Why Saying “I’m Doing What’s Best for Students” Isn’t the Best Rationale

One of the most common utterings you will hear from school leaders is, “I’m going to do what’s best for kids” when justifying or providing reasons for actions taken. But, is saying that justification enough?

By using the justification that actions are “what’s best for students,” the addressor, or one uttering that phrase, is staking claim to the higher moral ground. Educators, for the most part and by nature, became so because of their concern for the learning and well-being of the young. So, when one claims what one is doing is “best for students,” the immediate reaction by other educators is simply acceptance and obedience. Most times, not one asks for further explanation and proof either. But what if that action really isn’t the best for students?

As a school leader, I am so self-aware when I use that phrase and when others use it too. Sometimes it is tossed around so much, it almost loses its real power to justify anything. But when we use that phrase as school leaders, do we really know that what we’re doing or asking others to do is “best” for kids? It might very well be in our minds that it is, but the history of education is riddled with schemes and ideas that were “what’s best for kids too."

Should we not be a little hesitant to use this phrase? After all, we don’t get a grade of “A” in leadership when we were well-intentioned. I don’t get the consolation prize of knowing that, “Well, I did really mean well when I decided to trash the school’s arts program in favor of more reading instruction” because I thought it best for students to be able to read rather than play the violin or paint a landscape. Never mind that there just might have been a Mozart, or a Shakespeare in the midst of bloom in my school that was stamped out by my actions.

Perhaps we should discard the phrase “doing what’s best for students” from our leadership practice. I suspect it’s another thing of many that educational leaders have borrowed from the field of business and industry leadership. In business, there exists a true bottom-line. You need to make a profit, and to do that, you delineate the bottomline to make that happen. And, as leader, you simply make your decisions align with that.

But I don’t really think there’s a ‘bottomline’ in education. Things are not just that simple. Perhaps there’s a bottomline for every single student who walks in the hallways of our schools, and because of this, there’s absolutely, no way, we can say with 100% confidence, that what we do is in the best interest of all our students. We are fallible human beings in spite of what our college educational leadership programs tried to tell us.

One major lesson I’ve learned from educational leadership? Abolutely certainty will surely get you into trouble. I honestly think I know less about being an educational leader now than when I started. What this really means in practical terms is that I am a fallible human who can’t always say definitively that my decisions are “What’s Best for Kids!”

How to Be an Educator When Thinking Has Become Dangerous

"Thinking has become dangerous in the United States and the symptoms are everywhere." Henry Giroux, Dangerous Thinking: In the Age of the New Authoritarianism

 For all the talk and blather about teaching students to think critically and creatively, we need to face the reality that much of our political and educational establishment is actually more interested in conformity, and teaching others to think in certain privileged ways. For example, with all the talk that comes with education as the engine of the economy, also comes the worship of greed, free-market fundamentalism, and simple form of idolatry that places the "businessman" as the salvation of all that is good and wonderful. Schools are seen as the producers of workers for industry. Art and music is irrelevant and unnecessary. Education is not about thinking critically; it is about making sure our students accept and conform to a culture that pursues economic interests, and selfish individual interests at the expense of everything else, with the belief, that in the end, all will be well in such a society.

The current predicament we face in this 21st century isn't just about jobs for our students; it is whether or not the world we are leaving them will even be inhabitable. Instead of educating students how to work the machines in the factory down the road, we need to be teaching them to be problem-solvers, creative thinkers, and dare I say, teaching them to be willing to be non-conformists?

Non-conformity is not always a negative. There are plenty of examples of constructive non-conformity in our history. Had the forefathers of our country chosen the path of conformity, we certainly would not have the country we have today. I realize that is a bit of tired thinking, but I think it illustrates a simple point that should be a part of our educational philosophy for 21st century thinking. You simply sometimes can't think outside the box when conformity matters most. You can't always expect different results when you insist on playing by the rules set by others. Sometimes you need to invent new rules, or simply refuse to play by the old ones, and invent an entirely new game.

As Giroux points out, "Thinking has become dangerous" and I would agree it has especially become dangerous in the United States in our current political climate. But, if we are going to push the limits and be "dangerous educational innovators," we are going to have to engage in the unsafe. We are going to have to be critical and creative thinkers, and question the official, and dare I say even resist. Ultimately, we can by example teach our students to be "dangerous thinkers" who can disturb the present by being willing to question and even think dangerously ourselves.

