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28 February, 2007

AUSTRALIAN EDUCATION: THE LEFT NO LONGER HAVE IT ALL THEIR OWN WAY

There are many parallels between the Australian and American education scenes but, under strong Federal government leadership, the ignorant and destructive Leftist stranglehold on Australian education is at last beginning to be unwound -- as we see in the four current articles below:

Teachers to be tested on literacy

Student teachers will sit a literacy and numeracy test when starting their university course and teachers will have to undertake continuing education to qualify for registration and higher rates of pay under proposals tabled in Federal Parliament yesterday. A two-year inquiry into teacher education calls for a national accreditation system of university teaching courses, with accreditation made a condition of receiving federal funds, and for national teacher registration, to be administered by the states.

The report, Top of the Class, also calls for an increase in funding for education students, both while at university and when undertaking their practical component, and a one-year induction program for beginning teachers. It recommends the practical component be funded separately and not wrapped into the larger university grant as at present, and that overall funding for teaching courses be increased by about $1800 a full-time student.

Under the induction program, based on a Scottish model, new teachers would spend 20 per cent less time in face-to-face teaching. They would be assigned a qualified mentor, observe classes and undertake professional development courses. The mentor would be trained, given time to properly perform the role, and be paid for the job. The scheme would be voluntary to start and funded by the Federal Government contributing 10 per cent of a starting salary, and by the employer.

It also calls on the Federal Government to ensure that it better allocates the funding of teacher education places to address shortages in the workforce. At present, Australia is training too many primary school teachers and insufficient maths and science teachers.

Tabling the report in the House of Representatives yesterday, the chair of the education and vocational training committee, Luke Hartsuyker, said teacher education was not in crisis but that improvements could be made. "If we invest $1 in teacher education, we're going to provide an increased return on investment in every other dollar in the system," he said.

The report dismisses the idea of setting a minimum tertiary entrance score, believing it would preclude too many applicants and particularly a diverse candidature including indigenous students and those from a non-English speaking or low socioeconomic background. It instead recommends a diagnostic test to identify student teachers' problems with literacy and numeracy and provide them with remedial teaching. "Attention should be focused on the capabilities graduates have at the end of their courses rather than at the beginning," it says.

The report says only four of the 31 Australian universities training teachers require students to have studied maths in Year 12 and that a further eight required students to have Year 11 maths.

Source



It's the teachers who teach the teachers who are at fault

How effective is teacher training in Australia? The question is more than academic. After all, the quality and effectiveness of the classroom teacher is one of the most important determinants of successful learning. The commonwealth report on teacher training, Top of the Class, released yesterday, suggests that all is well and that there is no crisis.

Wrong. As University of Melbourne emeritus professor Brian Start points out, teacher training suffers from provider capture and there is little attempt to measure effectiveness. In 2005-06, Start contacted 38 teacher training institutions, asking whether there was any evidence of a link between teacher training - indicated by admission procedures and graduation scores for prospective teachers - and success, however defined, after teaching for three to six years. Not only did about half of the institutions fail to return the questionnaire but it appeared that none had undertaken any research investigating how effective their courses were in preparing teachers for the classroom.

According to Start in a paper given in Philadelphia last year: "Teacher education is a legal requirement for entering the teaching profession. Universities have a monopoly on this process (as) the providers. They select, train, qualify and certify graduates as competent to teach. Yet there does not appear to be any validity checks on the near billion-dollar enterprise."

Start argues that teacher training institutes are unaccountable. For evidence, consider a paper related to establishing the National Institute for Quality Teaching and School Leadership prepared by the Australian Council for Educational Research. "To our knowledge," the paper states, "no teacher education program or institution has ever been disaccredited, yet variation in quality is known to be considerable." It goes on: "Teacher education is arguably one of the least accountable and least examined areas of professional education in Australia."

It is easy to find evidence that beginning teachers are not being properly equipped to teach. Says one submission to the commonwealth parliamentary inquiry into teacher education, written by the Australian Secondary Principals Association and based on a questionnaire to 600 beginning teachers: "The respondents indicated that their colleagues at school had provided the most worthwhile support and advice with relatively little value being given to that provided by university personnel."

Not only does the ASPA submission argue that teacher training must better prepare teachers for the classroom but it concludes that teacher education "was at best satisfactory" as a preparation for teaching and in "several areas it is clear that they felt that they were significantly under-prepared".

A 2005 survey of beginning teachers, funded by the federal Government, identified literacy, especially the basics represented by spelling, grammar and phonics, as one area in which teachers lacked confidence and knowledge of effective teaching. Fifty-seven per cent of primary school teachers felt unprepared to teach phonics and 51 per cent of secondary teachers interviewed felt unprepared to teach reading.

Of course, it's not the teachers' fault that they struggle in the classroom. Blame rests with teacher education institutions that appear to be driven more by politically correct fads such as whole language - where children are taught to look and guess instead of sounding out syllables and words - and new age theories such as constructivism, where teachers no longer teach. Students, in the words of the commonwealth report Teaching Reading, are treated as "self-regulating learners who construct knowledge co-operatively with other learners in developmentally appropriate ways". And there's more: "Adoption of a constructivist approach in the classroom involves a shift from predominantly teacher-directed methods to student-centred, active discovery learning and immersion approaches via co-operative group work, discussion focused on investigations and problem solving."

During the past few years The Australian has detailed example after example of how the curriculum has been dumbed down and how standards have fallen. While some suggest teachers are at fault, the real culprits are those responsible for teacher education who fail to provide them with the right tools to do the job

Source



Schools dump soft options

The number of subjects Queensland's senior students can study will be slashed to fewer than 20 in the latest phase of the most widespread education reforms since the 1970s. A two-year review has recommended non-mainstream subjects such as recreation, tourism, retail and marine studies be scrapped to enable children to gain a deeper and broader knowledge in their chosen areas of study. Education Minister Rod Welford said the aim of the review was to reduce the "curriculum clutter". "Subject options have been growing like Topsy," Mr Welford said.

But he claimed that while the new system would offer fewer subjects, students would receive a broader education because they would not be specialising so narrowly. "There has been a knowledge explosion and we have to adjust accordingly," Mr Welford said.

The latest changes come less than a week after the Queensland Studies Authority recommended students in Years 1 to 10 go back to learning plain English. Selective state school academies for gifted students have also been introduced, while last month the first intake of Prep Year students began school.

The reforms reverse the trend in recent decades towards "new age" teaching methods which have come under sustained attack from federal Education Minister Julie Bishop and conservative academics.

Mr Welford said the move to cut the current offering of about 80 senior school subjects to between 16 and 20 subjects would add depth and flexibility. It would give students new options to study core subjects at basic and advanced level as well as the option of specialising in their areas of expertise. The new system, likely to be in place by 2009, would result in current subjects such as tourism, recreation, retail, manufacturing and marine studies being subsumed into broader subjects to be known as fields of learning. Mr Welford said the "fields of learning" would include maths, science, English, humanities, technology and design and business. "It will allow for a broader inter-disciplinary approach to allow advance science students, for example, to study emerging fields like biotechnology and nanotechnology as well as the traditional physics and chemistry," he said.

Students opting for a business pathway, for example, would be able to include subjects like legal studies as well as accounting and economics. Mr Welford also hoped to give students the option to begin a foreign language at Year 11. At present that is possible under the international baccalaureate program but not the general Queensland public school system.

The senior syllabus review is being chaired by Griffith University Deputy-Vice-Chancellor Professor John Dewar. He said teachers, parents, Education Queensland, Catholic Education authorities, independent schools and TAFE were represented on the reference group. "We have had wide public consultation and we will be seeking more feedback when a proposal is finalised," Professor Dewar said.

Russell Pollock, principal of The Gap school in Brisbane's western suburbs, said his school had between 160 and 168 students in each year level and offered 30 to 40 senior subjects. "Sitting down with parents and a guidance officer at the end of Year 10 is essential for students selecting their subjects for Years 11 and 12," he said. Queensland Teachers Union President Steve Ryan said teachers were open-minded about the move but were generally satisfied with the current system. "It is important that students do not narrow down their options too early," he said.

Source



Tot schools' dubious nurturing claims

Here's one for parents keen to get ahead of the pack, writes Bettina Arndt. They can enrol their children in early learning programs. Very early learning programs. The good Bettina blames the destructive move on career-minded parents but it should be added that the parents concerned -- mothers in particular -- are just doing what the feminist Left have always preached: put a career first and farm kids out to group "carers". And that was also of course the Communist system -- both in the Soviet orbit and in the Israeli kibbutzim

For years now, Melbourne's Methodist Ladies College has run a school kindy that takes babies of six weeks and older. That's far earlier than the Perth school, St Hilda's, which attracted headlines last week by allowing 2 1/2-year-olds into its new junior kindy. Newspaper photos featured the tiny tots, complete with school uniform, satchel on their backs. Across the country, private schools are now increasing school enrolments by attracting pupils very, very young. It's proving popular with busy, affluent parents keen on the idea of putting their infants and toddlers into "enriching learning environments."

MLC's program promises even the youngest students will discover the fun of learning a language, explore computing and engage in gymnastics. The Cathedral School in Townsville boasts it offers babies a stimulating environment for promoting fine and gross motor skills as well as sensory development. Most of these schools are willing to take youngsters from 7am to 6pm, with a solid five hours of schooling in the middle. And they offer all this enrichment for 50 weeks a year.

What a cynical exercise. Shame on these schools for conning parents into believing children of that age benefit from this crazy hot-housing. If these programs are indeed put together by trained early education teachers, they should know better. Basic knowledge of early child development shows infants and toddlers are unlikely to thrive when they are separated from their primary carers for such long hours. And surely they learned something about the slower pace of these tiny children who need time to explore their world.

Walk down the street with a two-year-old and watch as the child stops to pick up a leaf, or dawdles along looking over a shoulder to examine his shadow or decides to sit down and look at her feet. Time is slow, the world is fascinating. So what are parents doing cramming these little children into uniforms at daybreak, rushing them into cars and dumping them at so-called "schools"?

