Ed Policy - NCLB

As Martin West talks about in the end of Video 3, No Child Left Behind was set to expire in 2007, but was slow to be reauthorized in part because of a lack on consensus about what to learn from the various failings of NCLB.  No Child Left Behind was originally passed in 2002 with overwhelming bipartisan support.  While the initial utopian 'every child proficient by 2014' seems like it was a good 'shock' to the educational system as shown in the NAEP score increases immediately after (at least in math), obviously we are not to that utopia now that it is 2014.  The overall NCLB vision of raising student performance is of course a worthy (and needed) goal, but the specifics of the original law need to be updated.

Pros/Cons & Possible Moves Forward...
* One major benefit from NCLB was a general increased focus on accountability and measuring performance.  The videos mentioned how parents used to judge schools based on dollars spent per child, etc, and after NCLB, schools had to be public with their math and reading test scores.  This transparency is definitely a pro that should be continued.  Although how much the transparency actually affects school choice, especially for those most in need, is debatable.  In previous weeks' readings, we've seen how families often choose schools by proximity, community, etc - not on test scores.  Just being transparent is not enough.

* While accountability is good, we need to think more carefully about what schools are being accountable for.  Having unattainable goals is not the way to go.  NCLB wanted all students to be proficient by 2014 - but achieving 'all' of anything is often impossible.  Also as the Prof Peterson pointed out, having everyone going for the same goal means that those who are most behind and most in need have the hardest time getting to the goal.  Perhaps adequate yearly progress could be redefined not as how to get to 100% proficiency, but as adequate yearly gains given previous levels of performance.  I don't think that it's necessarily unfair to expect schools with lower levels of achievement to have larger gains (given more resources) as gains may start to reach an asymptote where it's harder and harder to get gains, but unrealistic gains towards 100% in only a few years are unfair.  Having more appropriate target goals, specifically around yearly gains not overall performance, would be needed in a new NCLB.

* Another issue with the original NCLB was that states were allowed to set their own standards of what was proficiency.  This led to states having widely different standards, and the case where a student could be passing with flying colors in one state and failing miserably in another state.  Also states could change their standards to make their numbers look better when reporting.  Going forward, perhaps the minimums could be set nationally, with states allowed to raise their minimum above the national minimum if they'd like.

* Measurement is important, but accountability is not only about measurement - it's about what happens in response to the measurements.  The NCLB accountability of what happens after a school fails were not very impactful - as the videos note, often only the principal changed or no action was taken even when a school had failed for five years.  In how to improve this accountability, I always think of failure as feedback - schools that are failing should be helped to figure out how they're failing.  Letting students go to another school or having extra tutoring doesn't help the school get any better (it may help the students which is important as well - although the evidence shows that many students did not leave or get the tutoring).

* Another large issue not mentioned much in the videos and only a bit in the readings is around whether NCLB focuses too heavily on math and reading, and on standardized testing - to the exclusion of other subjects and other evaluation methods.  We don't want teaching to the test - we want students learning higher levels of thinking.  Creating a national standard for other methods of evaluation in multiple subjects might be a tough task, but certainly a new NCLB could encourage states to use multiple measures.

Other interesting resources I found in looking more at the effects of NCLB...
http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monographs/2010/RAND_MG977.pdf
http://www.ed.gov/blog/topic/esea-reauthorization/

Giving 2.0 Week 2

Exercise:
Overview
Complete after Week 2, Video 1.1 -
Philanthropic Strategy
This activity may take a considerable amount of reflection and brainstorming. Think
about your issue area, under what conditions would you feel comfortable saying, this
problem is solved? What would your issue area look like in a perfect world? At what point
of improvement in your issue area would another issue eclipse yours as being a greater
social need? After these reflections, try to answer, in one sentence, what is your mission?


Given my issue area of early childhood education in the US, I would say that this problem is solved if all children enter school ready to learn at a high level.  In a perfect world, all children would have had safe, healthy, and enriching childhoods so that they are physically, emotionally, and mentally 'school ready'.  My mission is to ensure that all children in the US start school ready to learn at a high level. 


Exercise:
Overview
Complete after Week 2, Video 2.2 - Guest
Speaker: Alexa Culwell - Comparing
Intervention Strategies
Brainstorm and research at least five different intervention strategies that are being used
on your issue area. Be creative and feel free to brainstorm many more than five. After
comparing, researching and thinking about your personal passion, select an intervention
strategy and write down why you chose it and why you think it is the best intervention
strategy

Strategy #1 - helping parents early on.  Nurse Family Partnership
Strategy #2 - having volunteers reading with preschoolers.  Jumpstart
Strategy #3 - promoting for better teachers.  NAEYC
Strategy #4 - building knowledge around nurturing early dev.  Zero to Three
Strategy #5 - building parents as teaachers.  Parents as Teachers

I don't know if I can make a judgment around the 'best' intervention strategy, because they all serve their part.  We need research and knowledge, we need better policy, we need better teachers, we need parents to support their kids. 


Foundations
* Brady Education Foundation - http://www.bradyeducationfoundation.org/grantsawarded.html
* Helios Education Foundation - http://www.helios.org/investment-history-helios-education-foundation.aspx
* Heising-Simons Foundation - https://www.cybergrants.com/pls/cybergrants/heisingsimons.heisingsimons_grant_search.search_page
* RGK Foundation - http://www.rgkfoundation.org/public/grants

Online Nonprofit Evaluations
https://www.myphilanthropedia.org/top-nonprofits/bay-area/early-childhood-education/2010
http://www.socialimpactexchange.org/focus/education/early-education

Articles & Blogs
http://www.teach-nology.com/teachers/early_education/organizations/
http://www.scpr.org/blogs/education/2014/04/17/16403/nonprofits-get-nearly-1-mil-to-train-parents-to-ad/

Experts
http://www.nea.org/home/18226.htm
http://www.edfunders.org/
http://earlychildhoodfunders.org/

I really enjoyed looking at what the foundations were choosing to fund.  Lots of interesting initiatives that aren't 'normal non-profits'!  Some of the online evaluation websites were good for browsing, but they seem more useful once I have a non-profit in mind that I want to research.




Pick two of your nonprofits and think about them in terms of these three criteria: 1) geography/population, 2) scale, and 3) risk. Write down what makes these two nonprofits unique for each of these criteria. Brainstorm for yourself at least two other criteria you could use to help you choose between nonprofits and write what makes the two nonprofits you wrote about previously unique for these two new criteria as well.

For myself, I'm looking for organizations that have a wider reach, preferably national.  I'm looking at organizations that focus on 0-8, or anywhere in that range.  For monetary funding, I'm drawn more toward proven organizations, although for volunteering, I'm drawn more to 'risky' new organizations.  My personal criteria also include being research-backed and data-driven.  And I think that working directly with the children, parents, or teachers is important to me - policy and research are important, but for me, I want to work with people (more important when volunteering, perhaps less important for monetary donations).
For this question, I'll look at Jumpstart and Zero to Three.
Both of these non-profits have national reach, which is important to me.  Zero to Three obviously focuses more on the younger side, where as Jumpstart focuses more on 4-5 year olds.  Zero to Three is more about research and policy, where as Jumpstart is about interactions with the preschoolers.  Both are 'older' organizations.  Because Jumpstart has a specific intervention, they have done research studies to show good short-term outcomes.  Jumpstart is definitely research-backed and data-driven as well as people interactions, where as Zero to Three is less so.

