cannot come from the top down except in the most generic fashion. Look at the dinosaur we call schools and tell me with a straight face that they can move as quickly as the world around them. That’s why my kids were homeschooled. I never trusted any expert (admin, legislative, or otherwise) or any other expert to be on top when it came to defining what my kids should know. Which isn’t to say that I might not agree with 90% of what Ellsworth might come up with as a standard for geometry, for example. Nathan, your point, I think, is that it is a systemic problem: it is not possible under our current system to do what Jim Ellsworth suggest that we do. What we should be teaching students is how to come up with their own learning standards. School then becomes a very different game then. I am not even sure how to imagine such an institution except to say it would be centered on the student as a learner. This is the classic battle between the perennialists who believe there are ideal forms in the world and the constructivists who believe that what you see is what you get and that ideals change with circumstances. Nobody likes a fence straddler, but thats what I am.
May 24th, 2005 at 12:12 am
Seems to me that at the heart of this debate lies what I call ‘the assessment problem’ - having standards makes traditional assessment possible - we can teach everyone the same stuff (which is cheaper/more efficient than personalisation), we can test everyone in the same way (which is cheaper/more efficient), we can compare person X with person Y (cos they have learnt and been tested on the same stuff in the same way) - but doing that traditionally (it seems to me) has meant that what we teach and test is not relevant to (all) individuals (or even to society).
So the killer question becomes how do we assess (give value to, enable comparison between) folk who have learnt different things (or indeed how do we assess process skills (eg collaboration, learning to learn) rather than products)?