The Wall Street Journal had an article today about a new plan from the U.S. Department of Education to bring Race to the Top (such a glorious success!) to the redesign of the American high school.
Unfortunately the article is behind a paywall, but I will summarize.
President Obama will announce a competition to find new way to prepare high-school students for the global economy. It will offer $100 million, for 25 to 40 grants for high schools to collaborate with higher education institutions and employers to give students “industry-relevant education and job skills.” The grants would be from $2 million to $7 million, and those who receive them would have to come up with matching funds for about 25% of the total.
The administration is using as a model the P-Tech High School in New York City, where students earn a diploma and an associate’s degree in six years. The school is a collaboration between the city Department of Education, IBM, and the City University of New York. It has yet to produce a graduate, but it is nonetheless considered very successful by the administration.
Unfortunately, there is a fly in the ointment: “Joe DiMartino, president of the Center for Secondary School Redesign Inc., supports the president’s efforts but worries a national overhaul could be slower than hoped. “The biggest impediment would be successful suburban communities that feel like they don’t need to change,” discouraging others from making efforts, said Mr. DiMartino, whose company is hired by states and districts to create programs that target students’ individualized needs.”
Yup, there they are again: those suburban moms and dads who like their high schools and resist Arne Duncan’s latest idea.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I believe this idea is being used in Duluth, MN schools.
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Wasn’t one of the mantras upon Obama’s election in ’08, “Science is back!”. I highly recommend the book, The Phenomenon of Obama and the Agenda for Education, edited by Carr and Porfilio. It helps. But it can’t diminish the unmitigated disappointment that the Obama ed policies represent.
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If “Science is back” what the hell is A. Duncan the education secretary?
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to complete my thought: for
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Exactly. We’ve gotten the faith-based model instead. Obama et al. see what they think might be the glimmer of a magic bullet in one approach, which has only just begun and hasn’t even played out yet, and they decide to throw billions at it so it can be done EVERYWHERE. As if there is ever one right way to reach every student. There is no science whatsoever in these determinations, and none of the decision-makers has even a modicum of understanding of child and adolescent development.
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The luminaries can’t throw away money fast enough. The only explanation is that desperate times demand desperate actions. I wonder who be the actual beneficiaries of this largesse?. This latest give away should be viewed as the Obama/Duncan Income Redistribution Plan? This is a ‘centrist’ administration? Perhaps, Obama should bring back Rahm Emanual.
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“. . . that desperate times. . .”
Please clarify what you mean by that.
Thanks in advance!
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Are you kidding? Rahm is implementing the same hairbrain, “New Democrat” “centrist” (aka neo-liberal right-wing) privatization schemes in Chicago’s schools. No, send him back to the North Shore suburbs, where he was able to get the progressive education that only rich kids are able to have in this country.
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Hi Mary,
As I read this, I wonder why we perceive our (FM) school system as inadequate with respect to college and career readiness? How does one measure that readiness? Who told us that our students were not college and career ready? Or is that simply a statement about all American students (and it doesn’t apply to our students)?
One other (sore) subject – are there any local districts who have made changes to lessons with respect to language arts and math classes? Seems like if state assessment scores are being published, schools would be doing all they could to keep students in those subject areas (limiting lessons to other content areas and/or special areas). Because our version of “test prep” is part of on-going instruction, students who miss a class are often missing important information – not just official “test prep” classes. I know this is a touchy subject.
Thanks,
Carol
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Diane, information on this was in Ed week, Here is what I had to say about it:
100 million dollars for High Schools?
According to ED week, the funding for this program comes from the Labor Department funds from H-1B visa programs (ironically, the same visas that Gulen Charters use to bring in cheap labor) . http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/2013/11/high_schools_to_compete_for_10.html?cmp=ENL-EU-NEWS1
The grants applicants must include, at a minimum, a local education agency, a local workforce investment system entity, an employer, and an institution of higher education.
Now what schools can you think of that work with corporate employers?
This will be another interesting “follow the money trail” and deduction as to who is actually putting it into their pocket!