The educational hook provides a convenient excuse to allow parents to justify their choice of minimalist parenting. For five years I lived in New York, where minimalist parenting was an art form. There was a childcare centre opposite where I lived and I'd watch sleepy toddlers dropped off well before sunrise and picked up long after dark, often not even by their parents but night shift nannies. Sports clubs were available to take older children off your hands not only afternoons but all weekend, delivered to your door late Sunday evening.

That would never happen in family friendly Australia - or so I thought. Last year, Queensland newspapers reported childcare services in seaside resorts were under pressure to open on Christmas Day - sometimes to help parents forced to work, but often because parents wanted to have a good time without the children.

So let's not kid ourselves that parents are putting babies or toddlers for long hours into this new school care because they have no choice. The high fees demand high earners - often affluent, two-income professionals who don't want children putting a brake on their careers. The real choice we should question is why they have children if neither parent is willing or able to cut back for a few years to provide some slack in the system.

The hot-housing may well misfire. We know spending long hours in even the most stimulating group care does not set children up for a brilliant school career. Solid international research shows these children are at risk of developing problem behaviours -- aggression, disobedience, conflicted relations with teachers, poorer work habits and social skills. Here are children who start off with one of life's great bonuses - educated, successful parents. How sad they hardly ever get to see them.

Source

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For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"

Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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27 February, 2007

Preschool for all? No thanks

Both in Australia and California there is a strong political push in that direction. Well-researched comment below from an Australian homeschooler

Politicians are calling for compulsory preschool and there is a lot of rhetoric around about ensuring all children have the benefits of a preschool education so they are not left behind when they begin school. But is compulsory preschool something we really want? Education Minister, Julie Bishop's argument in favour of compulsory preschool is: "many studies and research and analysis show that investment in high quality, large scale, early childhood programs find that early learning experiences, including pre-literacy and numeracy skills make the transition to school easier for children, and it increases the chances of school success."

University studies are often quoted to support the perceived academic benefits of preschool. What is not often mentioned is that, while these studies demonstrate preschool in a favourable light when compared with an impoverished home environment, preschool does not compare favourably with the average home environment.

Even Professor Edward Zigler, credited as "the father of Headstart" a widespread American preschool program admits "there is a large body of evidence that there is little to be gained by exposing middle class children to early education . (and) evidence that indicates early schooling is inappropriate for many four-year-olds, and that it may be harmful to their development".

If preschool were truly beneficial in terms of giving children a head start, those places with some form of compulsory preschool should do demonstrably better academically. The evidence does not bear this out. For example, the two states of America which have compulsory preschool, Georgia and Oklahoma, have the lowest results for fourth grade reading tests in the country.

In 2000, the Program for International Study Assessment (PISA) compared the academic scores of children from 32 industrialised nations in reading literacy, maths and science. The results showed that in countries where schooling starts at a young age they do not consistently outperform those who start later. Finland, which has a compulsory schooling age of seven, held the top ranking in all test subjects of the Third International Mathematics and Science (TIMS) results in 1999. Singapore, which also scored highly in the PISA and TIMS assessments, has no publicly funded early education programs.

By contrast, Sweden, which has one of the most comprehensive early child-care programs in Europe, was one of the lowest scoring nations. Hungary and Czechoslovakia, cut their day-care programs significantly in the 1990s after studies determined that institutional care damages preschool-aged children.

Perhaps most tellingly of all, the longitudinal studies often quoted to argue an academic advantage provided by preschool for lower socio-economic groups, actually also show that this "advantage" disappears by grade three.

But what about the much-touted social benefits of preschool programs? Here again, there is research to refute this. A 2005 Stanford University study reported: "We find that attendance in preschool centers, even for short periods of time each week, hinder the rate at which young children develop social skills and display the motivation to engage in classroom tasks, as reported by their [prep] teachers."

In 1986, Tizzard and Hughes compared the language environments at home and in preschools in the UK. Their method involved tape-recording the conversations of four-year-old girls at preschool in the morning and again at home with their mothers in the afternoon. They reported:

We became increasingly aware of how rich this [home] environment was for all the children (working-class and middle-class). The conversations between the children and their mothers ranged freely over a variety of topics. The idea that children's interests were restricted to play and TV was clearly untenable.

At home the children discussed topics like work, the family, birth, growing up, and death; they talked with their mothers about things they had done together in the past, and their plans for the future; they puzzled over such diverse topics as the shape of roofs and chairs, the nature of Father Christmas, and whether the Queen wears curlers in bed.

Many of these conversations took place during recognisably educational contexts - such as during play or while reading books - but many did not. A large number of the more fruitful conversations simply cropped up as the children and their mothers went about their afternoon's business at home - having lunch, planning shopping expeditions, feeding the baby and so on.

When we came to analyse the conversations between these same children and their [preschool] teachers, we could not avoid being disappointed. The children were certainly happy at school, for much of the time absorbed in play. However, their conversations with their teachers made a sharp contrast to those with their mothers.

The richness, depth and variety which characterised the home conversations were sadly missing. So too was the sense of intellectual struggle, and of the real attempts to communicate being made by both sides.

The questioning, puzzling child which we were so taken with at home was gone: in her place was a child who, when talking to staff, seemed subdued, and whose conversations with adults were mainly restricted to answering questions rather than asking them, or taking part in minimal exchanges about the whereabouts of other children and play materials.

In all this research, it is difficult to sort out to what extent there is a difference between compulsory preschool programs and optional preschool but it seems that there is enough evidence both to question the push towards compulsory preschool and to throw doubt on the theory that preschool is beneficial for all. Children at home with their families are not disadvantaged. Indeed they are very likely better off. So if your child does not wish to go to kindergarten, or you do not wish to send them, rest assured that you are not depriving them.

Relationships are the most important part of life. For small children especially, the time spent in the secure home environment is invaluable. Contrary to popular opinion, forcing children to separate from their parents before they are ready to is not necessary.

Preschool should remain optional so that parents are in control of the amount of time their children spend there. For some families this will be full time, for others, no time at all, but as a society we should stop pressuring families into thinking that a decision not to preschool their child is somehow irresponsible and will disadvantage the child. The evidence just does not support this view.

Throughout history small children have always been nurtured by their parents. Parents talk, read and sing to their preschoolers; they answer questions; they play games; they provide stimulating experiences and the security of cuddles and they accompany their children out into the world as mentor guides who interpret and explain new sights and experiences. Some families wish to supplement this rich rewarding education with a preschool experience. By all means make preschool freely available to all who wish to use it but why make it compulsory?

Source



CAIR Reacts To Dose Of KIMO

Post lifted from Riehl World

CAIR has filed a complaint which will likely get a school teacher disciplined, if not fired, for allowing Kamil International Ministries Organization (KIMO) to address some NC high school students on the potential dangers of Islam.

The AP defines KIMO as a Christian organization, which it is, but a little elaboration can't hurt. We wouldn't want people to think KIMO is a bunch of Southern rednecks, now would we?

Kamil Solomon, from Bany Ady town in Assiout Province, Egypt, became a Christian at the age of five in this intensely Islamic nation when his mother shared Jesus with him. Kamil became an apologist for the faith as he got older. Persecution in the Middle East became worse after Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979. He preached in numerous churches in Cairo and throughout Egypt teaching the truth about Islam. The state police followed him, and after hearing his remarks about Islam, they arrested him in 1993. They confiscated all his belongings including his library and Ph.D. dissertation on "Church History in Arabia Prior to Islam." His dissertation was basically an argument against Islam and was later destroyed. He was tortured in numerous ways for Christ, which included being blindfolded, beaten, and enduring electric shock.

Kamil endured by God's power, and eventually, American Christian agencies worked together to get him released in 1994. His ministry was banned, and he was placed under house arrest. The American Embassy in Cairo granted him an asylum. In February 1996, he came to the United States and formed Kamil International Ministries Organization, through which he travels the country to teach the truth about Islam, including their desire for jihad on American soil. "Muslims are converting black men, white women, students and prisoners," says Kamil.

Kamil came to Providence because he was attracted to the college and international ministry here. "There are many Muslims coming to the area, and we should share Jesus with them while they are here as students." He also hopes to help plant desperately needed churches in Egypt.

Humbly, Kamil pleads for Providence members to put Jesus first and urges us to be ready to sacrifice what it may cost to evangelize. He encourages us to use money judiciously and spend it on people overseas or on the poor among us. Kamil's ministry also offers various tracts on Islam and Christianity. If you would like to receive this free literature, e-mail him at kamil@kimo4jesus.org

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- A high school teacher allowed a group whose declared mission is to "raise an awareness of the danger of Islam" to distribute literature in his class, including a handout titled "Do Not Marry a Muslim Man," according to an advocacy group.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations says a representative from the Kamil International Ministries Organization, based in Raleigh, spoke to a ninth-grade world history class at Enloe High School and distributed the literature, which also discussed Jesus.

The father of a Muslim student reported the incident, said CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper. The council wrote to Wake County schools Superintendent Del Burns asking that the incident be investigated and that the teacher be disciplined.

Burns had not received the letter, but an investigation is under way and officials will take appropriate disciplinary action, district spokeswoman Kristin Flenniken said.

Censoring students at Oxford? That is so gay

Welcome to the Oxford college where students can use the word gay to refer to a homosexual man but not to describe a rubbish pool shot.

In the quad at Merton College, Oxford, scruffily-clad students scurry to their lectures. But behind this everyday student scene, there lurks a rather bizarre controversy. The trendy college is renowned for its LGBT-friendly ethos (that’s LGBT as in ‘Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender’), yet it has become a rather unlikely setting for a university-wide controversy over homophobic remarks. Recently, fourth-year Merton student Andrew Godfrey complained about some of the language being used by his fellow students. This led to official action by the executive of the Junior Common Room (JCR) warning the student body to refrain from ‘unacceptable and extremely offensive’ behaviour ‘even if you are not being intentionally malicious’. Students were reprimanded for contributing to ‘an uncomfortable atmosphere in college’.

What was the ‘unacceptable and extremely offensive’ behaviour? It consisted of limp-wristed impressions and the use of phrases such as ‘Oh don’t be such a poof!’ and ‘You missed that shot, you big gay!’ during a heated game of pool in Merton’s swanky Games Room.

