We Must Redesign Our Public Schools or Else!

Small high schools are necessary because they help school districts fill a niche, that if left unfilled, parents will seek alternatives outside public schools. While I do not consider myself an avid supporter of increasing the number of charter schools and school vouchers, I understand why there's interest in options for schools. Instead of constantly complaining about the increase of charter schools and vouchers, perhaps school districts need to seriously question the design of those schools they are offering parents. School districts can provide parents with high school options, but they must be willing to let go of their preconceived notions about what high schools should look like, and be willing to rethink high school design in general.

Around 2005, the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation and others were funding small high schools because it was recognized that large, factory-assembly-line high schools were failing too many kids. If I remember correctly, a study at the time called them "Drop-Out Factories" because there were so many instances of high schools with drop out rates well over 50 percent. Now, many of those once supporting small high schools, including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, have moved on to other educational endeavors. They argued that smaller high schools are more expensive to operate, offer too few educational opportunities as compared to larger ones, and they don't produce the test scores, at least at level of return for the investment. In addition, small high schools cannot churn out "credentialed students" in the same cheap and efficient manner as large, assembly-line, factory high schools. But there's a reason why "drop-out" factories exist. No one-size-meets-every-kids-need high school exists, and I doubt it will ever exist. That's why we need small high schools too.

But I can't help but ask, is the goal of a high school to churn out students who have the appropriate credentials stamped in their curriculum vitae, or is the goal of high school to foster individuals who are life-long learners, who are knowledgeable and engaged citizens who can contribute back to society and the world? At the heart of this large high school efficiency model is the mistaken belief that having high school credentials equals potential success later in life. This belief persists in spite of the fact that real skills, dispositions, aptitudes, and habits of mind are the real determinants of success later in life. While statistically, we can say "having a high school diploma" means a student is more likely to graduate and be productive and successful, we forget we aren't dealing with numbers; we're dealing with the lives of real people. Perhaps educational reformers aren't really looking for new and powerful designs for high schools and ways of reforming school; what they really want are cheap and efficient designs. And, in their decision-making efforts, they use test scores, though every educator knows how imperfect those are.

Ultimately, when all your thinking centers around values of cheapness and efficiency, you must compromise on others. The result is an imperfect, large comprehensive high school that can't possibly meet the needs of every student. So you turn to credentialing as your sole object, and engage in building large, factory-model high schools that can roll the students through and stamp them proficient as they jump through a series of prescribed hoops and declare them "graduates" when they've completed the hoop-jumping.

There are real problems at the heart of this obstinate belief is that only the comprehensive high school can serve the needs of all its students.  I have been a teacher for many years in larger, assembly-line high schools, and I have also served as an administrator in them. I have also been principal of a small, redesigned high school too. We know what typically happens in the large assembly-line high school. The top 10 or 20 percent of students get the attention and focus from the school community, which includes top athletes as well. At the other end, students who struggle severely, fail multiple classes, and who are constantly in trouble also receive attention and focus from the staff. There is a large group in the middle who make up the bulk of students. These students are the quiet majority. They make no noise and can exist anonymously in high school for four years.They quietly go about the business of "getting their credentials" so they can graduate. While there have been programs like AVID and others who have tried to target these students, these programs fail to understand a program won't fix this problem. It's a design problem, not a program problem. The design problem is that the whole idea of a large, cheap, efficient credentialing system is simply incapable of addressing the needs of these middle students. These students might be in school. They may or may not have adequate grades. They may or may not be involved in arts or other programs. But the bottom line, they are largely unengaged in learning and are more engaged in just getting their credentials in the form of a diploma and get on with life.

The answer for addressing the needs of all students is not to continue to try to tweak the large, assembly-line model high school and force it to serve all students. Large high schools are cheap and efficient credentialing systems, not systems for personalizing education. That model is incapable of serving all students for the same reasons that small high schools can't meet the needs of all students either. Instead of a one-size-fits-all high school, we need a variety of high schools, small and large, academic and career-oriented, theme-based and STEM. Instead of continuing to just build these large, mullti-million dollar relics of the 20th century, we need to offer students and their parents choices. And, as indicated at the start of this, if we don't, they are going to look for solutions outside of public education.

4 Trends of Global Connectivity We As Educators Can No Longer Ignore

“As global connectivity continues its unprecedented advance many old institutions and hierarchies will have to adapt or risk becoming obsolete, irrelevant to modern society.” Eric Schmidt & Jared Cohen, The New Digital Age: Reshaping the Future of People, Nations, and Business

Even a decade into the 21st century, educational leaders and policymakers stubbornly hold on to an outdated, twentieth century manufacturing education model with its standardized approach to teaching and learning. Little discussion has been about how can we redesign teaching and learning; instead, we are still bolting on new and recycled reform measures to an old model of education that has proven inadequate for all students. The search for the perfect test or set of standards that has the power to magically transform education continues. It's as if in some ways, there's still little incentive to change, but as Schmidt and Cohen point out, the power of "global connectivity" continues to force its way into our institutions and our lives, and the question is adapt or be irrelevant.

What education leaders and policymakers really fail to see are Four Big Trends of Connectivity that Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen describe in their book, The New Digital Age: Reshaping the Future of People, Nations, and Business. According to these authors, these trends are at work, powerfully transforming our public institutions whether we want them to or not. Education leaders have spent much of the first decade of the 21st century either resisting these trends, trying to adapt them to old models of schooling, or trying to ignore them, perhaps even hoping they're some kind of fad that will fade with time. But these four trends are creating stress on all our public institutions, according to Schmidt and Cohen. Their impact on education is continuing as well.

1. Quicker rate of change than at any time in history. According to Schmidt and Cohen, “We experience change at a quicker rate than any previous generation, and this change, driven in part by the devices in our own hands, will be more personal and participatory than we can even imagine.” This handheld-device driven change has already began impacting education. Schools have yet to really harness the power of these devices and connectivity, because they mostly have only been asking questions like: "How can I control these devices which are a nuisance?" or "How can these devices help us do the teaching and learning we now do?" For schools to capitalize on this quicker rate of change, our educational institutions and the people in them must become much, much more flexible. They need to recognize the personal and participatory nature of learning and move away from a “prescriptive philosophy of teaching” where education is perceived to be a “treatment” provided to produce a desired result. In the “quick change” environment of the future, individuals will take charge of their own learning, and prescription learning will be history. Personalized learning will result from the quicker rate of change.