Ed Policy - Ed Spending

For those of you who just can't get enough of this topic, you might enjoy this recent video from Stanford University. At the 50:25 min mark, Prof. Linda Darling Hammond says, "One other interesting fact when we compare spending in the US and in other countries is that in virtually all the countries we would be compared to in the OECD rankings, they have nationalized or other buckets in the society from which they pay healthcare. So about 20% of the US education budget actually goes to healthcare for employees [...] and in other countries that's paid outside the education budget"
 What's your response to her point?  Is it misleading to state that the US is one of the top spenders on education? Why/Why not?
 https://medium.com/state-of-the-union-2014/state-of-the-union-2014-class-3-education-a9387c9884fe

Thanks for the link to the Stanford video - very interesting!

In general, the US spends a lot on education.  This interesting infographic shows that we spend much more in total, and more per student - http://rossieronline.usc.edu/u-s-education-versus-the-world-infographic/

Linda Darling Hammond brings up a good point that the way we allocate our spending on education may not be comparable to other countries' education spending.  She brings up that we pay for health care through education, as well as pensions for teachers and other ed professionals.  Also food services for students ($14.8 billion according to this article - http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/02/27/putting-a-number-on-federal-education-spending/)  And we spend a lot on special education services for a small set of students.  Our education budget number may also be including early education, which I'm not sure if other countries include in their ed budgets, or in their social services budgets. And what about school sports?  Are those finances included in our US education budget?  (http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2014/10/21/taking-sports-out-of-school-2)  In most other countries, sports are done on a club basis, not primarily through schools.  Given all of these non-educational aspects that may be included in our education budget, I think that it may be misleading to say that the US spends more per child than other countries.

One other big issue as talked about is not how much we spend in general, but how much we spend in different districts.  Many other countries equalize funding, or even send more funding to high need schools (I believe Finland does this).  Where as in the US, there is wide variation in spending on education in different parts of the country - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/05/23/the-dramatic-inequality-of-public-school-spending-in-america/  Some of this is of course due to differences in cost of living, but still the differences are wide.
 

Future Ed - What makes a good teacher?

Reflect on:

    Do you remember having a good teacher? Or a particularly bad one? Reflect on your memory, what was about it about this teacher that makes them stand out for you?
    How does this image of a teacher relate to other images you have of a "good" teacher?

My main good teacher that I remember is Mrs Brennan.  She stands out because she got us thinking about more than just her subject area (math) - we did a lot of general problem solving as well.  Also she let me opt out if I understood a concept already.  Mrs Brennan also pushed me to join math team in high school, which started a trajectory in my life.  Also Mrs C in first grade...  I remember her giving me and another student the opportunity to do an independent project because we were beyond the level of most everyone else in the class.  On the aspect of bad teachers, I don't remember too many that were really bad.  Although I do remember a few instances where I felt excluded.  Seems like some of the main aspects that made me feel good about a teacher were a connection outside of just the subject area, and also the ability to move at my own pace, or at least not be held back by the 'normal' pace.

My general image of a good teacher fits in with my experiences.  Someone who engages the students at their level and with their interests.  Someone who scaffolds and pushes, who has high expectations.  Someone who connects with the students, and their families, and the community.  Someone who is a role model themselves.  Someone who is adaptable, reflexive, and meta.  Someone who is constantly learning and growing themselves.



Reflect back on the teachers you considered in the first reflection task at the start of this week. Reconsider what it was about them that made you consider them to be so good. Would others that were taught by them have the same conclusions?

Perhaps part of the reason that I felt connected to those particular teachers was because of some similarities between ourselves (conscious or unconscious), and perhaps other students would not have felt the same connection because of not having similarities.  (Interesting research - http://t.co/FBEsEVbKe1)  Also I am fairly self-driven and able to learn well without much instruction - so perhaps for students who needed more instruction from the teachers, my favorite teachers may not have been the best.  Although I do feel like they were adaptable, and so perhaps could have accomodated different learning needs and personality needs.

My general image of a good teacher still stands...  Someone who engages the students at their level and with their interests.  Someone who scaffolds and pushes, who has high expectations.  Someone who connects with the students, and their families, and the community.  Someone who is a role model themselves.  Someone who is adaptable, reflexive, and meta.  Someone who is constantly learning and growing themselves.

The real questions are... how do we attract this type of person into the teaching field?  How do we continue to develop their skills while there?  And how do we encourage those who aren't improving to find a profession that is better suited for their talents and abilities?

Ed Policy - Teacher Pay

Professor Peterson identifies six primary objections to merit pay. Choose one: Devote the first half of your post to thoroughly fleshing out the details of this objection. Devote the second half of your post to refuting these objections as best you can. Finish your post by concluding whether or not this particular objection is a valid concern against merit pay programs.

Before going into Prof Peterson's objections, one thing that I wanted to note about the 'pros'.  The video mentioned that merit pay would be an incentive to teachers to take their obligations seriously and to teach better.  This assumes that teachers are motivated by money, and that they are able to change their teaching based on their motivations.  While I certainly think that teachers can change their effectiveness with coaching and other instructional supports, I don't know if the assumption that teachers can magically choose to get better quickly because of a new motivation (money or otherwise) is a valid assumption.  Children are not pieces in an assembly line where we can just motivate the line workers to build the finished product faster.  Teaching is less of a technical skill that can be just be learned through more knowledge, and more of an adaptive skill that has to be learned through focused practice.  It seems to me that any merit pay system that assumes that it will make current teachers better should also have a system in place to help the teachers improve their skills.

On to the objections...
Prof Peterson brings up the six objections of cheating, teaching to the test, being unable to test certain subjects/ages, having favoritism by principals (or parents, or students, or peers), not controlling for factors outsde of the teacher's control, and fostering competition rather than cooperation.  On the whole, these seem to be less of 'cons' about merit pay as a theory, and more so 'cons' about particular implementatons of merit pay. 

Let's look at the last objection - the idea that individual merit pay would foster competition between teachers rather than cooperation within schools.  That certainly seems like it may be true, especially if the merit pay system is using rankings or other schemes where only a certain number of teachers can get the highest ratings, and thus the highest pay.  If the teachers know that only some of them can get merit pay, then they may hoard resources - physical or intellectual - in order to gain the advantage, as opposed to sharing lesson plans and classroom ideas.  Certainly we want the teachers to be trying to work together, to be sharing best practices, and to be helping the children succeed overall, not just in their individual classrooms.

Perhaps we can change the implementation of the merit pay system to address the issue of competition.  If the system is set up such that any, or even all, teachers can get high ratings and higher pay, then they won't be fighting over limited resources.  Similarly with students, most teachers don't grade on a curve anymore - each student is graded on their individual achievements, and any student who achieves all of the objectives will get an A, even if all of the other students also achieved the objectives and got A's.  This is certainly how I like to run a classroom (with high expectations of course), and how I would think that effective administrators would want to run a school.

Another possible solution is to make all (or some) of the merit pay bonuses tied to the overall performance of the school, rather than each individual classroom.  This would hopefully encourage teachers to collaborate and try to make the school better as a whole as well as their own classroom.  Although as the reading about NYC experiment notes, there isn't yet a solid research backing to support this idea.  The NYC experiment found little difference for the students, although there were confounding factors, and a system may take a while to actually show improvement (especially if, as I caveated at the beginning, teachers are not able to change their teaching on a dime).  The study did seem to show some benefits for schools with fewer teachers - perhaps a reason to create smaller instructional teams or communities within larger schools?

