Hello List, JM-I don't know if the education debate has been beaten to death, but I took a walk today, and a number of points suggested themselves to me, so I want to make them here.
First thing that came to me is that we have to settle just what it is we call "education". If it were nothing but basic literacy skills, that would really simplify matters. And you hear employers grousing about graduates who present themselves in the workforce without those basic skills. But we know that we're not settling for that most of the time. We want study skills. We want analystical skills. We want social skills. And the worst part of it is we want the educated student to fit into a standard box. When we test achievement, we don't route people to different achievement tests, we run them all through one standard test. PT - Jim's post makes the point of why Multiple Intelligence makes perfect sense as educational reform, and why standardized testing has to be given an upgrade. People want to ballyhoo MI and say its experimental, but it has worked in other parts of the country, as well as various institutions within Minneapolis. It is used in other countries successfully, and has helped them stay educationally ahead of the United States. Speaking of experiments, what do they call all the bussing, and other nonsense the school board has tried to get results? A lot of those efforts had kids going to school in mazes like little mice looking for the big cheese. And they failed. So why are folks so adverse to trying something new? Are folks afraid that it may actually work? JM - Now what I'm asking is whether this really makes sense. One analogy that suggest itself was what if we insisted that the Special Olympics and regular Olympics merged with both sets of athletes performing in the same events? It seems ridiculous, but with our education system, we seem to set a common goal for all students while we know (or should know) that there's no way they can all make it to the same goal in a fixed span of years. And we're defining those who fall beneath some standard as "failure" which we publish in the test scores. But what happened to "achieving personal potential"? If the fastest marathon I can physically run takes 5 hours, haven't I really achieved as much as a guy who runs one in 2 hours 9 minutes because that's the fastest HE can run? Should I be classed a failure when I've done what I really CAN do? PT - Did anyone ever read Leo Buscaligia's (sp?) book about Love? It talked about being the best YOU that you could be. It told the story about trying to make the rabbit climb trees, and other animals doing things that they were not good at and how soon the school trying to teach these things was failing the animal students because of their inability to excel in everyone else's fields. There is nothing wrong with knowing lots of different things, nor having a learned appreciation for them, but everyone cannot do everything well. Everyone deserves a chance at the opportunity to learn outside of their arenas, but should not be deemed a failure because their expertise in this life lies elsewhere. JM - As for the needs of the society, the fact is that society needs a wide array of talents. If it weren't for the poor English-speakers, you'd probably have to arrange a year ahead to have your roof replaced since Latinos seem to be doing nearly all the grunt labor. And though jobs for the intellectually challenged may be low-paying, they are still very important to society. And they can be torture for someone with a restless, inquiring mind. What we need to do is educate people who are most suitable to those jobs so they can handle those jobs. And we need to educate the numerically gifted so they can do our engineering and actuary work. Educate the verbally gifted to do our verbal work, and so on. And not set one particular category as the hallmark of "success". Success is when people are suitably prepared for whatever they can handle that society needs to have handled. I guess every parent wants little Bobby or Suzy to be the next genius, but that's unrealistic, not necessarily in the interests of little Bobby or Suzy, and an impossible task for public or private schools. Of course, if the kid is average or even a moron, that reflects back on the parents genes, so you can understand the suffering such a discovery causes for the parent, but society cannot start faulting the schools because levels of possible achievement sort themselves out along the normal curve. PT - This means not directing certain students to trade schools, but viewing ALL children as Gifted, and helping uncover their giftedness, and help them to excel in it so they may be a future benefit to themselves and society. This means not being afraid that Little Akeem will grow up to nab a job that society (as it stands now) thinks Little Ritchie Rich should have. They should be educated, not simply raised, with equal opportunity options. That is what I personally believe some people don't want to do. JM - So, if you apply THIS set of standards, are schools really failing? One thing people do is take certain schools that seem to be doing the best and judge all schools against them. But that's illogical. Am I a failure for coming in behind the winner of a race? For example, there's a St Paul school called Capitol Hill Magnet. If you look at the charts, their results are very high, even though 30 percent of the students qualify for free meals. I asked friends whose kids go there, and they told me there are entrance requirements to get in. Your child has to be gifted by some definition. Well, there are many schools that have informal entrance requirements. Such as upper-income parents who can afford the housing in the district. So before you do any comparison at all, , you must make sure you are comparing apples to apples. The fact is that the obstacles to teaching Minneapolis students as so many would like to see them taught are many. They fall across the board from family values to social values to nutrition to genetic endowment. The school district basically puts weights on its ankles and then is faulted for not running fast. Pamela Taylor (Tampa) _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:mpls@;mnforum.org Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