2. Seamless permeation of technology everywhere. In spite of their efforts to keep devices and technology from their buildings, school leaders are losing this war. As Schmidt and Cohen point out, "In the future, information technology will be everywhere, like electricity. It will be a given, so fully part of our lives that we will struggle to describe life before it to our children.” In that same future, educators will be surrounded with technology. Questions like, “What do we do with these devices?” or “How do I use this in my classroom"?” will completely vanish. Technology will “just be” part of how we do education and life. It will be seamlessly part of every aspect of teaching and learning. In that future no one will question or even notice the technology.

3. Attempts to try to contain or restrict connectivity is futile. “Attempts to contain the spread of connectivity or curtail people’s access will always fail over a long enough period of time---information, like water, will always find a way through,” state Schmidt and Cohen. No matter how institutions try to to control access, it will happen anyway. Since the age of connectivity began school leaders have been trying to control connectivity on their terms, which is like trying to control the output from a fire hose. Many still don’t get it; that this torrent of content, wanted and unwanted can’t be contained or restricted. Like the printing press, once information begins spreading, ideas and information spread. Instead of futilely trying to restrict or contain the torrent, we need to provide our students with the values necessary, the moral and intellectual center to engage connectivity appropriately and effectively.

4. Permeation of connectivity and mobile technologies means power moves away from the few to many. The final big trend described by Schmidt and Cohen involves a power shift. As they point out, “With the spread of connectivity and mobile phones around the world, citizens will have more power than at any time in history, but it will come with costs, particularly to both privacy and security.” The power of teachers being the “primary dispensers of information” to our students has slipped away. This shift continues unabated, and if students really need content experts, they don’t need teacher-content experts any more. They can connect with those using the devices in their hands. Students need guides and mentors to help them navigate the global world of information available. They need connectivity experts. They need simply, those who will help them make sense of information, evaluate it for relevance and validity, and use it solve real problems.

Judging from these four trends described by Schmidt and Cohen, schools as public institutions have little choice in adapting to the changes wrought by global connectivity. I fear, though, we're still too busy trying to adapt the technologies and global connectivity to fit our old ways of teaching and learning.

Posted with Blogsy

3 Ways to Create a Climate of Possibility and Creativity in Our Schools

“The real role of leadership in education is not and should not be command and control. The real role of leadership is climate control; creating a climate of possibility, and if you do that, people will rise to it and achieve things you did not anticipate and couldn't have expected.” Sir Ken Robinson, TED Talk "How to Escape Education's Death Valley"

What is ultimately wrong with No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, and the Common Core State Standards? Each of these initiatives are a product of what Sir Ken Robinson calls mechanistic thinking. In mechanistic thinking, education is seen as an “industrial process” done to kids. You subject kids to this process, and at the end, you test them, then declare (or not declare) them college and career ready, educated, or whatever term you choose. As Robinson points out in his TED Talk "How to Escape Education's Death Valley," subjecting kids to these kinds initiatives and the standardization movement means millions of children have been left behind.

Why are so many children left behind in the current American system of education? The whole problem, according to Robinson, is simple: American education "contradicts 3 principles under which human life flourishes." These principles are: 1) Human beings are naturally different and diverse, 2) Human beings are naturally curious creatures, and 3) Human life is inherently creative. By contradicting these principles, we are losing students because the American system of education ignores the very things that allow humans to thrive and survive.

There's no denying that these fundamental principles of humanity are ignored in an education culture where standardization and conformity are elevated above principles of diversity, curiosity, and creativity. But what can we do, as school leaders, to create a "climate of possibility and creativity?" Perhaps we can begin to establish that climate by doing three things:

1. We can treat students as different and diverse, not as standardized unfinished products to which we "add value" through subjecting them to the same curriculum and the same tests. Education under No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, and the Common Core is all about conformity and standardization, not diversity. Each of the initiatives is about narrowing the curriculum so that we can test kids the same way, compare their scores, and boast or censure what we have done educationally. Instead of moving more and more toward standardization, we need to be moving to personalization. Under a personalized education system we capitalize on students' natural talents and abilities, not stifle them with standard curriculum and standardized testing. As 21st century school leaders we need to focus not on data entirely, but more on individual students. Drop out rates, proficiency rates, growth rates are not the center of what we should be doing as educators. Kids are.

2. We can recognize that human beings are naturally curious creatures, and create systems of education that value curiosity above all else. As Robinson points out, “Curiosity is the engine of achievement.” Yet in our efforts to treat our education system mechanistically, we stamp our curiosity with standardized curriculum and standardized testing. We treat “teaching” as a delivery system, when it should be treated as the "art of mentally stimulating, provoking, and engaging children in learning."  Robinson points out that the dominate culture in American education does not focus on teaching and learning, it focuses on testing. We have turned our schools into places where the culture is about compliance, not curiosity. As 21st century school leaders we need to make human curiosity central to our school cultures, not compliance.

3. We can recognize in our schools that human beings are inherently creative and turn them into places where creativity is valued. We spend our whole lives creating; it is a part of who we are as humans. Our role as educators should be to awaken this creativity and power it up, instead, we are too busy standardizing everything and stifling creativity. Our students should be engaged creatively, not engaged in test prep and testing at the expense of all else. As 21st century school leaders we need to create a school culture that values creativity above standardization and conformity.



Sir Ken Robinson's TED Talk: How to Escape Education's Death Valley


As long as policymakers at the national level, state level, and the district level continue to see education as this mechanistic, industrial process that is “done to kids” we're going to continue to have an education system that fails a large number of students. Changing our tests and our standards every few years is not going to create a climate of possibility and creativity in our schools. It only perpetuates the mechanistic system of education that has failed many of our kids for over a hundred years.