In response to Godfrey’s complaint about this behaviour, the college’s JCR president, Laura Davies, sent out the following email to students (drafted by Godfrey in collaboration with student welfare and LGBT representatives): ‘JCR members have raised concerns after groups have been overheard in the Games Room and other communal areas of college using terms like “gay” and “poof” as joking insults. Please be aware that using language like this is unacceptable and extremely offensive, even if you are not being intentionally malicious and think you are being ironic or witty in some way. It creates an uncomfortable atmosphere in the college.’

Can students not take a joke anymore? Can they not handle the use of words such as ‘gay’ or ‘poof’ in a slang context, in a setting as informal as a Games Room? Both Davies and Godfrey admit that the students probably were not expressing anti-gay prejudice when they made these comments while making their wrists go all limp. As Godfrey himself says: ‘I never maintained that this was deliberately malicious homophobia because I didn’t feel like I had been harassed; otherwise I would have turned to the college authorities. They were basically acting the way guys do.’

And yet guys ‘acting the way guys do’ has now been redefined as ‘unacceptable and extremely offensive’ behaviour that apparently warrants a stern official warning. Davies tells me she had no qualms about sending an official admonishment to the entire student body in response to behaviour that she admits was not purposefully malicious or offensive. ‘One of the JCR members raised the fact that he was quite unhappy with someone using the word “gay” and that he personally found that very offensive’, she says. This is a world away from John Stuart Mill’s argument that opinions ought only to ‘lose their immunity’ when ‘the circumstances in which they are expressed are such as to constitute their expression a positive instigation to some mischievous act’ (1). His point, made in On Liberty in 1859, was that only in instances where words and actions might directly lead to violence could one make a case for curtailing freedom of speech. Fast forward 150 years and we have the new Merton rule – where JCR officials recognise that students saying ‘gay’ to mean rubbish and swinging their wrists around was not intended maliciously, much less was it likely to lead to violence; and yet because these antics offended the sensibilities of a single student they took it upon themselves to chastise all students in a hectoring missive about what is acceptable and unacceptable behaviour.

This points to a worrying level of sensitivity among today’s students, and a lackadaisical attitude towards words, arguments and freedom of speech. The JCR’s aim seemed to be, not to protect students from harm, but to protect the college’s reputation for being caring and accepting from the ‘unmannered’ behaviour of some students playing a game of pool.

Apparently the term ‘gay’ is now in common usage among young people to mean ‘lame’ or ‘rubbish’. This has caused some controversy, especially among gay rights groups who don’t like the idea that being called ‘gay’ is now seen as something negative. Last year Radio 1 presenter Chris Moyles was the subject of an internal BBC inquiry after he described a ringtone on air as ‘gay’. Leaving aside the question of why there has to be an inquiry every time a broadcaster says something un-PC, it is reasonable to ask: where could young people have got the idea that ‘gay = rubbish’?

How about from another term, very closely associated with gay culture: ‘camp’. ‘Camp’, as Stephen Bayley argued in his scratch-their-eyes-out book on New Labour, Labour Camp, is just a synonym for rubbish. Or, as Susan Sontag observed in Notes on Camp, first published in 1964, ‘The ultimate Camp statement [is] it’s good because it’s awful...’ Sontag noted that Camp culture tends to emphasise ‘texture, sensuous surface, and style at the expense of content’; and that ‘homosexuals, by and large, constitute the vanguard - and the most articulate audience - of Camp’.

It doesn’t take a huge leap of the imagination to re-work ‘camp’ as ‘gay’, especially when so many gay celebrities tend to wallow in kitsch. If you, like many people both straight and gay, think Graham Norton and Will and Grace and Queer Eye for the Straight Guy (now there’s a show that emphasises ‘style at the expense of content’) are pretty dreadful, then surely no one could blame you for associating ‘gay’, at least in its cultural sense, with ‘rubbish’.

The self-censoring attitude of Merton’s JCR reflects a broader view taken by many today: that free speech is something that can be easily sacrificed in the name of protecting people from utterances they might find offensive. The idea that students should behave according to some predetermined college ethos stands in stark contrast to the old idea of universities as places where young people should be free to experiment, to think, to argue, to learn, to say what they please in a student common room…. Enforcing an official dogma about words, phrases and actions betrays an elitist view of what sort of behaviour is appropriate, and what is not.

Worse, it treats students as children who either must be reprimanded for saying naughty words or who must be protected from the jokey words of big ‘bully boys’ by student officials posing as social workers. This infantilises students – which is hardly conducive to creating an atmosphere where students can grow, both educationally and personally.

Some students have reacted against the JCR’s illiberal telling-off. Merton student Ben Holroyd created an online group called The Gay Appreciation Society, which argued that: ‘The word “gay” has several definitions, only one of which is “homosexual”. Others include merry, licentious and wanton. When I miss a pot at the pool table, I sometimes refer to said shot as “gay”. Obviously, I do not consider the shot in question to be homosexual. Having said that, I rarely miss, so I seldom offend the minority of pedantic, over-sensitive fools at Merton.’

Perhaps the most pernicious thing about the Merton ruling on when it’s okay to say gay is that it represents almost an attempt at thought control. According to the JCR officials, it is okay to say ‘gay’ to refer to a homosexual man but not to describe a ‘rubbish’ pool shot. What is being monitored here is not just the use of language, but thought itself, the meaning behind one’s use of the word gay. We are presented with a two-tiered attitude to the word gay, where it’s okay to use it responsibly to mean homosexual but not irresponsibly to mean rubbish. It seems the JCR wants to get into Merton students’ minds to see what is really going on when they speak.

Even if some students had been expressing anti-gay prejudice in their use of words such as ‘gay’ and ‘poof’, then censure would be no solution. The idea that monitoring student language can have an impact on certain people’s prejudicial views, or on discrimination in the real world, is ridiculous. It merely brushes issues under the carpet, seeking to silence certain arguments rather than challenging them. Prejudice – which is a more serious matter than banter around a pool table – can only be effectively challenged in open debate, through reasoned argument.

University should be a place where we are free to experiment and to express ourselves in whatever way we deem fit. Disagreements can and should be settled between students themselves. Official sanctions telling us how we should behave only thwart the advance of genuine tolerance, which is based, not on intolerant censorship of uncomfortable views, but rather on establishing through open discussion which ideas are good, valuable and useful, and which are not.

The campus thought-police have no right to tell us how to think, speak or behave, and certainly not when we are just hanging out with friends and playing pool. They should bugger off and stop being so gay.

Source

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For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"

Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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26 February, 2007

HOMESCHOOLING THRIVING IN BRITAIN

More parents appear to be turning away from school in favour of teaching their children at home because they are unhappy with state education. A government-commissioned study into home tutoring indicated that about 16,000 children in England were now being educated at home, which researchers said implied a threefold increase since 1999.

Home tutoring has become increasingly popular since evidence emerged that home-educated children frequently perform better in national tests, GCSEs and A levels. In 2002 a study of home-educated children found that 64 per cent scored more than 75 per cent on the performance indicators of primary schools assessment, compared with 5.1 per cent of children nationally.

All parents have the right to teach their children at home. Unless a child has been removed from school, parents in England are not obliged to tell the local education authority. While the authority may monitor the children who have been deregistered from school, parents also have a right to refuse access to the child.

The study of nine local authorities found that home-educating parents had removed their children from the state system because they were worried about bullying, poor behaviour and quality of provision. Others thought that the special-needs education on offer for their children was not up to scratch or that they were required to start formal schooling too young, the study by York Consulting, for the Department for Education and Skills, said. “Some of the parents interviewed felt that standards of education had declined,” the report said. “This, coupled with a view that the current education system is overly bureaucratic, inflexible and assessment-driven, prompted some parents to home-educate.”

Most parents who took their children out of school were white British, but religious and cultural reasons had also prompted Muslim, Christian, Gypsy and traveller families to teach youngsters at home. Overall, 65 per cent of those being home-educated were of secondary age, compared with 35 per cent who were of primary age. The study found that some parents used formal and highly structured methods, including following the national curriculum, using online tutors and hiring professionals. Others were less conventional.

Source



What Are Education Markets, and Why Do They Matter?

Broadly speaking, a free education market is a system in which parents decide what, where, by whom, and for how long their children will be taught. It is a system in which educators have complete control over the curricula they offer, the teaching methods t hey employ, the prices they charge, and the hours they work; in which anyone who wants to open a school has the right to do so; and in which the profit motive drives the innovation and expansion of some substantial share of the education sector. . It is also a system in which consumers are the primary payers and in which government schools do not enjoy a subsidy advantage over private schools–that is, if the government runs "free" schools, it must make a comparable level of financial assistance available to families who prefer independent schools.

Contrary to common assumptions, education markets are not a recent, untested idea. The first education system in the world in which schooling reached beyond a tiny ruling elite was the market that arose in classical Athens during the 5th century BC. Today, education markets thrive everywhere from impoverished slums and villages of the developing world to the multi-billion-dollar after-school tutoring sector in Asia. Conversely, though fee-charging, nongovernment schooling does exist to a limited extent in many Western nations, it would be a mistake to say that those schools currently constitute a free market in education, given that virtually all are nonprofit and must compete with a high-spending (and yet tuition-free) government monopoly.

Why does it matter whether or not education is organized along free-market lines? It matters because a substantial body of international and historical research finds that education markets are a superior way to meet the public's educational goals, in terms of both individual needs and broader social effects. According to that research, market schools are typically more efficient, academically effective, well maintained, and responsive to the demand of families. In addition, students in independent schools in the United States have been found to exhibit levels of civic engagement and tolerance that are comparable to or better than those of their peers in public-sector schools. Systems in which parents can easily pick schools of their choice, and in which most education funding comes directly from parents, also reduce the cultural conflicts that arise over government-run, government-funded schooling. The less people are pressured to patronize or pay for school they disapprove of, the less social tension is created. Finally, in the industries in which markets have been allowed to flourish, they have driven dramatic improvement in quality and efficiency, spurred relentless innovation, and pressured producers into being responsive to the preferences of consumers.

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For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"

Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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25 February, 2007

U.S. Test Scores at Odds With Rising High School Grades

High school seniors are performing worse overall on some national tests than they did in the previous decade, even though they are receiving significantly higher grades and taking what seem to be more rigorous courses, according to government data released yesterday.

