60 Minutes, Urban Education, and Where Do We Go From Here?

60 Minutes recently profiled my school, The SEED Public Charter School of Washington, D.C. The crew had been visiting the school for just over a year, and the final product is the 13-minute clip below. (Catch me around the 4:40 mark.)

Great stuff is happening at my school. Just a couple tidbits from my teaching world: Enrollment in my AP Literature class nearly doubled for next term, and my future students headed home for summer break today with copies of Crime and Punishment in hand. After distributing the books this morning, I spotted a few students around campus already tearing into Dostoyevsky's text. Byron Pitts's brain would have likely melted.

There are names to drop (In the fall, George Stephanopoulos visited one of my ten-student classes, then invited us to his final taping of This Week) and achievements to celebrate (all seniors performed scenes of Shakespeare's Henry V to a packed house at the downtown Lansburgh Theater). Almost all of the graduating seniors are heading off to college, many with scholarships lined up. The urban-public-boarding-nonselective-college prep model is exciting and should be replicated in urban centers across the country.

However, I'm a little concerned that any discussion on education reform has been overtaken by emphasizing charter schools and merit pay. Charter schools-- privately operated, publicly funded schools -- do not automatically confer superiority over traditional public schools. By definition, charters are like islands, and many are chaotic and horrible. Mine is a great one that does great things for about 320 students per year. I don't want the overwhelming majority of students in America-- traditional public school students-- to be shortchanged because everyone is dazzled by a few innovative success stories. There is dire need to improve traditional public schools; we can't ignore that.

What do you think of today's mainstream political/media discourse on education?

 

 

 

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Comments

[Teachers Husband]

03:40 PM on 06/15/2010

The most telling passage in this article was the implication that the teacher's (or school's) success is judged by the fact that the students are excited to take on a difficult and challenging summer reading assignment, rather than their performance on some standardized test. Education is a lifelong endeavor and the most critical thing that any school can do is to instill some degree of intellectual curiousity in its students. Sadly, this seems to be ignored by so-called reformers who seem to want the easy satisfaction of an objective test score.

[javajava]

03:08 PM on 06/14/2010

I'm of a mind tha community involvement in schools is the essential. Preperation for parents and students for school ought to be done early, maybe by home visiting school counselors. Preschool and Head Start programs where praents drop kids off and pick them up with no interaction with the educators just sets precident for lack of involvement for the rest of a childs learning. The best schools have active and concerned parents envolved. They make time and give the effort to make schools function. Usually we see broadcasts of concerned parents waving signs when there is a school closure or drastic cuts in budgets and I sometimes wonder where was the concern before.
Often I hear "parents work, sometimes two jobs and do not have time", all I can say is they are our children. They will need more than food and shelter to thrive.

[Puller58]

07:16 AM on 06/14/2010

The discussion that has taken place over education in the media consistantly ignores problems that are far more harmful than certain superficial notions. Public schools live in terror of lawsuits, and the result is one of administative inertia. Old friends of mine have been in public education for over 25 years and their stories revolve around school officials trying to push all problems back onto the teachers. The fantasy is that private and parochial schools are so much better. One friend of mine and his mother taught at a Catholic school for a time. One child's parents came to see the mother and announced that she was not to discipline their child. When they were told of the circumstances of the child's behavior, they responded that they paid the teacher's salary. A visit with the schools headmaster had him backing the parents. Things came to an end when the headmaster asked my friend and mother to take a pay cut. Sound like a solid educational experience?

[jcwtts1]

07:05 PM on 06/12/2010

My general feelings about the discussion surrounding education misses key points. There are several basic things that we need to make sure every school has access to, tech, good books, replacement books if the students lose those books or if the books are taken from them, health food, safe places to do work, access to libraries, leveled classes, enthusiastic teachers, safe non disruptive classrooms. I feel the conversation lacks credibility because it is agenda driving. The dems want to save a massive part of their base, and the gop wants to cripple a massive part of the dem voting base without thinking about the harm they will do to public education. Then you have Texas and their crazy text book bs on top of it. If I had more room I'd outline a plan to revamp education, but I feel the conversation is going no where in hurry.

J

[Skeptical Patriot]

09:50 AM on 06/11/2010

Without labor and competitive reform (charter, vouchers,etc), we have a system that gives automatic tenure to teachers after two years, funds schools by income level (property taxes=income), and force students to attend only the school in their neighborhood. Poor teacher, good teachers, poor schools, good schools, it makes no difference unless the system is forced to change to be STUDENT centric not teacher and institutionally driven.

Are Charters the answer, no. But the are a part of a solution of competitive change, measurement of standards that is essential.

Would we accept a system of higher education where the only choice of school is provided by your local community and you have no other choice?

[jcwtts1]

06:50 PM on 06/12/2010

There need to be systemic changes and the only way to do them is to address a couple of things from the start. First, people have to stop comparing suburban schools with urban schools. The comparisons are ludicrous. First, the education level of the parents, which is a major factor in a) valuing education and b) helping students assimilate what they learn during the school, further the class sizes, resources, and access to basic equipment and class room behavior problems are fundamentally different. The second thing that needs to be done before you can even have this conversation is you have to level city schools so you don't have the mash up of brilliant kids and kids who are remedial in the same classroom. Do those two things and then start the conversation about tenure etc.

[supportamerica]

09:36 PM on 06/14/2010

I fanned and faved you. You make a lot of sense, it is like comparing apples to oranges. My Grandchildren go to a small 3A school, I know most of the teachers and Administrators because they live in our community and some even teach Sunday school at the local churches.

We still celebrate Christmas, the kids can wear crosses if they choose and are not asked to remove them or be sent home. The community pulls together to ensure all of the kids in the community are well rounded.

This is not so in urban areas. It is very transient and no one knows who is living next door let alone down the block. Our school does not do separation of AP students and Remedial students until High school. If a child needs more help in a particular area then he has a separate class for that period of time.Then they go back together for the next class.

I am as involved in my Grandchildren's education as their parents and it all works out very well. I am often called to the school to tell the students how it was "back then". I enjoy it and it keeps me young.

[Leonie Haimson]

11:30 PM on 06/10/2010

Good piece, Dan; I also wonder how regular urban public schools would do with the resources and class sizes provided to students at SEED; and why many of the charter advocates including the Billionaire's Boys Club are so vociferously against reducing class size throughout the public school system.

[Dan Brown]

11:12 AM on 06/11/2010

Thanks for the comment Leonie. The small class sizes at SEED (10-20 students) are absolutely one of the most important factors in the school's success. Everyone deserves an intimate, personal learning environment with a teacher who isn't overloaded with 150+ students in his gradebook.

[changing]

10:08 PM on 06/10/2010

Thank you for saying that a few charters can serve a few students well but public education must serve the rest. We must help all the schools based on need, not on some half baked "reform" movement lead by bogus "data" evaluations. As an educator with over twenty years of experience in both the public and private schools, I say private and charters can serve some needs but will be never be equipped to serve children on a large scale basis. It is incredibly important we stop the naive and arrogant dismantling of our education system. The Race to the Top is simply a game to starve the poor and needy schools and bring in a dysfunctional, discriminatory, separate but unequal education system.