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Smells to a higher heaven than a dead skunk in the middle of the road: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CLtsPktje0
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But I have no problem with high schoolers working with employers and the next level of education whether technical or practical to learn the work that THEY want to do.
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Appreciate your Louden Wainwright III ref.
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We get all kinds of dead skunks in the middle of the road all year long out where I live.
Hell, one day I was sitting on the front porch enjoying the evening and a brew and a skunk comes walking down the driveway right to the sidewalk to the porch (all of 10 feet away) and I was hoping that he/she would keep going. Fortunately it did.
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Buffalo Public Schools has a program called Middle College where the high school is incorporated into the local community college. After five years the student graduates with an associates degree.
Providing internships or the opportunity to earn college credits at local colleges/universities is nothing new. At least not in my area – they’ve been doing it for years, even in the suburbs.
We need to be objective. Not all ideas are bad ideas. Some ideas might even be worthwhile with a little tweaking. To be truly college ready, seniors need the opportunity to visit college campuses and get a feel for upper level expectations. This would be more worthwhile than high stakes testing. Pairing up with local higher education institutes seems like a good thing to me.
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Well, it might be worth bringing up “college readiness” that is deemed “lacking” by these pushers of the CCSS. What is generally lacking? Maturity, responsibility, class attendance, studying, not completing assignments …all things that take place in the Freshman year. Kids behave like sexually charged, drunken, drug using fools and then expect to pass college courses. They may be bright but the “freedom” to be immature while pretending to be “adults” ruins many a college student’s life.
I don’t know that K12 schools can do a thing to alleviate the terrible choices made by some college students. I don’t believe this version of the CC will address this.
All I can say is…somebody needs to get real.
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“. . . but the “freedom” to be immature while pretending to be “adults” ruins many a college student’s life.”
And for many an other greatly enhances their lives perhaps from the sheltered existence that they knew before college.
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? Sheltered from boozing, taking drugs, being promiscuous, wasting their parents’ money while leaving the professors shaking their heads at how poor their K12 education must have been??? My point is: poor performance in college is the responsibility of the STUDENT.
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Bush had a program like this where an existing public high school would team up with a local employer and a community college. We’ve been doing it here for ten years. We call it “two plus two” and the kids graduate with a high school diploma and an associates degree. This area has a lot of manufacturing, so that’s the focus, skilled trades. The community college works with employers to offer the courses the kids need.
Why would you need to change/create a whole new school? Why not just send the kids who want to take that track out to a community college program their junior and senior year?
My concern is we’ll just end up paying a bunch of consultants, especially given that the proposal at the Dept Of Labor calls for “experience with reform”. Egads. The “r” word. It’ll be the same old cast of characters.
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/7067604/#.Uo0fx2ResWU
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and as now, most of those consultants won’t ever have worked in industry or business, they will just have been told about it. Something like how many of the ed-tech experts today couldn’t cut it in the actual tech industry, but act like they are on the cutting edge of things.
I spent 15 years as a info tech consultant with ‘high end’ firms. I can’t count the number of times that someone in a K12 setting has told me how things work ‘in the real world’ even though they have never worked there.
I don’t really see what is so special about a 6 year high school and Associates degree program. Couldn’t they have just gone to a good high school and then to an actual college or junior college for the Associates degree? Or is the point that taxpayer are footing the bill for these kids until they are 20?
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Early colleges have existed for years here in North Carolina. More students would like to attend them than there are slots in them because the state pick up the tab for 2 years of a 4 year college or an associates degree. So maybe this $ can be used to expand already successful existing programs than creating new ones. There’s a thought . . .
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I will bet we head in that direction.
I will say, from what I am finding out by asking around and reading, it seems NC has trended towards some of the type models supported by Duncan. Apparently we were already redoing our Standards when CCSS came along, so we just adopted them to save time and resources. If there is a way to match federal money with goals we already have, I imagine it will be sought after. But who knows.
Also, I understand that even though Virginia did not sign in for CCSS, that their standards closely resemble them. If anyone knows anything about that, I would live to know (apparently their website even lines up their standards with CCSS).