Structuring Classrooms for Exploration, Risk-Taking and Engineering

“But engineering isn’t about perfect solutions; it’s about doing the best you can with limited resources.” Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture

As Randy Pausch suggests, engineering isn't about "looking for the one right answer or perfect solution." Engineering is about looking for solutions that work. While our policymakers and politicians talk incessantly about the need for more engineers and scientists, they advocate for a system of education of standardization and accountability that is in some ways direct contradiction to the kinds of tasks and thinking engineers and scientists do.

According to Sylvia Martinez and Gary Stager, authors of the book Invent to Learn: Making, Tinkering, and Engineering in the Classroom,

“The past few decades have been a dark time in many schools. Emphasis on high stakes testing, teaching to the test, de-professionalizing teachers, and depending on data rather than teacher expertise has created classrooms that are increasingly devoid of play, rich materials, and time to do projects.”

With classrooms that are bleak and where test scores dictate every move, it is no wonder our schools are rapidly becoming places where no one wants to be. Why can't we reduce a drop out rate that seems to stubbornly persist no matter what we do? Why do our students stare at us with blank expressions from their uniform rows of desks? Why are our so many of our students so disengaged from school and see it the last place they want to be? It is because our schools have become prisons of standardization where creativity and inventiveness are sacrificed for conformity. It is because of an emphasis on comparing student test scores for the purpose of determining school effectiveness and  teacher/principal effectiveness which fosters more test-prep and teaching to the test. These reforms dictated through NCLB and Race to the Top have made our schools “places devoid of play, rich materials and time to do projects” as Martinez and Stager describe it. That's why no one wants to be there.

What is our alternative? How can we create classrooms and schools where learning is the focus again, not just test scores? How can we make our schools into places where our kids want to be and want to learn? How can we have schools that encourage the kinds of tasks and thinking engineers and scientists do? The answer lies in turning our schools into places where students can “make, tinker, engineer” to use the terms of Martinez and Stager.

I am just now beginning my reading  of Martinez and Stager’s book Invent to Learn: Making, Tinkering, and Engineering in the Classroom, and I am intrigued by what they propose. Martinez and Stager point to all the “amazing tools, materials, and skills that turn us all into makers.” We are all "makers" and "tinkerers" at heart they say, which means we can do as these authors suggest and use "technology to make, repair, or customize the things we need" and "bring engineering, design, and computer science to the masses.” Furthermore, we can create the kinds of learning places where “Children should engage in tinkering and making because they are powerful ways to learn.”

But what would a classroom that emphasizes “making, tinkering, and engineering” look like? Martinez and Stager will no doubt answer that question in their book, but I suspect that some of the characteristics of such a classroom would be like the following.

• Structured for exploration: The physical space would not be structured with a teacher’s desk or podium-presentation equipment at the center. Instead, space would be structured for collaboration, for individual learning, and for student-centered learning activity. A variety of high-tech and low-tech materials and equipment would be available for making, tinkering and inventing.
• Structured for risk-taking: The classroom is purposely designed to allow students to take risks in learning and in trying new ideas. Mistakes are allowed and actually encouraged. Experimentation is the rule, not conformity.
• Structured for inquiry: Students asking their own questions rather than answering predetermined questions provided by a teacher is the norm for classrooms structured for inquiry. Students pose the questions and their learning comes from the exploration and search for answers to those questions.
• Structured for students: The classroom would be structured for students, not teachers, not principals, not policymakers and not politicians. Too much of what we currently do in the classroom is done to satisfy politicians with agendas and leaders with egos. Classrooms structured for students exist for student learning and places them at the center.

One can perhaps argue whether our schools are going through “dark times” as Martinez and Stager suggest. It probably depends on your perspective of standardization and testing. But, it is difficult to deny that some aspects of our standardization-accountability movement are turning schools into places where creativity and invention are devalued in favor of conformity and test-prep, and those who continue to push for more testing and more standardized curriculum need to be aware of what they may be trading in to obtain those things.

4 Principles for Designing 21st Century Learning Spaces

“School buildings must change because instruction must change. We need creative new designs that will support 21st century learning.” Frank S. Kelly, Ted McCain, and Ian Jukes, Teaching the Digital Generation: No More Cookie-Cutter High Schools

A great deal of the reform talk that we engage in focuses on changing how teaching and learning should change to better fit the needs of 21st century learners, but how much of that talk focuses on how we can better redesign our schools so that they better facilitate 21st century learning? Kelly, McCain, and Jukes point out one really sad fact about school construction in the 21st century:

“We are currently spending millions of dollars building new high schools that will last 40 years or more that are designed on ideas that date back to the early 1900s.”

In other words, the high schools we currently build are monuments to obsolescence, and instead of asking ourselves the critical questions about what should a high school in the 21st century should look like, we just keep building them the same way we always have. Then, we shake our heads with wonder when we can’t reform the kinds of teaching and learning that occurs in those schools. As Kelly, McCain, and Jukes so aptly point out, “We are victims of TTWWADI, or That’s the way we’ve always done it.”

What are some principles to guide us in designing 21st century learning spaces? Borrowing from Kelly, McCain, and Jukes, here’s some to consider.

• Instruction should drive construction. Instead of automatically assuming we need classrooms separated into subject-area departments, perhaps we need to ask what kinds of instruction and learning will be happening in those spaces. Too often, the people designing our schools are totally disconnected from those designing 21st century instructional and learning models. We need to design learning spaces that facilitate 21st century learning, not try to fit 21st century learning into 20th century Industrial Age learning spaces.
• Question everything. No preconceived notions about instruction and learning spaces are sacred. For example, do we have to have classrooms that place teachers front and center? Does learning have to even take place in classrooms? Do these learning places have to have the capacity to hold 25-30 students? Can they be larger or smaller, or do we need both? Does learning have to fall within a 9-month school calendar and during a 4-period, block-scheduled school day? In designing true 21st century learning spaces, we must question all of our preconceived notions about what these spaces should look like and how they are organized.
• Design learning spaces that capitalize on technology. Instead of fitting technology into existing classroom and school designs, how can we design classrooms and schools that capitalize on technology’s strengths? In other words, let's fit our schools to the technologies. For example, how does the potential for global connections and collaboration fit into high school design? Maybe we need a conference room with global video-conferencing capabilities. Designing learning spaces that fit the technologies means rethinking those spaces to capitalize on technology.
• Think about designing a school to fit the needs of 21st century learners rather than fitting 21st century learners into existing school designs. We know a great deal about how this digital generation learns and wants to learn, so why not incorporate those into our school designs? Don’t build lecture halls or classrooms with row after row of desks. Instead, build both places where students can engage in collaborative projects and places where they can explore and learn individually. Learning spaces should be designed to fit the needs of today's digital learners.