Sometimes You Can't Feel the Same Way About E-Books as a Real Book

As I sit here surrounded by books, working and writing, I can't help but think back just a couple years ago, when I started amassing e-books. I purchased both a Kindle and a Nook reader, set up a Google Books account too. I was converted: I moved my reading into the 21st century. Now? I have become a backslider, as evidenced by this photo. Why have I fallen from the faithful? It's really not very complicated at all.

When I started my doctoral degree, I tried to purchase e-books as much as possible, often from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Google Books, and iBooks, mainly because some titles were not always available as an e-book from one of the publishers. There were even quite a number of books not available as e-books at all. It was toward the middle of the program that I discovered that there just wasn't a way to replace being able to hold the book in my hand, take a pencil and underline and then write notes in the margins. All of the e-books readers offer the ability to highlight and make notes, but being able to do this in pencil just seemed to help me wrestle with the texts, and those who have worked on doctoral degrees know that there is a great deal of "text-wrestling" to be done. I could thumb back through the pages I marked up to quickly retrieve a note or an idea that I had during my original reading.

Still, I am not sure I have a totally rational reason for my almost-complete move back to e-books unless it as the current state of my study shows: I can stack the books around and see simultaneously, in one glance, where I've textually been and where I am going.

A few years ago I heard the chatter that physical books were going the way of 8-tracks, cassette tapes and vinyl records, but here it is about four or five years later, and the total demise of physical books has not yet occurred. What has occurred is the blunting of my enthusiasm for e-books. Sure, I still purchase them, especially if it's a title I would like to see immediately, but many times I have elected to the physical book instead. I even find myself thumbing through the new titles on Amazon's website to see if there are books I might want to pick up at the local bookstore. It turns out the failure of e-books to eradicate physical books wasn't enough,  and it seems that vinyl records, 8-Tracks, and cassette tapes are coming back as well, though I have yet to long for those yet.

I've heard and keep hearing all these predictions about how this technology is going to revolutionize this industry, and how this device is going to make some old standard way of doings things obsolete, but it just doesn't seem to be happening with the same level of frequency anymore. In my case, I literally enjoy the comfort of being surrounded by books that I am reading. That's just not something they've figured out how to get out of Kindle app yet.

Be Wary of Products Claiming to Be ‘Research-Based’

I receive countless emails during a given week from vendors of software, textbooks, and other instructional materials. A number of these throw the term “research-based” around like a badge of validation. The truth is, I can’t help but be skeptical.

"Products claiming to be ‘research-based’ throw around that label like a badge of validation."

Recently, a vender sent me an email for some redial reading software and in that email was the claim to be “research-based.” I emailed the sales person and asked them to send me copies of the research studies that validate their product. The email I received was links to simple generic titles of studies that indirectly validate the “supposed methods” and psychological principles on which their product is based. There was not a single study that actually “validated” their specific product. That hardly, in my opinion, gives them validation as a “research-based” effective product.

"Having a product that claims to be ‘based’ on research-based principles of learning is not the same has having a product that is validated by research."

If we were operating in a more skeptical world, when we ask for “research” that a vendor claims validates their product, I honestly think we should ask for specific independent studies that examine their product.Being “based” on research-based principles does not validate that specific product.

"Being ‘based’ on research-based or scientific educational principles does not validate the product."

I realize that is a very high hurdle for edupreneurs and educational product developers to traverse, but if you’re going to say that your product is “research-based,” you have an obligation to prove that your specific product is just that. Otherwise, your language should simply say that your product is based on research-based learning principles, and then provide documentation for those principles.

"If a company claims their product is 'research-based,’ then that company is obligated to provide those validating studies."

We as educators should not be naive and be willing to ask the tough questions when salespersons call. Just because the product was developed by an educator, or is being sold by an administrator you knew a long time ago, does not mean that we accept their word either. We owe it to our stakeholders and our students to make sure our limited funds aren’t wasted on bogus educational materials or products.

