A friend sent this provocative article, written by a TFA alum.
He questions whether TFA’s focus on college readiness (which apparently begins in kindergarten) makes sense.
I find myself both agreeing and disagreeing with him.
I believe that teachers must treat all students with equal respect and have high expectations for all.
But I have also been taken aback when I visited charter schools and saw college banners in kindergarten and first grade classrooms.
There is something vainglorious about telling a five-year-old that they are bound for the Ivy League.
Very few are, no matter who their parents are.
It appeared to me that the teachers were trying to program the children to be like themselves.
My thought: Educate them.
Inspire a love of learning.
Teach them to believe in their own capacity and help to build that capacity by daily effort.
Don’t confuse your own personal history with theirs.
If you really want to increase the college-going rate, elect politicians who will provide more scholarship money and loan forgiveness for college students.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I have found that even public schools have the mentality that all students should be college bound.
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At my elementary school ALL classes had to have a “College Bound” themed presentation somewhere. The edict came from “the powers that be” and since we were up for a Quality Review, we had no choice but to comply. However, I didn’t focus on just Ivy League schools. My fifth graders and I had had endless conversations about what college is and isn’t. Many of their parents and older siblings were in some type of college program, so it wasn’t a big deal. We had fun surfing the Internet for information about schools they’d heard about and learned a lot about schools I had never heard off! They became utterly fascinated at what careers were open to them, from marine biologist, pediatrician, astronaut!I am a first generation Italian and from the time I could walk and talk, going to college was instilled in me by my immigrant grandparents and parents. My husband and I did the same for our daughter. Having goals is important. Knowing college is certainly available and affordable for anyone who wants it, is, I believe, part of my repsonsiblity as an educator. My students and I had fun with this and isn’t that a big part of learning?
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“It appeared to me that the teachers were trying to program the children to be like themselves.”
Unfortunately, I have seen teachers trying to “program the children to be like themselves” too many times, usually from young and inexperienced teachers. The experienced teachers know that one has to “let go” of their egos and sense of self to be unegotistical in order to “Educate them. Inspire a love of learning. Teach them to believe in their own capacity and help to build that capacity by daily effort. [and] “Don’t confuse your own personal history with theirs.”
To be “unegotistical” is one of the reasons that teachers do not respond well to “merit” pay as the good ones know that teaching is about the students learning and not about the teacher’s advancement.
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TFA, KIPP and some charters refer to the students as “scholars”. As if scholars spend their days prepping for tests, taking tests and following orders all day.
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Yes, that is ridiculous, isn’t it?
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I went to school today to start setting up my room. Our beautiful citizenship mall, a collection of all 50 state flags, summaries of each state, replicas of the Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and Essays from Washington and Jefferson, as well a pictures of every President of the United States had been taken down. In it’s place, a mass of college banners. I really appreciate the parents of my students who are first rate machinists and mechanics. They did a first rate job repairing a relative’s prosthetic limb, enabling him to go hunting with me. The Ivy league isn’t always the most practical or personally actualizing option. What is wrong with letting children find their own passions as they grow? I think we are suffering from a mass infectious disease that leave insanity as a side effect.
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Yes, I’ve seen this in charter schools–the same charter schools where teachers are required to decorate the classroom in the colors and logos of their collegiate alma mater. Elementary children referred to as scholars and told “this is what good scholars do” and “good scholars never, never [fill in blank].” I can honestly say that most of the children could not even tell you what a scholar is.
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I agree with his criticism of TFA’s (and many other charter and public schools’) obsessions with pushing college as the only option. I firmly believe that all students should have the opportunity to attend college and to make an informed decision. However, to attempt to indoctrinate children and adolescents into thinking that college is the only path is not only unrealistic, but also potentially harmful.
To say that this is TFA’s “real failing”, however, is completely off base. Sending under-prepared teachers into some the neediest and most challenging classrooms armed only with the belief that “all kids just need to be told they have potential” and a chip on their shoulder, strikes me as a much greater failure.
Take a look at my thoughts on “TFA and assumptions about poverty”. http://phillyteacherman.blogspot.com/2012/08/tfa-and-assumptions-about-poverty.html
-Chris
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It reminds me of Jon Benet Ramsey. Developmentally inappropriate to say the least.
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I teach in a low income (nearly 80% free/reduced lunch) public high school and we have been told to ensure every student is college ready and focused on attending post-secondary education. While I don’t completely disagree with ensuring students have the skills and knowledge to make any post-secondary choice, I don’t think pushing all students to focus on college as the only real option is positive.
I use my own family as an example. My dad finished an AA and then completed his plumbing apprenticeship. He has been a successful plumber for over 40 years. My mom completed her BA in Accounting when I was a child and worked when we needed the extra money. She recently completed her MS in Accounting (at age 61) and has worked in accounting and payroll positions for the last 20 years.