In conclusion, the objection of competition versus cooperation is a valid objection about certain implementations of merit pay, but I certainly think that it is an objection that can be handled and even turned into a 'pro' with other implementations of merit pay.  If all teachers can achieve at high levels (just as we'd hope that all students will achieve at high levels) and if some of the ranking is based on a small community (where there are supports and assistance in changing teaching practices), then merit pay may foster even more cooperation than no merit pay.

One last note not related to merit pay...
I disagree with Prof Peterson saying in the first video that the high school teachers need to know 'more' than elementary teachers.  I would argue that they do need to know different things, but I don't know if 'more' is a fair thing to say.  Elementary school teachers still need to know their content thoroughly as well as instructional strategies and developmental progressions.  Just because we as adults think of addition and subtraction as 'easy' doesn't mean that it's easy to teach.  Prof Peterson was talking about this in terms of high school teachers getting paid more.  If we're going to do market pay, then yes perhaps high school teachers should be paid more because their skills & knowledge are more in demand in other professions, where as elementary school teachers' skills and knowledge are often only in demand in schools and other child-related careers.  But to say that high school teachers should be paid more because they know more undermines the skills and knowledge that it takes to be an effective elementary school teacher.  Not to mention, I would like to envision a teacher force where elementary teachers are just as accomplished as high school teachers in terms of college grades, how far they went in math classes, etc.

Innovation in Coursera

Conclusion video from Operations Management about how Coursera is innovating in operations...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igEx_DQ4D5c

Ed Policy - Teacher Pay Forum Post

"The problem with teacher benefits is that they are greatly beneficial to those who stay in teaching their whole career"  Many of you have touted the benefits of teacher experience. Indeed, research has shown that teachers improve over the first three to five years of their careers. Additionally, some of you have argued that schools in challenging neighborhoods would benefit from a stable teaching corps-one that has low faculty turnover from year to year. What do you think of the argument that teacher benefits, as they are currently structured, incentivize longevity, which is a good thing?

I think that teacher benefits should incentivize teacher effectiveness and results for the students - which to clarify does not only mean test score increases.  As we've noted before, there is improvement in the first few years and so I do think that benefits should increase as teachers prove themselves to be effective over those first 3-5 years.  However, highly incentivizing after 20 years doesn't make much sense as there don't seem to be clear additional results for the students that happen at that point in time.  As I've talked about in previous forum posts, this seems to be another incentive for stability in the teaching profession.  Some stability in schools is certainly good, as having lower turnover (while keeping effective teachers) can help improve student achievement and help to build a sense of community.  But do we really want teachers staying in the profession for benefits in the future if they are not the best teachers?  As Thomas Kane from HGSE mentions in this post (http://tntp.org/blog/post/policy-thinkers-on-teacher-evaluation1), by keeping a long-term teacher in a position, we're turning down many new possible teachers.  Of course some of them would be worse than the long-term teacher, and perhaps many of them would be worse in the first year or two.  But how many of them would be better after the three year mark, or even at the first year mark?  How can we change the incentives so that they incentivize growth and better effectiveness, not just longevity?  Perhaps by moving away from the lane-and-step pay schedule, and making retirement benefits kick in sooner for effective teachers.

Not on the forum question asked, but related to the teacher pay readings...
I found it very hard to continue following Michael Podgursky's point of view after he claimed that teachers work fewer hours per day than other professionals.  To me, making that claim shows a deep misunderstanding of the teaching profession and of what teachers actually do.  I can maybe go along with the claim of a shorter workyear because while many teachers are preparing during the summer, it certainly doesn't take up all of their time and some do get other summer jobs.  But to say that they work shorter hours seems very wrong (at least on average - of course, different teachers are different, and will work different hours and schedules).  Most teachers in the US do not have adequate prep time scheduled into their 'work day' so they are preparing lessons at home as well as grading work and giving feedback.  Yes, other professionals bring work home, but I would argue not with the same regularity as teachers do.  The other big issue that I don't think many people realize is that when teachers are in their 'work day', they're working the whole time.  There's very little hanging out at the water cooler or surfing Facebook - when you have 20+ 3rd graders demanding your attention.  Most other professionals may have to be at the office longer hours, but how much of that time is actually focused work time?  You could maybe say that teachers have more flexibility in that they get off at 3-4pm, rather than 5-6pm - but how many professionals go out for lunch, and take non-work meetings during the day?  I don't have statistics, but my guess is many.  Teachers have one type of flexibility, while other professionals have another type of flexibility.  Michael Podgursky also claims later that if teachers were to shift to other professions, they may make more money but they would also have "greater responsibility (and stress)".  They would certainly have different types of responsibility, but to choose between managing a team of salespeople versus managing a classroom of kindergarteners, I would say that the teacher probably has more responsibility and more stress.  Some of Michael Podgursky's later points about fringe benefits are actually valid and should be considered in comparing teacher pay, but by starting off with the claim that teachers work fewer hours per day, the article put a sour taste in my mouth that was hard to get rid of.  ('m basing much of this paragraph off of anecdotal evidence, so I would certainly welcome actual statistics to prove me wrong and show that teachers do work fewer hours, but just citing the unions' agreements on number of hours at the school doesn't mean much for actual hours worked.)

Giving 2.0 Week 1

Exercise: Overview
Complete after Week 1, Video 5 - Why I Give
Take a few minutes to think about experiences, individuals or events that inspired you to
give. Try to focus on one, but consider others if you feel they are crucial. Write out your
personal story, similar to video 6, on a piece of paper or on your computer. Describe what
happened, how it impacted you and how it still inspires you today.


I don't know if I have one particular experience.  My parents have certainly been influential - my mom gives a lot of money to charity, and my dad gives a lot of time.  I've always been drawn to helping educate people, especially children.  The basic needs charities (food, water, etc) resonate with me intellectually, but on an emotional level, I'm more drawn to inspiring people.  Giving them hope and happiness, giving them opportunities.  I often give small amounts of money to a lot of different organizations, almost more as moral support.  I often feel like as good as financial resources are, sometimes the non-financial resources can make even more of a difference.  Many projects have come into existence because a few outside people believed in it.


Exercise: Overview
Complete after Week 1, Video 9 - Charity vs.
Philanthropy
Watch videos 7-10 on the definition of philanthropy and review the handout, “Definitions
of Philanthropy,” on the course page. Think and reflect on where you grew up, where you
are now and what it means to be a philanthropist in those communities. Write what you
think philanthropy means in your community, what philanthropy means to you personally
and how, in your opinion, the concept of a philanthropist is changing.

I am happy to see that this course is distinguishing between charity and philanthropy, and emphasizing the importance of both while focusing on philanthropy.  We definitely need to address the problems at hand and help those in need, but if we don't also address the causes of the problems, we will never move forward - one of the reasons that I am focused on early childhood education.  In my community growing up, most of the giving was about charity - giving to those who had less than us.  We did food drives for poor communities.  I helped at the soup kitchen in the city.  But we had to do the food drive every month, and I served breakfast every other week.  While these immediate putting out of fires may have helped the poor to feel better that day and thus maybe have been able to do better at work or with their family, it was mostly just charity, and not fixing any root causes.  My community of friends now is much more interested in fixing root causes, although I do think that some of them, especially in the technology sector, are a bit too removed from the charity side of things to be effective philanthropically.  I try to do a bit of both - charity and philanthropy - in terms of money and time (usually more so time, my parents often think that I should give less of my time and make money more of the time).  I see educational opportunity as an important part of philanthropy because when we give people the resources they need, then they can often succeed on their own.  I think that more people are starting to think about philanthropy and not just charity, especially as many of the large gifts from the major foundations are going toward working on causes and not just fixing problems.


