Abstention and Kool-Aid Drinking: CCSS Adoption

According to CommonCore.org (McGraw Hill, 2014), 45 states, 4 territories, and Washington D.C. adopted the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). 89,890 public school districts with 2,972,000 public school teachers implemented and taught lessons anchored to the CCSS, and 45,750,000 students took one or more end of course tests based on the CCSS. With all of this participation from states and teachers, some states have abstained from drinking the Kool-Aid for various reasons.

While Virginia, Texas, Nebraska, Minnesota, and Alaska never adopted the CCSS, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Indiana adopted then chose to repeal the CCSS. Other states that were early adopters have since reviewed, revised the adapted or even repealed the CCSS  (Bidwell, Common Core Support in Free Fall, 2014).

Focusing on the states that decided against the full adoption of the CCSS, their reasons were and are based on local, state, and federal politics. At the time Gov. Rick Perry of Texas explains, “Texas is on the right path toward improved education, and we would be foolish and irresponsible to place our children’s future in the hands of unelected bureaucrats and special interest groups thousands of miles away in Washington, virtually eliminating parents’ participation in their children’s education” (Bidwell, The Politics of the Common Core, 2014). His sentiment and fear is shared equally by other states that refuse to relinquish state and local control to federally backed standards.

Indiana Governor Mike Pence intimated similar concerns as the state was considering a repeal of the CCSS, "Hoosiers have high expectations when it comes to Indiana schools," Pence said. "That's why Indiana decided to take a time-out on national education standards. When it comes to setting standards for schools, I can assure you, Indiana's will be uncommonly high. They will be written by Hoosiers, for Hoosiers, and will be among the best in the nation" (Bidwell, The Politics of the Common Core, 2014).

While state pride seems to be a central reason and controlling the content another, the CCSS is a thoughtful idea that was ruefully implemented as its adoption was tied to federal Race to the Top considerations. States that are choosing to forge their paths is fine. Having worked in Virginia and actually worked with a committee to develop state standards of learning, the process was one of community and consensus that took several years to implement and refine. The money and time invested could not be washed away with simple adoption of the CCSS.

References

Bidwell, A. (2014, Aug 20). Common Core Support in Free Fall. U.S. News and Report.

Bidwell, A. (2014, Mar 6). The Politics of the Common Core. U.S. News and Report

McGraw Hill. (2014). What everyone needs to know about Common Core State Standards. Retrieved September 17, 2015, from CTB.com: http://info.ctb.com/commoncorewhateveryoneneedstoknow

Stephens, C. (2013). Unlike Alabama, these five states didn't adopt the Common Core. Retrieved 17 September 2015, from http://blog.al.com/wire/2013/11/unlike_alabama_these_five_stat.html

My Psychology of Learning Redux

I wrote this as end of class reflection for Teaching in Higher Education course with Dr. Tomei. At the beginning of the course we were asked to articulate which learning psychology we supported - Behaviorism, Cognitivism, Constructivism, or Connectivism. At the end we were ask to revisit the original assignment. Here is my response:

My Personal Psychology of Learning Redux

I am now an ardent connectivist. So much so, that it was hard at times to sit through presentations on the other learning theories when they woefully fall short to how I now learn and teach. 

I floundered in those theories during the 70’s and 80’s as a student and perpetuated them early in my teaching career with great dissatisfaction. It wasn’t until I had enough confidence to start to experiment with class culture and Gardner’s multiple intelligences that I really started to connect with my students and  my pedagogical practice. 
The appeal of Connectivism, beyond the common sense aspect, is that a learner can grow and learn exponentially by simply plugging into and connecting with a network of like-minded learners. The power in that simple precept of Connectivism inspires me and propels my philosophical learning belief that anyone at anytime anywhere can learn anything – what is more flat than that? A connectivist knows how to find the information and “see connections between fields, ideas, and concepts (Seimens, n.d.).  Moreover, a Connectivist not only can access information and see connections, this is the consumptive part of learning, but the connectivist contributes to the knowledge base through their own perspective by redesigning and redistributing and releasing their understandings for other Connectivists to do the same.  