There are 4 kids in our family – 2 girls and 2 boys. I went from high school to university completing my BA in English and later my teaching certification, M.Ed in International Education, and am currently working on my Ph.D. My younger sister got her AS moved on to university and got her BS and her teaching certification, taught for a while and went back and earned her M.Ed. My brothers, raised in the same household, took different paths. One went from high school to the Marines, served 3 tours in Iraq, and after 4 years in the military got out and has earned his AS and is now slowly working on his BS. The other tried community college and hated it. He then got into the pipe fitters union and began his apprenticeship. He’s currently working and considering a degree in construction management so that if he gets injured or simply too old to do the heavy pipe fitting work he has another option.
Now for the best part of the tale. We’re all four happily married. We all own homes. We all have enough money to have the things we need and some of the things we want. None of us is rich. We all took different roads to success and did need post-secondary training to be successful, but we didn’t all need college.
This story shows my students they have options and that whichever option they take they will be supported and can be successful. The total focus on college bound and college ready makes those who don’t have access to federal loans feel defeated. It makes those who just can’t imagine a few more years behind a school desk feel unsuccessful. Let’s show our students that they have options and how to access those options rather that focus on only one option.
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I have a son that had near perfect SAT and ACT scores, was an all state athlete, and had schools falling all over themselves offering him scholarships. He found his passion as a Coast Guard Rescue Swimmer. Some would consider that to be an educational failure. He considers it the best use of his talents. As he says, I get to be part of a miracle for people one of the worst days of their life.
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You make excellent points! The reality that only ~35% of American youth (and only ~12% of low-income youth) hold a college degree by age 24 also speaks to the fact that schools need to prepare students for paths in life aside from college. Doing so would help to communicate that ALL youth–not just those who are college bound–are valuable and have the potential to make valuable contributions to society.
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Comment above was meant as a reply to Shannon. 🙂
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Diane you make a very important point. Teacher counter-transference. as we say in mental health, “Its not about you”. The implied message is “be like me or do as I say and you’ll make me happy” which doesn’t guarrantee that is in the best interest of the child or takes in their individual assets and areas that need development.
And if we take it tease it out further, its rather insulting to think that some of these teachers think they share the same background & resources as some of their students so any ” If I can do it, so can you, if you try really hard enough” is pure crap.
It also sets up the teacher for burnout with all of their unfullfilled unrealistic expectations projected onto students. they feel too feel like failures when students don’t want to be them or don’t do well academically in a subject the teacher loves. I’m also sure that the kids pick up on this as well.
And Lastly while I’m pontificating, its damn arrogant to think that you can dramatically change a student’s life by listening to you a few times a week. You are blessed when you see the spark in a kid flicker & grow but more often than not we don’t always see the fruits of our labor. If you plant the seed it will grow. Like the quote in one of your earlier posts is it to “fill a bucket or light a fire”
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Frankly, what concerns me more than how teachers feel is how students feel if they don’t go to college; if they don’t want to go to college; if they can’t afford to go to college. For 12 or 13 years, they have been told that they must go to college (or, it is implied, they have failed). How many will feel like they have failed, even though the work they do is useful and they lead good lives and are good providers for themselves and their family? My view is that college should always be an option, but every should make their own choices. Some people choose to go to college when they are 28 or 30. Some go right away. Some never go. The role of teachers is to do the best they can for every student in their class, but ultimately the students make the decisions about their life course.
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Diane I agree again, the over-reliance on going to college as a barometer for student or teacher success is folly and stigmatizing. College is an option that many don’t pursue or do so in their own time, which is the key. I think the message that needs to be gven to kids is that they are valued no matter what option they choose.
Unfortunately the paradigm of not going to college=failure is so widespread and encultured that trying to convince otherwise can costrued to being a heresey. Thank god there are people who see that kids/people make decisions in their own time.
I, myself have a GED diploma and didn’t obtain my Ivy league master’s degree until I was in my late 30s, Without discussing my therapy sessions, I will state that narrative of not being in college makes one me a failure certainly affects one’s self-esteem & self worth.
Trying to get people which includes parents. administrators, and some teachers, to see that measuring personal success by college admission, is wrong and going college is one of many career options is extremely difficult.
Imagine trying to do so in a school envrionmemt run by brain-washed Ed reformers or from the Leadership Academy chetniks.
I have friends in NYC who are licensed plumbers & elecricians whose choice not to go to college hasn’t affected their earning power or their percieved “success”.
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There are many ways to be successful. And there are today many unemployed college graduates or waiting on tables.
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All students in Louisiana will have to take the ACT. First time at the expense of the state. We must prepare them for college. This is just another piece of the LA ed reform.
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