As Kelly, McCain and Jukes, point out, “What is currently lacking from the school design process is a way to set aside old assumptions about teaching and learning in order to allow people to develop new visions of the future.” School leaders are still designing and building schools not fundamentally different from schools designed and built in the Industrial Age; yet, we expect students to engage in Information Age activities. If we truly want instruction to change, we need schools and learning places designed for 21st century learning.

Ideas for Establishing & Revising Your School or District's BYOD Policies

A Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policy is a necessity in a 21st century school. I am not sure deciding whether or not to provide wireless Internet access to students is even optional anymore. With more and more of our students getting technological devices with WiFi capabilities, they come to our schools with the expectation that they are going to be connected. Add the fact that municipalities like our own hometown of Newton, North Carolina are working to set up city-wide WiFi, and lower costs of cellular hotspots, educational leaders are quickly finding it difficult keeping schools a "WiFi dead-zone."

Our school district recently updated our Bring Your Own Device Policy and Procedures (Newton-Conover City Schools BYOD Policy). This year, our BYOD policy expanded to include all our schools, but it is primarily just middle and high schools that are actually utilizing it. It also covers guests who come to our school buildings who want to get connected as well.

Some of the most pronounced changes in our BYOD update included the following:

• Change in the definition of devices. Two years ago, so few of our students had tablets, we had not included that in our policy. We now include any device capable of connecting to our wireless network under our BYOD. While we haven't had many students bring  Xbox 360 or Ninetendo game systems into our school buildings, we need to make sure all devices using our wireless Internet connection are included.
• Clearer definition of user. This was a key revision since our original focus covered mostly students. Our new policy covers anyone who connects and uses our wireless network.
• Clearer expectations about the devices. In our revision discussions, we wanted language to make sure all of our users understand that our wireless Internet's purpose was to support instructional use. We also wanted language that covered when those devices become a disruption. In addition we added a clear connection back to our district acceptable use policy.
• Revised consequences for violations. Under our old policy, the consequences were clear enough, but the new policy more clearly explains those consequences, and there is some flexibility. In addition, we clearly spell out the offenses for which immediate and permanent loss of wireless Internet privileges could result. Those are: accessing web sites of a clearly pornographic nature and web sites with illegal content. We also include cyberbullying and harassment as an offense that could result in loss of privileges and any activity of a malicious or illegal nature.
• Finally, we updated our disclaimers section to make it very clear that users would not have access to network hardware and resources. Also, our district does not provide tech support for personal devices, nor is our district responsible for any damage, theft or loss of these devices.

Now that we are in our third year of BYOD implementation, there are some more lessons we have learned. Those include:

• Review and update your BYOD policies and procedures at least once a year. You may also have to update sooner should tech trends demand it.
• Clear definitions are a must. This is a no-brainer for those who write policy, but it is vital that definitions of devices, users, and violations as well as conseuqences be written with clarity. Revising these definitions regularly is important too.
• Make sure your policy includes disclaimers. Our district technology department does not have the resources to support personal devices, and as I understand it, our state does not permit state employees to provide that support. Disclaimers regarding theft, loss or damage is important as well, otherwise, more resources may be consumed when these things happen.

Having a Bring Your Own Device policy and procedure has moved to the mainstream. As more and more of our students get personal devices, and come to our schools with the expectation that they can be connected, we must make sure we provide that access or they will get it elsewhere. Having a current BYOD policy in a 21st century school is a must.

Posted with Blogsy

21st Century Leadership in Schools with Changing Demographics

Recently, the Duke Sanford School of Public Policy released an updated study entitled "Racial and Economic Diversity in North Carolina's Schools: An Update." The study by Charles T. Clodfelter, Helen F. Ladd, and Jacob L. Vigdor, had some interesting bulleted points regarding the demographic status of North Carolina Public Schools.

• Since the early 1990s with the end and weakening of school desegration policies and measures, North Carolina schools became increasingly segregated. In other words, racial isolation has increased.
• Within school districts in North Carolina, where schools have higher shares of minority students, teachers in those schools have weaker credentials.
• With growth of enrollment of Hispanic students in North Carolina, school integration is no longer just a black-white issue. Hispanic enrollment has grown from 1.5 percent in 1994-95 to 13.3 percent in 2011-12.
• Though it appears the racial imbalance has stopped growing, the economic status imbalance has increased and is still increasing.

The next logical question is, What does this mean for educational leaders in North Carolina as we move further into the second decade of the 21st century?

It means we as 21st century school leaders are going to be leading less diverse educational communities.

It means we as 21 century school leaders are going to have to make sure our students gain understandings of diverse cultures because many are attending schools where multicultural experiences are lacking.

It means we as 21st century school leaders must recognize the continued need to grow in understanding and knowledge of Hispanic cultures.

Finally, it means that we as 21st century school leaders must find ways to mitigate the growing economic imbalance in our student population.

Posted with Blogsy

7 Kinds of Thinking Keeping Your School or District from Transformation

Is your school or district “missing the wave of change” that is propelling many other innovative schools and districts forward? What exactly is it within the DNA and thinking of your educational organization that is causing it to resist efforts to reform, transform, or change? We only need to look to business in recent times to learn what the consequences are for “failing to adapt to the enormous wave of change” that is all around us.