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Maybe those “successful suburban communities” don’t want their children to be trained as serfs in the global economy. Industries that want to partner with schools don’t want educated citizens, they may only want pliable obedient workers.
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And you’re ready to free the serfs, eh?
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Nah, HU, just try to learn them a little about self realization to throw off the chains of capitalism.
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Great, more disruption.
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You know who used to train people in skilled trades right out of high school?
Labor unions.
One would think the US Department of Labor could mention that in passing, but I suppose expecting anyone in Obama’s rather ELITE ed reform clique to say something positive about the role of labor unions in creating a middle class would be too much to ask 🙂
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Yep, we sure seem to have had a system that supposedly produced this, America, the greatest nation of the world.
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The experiment is costing a lot of money in the form of grants. If something like this is actually beneficial to students, will there be a budget to replicate it everywhere in the country? In this political climate? Will they learn what works and only wealthy public schools and private schools will reap the benefits of this experiment because they can fund it? Is this another example of grant money used to try new methods on poorer children so only the schools that can afford any success that comes from this will benefit?
If it turns out this grant will do some good in educating our students, who will get to benefit from this?
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Here’s a (rather feeble, but still) defense of public schools from an unexpected source:
Although he described himself as a “hardheaded guy” in his speech, he said improvements in the nation’s educational system will not be won by “waging a war” on the traditional public schools, but rather by engaging with them and working together.
Sometimes, he said, “It’s better to go with the grain.”
Larry Summers talking about (Duncan’s?) war on public schools! He didn’t say “Duncan”. I added that 🙂
http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2013/11/20/different-kind-chairmanship-harvard-summers-finds-new-cause/nZCxipcmPB0OgZKpx62SvO/story.html?utm_content=buffer84576&utm_source=buffer&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Buffer
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The faster and more furious this crap comes the more and greater the need for resistance to these supposed reforms.
Why not just adequately fund all public schools so that all children receive the kind of education all the edudeformers’ children get at their supposedly elite schools????
Throw monies (NCLB) after monies (RaTT) after monies (and now this “competition) at imagined problems but never properly and cognizantly developed, implemented and evaluated educational malpractices.
Truly, Wilson has it right in stating: “Facts are less dangerous than theory; despite the promise of the Enlightenment, most people use up far more energy defending their Mythologies [ideologies] than in searching for facts; the world is full of answers looking for questions, and significant questions are rather an endangered species.” In ch 11 pg 5. of “Educational Standards and the Problem of Error” found at:
http://epaa.asu.edu/ojs/article/view/577/700
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Agreed! Why is it that American students have to compete against each other to get an education (read: money) in their own country?
And where does Hillary stand on all this? Elizabeth Warren? Anyone?
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@suzydog
Warren supports vouchers since 2003 book, don’t know about it now but still expect support for it. Hillary isn’t clean (I don’t know where she stands at all anymore because of the incestuous nature of politics) There was a topic here a while back about this.
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Suzydog,
I don’t give a crap where those two stand on this issue. We need to get beyond this “saviour” nonsense who will come along and “save” us and get to the dirty work of doing it outselves.
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America’s most trusted pundits agree with Arne Duncan that America’s moms are ruining America:
http://blogs.rollcall.com/beltway-insiders/arne-duncan-was-right-about-u-s-schools-kondracke/?utm_content=bufferd6e52&utm_source=buffer&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Buffer
God, this is hilarious. First it was teachers and now it’s the moms. We’d have a thriving middle class if it wasn’t for teachers and moms, and their low standards.
I finally figured out who Duncan’s political constituency is. It’s pundits. He’s adored by pundits.
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We’d have a thriving middle class if it weren’t for Democrats imposing state solutions on the economy. But if you have the votes, I guess you can be as ignorant and stupid as you want.
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We’d have a middle class if the pissonus (whoops trickle down) economics hadn’t been instituted.
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You mean like the TPP that was done out of the public eye? Because obviously no Rethuglican would ever vote for a policy that usurped America’s sovereignty, right?