The shifting economy from an industrial/manufacturing to an information/innovation economy demands we prepare our students for the future (Building a 21st Century, n.d.). Our current practices and pedagogical beliefs are antiquated and underserve our students. According to Microsoft, “our education and workforce development systems are . . . not equipped to meet the needs of the 21st-century economy (Building a 21st Century, n.d.. p. 7). So what? We have to shift the way we teach to the way we learn. The emergence of Personal Learning Networks and the proliferation of Massive Online Open Resources, and the abundance of Open Educational Resources indicate our demand for this change.

I know we still have a wide spectrum of philosophical stances with a majority of us are contructivists, but I know there is a growing number of connectivists out there. I see this in the growing networks of educators sharing, learning, resourcing, and pioneering new technologies into their pedagogy. 

References

Building a 21st-Century workforce: Working together to meet today’s skills development challenges (Issue brief). (n.d.). Retrieved http://tinyurl.com/pq4kao5

Siemens, G. (n.d.). Connectivism. Retrieved June 20, 2014, from http://www.connectivism.ca/about.html

Why I want to be . . .

My father was the first of his family to go to college. He completed 2 years at a junior college then entered the military. Mom graduated high school and worked before meeting Dad and quickly became an Army wife. Growing up, schooling in my house was not central to the discussions in our family. Often moving every 2 or 3 years, my parents – more my mo

m – excused our mediocre performance to this and the destructive cliché of “boys will be boys.”

The common theme in my early academic travels after school was rushing home with book bag in tow busting through the door slinging the bag into a corner and turning on the TV. Mom would have a snack ready, which would be received thanklessly, and in all earnestness she would ask, “How was your day at school?”

“Fine.” my brother and I would retort as we fought to pick which channel of the 10 we would watch until Dad would come home and we would surrender our dominion of the living room.

Fast  forward to high school – senior year. As the weeks turned into months, all of my friends were making plans for college. I didn’t have a clue. After 12 years of mediocrity, in the room of opportunity there weren’t many doors left for me. In a panic, I remember a conversation with my father.

 He was sitting in his chair. I said in all shaky confidence, “Dad, I want to go to college.”

He took a drink, turned the TV off, placed his drink on the TV tray where the leftovers of his dinner remained. He cleared his throat then rolled to his left and removed his wallet from his back pocket. He slowly opened it to the center billfold.

“Boy, I don’t have money to throw away on you for college. I’m not a fool. ”

I was stunned.

He continued, “Your not ready for college. You have no idea what you want to do or the discipline to make it happen.”

He went on for about 30 minutes, but I my 17 year old mind had tuned out after that.

I ended up spending 4 years in the Air Force behaving very badly. Spending my money carelessly and coming very close to a dishonorable discharge. Luckily I figured it out, but in all, he was right. I was not ready.  

Chelsea, Darby, London

Thankfully, early in my life I met a smart, driven women who didn’t see mediocrity in me and demanded growth in our relationship, family, and our careers. Education was and still is the foundation and driving force in our lives. I have taught for 18 years. Between us we have one associate, two bachelors, two masters, one EdS and one EDd. My daughters are all in the top 5% of their class and each have an immense room of opportunity with many many doors waiting for them. Now, two are in college on scholarship and the other on her way.

Nearly 1% of the world’s population holds a terminal degree.   That young man in my father’s basement has come a long way. I want to continue my journey in scholarship because that is where I found opportunity, love, family, and myself. 

Waxing Nostalgic: NCLB

As a teacher who began his career in 1998, I can attest to the damage NCLB did to the teaching profession, education overall, and to the children left behind in the wake of a demanding, unyielding, bulwark of state and federal accountability. Informed by experience and the listed research, NCLB was a program that pressurized standardized testing unilaterally and redirected funding at the cost of educating our children.

The ideal of school accountability systems are designed to:

encourage educators to  align their instruction with important learning standards, foster the adoption of instructional techniques that produce measurable results in student learning, improve the quality of educators entering and remaining in schools, and inform educators and the public about how well students are learning various subjects and skills (Davidson, Reback, Rockoff, & Schwartz, 2013).