The mismatch between stronger transcripts and weak test scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, often called the nation's report card, resonated in the Washington area and elsewhere. Some seized upon the findings as evidence of grade inflation and the dumbing-down of courses. The findings also prompted renewed calls for tough national standards and the expansion of the federal No Child Left Behind law. "We have our work cut out for us," Education Secretary Margaret Spellings said in a statement. "If, in fact, our high school students are taking more challenging courses and earning higher grades, we should be seeing greater gains in test scores."

About 35 percent of 12th-graders tested in 2005 scored proficient or better in reading -- the lowest percentage since the test was launched in 1992, the new data showed. And less than a quarter of seniors scored at least proficient on a new version of the math test; officials called those results disappointing but said they could not be compared to past scores. In addition, a previous report found that 18 percent of seniors in 2005 scored at least proficient in science, down from 21 percent in 1996.

At the same time, the average high school grade-point average rose from 2.68 in 1990 (about a B-minus) to 2.98 in 2005 (about a B), according to a study of transcripts from graduating seniors. The study also found that the percentage of graduating seniors who completed a standard or mid-level course of study rose from 35 to 58 percent in that time; meanwhile, the percentage who took the highest-level curriculum doubled, to 10 percent. "The core problem is that course titles don't really signal what is taught in the course and grades don't signal what a kid has learned," said Kati Haycock, president of the Education Trust, a D.C.-based nonprofit group that supports No Child Left Behind. She added hyperbolically, "What we're going to end up with is the high school valedictorian who can't write three paragraphs."

Some experts say these educational mirages, which obscure low student achievement with inflated grades and tough-sounding class titles, disproportionately harm poor and minority students......

The potential for grade and course-title inflation is not confined to low-performing schools. Julie Greenberg, a math teacher at Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, said she was under such pressure to raise grades that she used to keep two sets of books in her statistics class: one for the grades students deserved and one for the grades that appeared on report cards. "If a teacher were to really grade students on their true level of mastery, there would be such extraordinary levels of failure that it would not be tolerated, so most teachers don't do that," she said.

At a news conference yesterday near Capitol Hill, education experts expressed concern that white and Asian students continue to score consistently higher than black and Hispanic students in all subjects. They also said the overall discrepancy between the test scores and transcripts deserves close examination. Darvin M. Winick, chairman of the National Assessment Governing Board, which oversaw the exams and the transcript study, called the gap "very suspicious."

"For all of our talk of the achievement gap amongst subgroups of students, a larger problem may be an instructional gap or a rigor gap," said David W. Gordon, superintendent of Sacramento County schools in California. "There's a disconnect between what we want and expect our 12th-grade students to know and do and what our schools are actually delivering through instruction in the classroom."

Lawmakers said the low test scores would reinvigorate the debate over high school reform as Congress considers the renewal of No Child Left Behind. Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, said "disappointing" results underscore the need to recruit first-rate teachers to low-performing schools.

Source



California Teacher Upsets Muslims

Post lifted from Interested Participant. See original for links

As reported last week, a sixth-grade teacher at Riverview Elementary School, Randy Ingram, made comments in class about Muslims and Iranians which have produced a firesquall of controversy. The situation is quite troubling since I've seen statements made by Iranian President Ahmadinejad that were similar to, and more strident than, Ingram's remarks. If anything, Ingram was merely being candid in his discussion.

From Fresno Bee:

Kamal Abu-Shamsieh, director of the Islamic Cultural Center of Fresno, said that the teacher, during a lesson about the ancient Israelites, said Iranians are America's enemy because they want to destroy Israel. He also said that extreme Muslims and Iranians want to take over the United States, kill the teachers and hire their own teachers, Abu-Shamsieh said.

Students from Ingram's class were questioned by school officials with one recalling, "He said you don't have to be afraid of Muslims. It's the super-extreme Muslims who would want to hurt the United States."

However, one sixth-grade student's parents, Mashalah Boroujerdi and Rezvan Jamshidy, both Muslims from Iran, were upset by Ingram's comments, saying that their child was treated differently and distracted by the anti-Islamic remarks.

As a result, Boroujerdi called for the teacher to be disciplined, "... so this won't happen again." Also, Seyed Ali Ghazvini, a leader at the Islamic Cultural Center, weighed in and called for the installation of a discrimination hotline to allow families and students to report bigotry. Ingram faces possible reprimand as the investigation continues.



Extensive special treatment demanded for British Muslim pupils



Schools in Britain should allow girls to wear the headscarf in all lessons, including PE, the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) has recommended. Its guidance aims to ensure state schools meet Muslim pupils' needs. The 72-page document covers such topics as sex education, Ramadan and halal meals. It says schools should respect the decision of boys to grow a beard.

But head teachers warned that meeting any list of "demands" would pose major practical difficulties for schools. It says schools have an important part to play in fostering social cohesion. "Schools can play a vital role in facilitating the positive integration of Muslim pupils within the wider community and thereby preventing or at least beginning the process of tackling some of the problems of marginalisation."

In its examples of good practice, the MCB says the concept of "haya" or modesty must be respected by teachers and school staff. "In principle the dress for both boys and girls should be modest and neither tight-fitting nor transparent and not accentuate the body shape." Schools should allow girls to wear full-length skirts and boys and girls should be able to wear tracksuits in PE lessons.

The guidance criticises the "vast majority" of primary schools for asking boys and girls to change in mixed groups. "Muslim children are likely to exhibit resistance to this sort of compromising and immodest exposure, but are often pressurised to conform to institutional norms which do not take account of their own or their parents' beliefs and values," it says. Communal showering involves "profound indignity".

Muslim pupils should be allowed to sit out dance lessons, which are on the national curriculum for PE. "Muslims consider that most dance activities, as practised in the curriculum, are not consistent with the Islamic requirements for modesty as they may involve sexual connotations and messages." Headscarves for girls should be allowed, but the MCB guidelines stop short of endorsing the niqab or full-face veil.

Schools are urged to be particularly aware of the needs of Muslim pupils during Ramadan, the month of fasting. They should avoid scheduling exams during Ramadan and should refrain from sex education, as Muslims should avoid sexual thoughts and discourse at this time. Swimming lessons may also be problematic for some Muslim pupils, as there is a risk of swallowing water which they may believe breaks the fast.

MCB secretary general Muhammad Abdul Bari said: "Many of our schools have a cherished tradition of fostering an inclusive ethos which values and addresses the differences and needs of the communities they serve. "We are convinced that with a reasonable degree of mutual understanding and goodwill, even more progress can be made."

But the general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, Mick Brookes, said: "Schools are trying to create societies within their walls which are tolerant and celebratory. "I just worry that if the list of demands - if it is a list of demands - is too much, that it will simply create a backlash.

A spokesman for the Department for Education said: "This is not official guidance and is not endorsed by the government, nor does it have any binding power whatsoever on schools as some hysterical headlines claim today. "The Department for Education and Skills has no involvement with the document produced by the MCB."

Source

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For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"

Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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24 February, 2007

DISASTROUS MATHEMATICS EDUCATION IN WASHINGTON STATE

Comment by a U Washington Prof. on the foolish "discovery" Math teaching method that now replaces the old but proven tell-and-practice method. Why are kids subjected to educational theories that sound fine but which do not have proven results? Do all the kids in a State have to be used as Guinea pigs just so some "educators" can feel good?

Washington students are coming to college unprepared for college math, with most unable to handle basic algebra. The math remediation rate in college is now 30 percent; 40 percent of high school students can't pass the WASL after two tries; math assessment scores of incoming freshmen have plunged at the UW; tutoring companies are enjoying triple-digit growth, and the move toward reform curricula is leaving students without the ability to do or understand math. Reform advocates like to parade Washington's average scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress as a mark of success. But varying demographics, curricula and application of this exam among states makes it a completely useless tool of comparison.

Supposed myth: Our state math standards are rated F. The truth: Our state math standards were rated an F and deserve it.

Reform math advocates like to paint the criticism of state math by the Fordham Foundation as the work of a conservative mind-set. In reality, the study that flunked our state standards was directed by an admittedly liberal California mathematician who selected the rest of the committee and was the primary author of the report. It's interesting that true-blue California was given the honors as having the best math standards in the nation.

Supposed myth: The WASL is a bad test. The truth: The WASL is not only a bad test, but it reinforces all the bad aspects of reform math.

The WASL exam reflects the reform math curricula that Warfield defends: Students are not taught, but asked to discover math for themselves, practice and competence with algorithms (such as long division and use of fractions) are neglected, and calculators are heavily applied. In fact, the WASL is too easy an exam and does not evaluate key ideas and skills needed in college and the real world. The WASL is also an extraordinarily expensive exam, and its development and scoring are done by one company, which also makes some of the leading reform textbooks. The WASL provides no usable information for the improvement of student learning or curriculum. Finally, because the WASL is used only in our state, we can't determine how well our students are doing compared with the rest of the country.

Warfield suggests the math problem will be solved if we just have more patience and put more resources into teacher training and parent education. That is a myth. The truth is that the reform math methods espoused by many in the educational community have made the situation infinitely worse and a generation of students are being lost to this experiment. More money is not the solution; better curricula that model the successes in those nations and states with the most success in math instruction is the only sure approach. Staying the course, as in international relations, is not always wise, especially when we already have entered the shoals of math failure and our children are the certain victims.

Source



ARROGANT ATTITUDE TO PARENTS

Comment from D.C. by Casey Lartigue

I tend not to address points raised by people commenting on posts. In the back-and-forth of such discussions, people sometimes say things they don't mean or take extreme positions. In other cases they are just trying to be provocative, especially when they can remain anonymous.

But a discussion on Greg Mankiw's blog caught my attention. That's because a couple of the folks suggested that parents don't really have the knowledge to make decisions about the quality of schools.

Between 2002-2004 I was actively involved in the fight to get school vouchers for families in DC. I often heard the argument that parents don't know how to choose between good and bad schools and that, anyway, parents had enough choices with the school system's "out-of-boundary" options and charters (that had also been opposed).

Without getting too deep into the out-of-boundary program, I'll point out that Woodrow Wilson HS, considered one of the best schools in the city, received 520 applications from parents out of the school's zone. That is even though it had ZERO available spaces for students to transfer to the school and parents KNEW there would be few spaces available. Deal Junior High, a feeder school for Wilson, had 532 applications, but only ten openings.