Exercise: Overview
Complete after Week 1, Video 11.3
Guest Speaker: Lucy Bernholz
Philanthropy snd Technology Part 2
The next page of the workbook has a list of 15 websites changing philanthropy. Take a
look and explore 3 of them (feel free to look at more). As you view the pages, engage with
them and write down how you think each website is changing philanthropy. Then think
about innovation and future ways technology will continue to change philanthropy. Reflect
and write your thoughts and maybe even come up with the next big philanthropy startup!

I am already familiar with a good number of these websites.  Was just using Guidestar and Charity Navigator for my first paper in my Nonprofit Management course.  I've given on Kiva and DonorsChoose, and ran a fundraising campaign on GlobalGiving a year ago.  I'm on VolunteerMatch (which reminds me that I need to follow up with the Kohls Children's Museum about helping them with early STEM).  I have friends who worked with GiveWell.

I was not familiary wth catchafire, Jolkona, or GlassPockets.  I'll have to check out some of the projects on catchafire to see if I can help (while still maintaining all of my other priorities!)  Unfortunately the Jolkana quizlet had technical issues, so I'm not sure which celebrity philanthropist I am.  I'll have to bring up the Glass Pockets website in two Nonprofit classes.



Exercise: Overview
Complete after the previous activity
In this activity you will answer three separate questions to guide your selection process. In
the end, you will have your issue area, an area where your passion and society’s greatest
needs meet. Here are the three questions:
What is your passion, are there certain people, places or problems
you want to solve? Looking at some of your previous workbook answers can help
guide this process.
My passion is around children and education.  How do we go from being one little cell to become thinking, feeling beings.  Early childhood is especially important to me because if we can start kids off on the right foot, everything else is so much easier later.  I am most interested in helping in the US - while there are many issues in the developing world, I feel a call to help regionally or nationally here in the United States.

What are the world’s greatest needs?
The world's greatest needs are much more about clean water, high-quality nutrition, reduced violence, and equal opportunity.  But in the US, those needs are strongly felt by our youngest population.  Too many children do not have the building blocks that they need to succeed once they reach elementary school.

Finally, find your sweet spot, where do these intersect; where does your greatest
passion intersect with the worlds greatest needs? Then you have your issue area.
My issue area is in early childhood care and education in the US.  The US is a bit broad, but I am currently looking at moving from a local impact to a broad regional or national impact.


Exercise: Overview
Complete after the previous activity
Slowly make your issue more specific. Use your research and your passion to refine your
issue area. Use the examples on the next page as a guide. If you think your issue area is
specific enough for you to make a significant dent, make the issue one step more specific;
that is your specific issue area. Think about location, different approaches, segments
of the population, etc. to help you narrow it down. Once you have selected your issue,
embrace it by tweeting about it, make it your Facebook status, send an article about it to
your friends or use other ways to celebrate your issue and advocate for it.

I am interested in many aspects of education - early childhood, STEM, leadership, high-quality teaching, etc.  And because of my personality, my value for variety, and the high needs in all of these areas, I will of course continue to give in multiple ways to multiple organizations.  For the purposes of these course, I will focus in on the highest impact in early childhood care and education, building school readiness skills, for low-income kids in the US.
I already embrace my issue(s) on social media.  I started @earlymath in order to spread the word and advocate for high-quality early math learning.  And on my personal social media, I'm constantly posting about education and early care.

Better Leader, Richer Life - Week 1

Please view at least two of the Reflections videos on the TLTV Network page of our Total Leadership Web site. Then write a comment about each of these two video clips (in a short paragraph for each) describing what you learned from listening to these alumni speaking about their experience.

Andrew speaks of being busy - family, work, volunteer, etc - which resonates with me since I'm constantly making myself busy and taking on new projects.  Balancing my time and giving my all in all areas of my life is highly important in order to move forward with everything I want to do.  "You get out of it what you put into it" - a true statement for all parts of life.

Kirk speaks of moving from a contributor role to a leader role.  I'm also in a similar position, although moving from a contributor/midlevel leader role to hopefully a higher level leader role where I can have more impact on education and children.  Glad that this course will give me more tools to influence a larger number of people.  Kirk also talks about vision and how good leaders articulate their vision.  I feel like I have some sense of my vision, but I could certainly clarify it and be better about communicating it.  Kirk then talks about experimenting - which is so important in all domains.  If we keep doing what we've always done, then we'll keep getting what we've always gotten.  In experimenting, it's ok if we fail, if we try things that don't work - we can always do another experiment the next day.

Both Andrew and Kirk talk about how important the stakeholder conversations are.  I have to admit that I'm a bit scared of having these conversations.  But it was good to hear Kirk mentioning that stakeholders often don't expect as much from you as you might think - that's probably true.  I probably do expect a lot more from myself than they do.  Although I think getting some clarification about what things they do expect would be good - from asking my previous employees, they sometimes brought up areas that I didn't even think about.  Everyone has different views of the world and expectations about how it should be - it's not the golden rule of 'treat others as you would want to be treated', it's the platinum rule of 'treat others as they want to be treated'.


1.B  Goals

As you are about to embark on your journey through our course, please describe, in a paragraph or two, (a) what led you to sign up for it and (b) what you hope to gain from it. Take a few moments to let your responses come to mind, then record your thoughts. 

I signed up for this course because I'm hoping to build my leadership skills in order to take my career to the next level and help even more children in education.  I feel like I've mastered multiple individual contributor roles and that I'm good (although perhaps not great) at leading a small team for incremental growth.  But in order to have a broader impact and give more children the opportunities that they need, I need to build my skills to work in a larger organization.

I also want to be able to balance everything in my life.  While work and making a difference are very important to me, I also value family, friends, community, etc.  My mom and grandma have been having health issues, so I want to be able to spend some time with them.  I have amazing friends who I want to make sure to stay connected with even as I'm traveling and doing so many different things.  I love helping with lots of different events and community groups.  I want to start a family soon.  And of course, I want to stay healthy and dance and learn and have variety in my life!  :-)

1.C  Skills

This exercise helps you focus on the skills you most want to develop in our course.  First, please complete the online TL Skills Assessment.  Then, please choose the two or three skills from the 18 that you would most like to focus on as you go through our course. In one sentence for each, please explain why these two or three skills are important to you.
I have strengths most like Michelle Obama.  Even though it really doesn't mean anything, there's something nice psychological about hearing that you're similar to someone who is influential and making a difference.  :-)

I think the three most important skills that I want to focus on for this course are...
1) Having a vision (and communicating that vision)
I'm at a bit of a crossroads - sold a business earlier this year, currently doing a masters.  But not sure what I'll be doing after that.  Gaining clarity on my vision will enable me to make easier and better choices about what opportunities to take and what opportunities to pass on.

2) Being able to convince people to support me in my goals
I can't move forward in having a broader impact and helping more people without increasing my influence.  While I'm fairly good at rallying people for a goal, I could still work on getting better at it for larger goals and larger groups of people.

3) Challenging assumptions and experimenting
I do a fair number of experiments already, but often within my comfort zone.  I want to work on experimenting outside of my comfort zone and seeing which assumptions are not actually true.


All of my answers...