In Out of Our Minds: Learning to Be Creative, Ken Robinson writes:

“Organizations that stand still are likely to be swept aside, and corporate history is littered with the wreckage of companies and whole industries, that have been resistant to change. They become stuck in old habits and missed the wave of change that carried more innovative companies forward.”

Many of our schools are “standing still” and stuck in "old habits" and are in danger of being “swept aside.” It is difficult to believe in an era of reform, but there are still educators, policymakers, and politicians who are “stuck in the old habits” of seeing education “as something done to kids,” and who see children’s learning as a “process of adding value.” Those, who hold tight to this conception of education where children are passive participants in learning, will be standing among the “wreckage” of a public education system that stubbornly held on to past era.

Believe or not, I experienced this “wave of change” at an early age. At only seven or eight years old, I experienced firsthand Ken Robinson’s phenomenon of companies “standing still in a wave of change” way back in the 1970s. My father worked for the trucking industry, which at the time was a way to make a good living. Then, deregulation came along, and many of the trucking companies refused to adapt and cope with the new world they faced, and they went under, one by one. My father worked for a series of successive trucking companies, each folding the tent when they could not longer adapt and cope with rapidly changing transportation industry. Instead of adapting to the change, they tried to ride it out, only to ride into nonexistence.

Fast forward to more recent times and we see the same thing happening again and again with businesses. If you glance back four of five years, the names of companies like Circuit City, Blockbuster, and Borders come to mind. Each of these companies stood still in the face of change and it cost them dearly. More recently, news reports speak about the struggles of Best Buy, a major electronics retailer, who is trying to cope with the rapidly changing retail environment, and who seems guilty of the same kinds of thinking these businesses had. Each of these businesses found themselves in a changing environment and made decisions, based on specific and stagnation-generating kinds of thinking. With the exception of Best Buy at this point, that thinking ended in their demise. They could not adapt.

If you examine your school or district closely, you are likely to find this same self-destructive thinking that is causing your educational organization to “stand still in a wave of change.” If it continues, then you could find yourself standing in the wreckage.

What are these kinds of thinking that are clearly obstacles to adaptation and transformation? Over the years, I have come to see them in very simple terms. Here are the top 7 Kinds of Thinking, or what I might call “Resistors to Change.”

• “We’ve always done it this way thinking.” In public education, I have found this kind of thinking the most common. You can easily run up against this thinking by simply questioning a policy or procedure, or by suggesting a new way of doing something. Immediate replies by the institutional-preservation police are, “You can’t do it that way. We've always done it this way.” Or, more simply, “I like the way we've always done it.” At the heart of our schools and school districts are thousands of these “ways of doing things” that are protected vehemently by others, not because there is anything special about them. These are valued because they are wrongly seen as  not negotiable for change. The best antidote for this kind of thinking? Asking the simple “Why” question. If the answer is, “Because we’ve always done it this way,” then the underlying rationale might be suspect.
• “Head in the sand thinking.” I can’t help but wonder if this was the kind of thinking Blockbuster was guilty of. They had to see streaming video services coming, especially if they were reading anything about industry trends. But just as deadly as ignoring the “waves of change” can be, so can the same head-in-the-sand habit of getting so caught up in “the doing” that you don’t see the change coming. In other words, sometimes organizations are so busy caught up in doing what they do, that they don’t pause and connect to the world around them. In that environment, it is extremely easy to miss the “wave of change” right in front of you. Schools are sometimes notorious for adhering steadfastly to motions they've always carried out, and with change roiling all around them. Each of these businesses certainly had to be guilty of some of that. They did not notice the change until it was too late. That can happen to schools too. Antidote for this kind of thinking? Simply being informed. Having the latest information goes a long way helping education organizations avoid being blindsided by change. But there must be a willingness and courage to act on that information.
• “It’s someone or something else’s fault thinking.” Back in the 1970s, many of those trucking companies complained that is was the government’s fault they had to go out of business, after all politicians brought about deregulation. In more recent times, I am sure there were those at Borders who blamed cheap electronic books and Amazon for their demise, and currently I read  where Best Buy is blaming Amazon for their problem of decreasing sales. Schools, school leaders, and policymakers do the very same thing. It’s the teachers’ unions fault. It’s the politicians’ fault. It’s the parents’ fault. In the interest of honesty and confession, I have been guilty of this thinking myself. Still, there’s no productivity in searching for a boogie man on which to place blame. There’s certainly enough blame to go  around anyway. If you spend all your effort and time trying to find someone or something to blame, you are wasting energy and resources that could be used to adapt and meet solidly the “wave of change” that is upon you. The best antidote for this kind of thinking is perhaps to engage in looking for solutions. That way, there’s no energy to expend on blaming.
• “You have to do it this way because policy says so thinking.” I honestly find this one of the most ridiculous reasons why we defend so much of what we do in education. Educational institutions are notorious for this kind of thinking, and often they do it much more than businesses. Businesses, to exist for any length of time, are most often forced to question what they do, and when they become too entangled in “policy-think” they lose sight of their reason for existence: making money. Then they simply cease to exist. On the other hand, schools do the same kind of thinking too, and they continue to perpetuate it. They get so caught up in “policy-think” they lose sight of their purpose too. This is most evident when decisions are made, clearly not in the best interest of kids. When adhering to a policy is more important than meeting the needs of kids, the school or district has lost sight of its purpose, and it’s reason for existence, and the world will move on without it. Antidote for “policy-think?” Spending some refocusing on why we do what we do, the kids.
• “I’m right and everyone else is wrong thinking.” In our polarized society right now, there is a great deal of this kind of thinking, and it can have a detrimental effect on an organization facing a “wave of change.” There was a time when being “open-minded” was a virtue, and compromise was not a dirty word. Tolerance ruled the day. Now, our polarized “”I’m right thinking” has bled over into our schools too. Polarized debates on topics such as school vouchers, sex education, prayer in schools, and teachers’ unions only serve to widen the divide between people. If someone questions the effectiveness or usefulness of these measures, they are immediately attacked.We can’t have an honest look at policy change without one side or the other cooking the data, which in educational research is all too easy to do. An immense amount of effort is going into establishing the “I’m right and you’re wrong” view, and the waves of change meanwhile are slamming hard into our educational institutions. There is greater interest in proving the other side wrong, than learning the truth of what really does work. What is an antidote for “polarized thinking?” Realizing that there is nothing sacred about being right in the debate, especially when it’s more important to do what’s right for the kids.
• “Protect our turf at all costs thinking.” I have often thought, the only people who have a claim to “turf” in public education should be the kids, and that turf is “What’s in their best interests.” When the “waves of change” started battering the trucking industry in the 1970s, I remember well how trucking company owners held strongly to their turf of wanting wage concessions and benefit reductions to preserve the company. Union trucking company workers held equal ground on these same issues of turf, and in the end, both sides lost. Companies closed, and no one had any turf to battle over any more. Fast forward today, and the recent complaints by Best Buy about Amazon seem to be the same kind of turf battle. Best Buy does not appreciate Amazon’s selling electronics and appliances to undercut their prices, so there was talk about Best Buy refusing to sell Amazon’s Kindle readers. The end result of this turf war would not improve Best Buy’s current situation against the “wave of change” that is upon them. There is just too much money to be made in electronics and appliances. Protect the turf at all costs thinking in both these cases results in both sides losing. Amazon loses satisfying customers who want to go purchase an e-reader locally. Best Buy loses that customer who came to their store to purposefully buy an ereader. In education, protect-our-turf-at-all-costs thinking is happening on multiple levels. It is most insidious at the local level, where individuals fight hard to preserve what exists because it is their turf, and they’re not giving it up. Antidote for “turf-protecting thinking is simple. Keep your eyes focused on the real reason why we do what we do, the kids. Recognize that we share a common purpose.
• “Change for Change’s Sake thinking.” With everyone yelling about the need to reform our education system, this is perhaps one of the most increasingly common forms of thinking that keeps a school or district from moving forward. This kind of thinking is perhaps best illustrated by the argument many make for certain reforms, by simply stating, “Well, we’ve got to do something.” This kind of thinking is responsible for the endless wheel of reform, education often finds itself on. Educators and policymakers institute change because, in their view, change is called for. Never mind whether the change is sound or really addresses the issues. Many people accuse those who speak out against such reforms or proposals as “defending the status quo” or as “advocating for what is.” But “We’ve just got change this” thinking is just as dangerous to an organization as well. When Borders decided to enter the ebook market, a great deal of blood between Barnes and Noble and Amazon had already been spilt. Their decision was late, and more importantly, it was reactionary thinking. Change for change’s sake thinking is reactionary thinking without deliberation. It is deciding to take a course of action, not because it is the best course of action, but because “We’ve got to do something.” I can’t but wonder whether a great deal of our current national ed policy under Race to the Top is this kind of thinking. There is no research to support that having Common Standards, instituting merit pay for teachers, or using value-added measures is going to raise student achievement. In fact, there is some research to the contrary, yet there’s the push to implement reform, and anyone who questions it is said to be guilty of “supporting the status quo.” Change of change’s sake thinking submits to simply taking a course of action, because there’s a perceived obligation to do so. The antidote for the reactionary thinking of this kind is simply pausing and resisting the urge to do something immediately. By pausing, you buy time for level heads to prevail. 

