Education Revisited

I have gotten involved in a dialog on a blog, “studentsfirtst.org”, sponsored by an organization founded by Michelle Rhee a former head of Washington DC’s school department. Its goal is to improve education with a focus on charter schools and elimination of tenure. It has gained the support of conservative governors, proponents of privatized education and opponents of unions. Following and responding to several postings on this blog, I have thought a lot about education recently. In my previous posting on “Education” I spoke about the need to ensure that all children are educated so that we can put the best of all of our players onto the very competitive global ball field. I feel this is still the case.

Much of the discussion is centered on improving education by two primary means. One is to get rid of poor teachers by eliminating tenure and unions. The other is to allow parents a greater say in education and provide them with the ability to choose the school their children will attend. I have an issue with the first because I believe that not unions but lazy administrators or better yet, lazy voters, are the problem with “bad” teachers and as a corollary to this, I am not sure that the suggested metrics for evaluating teachers are valid and effective ones don’t exist. There have been studies referenced that indicate that 90% of the problems with education reside outside the classroom so if there is validity to these studies, eliminating bad teachers only addresses 10% of the problem. (That’s not to say it shouldn’t be done).

The second point is the one I have the greatest issue with. I agree that parental involvement is key to a child’s education. But my feeling is that the reason our K-12 education is slipping is not because of unions protecting “bad” teachers but a decline in parenting brought about by the economic and social changes in the last few decades. Following is a quote from a book I am reading , “Ownership Solution by Jeff Gates Published in 1998, which I received as a gift when I sold/transferred 30% of ownership to the employees. The gist of the book from what I can glean from only the first couple of dozen pages is that current Capitalism is a closed loop system within which the rich get richer and poor get poorer. This is not sustainable long term. If not corrected, the system to collapse. The author suggests expanded ownership as a way to preserve Capitalism. (but that’s another posting) However in the book he makes a point that supports my concern about the decline in parenting ability. Following is a quote from the book:

“Laura Tyson, former chairman of President Clinton’s Council of Economic Advisors, contends that, from 1978 through 1991, the inflation adjusted median income showed no change, despite and increase in hours worked. The lower the level of skills, the worse the impact. The average adjusted earnings for non-supervisory American workers was the same in 1993 as in 1959, when Eisenhower was president. For those with only a high-school education, entry-level wages fell 39% from 1973 to 1993.Despite the long-heralded promise of labor-saving advances, the average American’s paid work year increased by 163 hours between 1970 and 1993, equivalent to adding an extra month of toil for no additional income. This is the first recorded economic boom in which real wages of the median worker fell.

The impact of this dramatic shift continues to ripple through American society. For the first time in history, the United States has a generation destined to experience a standard of living lower than that of their parents. As two-income families become the norm, a nationwide “parenting deficit” (my emphasis) undermines the family and tears at the core of the social fabric. An entire generation is growing up in conditions where family stability and failure are now commonplace. ” Crime continues to skyrocket while armed security guards emerged as the fastest growing segment of Americas highly touted “service Sector”.”

From what I understand, Miss Rhee’s project proposes funds be provided to parents who want to choose to send kids to private or public “charter” schools. My fear is that the kids of parents who are sufficiently concerned with their kids education to study advantages of different schools and select alternatives are probably sufficiently involved with their kids anyway and they will be OK under most circumstances (I know there are exceptions in the poorest neighborhoods where often it is dangerous for kids to go to school). The funds that will be directed to these schools and parents will take away from the kids of parents who haven’t the time, energy or skill to help with the kid’s education.

What I have been trying to propose is that we review the entire method of teaching and while continuing to provide education for the kids with talented parents, focus on a system wherein kids education is less and not more reliant on contribution from the parents. I heave read a number of articles and books where it is stated that kids of more affluent parents have an advantage because of the amount of time parents spend interacting with them. Though it is very difficult for single parent household or ones where both parents have to work, parents do, through heroic effort, still provide good parenting. I feel their effort is not adequately recognized or appreciated.

Part of the solution, along with improving teacher quality might be expending the school time, hours and weeks. For parents who are sufficiently interactive with the children this may not be an advantage so the system could allow parents to opt out of the extended school day and year. The act of opting out suggests that they do have the time. The curriculum could be structured so that the core study is done during times comparable to what we have now and other “softer subjects” could be taught during the extended times. Parents who, because of many different circumstances cannot properly interact with their kids will welcome the opportunity for them to spend more time in school. Of course, reversing the “parenting deficit” trend Jeff Gates speaks of would be the “root cause” solution. But I am afraid that that will take several decades and we don’t have the time if we intend to maintain our World leadership role.