At the same time, D.C. parents shunned the low achieving schools. Anacostia Senior High School had 80 spaces available, but only seven applicants. Ballou SHS had 220 available spaces, but only three applicants. In 2002, fewer than 800 of the 7,000 children who applied for out-of-boundary spots were granted permission, mainly because many of the available slots are in low-performing schools (the same problem hindering NCLB). From my on-the-ground conversations with parents, visits to schools, going door-to-door in neighborhoods, based on community meetings I attended and speeches I gave, parents were quite aware of the level of violence and the level of achievement in the schools.

The main point is, based on what I wrote above: intellectuals, experts, and politicians greatly underestimate the knowledge and information that parents have about schools.

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For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"

Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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23 February, 2007

Apple CEO Jobs attacks teacher unions

Apple Inc. CEO Steve Jobs lambasted teacher unions today, claiming no amount of technology in the classroom would improve public schools until principals could fire bad teachers. Jobs compared schools to businesses with principals serving as CEOs. "What kind of person could you get to run a small business if you told them that when they came in they couldn't get rid of people that they thought weren't any good?" he asked to loud applause during an education reform conference. "Not really great ones because if you're really smart you go, 'I can't win.'"

In a rare joint appearance, Jobs shared the stage with competitor Michael Dell, founder and CEO of Dell Inc. Both spoke to the gathering about the potential for bringing technological advances to classrooms. "I believe that what is wrong with our schools in this nation is that they have become unionized in the worst possible way," Jobs said. "This unionization and lifetime employment of K-12 teachers is off-the-charts crazy."

At various pauses, the audience applauded enthusiastically. Dell sat quietly with his hands folded in his lap. "Apple just lost some business in this state, I'm sure," Jobs said.

Dell responded that unions were created because "the employer was treating his employees unfairly and that was not good." "So now you have these enterprises where they take good care of their people. The employees won, they do really well and succeed." Dell also blamed problems in public schools on the lack of a competitive job market for principals.

Earlier in the panel discussion, Jobs told the crowd about his vision for textbook-free schools in the future. Textbooks would be replaced with a free, online information source that was constantly updated by experts, much like the online encyclopedia Wikipedia. "I think we'd have far more current material available to our students, and we'd be freeing up a tremendous amount of funds that we could buy delivery vehicles with - computers, faster Internet, things like that," Jobs said. "And I also think we'd get some of the best minds in the country contributing."

Source



THE BRITISH ELITE VOTE WITH THEIR FEET WHEN IT COMES TO GOVERNMENT SCHOOLS

David Cameron said yesterday that he wanted to send his daughter to a state school and, like Tony Blair before him, entered into an educational controversy. Rather than choose a grant-maintained school, as Mr Blair did, the Conservative leader is opting for a faith school. “I’m quite a fan of faith schools and we’re looking at a church school we’re very keen on, but we’ll have to see what places are available,” he told You and Yours, the BBC Radio 4 programme.

Mr Cameron — who during his leadership campaign said that he did not attend church as often as he should — has become an active participant at St Mary Abbots Church in Kensington, West London, and hopes to get his three-year-old daughter, Nancy, into the highly prized and secluded school in the church grounds.

Mr Cameron’s regular appearances at the church risks raising speculation that, like many middle-class parents, his interest in the church could at least partially be influenced by his interest in its school. Mr Cameron’s aides denied the suggestion, insisting that he had always attended church regularly, near his home in London and in his Witney constituency. They said that he had been attending the church for about two years, that it had a crăche for his children, and that Nancy was 18 months from school starting age. “He goes to the church whenever he is in London on Sunday, which is very regularly,” a spokesman said.

St Mary Abbots Church of England Primary School lies less than two miles from Mr Cameron’s home. However, there are 46 other state schools that are closer, and not nearly as desirable. The ones closest to his London home are large and with low educational standards. The school, which was founded in 1645 and takes only 30 pupils a year, is among the best schools in the borough, with parents describing it as “gorgeous” and “traditional”. In stark contrast to his predecessors, Mr Cameron has often said that he wants to send his children to a state school. His four-year-old son, Ivan, who has cerebral palsy, attends a state special school.

Yesterday, in an uncanny echo of Tony Blair’s decision to send his children to the London Oratory School miles from Downing Street, Mr Cameron told the BBC that he wanted to send Nancy to a faith school. His main concern appeared to be that Nancy would be overwhelmed by an ordinary state school, with the two closest to his home having more than 300 pupils. “I do worry that some of the primary schools — maybe I’m being overprecious and protective of my daughter — but you sort of feel that your small child is going to go into this enormous state primary school and may get a bit lost,” he said.

However, unlike Mr Blair, who was criticised for sending his children to a selective school, there is no suggestion of hypocrisy. “I want parents to have a choice. In London you have a choice,” he said.

The school has a complex admissions procedure, but parents’ chances of getting a child in are far higher if they play an active part in the church. Father Gillean Craig, chairman of the governors, said: “We’re delighted with the way he [Mr Cameron] and his wife play a strong part in the church.”

Source



Australia: Literacy breakthrough?

Kids to learn plain English at last, apparently

QUEENSLAND students from Year 1 to Year 10 will have a new plain English syllabus from the middle of next year. It will emphasise the teaching of reading, spelling, grammar and punctuation and the importance of literature. "Curriculum waffle is out, clear English is in," Education Minister Rod Welford said. He said the new syllabus would take a "nuts-and-bolts" approach to help children write well and speak clearly while encouraging them to read and think.

The syllabus is being drawn up by the Queensland Studies Authority after a review of the preschool to Year 10 syllabus last year. The review was conducted by Sunshine Coast-based education consultant Ray Land, a former teacher and education official. Part of the draft syllabus will be available on the authority's website from next month for public scrutiny and feedback, and the full syllabus is to be ready for approval by the authority's board by October. This will allow support materials and teacher training to be provided ahead of the introduction of the syllabus from the start of Semester 2 next year.

The new syllabus was welcomed by Queensland Council of Parents and Citizens Associations executive officer Greg Donaldson. "If this new QSA syllabus is going to improve the literacy levels of our kids we would support it," he said. Queensland Teachers Union president Steve Ryan said teachers had been heavily involved in the process and were satisfied with the new syllabus.

The redeveloped syllabus would be organised in three strands: speaking and listening, reading and viewing, and writing and shaping. "There will be greater emphasis on correct spelling, grammar and punctuation," said QSA assistant director (syllabus services) Bob Dudley. He said the syllabus would be more balanced in terms of the texts studied with wide range of books, poetry and plays to be read. He said material from the internet, films and television programs would also be included.

The syllabus will be much more specific than it is at present. For example, it is envisaged that by the end of Year 3 students will be able to:

* Identify and record main ideas and make simple inferences.

* Organise and sequence one or two main ideas with some supporting detail.

* Create texts that tell stories, recount, report on, explain, give opinions or transact.

* Use punctuation to signal the meaning boundaries of simple sentences.

* Create and play with representations of people, places, events and things for an audience by selecting descriptive words, images, facial expressions and gestures.

The syllabus requires teachers to use a range of measures, including phonics and whole word recognition, to teach reading to young children. Students' progress will also be tightly monitored under the new syllabus. The syllabus is being drawn up by a team of QSA staff with input from a panel of 20 teachers. Focus groups of parents have also been consulted

Source

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For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"

Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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22 February, 2007

Future School

Alvin Toffler tells us what's wrong -- and right -- with public education

Forty years after he and his wife Heidi set the world alight with Future Shock, Alvin Toffler remains a tough assessor of our nation's social and technological prospects. Though he's best known for his work discussing the myriad ramifications of the digital revolution, he also loves to speak about the education system that is shaping the hearts and minds of America's future. We met with him near his office in Los Angeles, where the celebrated septuagenarian remains a clear and radical thinker.

You've been writing about our educational system for decades. What's the most pressing need in public education right now?

Shut down the public education system.

That's pretty radical.

I'm roughly quoting (Microsoft chairman) Bill Gates, who said, "We don't need to reform the system; we need to replace the system."

Why not just readjust what we have in place now? Do we really need to start from the ground up?

We should be thinking from the ground up. That's different from changing everything. However, we first have to understand how we got the education system that we now have. Teachers are wonderful, and there are hundreds of thousands of them who are creative and terrific, but they are operating in a system that is completely out of time. It is a system designed to produce industrial workers.

Let's look back at the history of public education in the United States. You have to go back a little over a century. For many years, there was a debate about whether we should even have public education. Some parents wanted kids to go to school and get an education; others said, "We can't afford that. We need them to work. They have to work in the field, because otherwise we starve." There was a big debate. Late in the 1800s, during the Industrial Revolution, business leaders began complaining about all these rural kids who were pouring into the cities and going to work in our factories. Business leaders said that these kids were no good, and that what they needed was an educational system that would produce "industrial discipline."

What is industrial discipline?

Well, first of all, you've got to show up on time. Out in the fields, on the farms, if you go out with your family to pick a crop, and you come ten minutes late, your uncle covers for you and it's no big deal. But if you're on an assembly line and you're late, you mess up the work of ten thousand people down the line. Very expensive. So punctuality suddenly becomes important.

You don't want to be tardy.

Yes. In school, bells ring and you mustn't be tardy. And you march from class to class when the bells ring again. And many people take a yellow bus to school. What is the yellow bus? A preparation for commuting. And you do rote and repetitive work as you would do on an assembly line.

How does that system fit into a world where assembly lines have gone away?

It doesn't. The public school system is designed to produce a workforce for an economy that will not be there. And therefore, with all the best intentions in the world, we're stealing the kids' future.

Do I have all the answers for how to replace it? No. But it seems to me that before we can get serious about creating an appropriate education system for the world that's coming and that these kids will have to operate within, we have to ask some really fundamental questions. And some of these questions are scary. For example: Should education be compulsory? And, if so, for who? Why does everybody have to start at age five? Maybe some kids should start at age eight and work fast. Or vice versa. Why is everything massified in the system, rather than individualized in the system? New technologies make possible customization in a way that the old system -- everybody reading the same textbook at the same time -- did not offer.

You're talking about customizing the educational experience.