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I’m not a subscriber to WSJ but I was able to open the article on this site:
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303755504579206350209201362
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To access try http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303755504579206350209201362
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Ha! Give ’em hell!
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It is important to remember that P-Tech exists at the expense of other students. P-Tech was given space after the DOE stopped funding and supporting Paul Robeson High School. When schools like this are created they should include all learners and not push out existing public schools. Our students deserve better…
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/25/obama-p-tech_n_4160548.html
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I sure as heck am not trying to “prepare students to compete in a global economy.” I am trying to help equip students to become fully actualized participants in the richness of our civilization. Being employable is an effect of being educated, not the goal.
As a Latin teacher, I am much more interested in focusing on 1st Century Skills.
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I love Latin. 2 years and I use it every day. Seriously.
I have decided the 21st Century Skills talk shows the fascination of some parts of our older generation who are very amazed that they have lived across two millennia. It’s kind of cute (because otherwise it doesn’t mean anything to me). It is a sensational phrase, for some. Which is charming.
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Are you preparing students to live on welfare?
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No, I am not.
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HU, Why did you ask that particular question? I thought you taught at a private elite school where Latin was part of everyone’s curriculum.
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By the way, glad you’re back!
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Seems like he preparing students to bring an end to the need for welfare. I hope they start with corporate welfare, the worst, most costly and wasteful kind. It institutionalizes incompetence.
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There needs to be a definition offered up, formally, of Global Economy.
I hope people have learned to stay away from these competitions.
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Joanna,
No, there doesn’t need to be a definition because the only thing that will serve to do is to skew the discussion towards those who seek to destroy the livelyhoods of those that do the majority of the producing in this world, the workers, not the capitalists.
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My kids are growing up in the inner city where they are facing shoot-outs in their neighborhoods. I don’t want them to be globally competitive. I want them to be LOCALLY competitive. They needs jobs here where they can help their families.
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Another big pile of bs
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It is not so much suburban moms who are under attack, but their defense of their known to be great schools. They know that what’s not broken doesn’t need fixing, and that their kids schools will only get worse when turned into profit centers. This is the kind of resistance to change (hostile takeover) described in Merrill Lynch’s 1999 white paper “Investing in Education”. Having established a beach head in impoverished inner city schools, deformers are turning their attention to the much tougher nuts to crack, America’s suburbs, thinking that their earlier success at walking all over desperate for change yet disempowered people of color would easily translate to similar success in wealthier more savvy communities in spite of the fact that there are no social/societal issues to blow up into a manufactured crisis in those places. Disaster capitalism won’t work as there’s no disaster to speak of in the suburbs and the initial lies that were told to create the first beach head are worse than ineffective when targeted at communities who historically have known better, at people who have generations of success in school and in their careers under their belts. Trying to employ loss aversion messaging or telling the suburbs that they’ll get left behind will also backfire. Deformers just don’t understand that you can’t argue with success.
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My mistake, actually they do understand that, which is why they lie so very much. Without their straw men deformers are lost in the weeds.
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Thank you, Jon Lubar! As long as the US funds public schooling via property taxes, good suburban schools are the sleeping giant that needs to be awakened to what ‘ed reform’ is all about– it’s already in many of their schools, via full roll-out of NCLB testing plus 2 add’l tests per yr to support teacher eval’n’s! All we need now is some factual PR!
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More profiteering for the business billionaires, no doubt. And schools have to match a percentage. 25% of 5 million dollars is over a million dollars. Schools don’t have money for paper, there are no jobs for high school or college graduates, and Obama and Duncan are swine. Never again, will I vote for a democrat. Or a republican.
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Of course the billionaire titans of industry who are financing school reform believe that the purpose of education is to produce workers. But what ever happened to producing well-rounded citizens?
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It’s all about “producing workers.” Every Duncan quote and proposal always comes back to these kinds of phrases. Human capital and global economic competitiveness.
If the new goal is to create employees, welcome to the North American version of China. The big Chinese complaint, recently, about their hyper-tested education system is that it doesn’t produce employers. So we’re headed down the same road.