The End of Ed-Tech Evangelism: Using Your Critical Faculties to Question Tech Obsession

One of the identifying characteristics of my blog, this blog, has been that it "advocates for the use of technology." Since the very first post here, I've often joined the educator chorus of singing the praises of "technology in education." Now, a few years later, I am beginning to wonder, in the spirit of Nicholas Carr, that perhaps I've been more "evangelist" than educator when it comes to "advocating for technology." I've been "spreading the gospel of technology use in the classroom and in my role as principal" for several years now, and I've come to some certain "Carrisian" (if I may invent a new word) realizations about technology myself which can be summed up thus: Technology is no panacea; it doth not an effective educator make.

Before the virtual spitballs start flying in my direction, let me explain myself a bit further. Being a "Tech Evangelist" gets it all wrong. There is "no gospel of ed technology." There's nothing to convert people to, and there's no salvation to be found in outfitting out classrooms with gadgets galore. Placing 30 laptops in a room does not necessarily transform that room into the new center of learning in Western Civilization. Why? It's simply this: the greatest feats of learning are not always found on the screens of our smartphones and tablet screens. No matter how much we try to convince ourselves, that "tech is better," sometimes a pad of paper and our favorite fountain pen is a much better way to engage our thoughts and the world.

Educators, I'm afraid, have been "spreading a utopian view of technology," as Nicholas Carr calls this technoevangelicalism, for some time now. I've engaged in that myself. I've been guilty of viewing any educational progress as "essentially technological." And, this means, I've been a part of the problem of "legitimizing" all these edupreneurs and opportunists who bombard my email inbox every day with promises of sure entrance into the "academic achievement promise land" if I will only purchase their products. Educational technology is the land of opportunity for many; including those who peddle snake oil and latest elixirs that cure every ailment in our schools. By being uncritical and faithful to the ed tech creeds, I am just as guilty as anyone of enabling that "commercial culture" that puts the profits of self and others ahead of what is sometimes best for the students in my building. No more.

If anything, ed technology needs it's own version of "Food and Drug Administration" that forces these edpreneurs and technoevangelists promoting their wares to provide solid evidence of their claims. Educators are a trusting lot. They want so much to believe that the nice gentlemen plugging his software program or tech device, or any other educational ware, really wants what they want: what's best for kids. But, while that may be true, understand that he is out to sell a product, not take care of your students.

We have the greatest "FDA" faculty in our heads as educators. We talk about critical thinking and independent thinking, then we need to exercise it when it comes to any educational product or technology. Anyone can claim their product is "research-based" and the best thing to happen to education since chalkboards. Yet, we are ultimately responsible for using this critical faculty to ask the tough questions of anyone promoting a product or even idea. We owe it to our own integrity and most of all to the kids we face each and every day.

By spreading a utopian view of technology, a view that defines progress as essentially technological, they've encouraged people to switch off their critical faculties and give Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and financiers free rein in remaking culture to fit their commercial interests" Nicholas Carr, Utopia Is Creepy and Other Provocations

A Career Caught in the Swirl of Ed Reform: What I’ve Discovered

My entire career as an educator, all 27 years, has been spent in the perpetual swirl of “reform” that enveloped education when I first set foot into the classroom. It was in the cusp of the “Era of Accountability” that I began teaching, and the clarion calls for site-based management, uniform standards, and testing were just beginning to resound. Soon to follow was the Total Quality Classroom movement, multiple intelligence theory, and right-left brain theory, critical thinking teaching, thinking maps, and whole host of other initiatives. There has been no shortage on theory during my career as an educator that’s for sure, and during my entire career, we’ve been reforming education, then reforming our reform in an unending pursuit of a “magical land” where schools succeed, except that there’s been one major problem: we’ve never arrived.

I don’t mean to sound pessimistic in this reflection; in fact, I’m not really that way at all. I am nostalgic in one sense, because there has always been that anticipation of the next great idea that comes around the bend, and the promise that all our educational ills will finally be resolved. Those who’ve promoted this atmosphere of perpetual reform, have, after all, succeeded even if our schools may not really be any better off. It’s those who’ve capitalized on these reforms by promoting products, professional development, computer programs and websites, and new techniques and strategies who have earned a bundle. The promise of their being one single way to resolve the educational puzzle has led many to search high and low, and our market-based approach to these products has not disappointed, at least for those who’ve made the money.