There are certainly many other kinds of thinking that would cause a district or school to miss that “wave of change” that propels other schools and districts to successful innovation. In my experience, the forces within a school or school district employ any and all of these ways of thinking to preserve things just as they are. Let’s just hope those schools and districts don’t end up like Circuit City, Borders, or Blockbuster.

Six Practices of Schools and School Districts Marching to Obsolescence

In 2012, the powerful inertia to keep schools and school districts the same continues to dampen and  neutralize any efforts to innovate and change how schools operate. We are still on a march to obsolescence.

A recent example of this inertia in North Carolina, was when school districts tried to innovate with changing their school calendars. School districts shifted their calendars to better align their semester schedules with student needs. But it was the powerful tourism lobby, Save Our Summers,  that then pushed lawmakers to set legal limits when schools can start and end because, as their web site says, they “seek to establish, protect and maintain a more traditional school calendar.” Maintaining a “traditional” school calendar was not about helping schools do a better job teaching kids, it was mostly about preservation of the status quo, and preserving the school calendar they enjoyed while attending Industrial Age schools, not to mention profit.

These kind of efforts are simply attempts to keep the same Industrial Age schools of the previous century. These forces of inertia are making our schools obsolete simply because too many of them are made up of people who hold tightly to a nostalgic view of an ideal standard school that never really existed, except in the minds of the few of them for which schools worked. As Frank Kelly, Ted McCain and Ian Jukes write in their book, Teaching the Digital Generation: No More Cookie-Cutter High Schools,

“The most important issue facing schools today is the reluctance of those in control of education to let go of what they are used to, whatever their role in the system.”

The people and forces at work to preserve our education system as it is are powerful and strong. There are the politicians who see nothing wrong with the school systems that provided them with opportunities, so they continue to make laws that prop up the Industrial Age schools and districts they know. Policymakers are often beholden to politicians because they are left with trying to create policy that follows the letter of the law and regulations developed by politicians. Teachers, who very often excelled under a 20th century, standardized, Industrial Age education, are reluctant to change teaching methodology because, after all, “It worked for me.” School and district administrators and staff are more engaged in carrying the dictates of policy from on high, and often do not see their place as “One to question why.” Then there are parents, who very often had positive school experiences when they were in school, so they want the exact same schools for their children.

Is it any wonder with all these forces at work, that most reform occurs at the edges of our school system as Milton Chen describes in his book Education Nation: Six Leading Edges of Innovation in Our Schools? Is it any wonder we spend most of our time tweaking schedules, lengthening school days, implementing new sets of standards and new testing, and trying to force technology to help us educate students as we always have done? And yet our drop out rates only improve marginally, student measures are down. Our schools are still on the road to obsolescence, because we are still engaged in practices that preserve 20th century Industrial age schooling.

