John Flavin teaches language arts in a rural high school in Oregon.
He wrote this article for Oregonlive.com explaining what really matters in school reform.
Time and resources for teachers to prepare for the flood of federal mandates.
Class sizes of 22 or less. In his school, some classes have more than 40 students.
A restoration of options and electives. He wrote: “All across America students are stripped of drama, band, wood and metal shops, and dozens of other career-starters designed to serve a diverse population.”
A de-emphasis on standardized tests,which harm children with high needs.
He concludes:
“If you’re not a teacher, you ought to be saying to yourself: The enemy of America’s future is anyone who is opposed to guaranteed classroom sizes of 22 or less, increased professional development for teachers, diversified options for students and the elimination of standardized tests as we know them.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
All valid recommendations!
These are all pieces of the puzzle to fix education. I applaud the author for these suggestions, however, they are only shuffling the deck chairs on the titanic. Begin with assessment http://savingstudents-caplee.blogspot.com/2013/12/accountability-with-honor-and-yes-we.html.
And follow with a system designed to take kids from where they are http://savingstudents-caplee.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-personal-map-to-success.html .
And then, and then, along came Jones…..ooops a song from the 50’s anyway, top it off not by repealling anything but fixing it forward http://savingstudents-caplee.blogspot.com/2013/12/is-stumbling-and-bumbling-good-thing.html
I doubt that anyone will read this but some day, some time, this is what will happen, get a grip. Ted Turner said, “iF 90% OF THE PEOPLE DON’T POOH POOH YOU, YOU DON’T HAVE A GREAT IDEA” I’m at about 99% now, must be great ideas 🙂
Mr. Lee’s notion that every child should have an individualized education plan is quite sound. Kids differ. Schools should do a lot more than they are doing now to recognize the unique gifts of children and to build on these. A complex, diverse, pluralistic society needs diverse outcomes from our schools, not kids who have been identically milled by a standards-and-testing machine that used to be a school before the deformers got hold of it.
I asked my principal once why all students didn’t have an IEP and he said it was too expensive. And he was a strong advocate for individualizing each child’s course of instruction.
Special Ed teachers that do 12 IEPs have their hands full. Individualizing education is time consuming and exhausting. There is so much narrative required. I am not sure that a teacher could deal with 25-30 IEPs to write up. It would require even more hours of after school work. If this becomes “standard” classes cannot be larger than 12.
I’m with you, Deb. They finally negotiated an extra stipend for special ed teachers for documented extra hours of IEP work in my last school district. The burden of managing an IEP caseload as well as a full teaching load was very time consuming. The concept would have to look very different for the general population and is probably overkill. Differentiated instruction is probably as far as you want to take that concept.
I think individualized lesson plans are a wonderful idea, but the term IEP is a hindrance to implementation. This used to be the way children were taught before “lesson plans” as they exist today became the norm. Every child deserves to be taught to their capabilities. A teacher who is not overburdened with too many children in a classroom has the best chance of succeeding as do the students. Reduced classroom size alone, I believe, could significantly increase success in the classroom.
Great piece, Mr. Flavin!
When you are dealing with greater need, do you need to more or less resources? What is so sad is that, apparently, we have to argue the answer to that question. Let’s see now…greater need…class of 46 or 22? Good article.
“Time and resources for teachers to prepare for the flood of federal mandates.”
Amen to that. Our state has a new evaluation law and our district is in charge of training its staff members on the evaluation instrument. This training is time-consuming and not really applicable to all levels and subject areas of teaching. Yet, we are being evaluated based on a system that relies on “evidence” in the form of “specific wording” of our direct interactions with students and the students’ own autonomy in not only learning from the teacher but from each other. This new evaluation process is forcing us to change the way we teach so that we can be deemed high achievers based on one model. The powers-that-be have finally brought teaching-to-the-test to a whole new level of measuring “success” by requiring teachers demonstrate that they operate on the level of these “standards.” We are now data points–just like our students, and our jobs depend on these narrow, yet ironically very specific, indicators of “evidence.” Just another attempt at squelching interpretation and creativity.
I’m exhausted.
Yes. That is why I retired. Exhausting. With no reasonable interpretation of teachers’ real abilities. Play their game or get out.
If we as a nation had decided to make a big change in our education system, maybe we would have chosen the one simple idea of lowering all class sizes in elementary (maybe even middle school). It’s never been tried on a huge scale. It would require more teachers, but those teachers would be much more content with their jobs and more willing to work with what they have. The profession of teaching would be more attractive, there would be room for newcomers to the profession and would help with the unemployment rate. Maybe it would be a boon to the construction industry, increasing even more jobs. And it would be easy to verify whether it worked or not. Just dreaming.
And to make optimum use of space and grade, they could utilize multi-age classes, such as a 1-2 or even a 1-3. Larger districts could redistribute students. Set a limit per grade and then supply the personnel. I bet it could be done without breaking the bank.