BE REAL: Act with Authenticity by Clarifying What's Important
1. I know how important each of the different aspects of my life is to me.
    Agree

2. I am able to be myself wherever I am, wherever I go. I act in ways that are consistent with my core values.
    Agree

3. I make choices about how to spend my time and energy in ways that match what I really care about.
    Agree

4. I tell stories about the key people and events that have shaped my values in a way that binds me to others.
    Neither Agree nor Disagree

5. I have a vision for where I am headed and the legacy I want to leave. 
    Neither Agree nor Disagree

6. I hold myself accountable for doing what is most important to me in my life.
    Neither Agree nor Disagree

BE WHOLE: Act with Integrity by Respecting the Whole Person

7. I communicate with people important to me about expectations we have of each other, and I make sure these expectations are clear.
    Neither Agree nor Disagree

8. I look for opportunities to help many different people.
    Strongly Agree

9. I am able to convince people to support me in my goals.
    Agree

10. I use skills and contacts from different parts of my life to help meet any need or goal.
    Agree

11. I am able to delineate and maintain boundaries between the different parts of my life.
    Agree

12. I am able to weave together the pieces of my life so that it has coherence.
    Agree


BE INNOVATIVE: Act with Creativity by Experimenting with How Things Get Done

13. I focus on the results of my efforts to accomplish goals and am flexible about the means for achieving them.
    Agree

14. I seek creative solutions to conflicts rather than sacrifice one part of life for another.
    Neither Agree nor Disagree

15. I challenge traditional assumptions about how things are done, experimenting to make things better whenever possible.
    Neither Agree nor Disagree

16. I am willing to question old habits and innovate in managing life's demands.
    Agree

17. I look forward to change—seeing it as an opportunity—rather than fear it.
    Agree

18. I look for opportunities to encourage others to learn new ways of doing things.
    Strongly Agree

What future for Education - Week 2

Reflect on:

    What you already know about intelligence. How do you know if someone is intelligent or not?
    Do you consider yourself to be intelligent? Why? What is your evidence for this?


Intelligence can be thought of in many different ways.  Intelligence can be having strong working memory and speed of thought.  Intelligence can be having a strong long-term memory and knowing lots of facts.  Intelligence can be mathematical, linguistic, physical, musical, natural, social, emotional, etc.  I typically think of someone as intelligent based on their ability to quickly connect old and new knowledge and apply it to a problem at hand.

I do think of myself as intelligent, at least in some areas.  I have done well in typical academic settings - high grades, good schools, etc - but I also seem to be able to figure things out faster than most other people.  I have surrounded myself lately, at least in my friend circles, with other highly intelligent people, so I sometimes feel not as intelligent when I compare myself to them.  I don't have as good of a long-term memory as some of my friends - I can't quote facts and studies off the top of my head - but I do know how to find the information quickly.  I'm also willing to try things out.  That was one of the biggest issues with some of my employees - not sure if it's related more to intelligence or to entrepreneurialism, but my employees would often ask me to come do things for them because I "knew" how to do the task.  But I didn't "know" how to do the task anymore than they did - I was just willing to try out a few options, google it for help, and figure it out.


Journal Entry:

    During your own education, how has your "intelligence" been assessed?
    How has this affected the educational opportunities you have been given?
    What judgments have people made about you that have been affected by an assessment of your "intelligence"?
    Do you consider yourself to be a "learner"? why?

While in school, I was of course graded - I consistently achieved high grades, even in high level classes, often without a lot of work - at least until I got to Caltech.  At Caltech, I actually had to work in order to do well - and in classes that I wasn't interested in, I often didn't want to do the work.  Earlier in grade school, my intelligence was assessed by an IQ test of some sort in order to test into the gifted program.  I don't think I was ever told my IQ or a 'grade' on the test, but I do remember on the literacy portion, reading a passage at high school level and then the proctor just decided that we could stop and we didn't need to continue - I was in second grade.  In order to get into the honors classes for high school, we had to take the SAT in eighth grade and also complete an essay.  I got in the mid-high 600s on both the math and verbal sections.  And for the essay, I remember that it was about a weird land where beings went around to different blocks, with clear bellys and their insides moving about as they traveled.  The beings were cars and the insides were people - but I remember talking with several other people after taking the essay test who didn't get the analogy.  On the way to college, I again took the SAT and ACT.  I got 800 on the SAT math, 35 on the ACT, and 740 on the SAT verbal.  I was disappointed in my verbal performance - I had been trying for a 750+.  Thankfully one of my friends reminded me that when he applied to college, he was going to talk about all the extra classes he'd taken, all the leadership roles he had had, etc - but he wouldn't even mention his SAT score.  A good reminder that intelligence and capacity to make a difference in the world is not measured by one test.  Although because of my ability to test well, I've had an abundance of educational opportunities - attending high quality institutions, etc.  The opportunities have also been in large part because of my family's financial resources and their commitment to spending on education.

Depending on who I'm talking with, I sometimes downplay my 'intelligence' in order to fit in.  I'll say that I went to school in Los Angeles, but not necessarily mention Caltech.  Or even when I was living in San Diego, a lot of people would exclaim that I must be really smart because I was going to UCSD.  And now with doing my masters, I often won't say that it's through Harvard Extension unless I know that it will be taken well by who I'm talking with.  Fitting in with the current situation is much more important to me than showing off or having people think that I'm significantly more intelligent than them.

I do consider myself to be a learner - I have way too many books and am enrolled in way too many MOOCs.  I'm constantly interested in and learning about new things.  I wouldn't say that I'll spend the time to learn anything, but there is a very wide range of topics that I am interested in and will take the time to learn about.  Watching TV isn't something that I engage in (except when I visit my parents) - I'd much rather be on the internet or reading.  :-)

Forum Post - 
I think that Elon Musk is a great example of a person who may be considered highly intelligent or gifted, but is also an expert learner.  He has consistently talked about putting in a lot of work in order to achieve more (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Fl9LRgG3_A).  Elon has definitely put in over 10000 hours in several different arenas. 

He also talks about defining a goal and learning in order to move toward that goal - like the video talked about finding a specific interest, and kids will often learn faster if they're studying around their own interest.  http://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2014/07/16/how-did-elon-musk-learn-enough-about-rockets-to-run-spa...

 Forum Response -
I agree with the statement that we can't have the same expectations for all learners, but we should ensure they reach 'maximum potential' for them in our classrooms. To claim that everyone has the same brain biology and can all do everything goes against cognitive science research, but that's not to say that we can't have high expectations for every student or that we shouldn't foster a growth mindset - because both of those things are also proven in research to raise achievement.

I think the point made in the videos about finding individual student's interest areas can help a lot to figure out what their max potential is.  Also making sure that we know where they are to start and that we take them from the point - because we assume that they know something that they don't, they'll just be confused.  And on the other hand, if we assume they don't know something that they do, then they'll just be bored.  By personalizing their learning both by their level and by their interests, we can help all students to achieve a lot more.

One of the article readings makes the same points - although contradicts itself as it does.  "I hope this disabuses you of any notion that your aspirations should be limited by any idea that you need a special level of IQ to achieve anything.  ‘Even within science, IQ is only weakly related to achievement among people who are smart enough to become scientists. Research has shown, for example, that a scientist who has an IQ of 130 is just as likely to win a Nobel Prize as a scientist whose IQ is 180.’" from http://sandraleatongray.wordpress.com/2013/10/16/a-guide-to-intelligence-and-heritability-for-beginners/  The first sentence says that you don't need a special level of IQ to achieve anything, and yet the quote that she uses then states 'among people who are smart enough to become scientists'.  While there may be little correlation above 120 or some cutoff, I'm guessing that there aren't any science Nobel Prize winners with IQs below 90. 