Here’s a list of some of those practices that are really moving our schools to obsolescence:

• We still design and build schools structurally the way they always have been. While I certainly do not advocate building the open school buildings of the 60s and 70s and causing that fiasco, today, it seems little thought seems to go in the designs of our school buildings. We are still building structures containing distinct classrooms to house students in assembly-line manner to push them through the grades, like products. Perhaps we should be building schools with flexible learning spaces with walls easily removed and reconfigured to meet the needs of students, rather than fitting students to the needs of the building. Perhaps we shouldn’t even build high schools all with the same departmental classroom groupings. Maybe to meet the needs of students, classrooms are arranged by areas of interest or study, with core content teachers working within these instead of departments. Or, maybe one high school need only have art studios, music studios, or an acting theater rather than a football stadium and science labs. Such a school would be structured to meet the needs of art students, rather than STEM or athletics. In other words, we need to design school buildings to meet the needs of all 21st century students, rather than trying to fit students in predetermined school structures that have no flexibility

• In many of our schools, we still have teachers engaged in teaching the same ways they have always taught and were taught. The argument that lecture is a perfectly fine method of teaching because it worked for me is a step toward obsolescence. We need to stop trying to fit students to teaching and instruction, and instead, fit teaching and instruction to the needs of students. Students need to have the options of learning traditionally if they wish, but they also need to be able to learn through project-based or problem-based learning if that fits their needs. They need to be able to engage in online learning and internships if those fit their learning needs. They need to be able to engage in the kinds of learning that fits them, instead of schools trying to force students to learn in ways that do not work for them.

• We still are too often engaged in finding ways to get technology to help us educate as we always have instead of using technology to reinvent teaching and learning. Students typing 5 paragraph essays on computers hardly qualifies as technology integration. Having teachers use PowerPoint to enhance their lectures hardly makes for 21st century teaching. Using the Internet solely as an information source, instead of a tool to engage in global learning and connecting, hardly means using it for 21st century learning. Our schools still plod toward obsolescence because we still think of technology as a means to do the things we’ve always done better, rather than using it to reinvent what we are able to do.

• We still sacrifice kids to uphold policy and procedure rather than developing policy and procedures to meet the needs of kids. How many times do we prevent a student from taking a higher level course simply because they do not have the requisite “seat time” in another class, especially when we know that student is perfectly capable to being successful in that class? How many times do we keep students in our buildings all day simply because our regulations say they have to be in the building 7.5 hours, when it would be to their advantage to spend some time working at the animal shelter? How many times have we had to purchase “state adopted” textbooks and materials because the rules only allowed us to purchase those items, when other materials would work better for our kids? Our march toward obsolescence also includes a hard-headed unwillingness to enforce and abide by policy, procedures, and regulations even though they are not always in the best interest of kids.

• We are hard at work standardizing our schools, our curriculums, our tests, and even our instructional materials. In public education, there is a strong force that says anomalies and differences are bad. We push for schools that are same, from how they are arranged to even how their web pages are designed. Our government pushes for a standardized curriculum for all in spite of the fact that we know all students do not learn the same way, and don’t even have the same interests. We tell ourselves,  “We’re going to make scientists and mathematicians of them whether they like or not.” We give standardized tests, so that we can “measure” both students and educators and see if we have “added any value” to our students as they have progressed through our Industrial Age assembly line schools. We have policymakers pushing for e-textbooks and tablets that merely make books electronic and encourage the same kinds of learning we’ve always done. Never mind that some students do not learn best from text whether it is electronic or paper. Our efforts to standardize everything demonstrates that Industrial Age thinking still has a tenacious hold on our schools in the march toward obsolescence.

• We are still caught thinking of school as something “done to kids” between the hours of 8 AM and 3 PM. We force teenagers into classrooms at 7:30 AM when all the research in the world, and common sense, says their intelligent thinking capacities don’t really kick in until much later in the morning. We allows bus schedules and lunch schedules drive when teaching and learning occurs instead of fitting those things to teaching and learning. We allow sports practices to dictate when school ends for all high school students, when there are some who would excel under a class schedule that extends into the early evening. We march toward obsolescence because we refuse to fundamentally rethink the school day.

I do not advocate change for change’s sake. It is just as easy to get caught up in the thinking that we have to change something because it needs changing. Many of the tweaks and changes being made to our schools are the product of this kind of thinking. Yet, our schools continue to march toward obsolescence because we are not willing to fundamentally let got of our own nostalgic view of schools and school districts. The key to moving away from obsolescence to innovation and invention is perhaps in not holding anything sacred. We must be willing question everything about our schools and school districts. By trying to find ways to preserve and better what has clearly not worked for all students in the past is a sure way to continue our march to obsolescence.

3 Lessons Schools Can Learn From an Obsolete Hometown Newspaper

Today, I was attempting to read an article from our local newspaper's website. I was trying to access an article through my RSS Reader, when I got the following pop-up:

Subscribe Now

Thanks for being a frequent visitor to HickoryRecord.com. You've now viewed your monthly allowance of 5 free premium articles. We're glad you enjoy our site.

Want to read more? For full access, please purchase a monthly or annual Online Unlimited digital subscription for as little as $4.95/month.

If you are already a print subscriber, you can upgrade your account to receive complete access to hickoryrecord.com and our E-Edition. If you have already purchased your online access with your print subscription, just click "Next" below to enroll or call us at 828-384-6479 to upgrade your newspaper subscription to include our digital services.

Our small town newspaper, The Hickory Daily Record, is a mediocre newspaper at best for a number of reasons. First of all, I was once a subscriber, but I stopped home delivery because there would be stretches of days I would not receive it. I would then have to call their office, and the paper seemed content to just give me a credit when I did not receive it rather than find a way to deliver a paper. They inevitably did this rather than resolve the issue of delivery. Secondly, there's not a been a great deal of content in its pages for quite sometime. The paper edition is primarily advertisements, and the paper has had to cut its reporting staff back so much, they aren't even capable of providing the news, except what  news comes to them. Finally, the Hickory Daily Record has become irrelevant as a news source in our region. I can access free news channels such as our local TV stations, and the Charlotte Observer's site and get more information about the happenings in my hometown  than I can in my hometown newspaper. In all honesty, The Hickory Daily Record has become little more than a neighborhood newspaper with absolutely no impact on the community. It is a dinosaur that is still trying to avoid extinction. In some ways, I think public education is trying to avoid the same fate.

