Back to School

MathTeacher had a good comment (as usual) yesterday.

Agreed that (teaching in a No Excuses school) is hard to sustain. For all of us still in the profession after more than a few years (I’m heading into year 8 of no excuses charter school teaching), there are many we’ve watched leave our schools. We’re getting ready to start another school year next week and there are going to be a lot of new people to meet.

I always feel as if there is a tension around this issue. Schools like ours seem to take one of two tactics:

1) Embrace the reality of burn-out and organize themselves with the tacit understanding that they will burn through most of their teachers in 1-3 years.

or

2) Try to figure out ways to make the job more sustainable so the school benefits from having more experienced teachers.

Of course it’s not an either/or – there’s a balance to be found and every school finds its own equilibrium.

As someone who considers whether to leave every couple of years, (but for now keeps signing on because I love my school and believe so strongly in our work), one of my biggest stressors is when my school makes a choice that makes it seem like the first model is in ascendance. It makes me wonder if my experience is valued, and whether I can really sign on for another year and continue to do a good job.

(What are these choices: continuing to ask for more time or responsibilities, or a reorganization that takes autonomy or decision-making from teachers. These kinds of choices make sense when the reality is churning through young teachers, but makes less sense when experience is valued.)

Of course, that being said, for now I’m pretty happy with the balance we’ve found as I head into my 5th year here.

The LA Times had a story on the same topic: charter school teacher departure rates. From the story:

In the instant of a job change, Joshua Cook went from being one of the youngest teachers at Crenshaw High, a traditional school in Hyde Park, to nearly the oldest at Animo Justice, a charter school south of downtown Los Angeles.

He was 32, with two years of teaching experience.

Three years later, he had another distinction: He became one of the astonishingly large numbers of teachers who left a Los Angeles charter school.

Around 50% of teachers in charter middle and high schools left their jobs each year over a six-year period studied by UC Berkeley researchers, who released their findings last week.

I averaged 70 hours a week of work, no problem, said Cook, who oversees student teachers for UCLA. The upside is that when you see positive outcomes, you feel like you are directly connected to them. But working 70- and 80-hour weeks is not sustainable.

50% is, I think, twice the Boston number. Id estimate teacher departure rates in Boston charter high schools and middle schools is 25% annually.

Clackamas High School Senior Jasmin Johnson is never content to hold the regular bake sale or carwash as a fundraiser.

As a way to raise money for her school’s drama, choir, band and orchestra program, Johnson is putting together musical theater classes taught by both young professionals and veteran theater instructors.

Students will be taught in voice, acting, and dance, Johnson said.

It’s not the first time Johnson has galvanized the arts community to help a cause: in 2009, she helped organize a concert to help pay the medical costs of Lake Oswego student Emme Ek, who was undergoing cancer treatment. Though Johnson didn’t know Ek personally, at the time she said she needed to help — echoing similar sentiments that helped spur the theater classes.

“I wanted to do something that could help somebody, but that I could also have fun with,” Johnson said.

The musical theater classes begin during the week of August 22 to 26 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Classes will be limited to 35 students and open to students in middle school and older. Limited scholarships will be available for the $250 fee for each class. The proceeds will go toward the arts program at Clackamas High.

You can visit the Facebook page for more information.

Questions about cheating could hinder efforts to improve schools The Washington Post
Suspicions of cheating in Pennsylvania and elsewhere may complicate efforts to create accountability via annual standardized tests.

PHL Freedom Rings: Internet access for students The Notebook blog
PSU alum Javier Morris reflects on Internet access as a human right and the new PSU computer center for students.

Pa. ethics panel says it didn’t have evidence to prove violations by former charter school head The Inquirer
The panel couldn’t prove violations by Vuong Thuy of Multi-Cultural Academy charter, but described his business dealings as “disturbing.”

Why Language Immersion? Philly School Search
Reprinted article from a language acquisition research center about the value of language immersion programs.