Exactly. Any form of diversity that we can introduce into the schools is a plus. Today, we have a big controversy about all the charter schools that are springing up. The school system people hate them because they're taking money from them. I say we should radically multiply charter schools, because they begin to provide a degree of diversity in the system that has not been present. Diversify the system.

In our book Revolutionary Wealth, we play a game. We say, imagine that you're a policeman, and you've got a radar gun, and you're measuring the speed of cars going by. Each car represents an American institution. The first one car is going by at 100 miles an hour. It's called business. Businesses have to change at 100 miles an hour because if they don't, they die. Competition just puts them out of the game. So they're traveling very, very fast. Then comes another car. And it's going at 10 miles an hour. That's the public education system. Schools are supposed to be preparing kids for the business world of tomorrow, to take jobs, to make our economy functional. The schools are changing, if anything, at 10 miles an hour. So, how do you match an economy that requires 100 miles an hour with an institution like public education? A system that changes, if at all, at 10 miles an hour?

It's a tough juxtaposition. So, what to do? Suppose you were made head of the U.S. Department of Education. What would be the first items on your agenda?

The first thing I'd say: "I want to hear something I haven't heard before." I just hear the same ideas over and over and over again. I meet teachers who are good and well intentioned and smart, but they can't try new things, because there are too many rules. They tell me that "the bureaucratic rules make it impossible for me to do what you're suggesting." So, how do we bust up that? It is easy to develop the world's best technologies compared with how hard it is to bust up a big bureaucracy like the public education system with the enormous numbers of jobs dependent on it and industries that feed it.

Here's a complaint you often hear: We spend a lot of money on education, so why isn't all that money having a better result?

It's because we're doing the same thing over and over again. We're holding forty or fifty million kids prisoner for x hours a week. And the teacher is given a set of rules as to what you're going to say to the students, how you're going to treat them, what you want the output to be, and let no child be left behind. But there's a very narrow set of outcomes. I think you have to open the system to new ideas.

When I was a student, I went through all the same rote repetitive stuff that kids go through today. And I did lousy in any number of things. The only thing I ever did any good in was in English. It's what I love. You need to find out what each student loves. If you want kids to really learn, they've got to love something. For example, kids may love sports. If I were putting together a school, I might create a course, or a group of courses, on sports. But that would include the business of sports, the culture of sports, the history of sports -- and once you get into the history of sports, you then get into history more broadly.

Integrate the curricula.

Yeah -- the culture, the technology, all these things.

Like real life.

Like real life, yes! And, like in real life, there is an enormous, enormous bank of knowledge in the community that we can tap into. So, why shouldn't a kid who's interested in mechanical things or engines or technology meet people from the community who do that kind of stuff, and who are excited about what they are doing and where it's going? But at the rate of change, the actual skills that we teach, or that they learn by themselves, about how to us his gizmo or that gizmo, that's going to be obsolete -- who knows? -- in five years or in five minutes.

So, that's another thing: Much of what we're transmitting is doomed to obsolescence at a far more rapid rate than ever before. And that knowledge becomes what we call obsoledge: obsolete knowledge. We have this enormous bank of obsolete knowledge in our heads, in our books, and in our culture. When change was slower, obsoledge didn't pile up as quickly. Now, because everything is in rapid change, the amount of obsolete knowledge that we have -- and that we teach -- is greater and greater and greater. We're drowning in obsolete information. We make big decisions -- personal decisions -- based on it, and public and political decisions based on it.

Is the idea of a textbook in the classroom obsolete?

I'm a wordsmith. I write books. I love books. So I don't want to be an accomplice to their death. But clearly, they're not enough. The textbooks are the same for every child; every child gets the same textbook. Why should that be? Why shouldn't some kids get a textbook -- and you can do this online a lot more easily than you can in print -- why shouldn't a kid who's interested in one particular thing, whether it's painting or drama, or this or that, get a different version of the textbook than the kid sitting in the next seat, who is interested in engineering?

Let's have a little exercise. Walk me through this school you'd create. What do the classrooms look like? What are the class sizes? What are the hours?

It's open twenty-four hours a day. Different kids arrive at different times. They don't all come at the same time, like an army. They don't just ring the bells at the same time. They're different kids. They have different potentials. Now, in practice, we're not going to be able to get down to the micro level with all of this, I grant you, but in fact, I would be running a twentyfour- hour school, I would have nonteachers working with teachers in that school, I would have the kids coming and going at different times that make sense for them.

The schools of today are essentially custodial: They're taking care of kids in work hours that are essentially nine to five -- when the whole society was assumed to work. Clearly, that's changing in our society. So should the timing. We're individualizing time; we're personalizing time. We're not having everyone arrive at the same time, leave at the same time. Why should kids arrive at the same time and leave at the same time?

And when do kids begin their formalized education?

Maybe some start at two or three, and some start at seven or eight -- I don't know. Every kid is different.

What else?

I think that schools have to be completely integrated into the community, to take advantage of the skills in the community. So, there ought to be business offices in the school, from various kinds of business in the community.

The name of your publication is Edutopia, and utopia is three-quarters of that title. I'm giving a utopian picture, perhaps. I don't know how to solve all those problems and how to make that happen. But what it all boils down to is, get the current system out of your head.

How does the role of the teacher change?

I think (and this is not going to sit very well with the union) that maybe teaching shouldn't be a lifetime career. Maybe it's important for teachers to quit for three or four years and go do something else and come back. They'll come back with better ideas. They'll come back with ideas about how the outside world works, in ways that would not have been available to them if they were in the classroom the whole time. So, let's sit down as a culture, as a society, and say, "Teachers, parents, people outside, how do we completely rethink this? We're going to create a new system from ground zero, and what new ideas have you got?" And collect those new ideas. That would be a very healthy thing for the country to do.

You're advocating for fundamental radical changes. Are you an optimist when it comes to public education?

I just feel it's inevitable that there will have to be change. The only question is whether we're going to do it starting now, or whether we're going to wait for catastrophe.

Source



Australia: Big squeals about performance pay for teachers

The Federal Opposition says the only way to ensure the quality of teachers in public schools is to work cooperatively with the states. Education Minister Julie Bishop wants to introduce performance pay for teachers and says it could be determined by exam results or feedback from principals, parents and students. If the states do not submit to the plan in the next education funding agreement, the Minister says the Commonwealth could withhold some state funding.

But Labor's education spokesman Steven Smith says that is not the right approach. "Yes, the quality of the teacher in the classroom is absolutely essential, yes we want to reward quality teaching, but doing it simply on the basis of the outcomes of standardised tests, doing it on the basis of cheap political points is not the way to proceed," he said.

The Queensland Teachers Union says the Federal Government wants to take control of the portfolio from the states. Union state president Steve Ryan says members are looking at a loss of conditions if Ms Bishop gets her way. "There are two issues here one is the proposal itself regards performance-based pay and the loopy ideas the Minister has put out in today's press, and the second issue is of course how the Commonwealth treats the states," he said. "All teachers in the state system across Australia are employed by state governments and it's curious to see the federal minister trying to interfere in that process."

Source

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For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"

Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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21 February, 2007

The Swedish School Voucher System

Post lifted from British blogger Sinclair's Musings. See the original for links

DK rightly asked, after my earlier post on the politics of school choice, if I could find some details of the Swedish system to back up my claim that school vouchers would not eliminate educational bureaucracy. I found the details in a study done by two researchers working for The Swedish Research Institute of Trade on behalf of Reform. The studies focus is on whether the number of independent schools would increase, it did, but it includes this section discussing the conditions attached to the voucher:

"However, in 1990 the system was altered and municipalities were given wider authority over their own schools. They were also given full financial responsibility for the school system. In 1992 the Swedish system was further advanced and a new school reform based on a system of school vouchers was implemented. As the objective of the new reform was to give independent schools funding on the same terms as municipality schools it radically changed the rules for funding independent and upper-secondary schools. Hence, under the new law, municipalities were obliged to give funding to independent schools on a per capita basis amounting to 85 per cent of what municipality schools received. The 85 per cent rule was seen to be necessary in order to avoid putting the municipal schools at a disadvantage, since the municipalities would still have to account for various administrative and overhead costs related to their overall responsibility for the school system. The system was further advanced in 2001. Funding of independent schools would now be decided in the same way as funding is given to municipal schools. This means that independent schools receive a municipality funding that is based on the undertaking of the school and the specific needs of each pupil. On its core, the new reform entails that anyone in Sweden can set up a school and receives public funding. Moreover, pupils and parents are free to choose whichever school they like.

Still, independent schools in Sweden must be approved by the Swedish National Agency for Education and meet certain criteria in order to receive funding. They have to meet the educational standards set up for the school system and must work in line with the targets set for the compulsory educational system. They must also be open to admit all children regardless of their ability, religion or ethnic origin. Last, they are not allowed to charge fees. Among the approved schools are schools owned by teacher or parent co-operatives, non-profit organisations and privately owned firms. Municipalities are allowed to give an opinion on whether they consider the establishment of an independent school to be harmful to existing schools, and the Swedish National Agency for Education takes their views into account. However, municipalities have no veto, and are bound by law to finance an independent school once it has been approved. On several occasions, the Agency has approved schools against the will of the municipalities."

The first paragraph is a little uncertain as to whether the voucher is for the full amount that state schools receive or if it is still 85% as in the original legislation. However, this article makes it clear; Sweden now has a voucher for 100% of the amount state schools receive.

The first thing to note is the similarity to the Conservative proposals for education at the last election in terms of preventing the topping up of the voucher by parents from their private income. I doubt this is a coincidence and it does make the major criticism, cited in my earlier post, that this will be a subsidy to the rich invalid. It is, I believe, more limiting than the old Conservative proposals in that our proposal under Howard was for voucher schools to be able to select by ability which is not allowed under the Swedish system; this does remove the "cream skimming" critique of school vouchers although it is a sacrifice in terms of educational freedom.

The second is that, as I predicted, the educational bureaucracy has not been abolished. There is still a DFES-style national organisation to set the overall standards and ensure that schools stick to them. Also, there is still municipal authority bureaucracy in order to determine the level of funding that is required (perhaps to account for greater costs in different regions); this does highlight that we may not want perfect equality of funding as schools with the hard job of teaching in deprived inner cities may need extra funds for specialist support.