We should provide educational opportunities from a young age (aka conception), and create healthy environments (food, exercise, low stress, low pollution, etc) to optimize everyone's potential - but we still all do have different brains and we'll be better at different things.

Ed Policy - Essays

Desegregation of Schools:

Desegregation has had a long history, perhaps even longer in schools than in other institutions. In 1896 with the Supreme Court case of Plessy v. Ferguson, segregation was legal, as long as the facilities were 'separate but equal'. This case was about railway cars, not schools, but its ruling was used to back up state laws, mostly in the South, requiring segregation, including in education. This separate but equal was maintained until the mid 1950's, and the segregation in schools wasn't limited only to blacks. The 1927 Lum v. Rice decision said that a Chinese-American girl could not attend an all-white public school in Mississippi. These decisions were not seen at the time as being in conflict with the 1868 Equal Protection Clause of Fourteenth Amendment, which says that states must not deny any individual equal protection under law.

The stare decisis of 'separate but equal' was finally broken in 1954 with Brown v. the Board of Education. Effectively overturning Plessy v Ferguson, the Supreme Court ruled that segregation in public schooling was unconstitutional. This decision was unanimous, partly because of Earl Warren, a new judge appointed by President Eisenhower, convincing the rest of the judges to rule in favor of desegregation. The argument was not so much around the inferiority of colored schools, but rather around the psychological damage to blacks, as evidenced by the doll study. In 1955, the Brown II decision called for desegregation 'with all deliberate speed'.

While Brown v. the Board of Education made de jure segregation illegal, unfortunately it was not immediately implemented, especially in the South. In 1963, the Governor of Alabama, George Wallace, stood blocking school doors until President Kennedy actually sent in the National Guard to allow African Americans to enter the school. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 made separate but equal illegal in all public accommodations, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 outlawed voting discrimination. Throughout these years, there were still a lot of civil rights issues, including violence such as the Watts Riots and the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

The Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education changed the 'with all deliberate speed' to desegregation now, and school districts started looking at ways to integrate the schools, including bussing black students to white schools and white students to black schools. Bussing was not a popular idea – and in 1974, Milliken v. Bradley ruled that desegregation didn't apply inter-district, and that 'de facto' segregation because of where families choose to live doesn't need to be 'fixed'. Thus many schools, even today, remain rather segregated, not because of any legal limitations on who can attend, but rather because families of the same race and social class tend to live closer together and thus their children attend school together.

Teacher Tenure: 

Teachers are typically given tenure after 1-5 years of teaching, meaning that they cannot be fired without due process. Teacher seniority requires that teachers who have been in the profession longer are given (or can keep) positions before less senior teachers. Teacher unions and tenure advocates argue that teachers need protection from unreasonable termination, such as discrimination or disagreeing with the administration. They also don't want older and 'more expensive' teachers to be fired just to save money. They are trying to protect teachers' jobs, which is an admirable goal, and we certainly don't want teachers being dismissed because of insignificant reasons.

However, teachers are not widgets – they are not all the same. Research shows that effective teachers have a huge positive effect on their students as compared to ineffective teachers – not just on test scores, but also on college attendance and social outcomes. However, teacher credentialing, having a masters degree, and length of teaching (at least after the first few years) do not correlate with more effective teaching. Hence teacher seniority requirements are not necessarily in the best interests of the students. Certain younger teachers might be more effective than many older teachers, and we are doing a disservice to the children by keeping ineffective teachers in positions when there are more effective teachers who could be helping the students to achieve at higher levels.

Due process as a concept is good, but unfortunately the implementation of it often makes it such a convoluted and time-consuming process that administrators would rather put up with a bad teacher than go through the litigation to get rid of them. Again, this does a huge disservice to the students by allowing ineffective teachers to stay in the profession. Even in districts where ineffective teachers are removed from their main classroom teaching responsibilities, such as with NYC's rubber room, the teachers are still getting paid and taking money away from other more effective educational measures because the due process takes so long.

To reform teacher tenure, I would decrease the time and complexity of due process, possibly having someone besides the principal being the one involved, so that the principal can stay focused on everything else happening in their school. I would also get rid of the seniority rights so that principals can hire and keep the best and most effective teachers for the jobs that they have. I would also make getting tenure and staying tenured tied more to effectiveness rather than just time in the field. Teacher effectiveness should not be determined only by test scores, but rather as a 360 degree process including some test-based value-added measures, peer review, the principal and instructional leaders' views, and even the students' thoughts (not by asking whether they like the teacher, but by asking questions about the atmosphere the teacher creates in the classroom). The goal of teacher tenure should be to best help the students, and in order to do that, we need to ensure that the most effective teachers stay and the least effective teachers leave.

Technical vs Adaptive Change

To blog about...

Is most of education about technical change or adaptive change?  Informational learning vs  transformational learning?

Nonprofit Management - Paper #1 - Accountabilty n Early Educaton Nonprofits

We often think of education as beginning when we start school, but children are learning long before kindergarten. And unfortunately some children, especially those from low income or minority families, are learning much less in those early years than other children with greater resources. Looking at readiness skills upon entering school, Zill & West (2001) found that only 44% of at-risk children could identify letters of the alphabet, as compared to 75% of the children without risk factors. And only 38% of at-risk kids could count beyond ten, as compared to 68% of no-risk kids. Educators may hope that their teaching will reduce this achievement gap, but unfortunately evidence shows that the gap stays the same or even widens during the school years (Duncan & Magnuson, 2011). Thankfully now more focus is being put on early education with President Obama calling for Universal Preschool (The White House, 2013). But there has often been a gap between what the market would support (many low-income families don't have the money or don't see the value in early education) and what the government was funding (previously public funds were targeted more toward K-12 education). The non-profit sector has a long history of filling this gap and promoting early initiatives, but are they operating effectively and what results have actually been achieved?

The early education non-profit arena contains many types of organizations. Some social welfare organizations are more focused on advocacy and information, such as Zero to Three, which has an annual budget of over $19 million, was launched in 1977, and focuses only on early care for ages zero to three years old (Fact Sheet, 2014). Some of these research and dissemination organizations are more membership-based, such as the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), which was founded in the 1920's and has several membership tiers for early childhood professionals but also puts out significant print and online resources available to the public (History of NAEYC, 2004). Private foundations also contribute heavily to early education and universal preschool, including the Pew Charitable Trust, the Packard Foundation, and the Joyce Foundation (Klein, 2004). And perhaps most importantly are all of the non-profits that work directly with the young children and their families. These include many smaller organizations that just serve their local communities – church-based preschools, day cares that are run for low income families, etc – as well as many larger organizations that work regionally or nationally. For example, Jumpstart for Young Children, a non-profit started in 1994 now with locations on the East Coast, West Coast, and the Midwest, trains college students to deliver an early literacy curriculum in low-income preschools (Grossman, 2010). With all of these different non-profits working on early education, what sort of accountability measures are in place to make sure that they're actually making a difference for young children?