Wharton tests lesson plan, teens gain business smarts The Inquirer
The Knowledge@Wharton website now has a section for high school students, and includes lessons plans for teachers.

LISTEN NOW: Exposing the Threats Behind Vouchers PSU Blog

Keystone Exams “go to sleep” for a year Keystone State Education Coalition

Reflections of an Author- Penny for Your PSSA Test Thoughts City School Stories

Education & Parenting: Playing the ratings game Daily News (opinion)

Minority youth media consumption may be hampering academic achievement Philadelphia Sun

Please if we missed anything today or if you have any suggestions of publications, email lists, or other places for us to check for news.

Last year, 435 students who live in Beaverton attended schools in other districts.

They left for a variety of reasons ranging from specialized programs to parents’ divorces. They took with them roughly $2.1 million in state funds.

Meanwhile, 137 students entered Beaverton from other school districts, bringing with them about $700,000.

That 3-to-1 difference was costing Beaverton, which worked with superintendents across Washington County to better balance the give-and-take of students among all seven districts.

The Northwest Regional Education Service District helped draft a policy and rules for the transfer plan and will handle applications for all districts. Each district, however, will determine whether to allow or deny a student request.

Beaverton, which approved nearly all students wanting to leave the district, will likely benefit the most financially from the new rules — at least for next school year.

Here’s how it will work for the 2011-12 school year for all Washington County districts. Students who already attend schools outside their hometowns will be allowed to stay at the out-of-district school. However, kids wanting to attend outside districts for the first time may find it more difficult because the districts must maintain a balance (within five) of incoming and outgoing students.

“If the balance is already there, there won’t be much of a noticeable difference,” said Jim Mabbott, former NWRESD superintendent. “But when the imbalance is there, people will notice a change going forward.”

For example, 72 Hillsboro students transferred to Beaverton schools in 2010-11, but 136 Beaverton students attended Hillsboro schools. That’s a nearly 2-to-1 ratio. The new rules require a ratio closer to 1-to-1.

“If the two districts are beyond that (plus or minus five students), the answer is more than likely going to be ‘no,’” Mabbott said.

In other words, no new students would be allowed to transfer from Beaverton to Hillsboro next school year. However, students will be able to transfer from Hillsboro to Beaverton until the balance of students is more equal.

Several districts outside Washington County also have a large imbalance with Beaverton. Last year, 122 Beaverton kids attended Portland schools, but Portland approved only 13 students to attend Beaverton schools. Riverdale, near Lake Oswego, had 55 Beaverton students, but Beaverton had no Riverdale kids. Until the imbalance improves, no new students will be released to attend those districts.

If the student’s home district says ‘no,’ parents have the option to pay tuition in those districts, which is around $6,000 for most. Riverdale charges more than $11,000 tuition.

In Washington County, Beaverton has the largest imbalance, which will restrict more students from leaving. Most other districts appear to have an equal balance between each other, and new students hoping to attend those schools will fare better.

Word leaked out about the pending changes this spring, but no one informed parents who had already applied for their kids to attend other school districts.

In Hillsboro, Debbie Epling heard rumors and worried that her son and daughter would have to return from attending school in Banks.

“I would be a very unhappy parent,” she said. “I pay my taxes and I would like to choose the Banks area.”

Epling learned her kids, a ninth-grade daughter and an eighth-grade son, would be allowed to stay in Banks because they were already attending that district.

“I like the smaller environment and country atmosphere,” Epling said of Banks schools.

Just when parents have it all figured out, however, the process is expected to change for the 2012-13 school year as state legislation kicks into place. The new rules would require districts to release all students who want to attend schools in other districts.