As you can see from the pop-up message I received, I could continue reading the article I wanted to see if I paid them $4.95 a month, but I won't pay them and I won't read the article. The whole problem is, the content offered by the Hickory Daily Record isn't worth $4.95 a month to me. You can scan their web site in less than 5 minutes. Unlike the larger newspapers, there isn't a wealth of content, certainly not 5 dollars a month worth. All this brings me to my point, "Newspapers basically still do not get it." While I have no idea how profitable the Hickory Daily Record's efforts to charge for online content is, it can't be sustainable. A glance at their site tells your they offer no amazing exclusive content you can't find elsewhere. A lot of the articles are from news wire services that offer the same text free. And, there is so little news content to begin with, in comparison to larger news sites. The bottom line is my small town newspaper is still caught in 20th century ways of delivering content and appears to be doing little to change. I can't help but wonder if our schools are still caught in the same time warp. We still try to deliver education the way we've always done too. So what can schools learn from my small town newspaper's predicament? Here's three things for thought:

1. In a digital age, we can't simply take what we've always done and post it online or digitize it and call it education. Our technology is clearly disrupting how we do things in our schools, and we'll not contain that force by trying to simply package what we're doing into 21st century packages. We need to fundamentally re-think and re-engineer everything we do in schools and take full advantage of the possibilities of the digital age.

2. We need to fundamentally re-think our digital content which is student learning. If newspapers want to have a hope of surviving online or off, they have to focus on content. People will only pay for content if they see it as engaging or useful, and if they can't get it elsewhere. As schools in the digital age, we must focus on our own "content" which is student learning. Everything we do, from front office procedures to instructional strategies in the classroom need to be about student learning. We need stop being distracted by everything that is not about student learning.

3. Twenty-first century schools need to acknowledge the competition. Newspapers like my small hometown paper haven't done this very well. They are still holding on to the belief that they offer something readers can't get elsewhere. They haven't acknowledged the competition. Whether charter schools, private schools, or virtual schools are better at raising student achievement is still debatable. That argument probably will not be settled any time soon, and most likely it will never be settled. The reality for public schools is that we have competition. Instead of expending large amounts of time discrediting the competition, let's use that energy to make our public schools better. Let's focus on what is most important.

Everyone knows newspapers haven't fared well under the onslaught of web content. Most barely survive. Some have learned that users will pay for content, if that content is of high quality, and if users can't get that same content from elsewhere. My hometown newspaper is still caught in an old paradigm that believes they can approach web content like they did paper content. They can simply post the same content from their newspaper online and people will pay for it. Of course they have tried to add some unique content like videos and information data bases, but its hard to say they've changed their content delivery model very much.  Maybe some will pay 5 dollars a month for this content, but I won't and I am sure many others won't as well. The newspaper is losing me as potential customer and I am sure there are others. If they want me to click that "Pay $4.95 Month" button they need to give me something I do not already have. Public schools would do well learn from this too. If our students aren't getting the education our parents want them to have, they aren't going to keep paying for our schools either. We have to give them the kinds of student learning they can't get elsewhere.

5 Indications Your Leadership Is Obsolete for 21st Century Schools

In October, I posted “Top 10 Signs Your School Is Caught in a Time Warp: List for School Leaders.” Of course the whole idea behind that post was to call attention to those leadership proclivities that are actually hindering movement toward a 21st century learning environment.

Now, let me be just a bit more direct in this post. Here’s the list of indications that your school leadership is obsolete and in need of a big upgrade.


1. You actually find yourself defending school policies that ban the use of cell phones in your building. Cell phone bans need to go the way of the slate and chalkboards. Instead of prowling the halls to catch students with cell phones out, how about getting students to use them constructively? Besides, if a cell phone disrupts class, it is the user that actually disrupts the class, not the phone. Cell phone bans are a waste of administrative energy and time.

2. You defend adamantly the use of Internet filters on your school networks. I know all about the CIPA compliance issues and all, but perhaps your leadership is just a bit outdated and your knowledge of computers inadequate if you actually think filters work. Let’s face it, most districts put filters on their networks, not because they work, but because they allow them to keep their funding. If you really want to know whether your Internet filters are working, just ask a student. The smile on their face says a great deal. Heck, some of them might even show you one way they use to get to Facebook even though it’s supposed to be blocked.

3. You brag about the number of computers, smartboards, or iPads you have in your building. I have to point the finger to myself a bit on this one. It’s darn hard to resist boasting about your computer-to-student ratio when a fellow administrator brags about his, but the truth is, it really doesn’t matter if you have 3 computers to every student if no one is using them effectively for learning. Administrators have historically boasted about needing an iPad for every student or a laptop for every student. I’ve even heard school principals boast about having Smartboards in every classroom. Truth is, it’s not the numbers that matter; it’s what students and teachers are doing with those devices that matters.

4. You see Facebook and other social media as one of the biggest menaces of modern society.  Granted, I will admit I’ve dealt with enough “Facebook-connected issues” that I sometimes think “Zuckerberg” should be a bad word. But, social media is our reality; it’s our students’ reality. We can’t keep blocking it out with the hopes that it will go away. It will, in some form, outlast us all. Instead, let’s figure out some way to use social media educationally. We all might learn something.

5.  You think learning occurs only within the confines of your building’s classrooms under the direction of your teachers. Our students are learning about things they care about in spite of us. Classrooms are not the only places where student curiosity is satisfied (if they ever were). Our students are engaged in massive learning on their own while sitting with digital devices wherever they happen to be. It’s time to measure learning by something other than seat time and length of class periods. Perhaps we could even figure out a way to channel all that energy to learn to accomplish our educational goals.

School leaders suffering from “obsolete leadership” really do prevent schools from becoming 21st century learning places. Perhaps someday we’ll quit trying to defend the rules and question why the rules exist in the first place. That said, I am positive there are others indicators that could be added to this list.