One basic aspect of non-profit accountability is in making sure that the organizations are not misusing the resources that they have been entrusted with. Finances and governance are regulated through requirements of the law, such as the IRS, and through transparency, such as charity rating websites (Worth, 2014, p. 129). Zero to Three has just a short, one-page graphic annual report for 2013 on their website, providing some transparency to their activities and financials (Annual Report Zero to Three, 2013), while NAEYC provides a much longer and more in-depth annual report with significant transparency about both the good and the bad happening in the organization. The 2013 report cites taking steps to 'right-size' the organization and reduce its annual deficit, such as eliminating departments, creating in-kind partnerships, and cutting other costs (Annual Report NAEYC, 2013). Even with these steps, NAEYC still had about $2 million more in expenses than revenue, which they clearly show in their annual report. Jumpstart, on the other hand, glosses over negative financial information in their 2013 annual report. They only show increases in revenues from all sources - government funding, foundations, private donors, and corporations – while redirecting people to see their financial statements for more info (Annual Report Jumpstart, 2013). However, the financial statements show that their expenses have also increased greatly, such that the bottom line for 2013 is even more negative than it was in 2012 and that their net assets are significantly reduced (Form 990 Jumpstart, 2013). These annual report documents are not used so much to report numbers for compliance, but rather as a bit of transparency and a lot of marketing to current and prospective funders, full of pictures of cute children engaged in educational activities and inspirational quotes from volunteers and clients.

While the annual reports look at the nonprofits perhaps through rose-colored glasses, the outside watchdogs give a somewhat more unbiased view. Interestingly, while Zero to Three is the least forthcoming on their own website with only the brief graphic report and no financial statements or Form 990's, the organization is actually highly rated with four stars on Charity Navigator and a silver rating on Guidestar (Charity Navigator & Guidestar Zero to Three, 2014). While NAEYC is very open and transparent with finances in the one most recent annual report available on their website, they do not participate in the Guidestar Exchange and they are not rated on Charity Navigator – perhaps because they are more a membership-driven organization that derives its income mostly from selling services and products, rather than from grants or donations (Guidestar NAEYC, 2014). Jumpstart has a bronze rating on Guidestar and shows a three star rating on Charity Navigator, although the star rating may need to be updated as Charity Navigator lists Jumpstart as not having audited financials or Form 990's on their website when they actually do, at least currently (Charity Navigator & Guidestar Jumpstart, 2014). Jumpstart may have been 'pushed' to be more transparent with their financial information on their website because of the lower star rating on Charity Navigator last year. Between the information from the rating websites and the information provided by the non-profits, all of these early education organizations are fairly transparent about their finances and governance, at least to anyone who goes looking for the information – although the one to two million dollar annual deficits they're all currently running is perhaps more cause for concern than the organizations are sharing.

Finances and governance are only part of the accountability picture – the other big issue is performance and mission impact. Even if the money is being handled properly, are the organizations actually changing lives with that money? Many nonprofits find it easier to report outputs, rather than outcomes, especially for early education where the benefits might not be seen for 10-20 years. Zero to Three talks of training 15,000 early childhood professionals and welcoming 1.8 million unique visitors to their website (Annual Report Zero to Three, 2013). NAEYC speaks of the nearly 2000 participants at their National Institute and nearly 7000 accredited programs (Annual Report NAEYC, 2013). Like the advocacy & information nonprofits, Jumpstart mentions outputs – 4300 volunteers trained that year, 600 classrooms, etc – but they also talk about the research studies done on their programs and how they're changing their practices because of these impact evaluations (Annual Report Jumpstart, 2013). Aaron Lieberman, the original founder of Jumpstart, said that “a culture of performance measurement was put in place early at Jumpstart and it's been evolving since” (Grossman, 2010). This Harvard Business School case study on Jumpstart included multiple observation and feedback forms, site management and monitoring tools, and their balanced scorecard showing not just increasing revenues and enrollments but also statistically significant gains on subscales measuring school readiness, placing social impact above financial as recommended in Kaplan's 2001 article. Jumpstart has continued their commitment to evaluation, and was named an Exemplar Program by The Center for High Impact Philanthropy, citing studies showing that “the average gain for Jumpstart students was more than two and a half times as large as the comparison group” (Center for High Impact Philanthropy, 2014). A non-profit organization working directly with the population they're trying to help, as opposed to advocating or disseminating information, will be better able to see the immediate effect they're having, which is part of why Zero to Three and NAEYC are only able to report on outputs, not specific outcomes.

The research shows that early education is extremely important for children's future achievement, and many non-profits are advocating for, informing about, and working with the young kids, including Zero to Three, NAEYC, and Jumpstart. These three organizations are all fairly transparent in their finances and governance, although their budget deficits are concerning. They all also provide measures of their performance, mostly in terms of outputs and immediate outcomes. How well they are impacting the long term futures of the children is perhaps a question too big to be answered.

References

Annual Report, Jumpstart. (2013). Retrieved from

http://web.archive.org/web/20140922005242/ http://www.jstart.org/sites/default/files/Jumpstart%20FY13%20Annual%20Report.pdf

Annual Report, NAEYC. (2013). Retrieved from http://www.naeyc.org/files/naeyc/annualreport2013.pdf

Annual Report, Zero to Three. (2013). Retrieved from http://www.zerotothree.org/about- us/2013-annual-report.html

Center for High Impact Philanthropy. (2014). Report on Jumpstart. Retrieved from http://www.jstart.org/sites/default/files/Scribbles/high-impact-philanthropy-article- February-2014.pdf

Charity Navigator, Jumpstart. (2014). Retrieved from www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm? bay=search.summary&orgid=4885#.VDbwUBZzCSpc

Charity Navigator, Zero to Three. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.charitynavigator.org/ index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=6562#.VDbuIhZzCSq

Duncan, G. J., & Magnuson, K. (2011). The Nature and Impact of Early Achievement Skills, Attention Skills, and Behavior Problems, in Duncan & Murnane (eds.), Whither Opportunity: Rising Inequality, Schools, and Children's Life Chances, pp. 47-69. Retrieved from http://sites.uci.edu/gduncan/files/2013/06/Duncan-Magnuson-including- web-appendix-0321121.pdf

Fact Sheet, Zero to Three (2014). Retrieved October 8, 2014, from http://www.zerotothree.org/about-us/zero-to-thees-fact-sheet.html

Form 990, Jumpstart. (2013). Retrieved from http://web.archive.org/web/20140922142447/ http://www.jstart.org/sites/default/files/Jumpstart%20August%202012%20IRS%20Form %20990.pdf

Grossman, A.S. (2010). Jumpstart, A Culture of Performance Measurement and Management. Case Study. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing.

Guidestar, Jumpstart. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.guidestar.org/organizations/04- 3262046/jumpstart-young-children.aspx

Guidestar, NAEYC. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.guidestar.org/organizations/36- 6009499/national-association-education-young-children.aspx

Guidestar, Zero to Three. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.guidestar.org/organizations/

521105189/zero-three-national-center-infants-toddlers-families.aspx

History of NAEYC. (2004). Retrieved October 8, 2014, from https://oldweb.naeyc.org/about/history.asp

Kaplan, R.S. (2001). Strategic Performance Measurement and Management in Nonprofit Organizations. NonProfit Management and Leadership, 11(3). Jossey-Bass.