Last week I had the chance to hear Douglas Rushkoff talk at the annual CSTA CS&IT Symposium. All of the conference attendees were also given a copy of his book Program or Be Programmed: Ten Commands for a Digital Age – I got mine autographed too! This week while on vacation I had a chance to read it. While it does not paint quite the dystopian view of the Internet that Sherry Turkle’s Alone Together: Why we Expect More From Technology and Less From Each Other it was concerning. Turkle’s book I found so discouraging and so scary that I honestly could not finish it. Rushkoff at least suggests a way out, a way we can make things better – learn to program. But it is is a mistake to look at Rushkoff’s book just as an argument for teaching more students to program. That seems to be the only message most reviewers get out of it. But there is more to the book than that.

There are “ten commands for a digital age” encapsulated in the book. “Program or Be Programmed” is the last of these ten commands. Each chapter is well written and has a huge number of items to contemplate. They do all sort of lead up to the last command but that is not all there is to it. Each of these chapters could be the source of a long, interesting and potentially useful discussion on its own. As I finished each chapter the same question came to mind – “What does it mean?” I’ve spent a lot of time on many of them. And they bring up still more questions.

For example, when I look at what it means to be a “friend” on the Internet today. Is it real? Is it just an advantage to marketing people more so than to us as individuals? One thought that came to mind was “how many friends would you or I have on Facebook if each one cost us a dollar a year to keep in the list?” Would all those cute girls accept hundreds of friend requests from boys they have never met? Would I have 350 friends including many I have never met? Would I pay a buck a year so my manager could see what I am up to? How would even a small cost change the way we look at Internet connections? Right now advertisers pay for Facebook. We who use Facebook (or Google or Bing or any one of many “free” services) are the product – what is being sold – not the customer who is paying for things. How would these sites be different if we were the paying customers?

Thinking about the programming piece again. When we look at history we see that changes are caused by people who create new things. John Deere and his brother changed the way of modern farming with their innovations in farm equipment. This lead to a reduction in the number of people who needed to work a farm which lead to more availability of people for industry. Industry was enabled by innovations in power from water to steam to electricity and the fractional horse power engine. Trains, cars, truck and airplanes changed the way transportation works. The printing press, which Rushkoff talks about a lot in his book, enabled more books to be created and read. The press was controlled for a long time though. Today everyone can publish via the Internet and that feels empowering. And it is empowering. But the way we publish is still largely controlled.

There are a few major blog engines and services. There are a few major social networks. The people who control those tools control to a large extent how we communicate. In short the gate, the determining factor of how we communicate is in the hands of the people who write the software. Every time Facebook changes something in the way it works people complain. With an audience as large as they have that is inevitable and unavoidable. But people remain because they lack the ability to do it (create their own Facebook) themselves. Sure perhaps something else may come along, Google+ is the new shinny object in social media, and maybe it will be better or just different enough. Trends come and go with amazing speed on the Internet. But these changes will come from programmers. Programming is power.

One of the things I hear from fans of Open Source software is “if you don’t like something you can fix it yourself!!” To which I reply, “Can you? Do you have the programming knowledge to make the change yourself?” Most people reply “ah, well no but I could pay some one to do it.” And that is the point. Having access to source code is valueless unless one has the knowledge and skill to manipulate it. At the same time if you do have that knowledge and skill you have the power to create it from scratch as well. If you think there is a better way and can program you have the power to do it better. If you don’t have the ability to program you are dependent on others.

I understand Rushkoff’s argument that by not creating programming our minds are susceptible to being changed/manipulated by people who do create programming (be it computers, TV or any other programming) and it makes some sense. But for me programming is about having the freedom to do it my way. A similar idea perhaps but a slightly different angle. Most applications train us to work the way they are set up (Rushkoff talks about that but I saw that first hand as a programmer in the 1970s). Programmers, because they create the program and the user interface as the ones who determine how work is done. If we have a way we think it should be done it is up to use to control the programming not the other way around. Whether we write the code ourselves, manage the development of code, or even have a say in what code is purchased a knowledge of programming is important and probably necessary.

So ask yourself this – are computers going to be an important part of your life in the future? Do you want to control your own destiny? If you answered both of those questions “yes” it’s probably pretty important to learn to program.