After some more investigation the evidence is that this scheme has worked well so far. In particular this study suggests that independent school competition has improved the performance of state schools. Certainly this was the story with the privatisations of the Thatcher years; privatisations shook up the rest of the economy in a very good way. Equally, it is popular:

"As early as 1993, a poll conducted by the National Agency of Education found that "85 per cent of Swedes value their new school choice rights" and "59 per cent of Swedish parents think that teachers work harder when there is school choice" (CGR 1997: 2). This was true even though only two percent of Swedes had exercised those rights. When the Social Democrats returned to power in 1994, the benefits and popularity of school choice were already becoming evident. They were felt both by the children attending new independent schools and by those who remained in the government-run system, which was starting to respond to parental concerns. As one Swedish professor of education concluded, "one cannot deny that the reform has made municipal schools more efficient" (Miron 1996: 79)."

Another positive to think about in conservative terms, not discussed in the studies, is that once the principle of school independence and vouchers is introduced I would expect that, over time, this will build a sizeable constituency for allowing fees. Once the principle of the independent financing is admitted it will be difficult to deny those middle classes who would like to spend a little to improve their schools; particularly as these schools will be happy to make arrangements for bursaries in return. This reform would build demand for further conservative policies.

In conclusion, I think that the Swedish system's results suggest that the Conservatives had settled on a very appropriate solution with their educational policy at the last election. It was moderate enough to be politically realistic while adventurous enough to make a real difference to educational performance and political reality. I am unsure whether the political advantages of disallowing selection by ability is worth the sacrifice in educational freedom; there is also possibly something in the "cream skimming" argument. However, it is clear that even under the limited terms of the voucher in Sweden they are highly worthwhile both in terms of results and politics. Equally, there is no serious evidence they are a particular political risk, while we did not win in 2005 does anyone seriously think that was because of our education policy?

A great way for Cameron to use the positive public perception of him he spent last year cultivating would be to have another go at selling school choice under the Swedish model.



Too few science graduates in Britain

But plenty of sociologists, no doubt

GlaxoSmithKline has given warning that a lack of UK science graduates is forcing Britain's largest drugs company to recruit from overseas to fill key research posts. Jackie Hunter, a senior vice-president who leads one of GSK's main global drug development centres, said that Britain is suffering an acute shortfall of scientists. Dr Hunter said that it was "absolutely vital" for the UK to address the issue to ensure the long-term competitiveness of the country's pharmaceutical industry and to prevent a gradual drift of jobs and investment overseas. The sector contributed 3.4 billion pounds in exports to Britain's trade balance in 2004 - more than any other industry sector.

She said that the situation was forcing GSK to seek more and more recruits from France, Spain, Germany and India. In one area, synthetic chemistry, GSK said that just 40 of 70 new placements at its research facilities in Harlow, Essex, and Stevenage, Hertfordshire, were were graduates of UK universities. Dr Hunter said that the problem had been compounded by the decision of several universities, such as Cardiff and Exeter, to scrap their chemistry departments due to rising cost pressures. "A lot of universities look at laboratory-based courses as something that is very expensive for them to run," she said. "The issue is the number of places. There is a real need across the industry [for more UK graduates]."

In response to the staffing shortage, GSK has forged links with the Societe Francaise de Chimie and other overseas organisations to attract enough high-calibre graduates. "It's an increasingly globalised labour market," Dr Hunter said. GSK employs 15,000 people in research and development globally, 6,000 of them in the UK. Britain's pharmaceutical industry employed 73,000 people directly and hundreds of thousands more indirectly in support roles. The value of UK pharmaceutical exports in 2005 was 12.2 billion, or more than 166,000 pounds per employee.

Source

***************************

For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"

Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

***************************



20 February, 2007

The progressive destruction of medical education

By Dr Amanda Neill -- a former lecturer in anatomy and related disciplines

Medical education is in serious trouble, and has been for a number of years. Recently there have been several articles questioning the level of the most basic knowledge of the medical graduates, much of it coming from the new graduates and students themselves. Surveys - some of them initiated by medical students - have revealed that they do not feel they know enough anatomy, physiology and pathology; that they are not taught, but rather thrown into a "sea" to learn in a "self-directed" fashion, and that they do not feel prepared enough to go out to practise medicine. Never has a profession's education been so mutilated, mucked-about-with, or mucked-up.

It is obvious to anyone that to fix a human body one should at least know about its components (anatomy), how these components interact (physiology), and what can potentially go wrong with them (pathology). All the rest is smoke and mirrors.

Yet the smoke and mirrors is all that the medical schools are teaching. Students these days can have remarkably good understanding of technologies such as magnetic resonance imaging, while remaining startlingly ignorant of the bones, fascia and other structures of the hand. No GP surgery will have an MRI scanner, yet every GP will routinely see patients with sore or injured hands.

One of the major reasons for the shift in what is being taught is that medical education is not being taught by doctors. Doctors are not teaching student doctors; rather science and other graduates with or without PhDs have gazumped university staff teaching appointments. It is very difficult to find a medical graduate on any university staff, and even rarer to find them in the medical schools. This is no accident.

In the 80s and certainly the 90s, medical schools started to rid themselves in a determined fashion of medical graduates on their staff and employ science graduates with strong research backgrounds to teach medical students - when they had the time. These researchers on the whole did not have any vocational training, had never been on a ward or treated a patient, and did not have a strong interest in teaching. Certainly they did not have, and were not required to have, teaching as their main priority, and still do not. Teaching of vocational degrees such as medicine, dentistry, pharmacy and veterinary science should never have been given to those in a research-focused environment such as the modern university. Neither teaching nor research is then done well.

When medicine and then other vocational courses first became taken over by this shift in thinking, initially medicine was taught by medical graduates, who knew what was needed, had been on the wards, and had a thorough knowledge of the human body. Gradually the art of teaching medical subjects and the need to teach them became lost as the ever-increasing number of PhDs grew and vied for positions on the university staff. After all as John Collins, dean of education for the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, wrote in Weekend Health (December 16-17, 2006), there has been an explosion of medical knowledge and technology.

Whatever explosion there may be, a leg is still a leg and a stomach still a stomach. Despite Darwin's theory of evolution, these are remarkably constant, and the structures are unchanging. To fix them (the leg and the stomach and all the other structures in the body), to understand them, the doctor needs to know where they are, what is above, below, in front and behind, and what common variations of these arrangements may exist. This knowledge should not just be the province of the surgeon and the radiologist.

We live in dangerous times. Universities are currently agitating to take over, or have already taken over, the teaching of other vocational courses such as for ambulance officers, paramedics, police, physiotherapists, chiropractors, occupational therapists and nurses - and in each case the pattern is the same. Less and less of the training is done by those who have been working in the relevant profession, and more and more PhD graduates with a research focus take on the teaching and designing of courses, with a view to teaching on the side and/or to protecting their area of expertise, no matter how irrelevant. They also have minimal teaching experience. Students learn more and more about less and less relevant material. They are less ready to take on their role as a doctor, or the work necessary to do this job.

Currently in many courses textbooks are no longer prescribed, but a recommended reading list and stacks of photocopied papers and hastily prepared lecture notes are given to the students. They are told to go and get on with it - and this is in the more structured courses. Others are completely self-directed and there is no actual teaching at all. This is lazy and cannot readily be evaluated. It is subject to change on a whim and leaves the student floundering in a sea of few definites. Facts, half facts, and fashionable views are weighted the same and it is difficult to gain an ability to determine what is true and what is "true for the moment".

Most doctors want to be doctors, and although many have open and enquiring minds and may want to go further into research and other developments, this is not what medicine is all about. It is about medicine, not the latest whiz-bang gadget, or the latest theoretical approach. By all means if this is the direction the student/doctor wants to take after graduation, so be it. But a lot of current research is too narrow, precisely because many researchers lack a basic comprehensive knowledge of the body's structures. For example, pathology of the liver can affect the eye, but research about the eye will be flawed if those conducting it lack this basic understanding of other organs and what relevance this may have.

Source



A teacher must not have girls sit on his lap

Another step towards making male teachers an endangered species

Prosecutors filed eight new child molestation counts on Wednesday against a substitute elementary schoolteacher suspected of inappropriately touching his young students. Each of the new counts against Eric Norman Olsen represents a new victim, meaning Olsen now stands formally charged with molesting nine girls. He faces up to 28 years in state prison if convicted as charged. Olsen pleaded not guilty to the new counts during a brief hearing Wednesday morning in West Valley Superior Court.

His attorney, Gina Kershaw, said afterward the allegations against Olsen have been blown out of proportion. "He's really a good guy who has been thrown into an unfortunate situation," the attorney said. Kershaw said no students have reported Olsen touched their private parts.

The only evidence suggesting his contact with them was at all sexual is a letter he wrote at the urging of police in which he admitted to gaining sexual arousal from having young girls sit on his lap. Kershaw said she believes Ontario police used coercive tactics to trick Olsen into writing a false confession. "They're good at what they do, they interrogate, that's what they did in this case," the defense attorney said.

Olsen was arrested Aug. 3 on suspicion of molesting a 10-year-old girl at the Berlyn School in Ontario. In that case, authorities said Olsen had the girl sit on his lap and rubbed her back underneath her shirt. He was charged with three counts of child molestation stemming from that case and he remained in jail while police sought other possible victims. Deputy District Attorney Jason Anderson said six of the new victims were students in the Central School District in Rancho Cucamonga. Olsen is accused of molesting all six on the same day, Dec. 20, 2005. One new victim is from the Fontana Unified School District. Authorities believe Olsen molested her sometime in the 2005-06 school year, according to a criminal complaint. The remaining victim is from the Ontario-Montclair School District. Prosecutors allege Olsen molested her sometime in March.

All eight girls were about 5 to 7 years old at the time of the alleged incidents. All the allegations involve Olsen placing the girls on his lap, the prosecutor said. "There are witnesses to it," Anderson said. "The young ladies are clear about who the teacher was and what the conduct was." Police have said at least 12 possible victims have been identified since Olsen's arrest, including the eight represented by the new charges on Wednesday.