Still, I’ve come to a cold, hard conclusion that is, in fact, very liberating. It is simply this: There is no magical theory out there or discovery that will allow us to suddenly be able educate like we’ve never done before. There is no one best way to teach, and as we already know, there is no one best way to learn. Despite all these infernal emails I get that promise to "raise my students’ ACT scores or SAT scores to exorbitant heights," in the end their promises are more marketing than reality, and in many cases, downright deceptive. Education has become a money making enterprise like everything else, with “experts” arising from all corners of the field with their version of the “final solution to all our education problems.”

My liberating conclusion that all of these are mostly empty promises frees me to view education as the difficult work it is with problems that do not, nor ever will have singular solutions.

Reform has become such a cliche now, every time I hear a politician say the word, I want to flee in panic, or hit him with a rotten tomato. It just won’t happen. Perhaps real “reform” will begin and end with ourselves rather than continuing the fruitless quest for magic. Real reform begins with the liberating thought: “There are no easy answers or solutions to discover about our educational system. There’s only hard work to be done."

Why Pursue a Doctoral Degree? You Might Be Changed By It!

I think it is fairly obvious that I haven't posted anything here in some time. Some have probably thought I dropped off this earth, and there are perhaps those, because of my sometimes irritatingly political posts, who hoped that such had happened. The truth is, so much of my time is consumed with working on my dissertation that blogging has taken backseat. The constant reading, writing, and journaling takes just about every spare moment I have, and when there is a moment I am not working in my role as principal of a small high school, and working on this infernal degree, I am sometimes too tired to even look at a computer screen. In spite of all these travails though, I would gladly engage in this pursuit of a doctoral degree and would encourage others to do so too. Here's why.

This scholarly endeavor has changed me in dramatic ways. I don't look at education, my job, or even leadership in the same way any more. I now find myself entangled with the Postmodernists, Poststructuralists, and Deconstructionists. Now, I won't subject anyone to any attempt to explain those terms. If you're an English teacher, you probably encountered these schools of thought (if that is what they are) in your literary criticism classes as I did. To be honest, I didn't pay much attention to them then. But what's different for me now, is that here toward the latter years of my career as an educator, the likes of Foucault, Derrida, and Deleuze once again haunt both my work, my thoughts, and even my writing. They have unsettled everything I once believed to be "education science."

Once again, I won't subject you to a biography or description of the contributions of these individuals to literary or cultural studies; I simply say that these Postmodernists-Poststructuralists-Deconstructionists have  disturbed me as a practicing educator and educational leader. How can that be? Through them, I've learned that I don't really know as much as I thought I did, and many of those things I took for granted as "truth" are not the truth. Even my daily actions and thoughts about what it means to be an "effective educator" is not as simple as it once was. The intellectual challenge that these thinkers have wrought has made me more inquisitive, and even more skeptical it that was possible, of this thing we call education and all the "science" in which we wrap it.

In effect, I've actually come home, because in these thinkers, I've found the permission and means to continue to be skeptical, which I've always been when it comes to those promising "educational elixirs" and promises of quick cures. It's as if I've been given free reign to question and examine relentlessly all these things about education that we take for granted and take as a given. As the intellectual leader of my school, I have come to understand that "experts" in education are sometimes better at selling their wares than actually improving our field, but that is another blog post altogether.

All these years I've talked about leadership practices, teaching practices, and practices of engaging in using technology. Now, due to my explorations and doctoral readings and studies, I walk around each day on my job with each of these enclosed in quotation marks. In fact, every time I hear another educator or education consultant use the word "research-based," I see the quotation marks there too. Why is that? It is because these postmodernists-poststructuralists-deconstructionists have disturbed what I took for granted as the boundaries of our field of education. My dissertation experience has fostered a new habit of mind that demands that I be both inquisitive and question relentlessly.

Some would see no practical value in being this way. I disagree. This "ethos of critique" I live in now has freed me to think even more outside the box than ever. If we want to innovate and be creative, we have to suspend the rules and think in ways that are out of bounds. Besides, who was it that got to decide what is "out-of-bounds?" There's a long list of individuals whose thought was initially out-of-bounds. Now, I am not so Trump-like to say that "only I can solve the problems of education," but I enjoy thinking beyond the boundaries now more than ever.

So, what has this dissertation journey done for me so far? It is teaching me to think "out-of-bounds" and not worry whether some other educator-referee is going to call me on it. After all, who made them referee?