Education Accountability

I have written before about the state of K-12 education in this country (see blogs of 9/11 and 9/21, 2007). My complaints have centered not just on student outcomes and “return on investment” of the significant dollars we invest in public education. Rather, my objections have centered on the basic services and teaching model itself upon which our educational programming is built. Namely, our expectation that all kids, regardless of family environment, family history, economic circumstances, intellect, interests, talents and god-given gifts, should all be expected to learn, understand and perform well the same material taught in the same manner at the same chronological age. But that is the underlying ridiculous assumption of the American educational system. It is a factory assembly-line approach to mass production – and in this case the “product” is supposed to be an educated young person.


Clearly this system is not creating a quality product consistently from all of the educational factories. We have some spectacular outcomes, average products, and some horrific environments that are barely better than low-quality baby-sitting. We have talked about these problems for years, yet bright spots of creative and fresh innovation have barely made a dent in the overall paralysis of our educational structure. Magnet schools; charter schools; teacher innovation and quality awards; centers for learning; state takeovers of bad districts; over 1,000,000 children now being home schooled; these are all reflective of our various frustrations. But these efforts are not enough.

George W. Bush put his education effort into the No Child Left behind (NCLB) bill, passed with by-partisan congressional support in 2001. While promising tough standards, instituting performance measurement tools, and punitive steps for under-performing schools, years later not much new has been accomplished except illusionary change. States and schools have simply downgraded their standards or testing criteria in order to look better than they really are; many teaching innovation attempts have been stymied; and converting educational goals to testing skills goals have been the predominant outcomes of NCLB.

At the centerpiece of this “expectations versus outcomes” tussle are the critical players – the school administrators and teachers who ultimately create the classroom experience. I have memories of some wonderful teachers who helped and guided me in my early life. People who taught me not just facts to memorize, but stories and ideas. Teachers who encouraged imagination and curiosity, and who made continual life-long learning a consistent part of my character. I remain indebted to those great people. But their very quality also helped me to recognize those teachers who had long passed their prime, were no longer learning their subject matter or investing in their teaching, or perhaps never had much ability in the first place. Today we still have those same energetic and creative teachers, the average middlin’ teachers, and way too many burned out and/or untalented teachers who should have left the profession years ago.

Unfortunately, for those of us looking from the outside in, it is this bottom-end group that is dictating the educational future. Stuck in old methodologies; protected by union regulation, tenure or employment traditions; as bored with teaching as their students are of listening to them drone from their yellowed lesson plans; too many teaching colleges still thinking it is the 1950s classroom; this “cadre of the protected” stands firm in resisting virtually any changes in the status quo. So the skilled, good teachers or the energetic new teachers (1/3rd of whom leave within their first three years) either bail out of the profession or hunker down and do the best they can to work around the system they are stuck within. God love their perseverance.

After many years of talking about change, the call for accountability, change and new results is growing. An entire school faculty and administration was recently fired en masse in Rhode Island following years of bad results. Detroit has lost 1/4th of their school population, yet teachers are fighting the responsible closing of numerous schools to reflect this new reality. Similar stories everywhere. So semi-autonomous charter schools are growing, as is the home school population for people who have given up entirely. Yet in center stage officials from teacher unions cry, “No,” or “just give us more money” as the solution. But more of us are now saying NO back – show us a new plan first instead of just holding our kids hostage. If we (correctly) fault congressional Republicans as simply being the Party of No that offers only the same old disproven ideas, then we must now fault teacher unions and a large preponderance of their membership as also just being no-sayers. This chorus of no, and what can’t be done, the lack of truly new ideas, has to stop. The very talented teachers whose jobs are legitimately protected by their skills have to reclaim their union and turn it into the change agent it could and should be. Start offering real and flexible solutions instead of continual resistance. Else they will also go down in this expanding sinking ship.

I have no doubt there were some quality, dedicated teachers that were fired in Rhode Island. But as long as they leave their future, and our children’s/grandchildren’s future, in the hands of these defenders of the last century, they will lose also. The current system does not work for too many; the creative mind of the individual student is being lost in the assembly line of standardization. Memorizing facts is neither an education nor reform. Reform is urgently needed, and will ultimately happen as pressures mount. Who will lead this reform – the teachers who should, or the outsiders who are forced to do so?