Klein, L. (2004). Private Foundations and the Move Toward Universal Preschool. The Evaluation Exchange, 10(2). Retrieved from http://www.hfrp.org/evaluation/the- evaluation-exchange/issue-archive/early-childhood-programs-and-evaluation/private- foundations-and-the-move-toward-universal-preschool

Ritchie, S. J., & Bates, T. C. (2013). Enduring Links From Childhood Mathematics and Reading Achievement to Adult Socioeconomic Status. Psychological Science 24(5). Retrieved from http://pss.sagepub.com/content/early/2013/05/02/0956797612466268

The White House. (2013). Fact Sheet President Obama’s Plan for Early Education for all Americans. Retrieved from http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2013/02/13/

fact-sheet-president-obama-s-plan-early-education-all-americans

Worth, M.J. (2014). Nonprofit Management, Principles and Practice. Third Edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Zill, N. & West, J. (2001). Entering Kindergarten: A Portrait of American Children When They Begin School: Findings from The Condition of Education 2000. U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, NCES 2001–035. Retrieved from http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2001/2001035.pdf

What future for education? Week 1

Reflect on: your previous learning experiences. Think about one particularly successful and one unsuccessful learning experience. Consider what were the conditions that made this experience successful or unsuccessful for you and what this tells you about your own preferred ways to learn.

A particularly successful learning experience was buying and running a business when I was 21.  Nothing makes me learn faster than having to figure things out while 'in the fire'.  Although of course, the consequences of wrong decisions or not learning fast enough are also a lot greater.  I like to figure things out - utilize resources but doing most of it on my own - not having someone telling me what to do.
A particularly unsuccessful learning experience has been learning new languages.  I'm always saying that I'm going to learn Spanish or Chinese, but I have not yet made much progress on this learning endeavor.  I sometimes get started with some flashcards or an online program, but I don't stick with it.  This brings up the aspect of all-encompassing learning - if I was living in a foreign country where I had to speak the language to get things done, I'm sure I would learn pretty quickly.

Other reflections...
* Need a strong motivation
* Need alone, quiet, and the ability to focus (get distracted by other people or sounds)
* Need deadlines


Based on your experience as a learner, what do you think you will be able to get out of this course? And what ideas do you already have about the future of education?

I already have a fair bit of experience learning in different contexts, as well as teaching in different contexts.  But as I just wrote about in the forum, learning is a never ending journey - we're always learning.  I think that I will get some more theories of education from this course - possibly seeing more of how things are internationally, as the course is from the University of London with a wide range of international students.  I'm also looking forward to getting some new frameworks around effective learning and what makes for a good teacher, school, educational system, etc.  And I'm interested to see how other people view education - I'm currently working on seeing the world through other people's lenses, figuring out what their expectations and needs are, rather than assuming it's the same as mine.  Going from the golden rule of treat others the way you want to be treated, to the platinum rule of treat others as they want to be treated.

When I think now about the future of education, I see that technology can be used to personalize education - both in terms of allowing students to learn more about what they want to learn about (personal motivation) and in terms of meeting students exactly where they are in their learning (scaffolding/flow).  But even with all of this technology, education is still about connection.  Education in the future will allow students to connect with other learners and facilitators who can go with them on their learning journey.  We don't need all the students to be studying exactly the same thing - students can learn at their own pace, in their own way.  I also see the future of education expanding out from schools into communities - students can learn at work places, at home, at community centers, etc.  As we remember that we're all learners, schools will become less of a focal point for education.

Ed Policy - Teacher Tenure

 “Tenure is not a guarantee of lifetime employment but a protection against being terminated without due process. It does not protect teachers from being laid off in a recession, nor does it protect them from being fired for incompetence or misconduct. Why does due process matter? Teachers have been fired for all sorts of dubious and non-meritorious reasons: for being of the wrong race or religion, for being gay or belonging to some other disfavored group, for not contributing to the right politician, for not paying a bribe to someone for their job, for speaking out on an issue outside the classroom, for disagreeing with the principal, or simply to make room for a school board member’s sister, nephew, or brother-in-law” (Ravitch 176).

“A 2005 study by the New Teacher Project, the national nonprofit organization that works with school districts to recruit high-quality teachers, examined five urban districts and concluded that seniority-based transfer privileges written into contracts often force principals “to hire large numbers of teachers they do not want and who may not be a good fit for the job and their school.” All but five states have laws giving teachers lifetime tenure after three years or less. While procedures for removing tenured teachers for “just cause” appear in most contracts, the available procedures are so burdensome that they are rarely used. A recent study of Illinois public schools found that, since 1986, an average of just two tenured teachers a year have been removed–in a state with more than 95,000 tenured teachers. The New Teacher Project report cited above found just four tenured teachers out of 70,000 fired for poor performance in the five districts studied” (Hess and West 41).

These two quotes from assigned readings conflict in their opinions on teacher tenure and its relationship to teacher effectiveness. Do you believe tenure should exist for teachers? How many years should it take to get teacher tenure? Which author do you agree with more?


Tenure, like most aspects of the educational system, doesn't have an easy answer or a quick fix.  The point that Ravitch makes about teachers wanting protection from unfair termination is valid, but so is the point that Hess and West make about ineffective teachers continuing in the classroom because tenure creates barriers to hiring effective teachers and dismissing ineffective teachers.  I would tend to agree more with Hess and West, and would advocate for a new tenure system based not on length of employment, but rather on effectiveness.  Although as the collective bargaining readings mention, getting such a system to fly with the teacher unions would probably be extremely difficult because many senior teachers would fight to keep their current job security.

Due process and protection from being fired for trivial reasons is important in any profession.  Employees want to be able to work and feel secure in knowing that they'll have a job even if they have a disagreement with the administration.  Tenure in higher education has been in place to allow for academic freedom - for professors to be able to study and research possibly controversial topics.  However, in K-12 education, teachers are (usually) not doing research, and thus don't need the same type of academic freedom.  In K-12 education, tenure is more about creating stability for teachers - which gets back to a conversation from last week's forums about whether stability and risk-aversion are pros or cons in regards to who gets into the teaching profession.

Assuming that we need some sort of protection in place, then comes the question who do we want to keep as teachers, who do we want to give stability to?  While teaching quality does correlate with experience for the first few years, in general after the first three years, there is little experience-related improvement (as mentioned in the Photo Finish reading).  So if we were able to actually sort and select out the ineffective teachers at the end of three years, then instituting tenure after that might make sense.  Or perhaps some way of giving short-term tenure to teachers that show their effectiveness, renewable as they continue to be effective?  Having tenure/seniority based on effectiveness rather than work length would also help with the issue of principals feeling like they have to hire undesirable teachers.  (Of course, with this system, there's still the issue of measuring effectiveness effectively...)

The other issue to change with tenure would be the process of due process.  While we don't want teachers being fired willy nilly, we do want principals to be able to move ineffective teachers out of the profession.  As the Great Teaching reading shows, the difference between an effective teacher and an ineffective one can be huge and long-lasting for children.  Perhaps if an outside group evaluates ineffective teachers and decides whether they can be coached or need to be let go.  That might get rid of some of the potential 'the principal fired me because she doesn't like me' issues.  Although it does increase costs and bring in a third party, which could be more hassle than the principal wants and thus she just lets the teacher continue.



Also interesting links from Lana's post -
http://cecr.ed.gov/pdfs/CECR_MCPS.pdf
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/06/education/06oneducation.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Also...

Just saw this post from a teacher about her experiences with tenure, and thought it was interesting... http://www.huffingtonpost.com/holly-kragthorpe/how-can-we-make-teaching-_b_5902418.html
"That's why we must reform tenure in public schools: so that all teachers, not just those with the most seniority, have a voice; so that tenure is a meaningful and earned milestone in a teacher's career--a career that has multiple pathways and options, with opportunities for teacher-designed leadership and hybrid roles.
 

More relevant links that I've been reading...
http://tntp.org/publications/view/rebalancing-teacher-tenure-a-post-vergara-guide-for-policymakers
http://tntp.org/blog/post/letters-to-the-editor-rebalancing-teacher-tenure