Source. (To avoid the risk of a trial, the teacher eventually pleaded "No contest". Sentence has not yet been handed down)

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For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"

Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

***************************



19 February, 2007

Colleges review ethics of textbook selection

Colleges are grappling with how to balance conflict-of-interest policy with professors' authority to choose textbooks. Prices have tripled in 20 years

A Miami Dade College professor took a trip to San Francisco, paid for by a textbook publisher. Weeks later, his three-member committee selected the publisher's book as required reading for all anatomy students at MDC's Kendall campus and the department chairman approved. Retail cost at the college bookstore: $178.50.

A recent state ethics finding on the trip two years ago has raised questions about MDC's ambiguous rules for choosing textbooks. And it has opened a window into the nation's $6 billion textbook industry, whose prices have tripled in the past two decades. MDC, the nation's largest community college, is a key market for publishers, with more than 100,000 potential customers paying an average $800 a year and up for books and supplies, according to federal statistics.

The state ethics commission found probable cause that anatomy professor Alfonso Pino knew or should have known the trip to San Francisco was given to influence him. The panel declined to treat it as an ethics violation, in part because the weekend trip, which cost less than $700 for airfare and hotel, ``left little time if any . . . to participate in junket-like activities.'' Pino declined interview requests. His attorney, Mark Richard, who also heads the union that represents MDC professors, said Pino volunteered his time to review books, an essential task for educators. ''It's far cheaper to ask professors to give of their time, for just expense reimbursement, than to pay us our hourly rates to review these things,'' Richard said.

The ruling comes as universities and colleges grapple with how to construct conflict-of-interest policies without compromising professors' authority to choose teaching materials. MDC has no rules governing what professors can accept from a textbook company or what they must disclose. Pearson Education, Benjamin Cummings' parent company, had offered Pino a $250 honorarium but never paid him, the investigation found.

Professors say lucrative offers from publishers are rare. One small company made headlines in 2003 when it offered faculty $4,000 to review and require books, according to a Chronicle of Higher Education report.

The man who lodged the ethics complaint against Pino, Christopher Turley, was a textbook salesman whose book wasn't chosen. Turley has since left John Wiley & Sons, which he said did not offer trips. ''I didn't see the point of going in and competing. . . . There's no transparency on anything,'' Turley said. Norma Goonen, MDC's top academic official, said, ``This is normal practice. It's not something nefarious or horrible.'' MDC prohibits professors from accepting payment in exchange for choosing books but allows honoraria for reviewing books, said MDC attorney Carmen Dominguez. Honorarium limits are not defined, and professors are not required to report them. ''Either the lack of effective disclosure procedures or the insufficiency of disclosure in this case is troubling,'' said Tony Alfieri, director of the University of Miami's Center for Ethics in Public Policy.

At the University of Miami, a private school, professors consulting for a publisher must recuse themselves from book-selection committees, said spokeswoman Margot Winick. Florida International University and Florida Atlantic University require professors to report outside income, but conflict-of-interest rules do not cover textbook vendor trips. ''Everybody is struggling with this . . . [to] make more specific guidelines,'' said Diane Alperin, FAU associate provost of academic affairs. Broward Community College has no separate policy beyond state ethics laws. Ken Ross, vice president for academic affairs, said faculty paid by publishers to review books or attend conferences should not pick textbooks. ''We're looking to make them [guidelines] a little clearer,'' he said.

MDC's textbook policy, like some from other colleges, deals only with potential conflicts arising from books written by professors, who may not participate in selecting their own books. MDC, like other community colleges, is covered by state ethics rules. Choosing textbooks is considered an academic freedom, and the choices tend not to be treated like typical government purchases, even when public universities are involved. The state ethics commission agreed that professors do not meet the legal definition of purchasing agents. By comparison, at the local government level in Miami-Dade County, no one involved in purchasing may accept a trip paid for by a vendor. ''It may be an issue that a lot of colleges and universities should look at,'' said Dominguez, of MDC.

It's not hard to find students complaining about the cost of textbooks. ''I was very shocked [by the price]. There were no used [books] left,'' said Bridgett Shane, 20, an anatomy student in Pino's class who calls him ``an awesome professor.'' Overall, prices for books and supplies rose at twice the inflation rate between 1986 and 2004, according to a 2005 federal government audit. Textbook companies have increasingly put out newer editions of books more quickly -- every three or four years instead of every four to five years -- making it harder for students to buy and sell used books. Publishers told auditors they update information and include more interactive extras to meet professors' demands.

The March 12, 2005, meeting attended by Pino included 14 other professors from across the country. ''It's pretty widely done,'' said David Hakensen, a spokesman for the publisher. ``This is the one way that we get feedback on our product.''

A spokeswoman for Pearson's rival McGraw-Hill, Mary Skafidas, said her company also schedules regular faculty focus groups around the country to get professional feedback, though not to review specific books. She said professors are chosen for their expertise.

Invitations to conferences seem to vary among schools and departments. English Department faculty members at FIU, for example, get pizza parties paid for by sales representatives, but not out-of-town trips, said Carmela Pinto-McIntire, the department chairwoman. Biology Department members get hors d'oeuvres trays, and some professors get a stipend of $100 or $200 to review books, said Gene Rosenberg, associate department chairman. ''Trips? Gosh, I wish,'' Pinto-McIntire said. ``Nobody's ever offered me a trip.''

Source



A NEW RELIGION FOR SCOTTISH SCHOOLS

In an email to Benny Peiser, economist Alan Peacock [pavone@blueyonder.co.uk] -- now aged 84 -- compares religious education of the past with Greenie education today. An abridged version appeared in "The Scotsman". A few days ago, Sir Alan Peacock celebrated his fiftieth anniversary of becoming a Professor of Economics, successively at Edinburgh, York, Buckingham and Heriot-Watt

On Friday 2nd February at the University of Edinburgh the Secretary of State for Environment etc. delivered an excellent piece of propaganda on the virtues of the latest UN report on climate change, with all the usual arguments for an apocalyptic view, succinctly presented. He revealed an interesting fact about the 'global' nature of his department's campaign to keep us on the straight and narrow - the issue of a pamphlet for schools. This is already claimed as a great success, getting the young in line to be in profound agreement with the Climate scientists backing the Minister.

Irreverent thoughts hit me at this moment in his disquisition. Did they use rhyming couplets - remember "coughs and sneezes, spread diseases"? I recalled the naughty cautionary tale attributed to Hilaire Belloc, suitably adapted by yours truly -"Uncle George and Auntie Mabel, fainted at the breakfast table, let this be an awful warning, never counter global warming!" No prizes to the elderly multitudes who remember the original last line!

The next thought I had was even more subversive. Could those of us who questioned whether the UN predictions were firmly based on best practice science and economics be permitted to enter the 'market' of ideas and issue schools with an alternative view? Of course, tender minds must be guarded against the threat of inflammatory documents that would corrupt the morals and manners of the young but this is no argument for 'zero tolerance' of views counter to officially approved scientific nostrums.

A reasonable case can be made out against inundating schools with a confusion of different standpoints on fundamental issues regarding our future. However, I would be less suspicious of raising barriers to entry against a different view on climate change had I not read, to my immense surprise, the written evidence of the Government Chief Scientist, Sir David King, to the House of Lords Select Committee on Economic Affairs (2005) concerning climate change. He categorizes sceptics who have no 'scientific training' (undefined) and other 'professional lobbyists' as likely as not to be hired guns, and, as some of other establishment figures have suggested, in the pay of the oil companies.

When some of us recently issued a detailed critique of the much-acclaimed Stern Report, which gives its economic blessing to the establishment view and is endorsed by the Royal Society, it was perhaps hardly necessary for us to state quite clearly that none of us received any financial or institutional support for our work. But it seemed advisable to do so. (See the journal, World Economics, October - December 2006 , p. 166)

I received a sound elementary education at the Grove Academy, Broughty Ferry (1928-33!) in grammar, spelling, arithmetic, singing, and bible studies for which I am immensely grateful. Of course, our daily input of religion was according to the doctrines of the Church of Scotland, but no attempt was made at converting us. I only remember one curious case where our routine was given over to the Band of Hope who were allowed to proselytize in a sensational manner on the moral and physical damage resulting from the consumption of alcohol. We were given an afternoon off in order to be conducted round a macabre visual display in large jars showing the corroding effect of alcohol on the human body with all the attendant excitement of a trip to Dundee, and then, some weeks later, were obliged to write an essay on The Dangers of Drink , and in school time .

I admit that there would be some teachers who would regard the Band of Hope's mission as entirely consonant with Christian doctrine, other than in regard to the medicinal properties of whisky. Likewise, environmental studies, which appear to be rapidly replacing traditional doctrine as the kernel of religious observance in schools, will admit the occasional display of the wares, say , of the World Wildlife Fund- much admired by the Secretary of State - or the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, as friendly sects, whatever misgivings one might harbour about the effects that animal behaviour could have on emission of carbon and methane gases.



More school hysteria

To an Arizona middle school, Batman! Three schools in the north Phoenix suburb of Cave Creek were on lockdown for about 45 minutes Wednesday morning after a student at Desert Arroyo Middle School reported seeing a person dressed as Batman run across campus, jump a fence and disappear into the desert, Scottsdale police Sgt. Mark Clark said.

The student described the person as 6 feet 3 inches tall and possibly male. "We're assuming it was male, although they did have a mask on," Clark said. Officers combed the desert around the middle school. A nearby elementary school and high school also were on lockdown as officers sought the caped crusader. The result - no Batman. "It's just one of those interesting little stories that we looked into but we couldn't find anyone," Clark said.

Nedda Shafir, a spokeswoman for the Cave Creek Unified School District, said putting all the schools on lockdown was a precautionary measure. "We didn't want to take any chances," Shafir said. "We just don't want to put anyone at risk."

Source

***************************

For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"

Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

***************************



18 February, 2007

Schools ban popular childhood games

Important learning experience short-circuited

Kids call "Not it!" when they gather to play tag, and some may never be "it" as a growing number of Valley schools ban the game at recess. Tag joins the list of childhood games such as dodgeball and tackle football no longer allowed at schools across the country because of too many injuries and squabbles. "Tagging turns into shoving, and someone's crying, 'He pushed me!' " said Cindy Denton, principal at Thew Elementary School in Tempe, where chasing games are prohibited except in gym class under adult supervision

Last year, schools