It makes one wonder about the future of American innovation and creativity of the end goal of every school is simply to make someone employable.
I’ll add that the jobs that such programs are preparing kids for may be obsolete by the time they complete the program. If anyone can predict the new and emerging careers that will be available in 5-10 years, I’d like to hear them. There’s really no way of knowing this.
Because of this endless innovation, employees must constantly update themselves and stay current in new developments and trends. Therefore, the single most important thing that a good education provides is the desire and ability to continue learning. I fear that many of these reforms will not help people understand how to be educated but rather simply be very prescriptive in a narrow way.
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Excellent points!
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I’m not so sure we should be automatically against this latest sally from the fed DOE… at least we’re looking at rounding up the 1% capitalists– the industrialists– to put their money into public schooling! In a down economy, we can’t expect labor unions to be doing the training. But we totally can expect & demand the US Corporate Hegemony get down with public schooling!
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In many fields, particularly the construction trades, it was unions, not employers, who provided training through apprenticeship programs.
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Absolutely, unions should be involved as well as multiple employers.
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Yes, but the problem here is that a major aim of so-called education reform, including Obama’s Race to the Top, is to destroy teacher unions.
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Not all ideas are automatically bad I agree.
However, here is another thoroughly untested idea (including by the people they’re lifting it from) that’s having a pretty stupendous pile of money thrown at it in hopes that public problems will be solved by free market systems on the relative cheap by making it a “competition” thus not requiring that everyone be adequately funded – just those who can afford to participate and lose.
If it works, great, but, what if we find out that this next “big thing” just benefits the students who would have managed to get associates degrees anyway. We may spend another 6 years waiting for results – and we’ll continue on our merry way down privatization land waiting for this latest experiment performed on our children using taxpayer dollars will benefit citizens rather than the elite who will collect in trying it.
Another idea with scant data, vague amounts of information as to why it works, and, a promise of money for any place it’s made to scale. If these schools are all promised to be well funded, and end up in areas with a modicum of well performing students that have low ELL, special ed, and other needs, then we may end up paying for the training costs for a bunch of organizations, for jobs they may not always have, for kids that would have gone through college anyway, to build up a model that may not scale nationally, and we won’t know till it’s tried with high needs at-risk populations, and that will likely enrich those who make a serious (or possibly even half-hearted) attempt at it.
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I believe most states already have this program. Here in Oklahoma it is called Career Tech. How is this innovative in any way, shape, or form? Tired old garbage from people who’ve never taught in a public school.
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It is a very good idea to have more effective school-to-work programs. And involvement of the private sector in apprenticeships and internships is very desirable. The motivation that mentors and contact with the real world can supply is vital, particularly for weaker students, who are often demoralized in high school. It is also desirable for ‘high fliers’, who can have contact with, for example, research scientists while they are still in high school. Organizing all this would be hugely positive.
The connection with community colleges is also good. However any basically good idea, like early childhood education, can be messed up. I really think that having *one* employer connected with a high school is a bad idea, both in principle and in practice. There should be options, depending on the student’s interests. And the program has to have enough breadth to be education, and not just vocational training. The labor market keeps changing, and people need to have the resources to adapt, and those are the humanist skills, particularly in language.
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The idea is good to look at different ways to run high schools but public schools are so mired in state regulations and union contracts that it would be hard to change them.
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UGH…ridiculous. Duncan is an empty suit who plays basketball and is not that good, too.
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We don’t need no stinking redesign… High Schools with WISE ( Wise Individualized Senior Experience) experiential learning programs have been preparing HS seniors for life for 40 years in over 100 schools across the nation. (www.wiseservices.org)
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This kind of thing looks great. I think many kids would benefit a lot from starting earlier though: juniors as well routinely, and the option of starting in the second semester of the sophomore year. The mentoring they could get, and having them see academic instruction, tailored to their interests, clearly helping their future prospects could do wonders.
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Agreed. It is harder to establish though. We are working with a couple of school who are designing WISE like experiences as a small part of HS from 9th grade on.
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