With this in mind, NCLB accomplished some of these, however, the pressure placed on schools and districts by federal mandates and state directives lined the pockets of test designing companies as schools and districts scrambled to create tests. This pressure forced schools to manipulate data and subgroup reporting to appear accountable, when in fact vast populations of students were underperforming and underserved (Davidson, et al., 2013).

            Funding also left vast amounts of students behind. At the risks of losing accreditation and students, underperforming schools in low-economic and urban areas ran the risk of losing Title I monies if AYP targets were not met. These monies would then be redirected to school outside the district to more affluent districts as school choice came in to play leaving the urban school under funded for the remaining students (Sanders, 2008). Moreover, school decisions to redirect funds away from non-assessed courses like the arts, physical education, history, and many other programs depleted these programs and sacrificed a future for those students within those programs to grow and flourish (Pederson, 2007).

            The impact of NCLB remains in question. While some research suggest positive impacts such as teacher quality and student performance (Davidson, et al, 2013), other research stress the negative effects on the schools and students left behind with a lack of funds, closings, cauterization to charter schools and more affluent schools (Sanders, 2008). Personally, “teaching to the test” effect was apparent in PLC, faculty meetings, and district professional development. Although always denied, the riptide of the accountability always held the noose of school closing above our heads. This looming doom impacted our teaching and relationships with our students.

References:

Davidson, E., Reback, R., Rockoff, J. E., & Schwartz, H. L. (2013). Fifty ways to leave a child behind: Idiosyncrasies and discrepancies in states' implementation of NCLB. Cambridge: National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.3386/w18988

Pederson, P. (2007). What Is Measured Is Treasured: The Impact of the No Child Left Behind Act on Nonassessed Subjects. Clearing House, 80(6), 287–291. Retrieved from Education Research Complete database

Sanders, A. (2008). Left behind: Low-income students under the no child left behind act (NCLB). Journal of Law and Education,37(4), 589-596. Retrieved from http://ezproxy.liberty.edu:2048/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/200982802?accountid=12085

Jumping in the Deep End

I like the mental activity involved in writing a poem. I write poetry. It is something that I have been toying with the past 10 years. I performed my poetry aloud for the first time last month. Since then the writing has flourished. I bought a journal and I discovered a poetry community in Erie and online. I even think I may have a book in me.

Shortly after the release of The Bucket List starring Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman, my wife and I joined the movement and made our own bucket list. I found our lists earlier this year in some boxes I was unpacking from our move to Erie. The third entry on my list was to share my poems – CHECK.  Move up two entries and at number one - “Earn a doctorate”

When we made our lists, we shared them. We kept it to 10 things. As we moved alternating between each from the last to the first, we were pleased to see many items of similar or exact interest. When my wife shared the number one item on her list it too was “Earn my doctorate”.  We both laughed.

“It’s my turn.” She said, and it was. I had just finished my Master’s at George Mason University. And as our life pattern moves, it was her turn. That was 3 years ago; she defended in July and graduated in August.

Now I know through our discussion at the open house, you frown on having candidates suggest that their only reason to enter the program is to earn a doctorate for the sake of a doctorate. I would be remiss to say that this is a little part of why I am doing this. To qualify this: it is on the top of my list and it is my turn.

That said, you must understand my marriage. We are both educators who firmly believe in the 10,000 hours idea of expertise. I am a master teacher with 10,000 hours of sought after expertise in technology integrations. I presented throughout Virginia and now in Pennsylvania. However, this expertise does not translate in the field I hope to enter. This past summer, there was a slue of university job opportunities throughout the state looking for Instructional Technologists, Instructional Technology Specialists, and Online Technology Integrators, to each my resume failed to translate my ability to train adults, create online content, and integrate technologies in the classroom. This both angered and frustrated me. I considered becoming certified in software platforms and or seeking accreditation from the state.

My wife and I discussed this over weeks and it came down to this:

“What do you want to do?” she pushed.

“I want to be noticed and respected.” I returned.

We unpacked what this meant and in short, I don’t want to settle now for specialist’s positions. I want to have influence to change things structurally on an institutional level. Whether it is at the university level or in a public school district as a Director of Technology.  I am seeking a larger sphere of influence.

So as I continue to write and share my poetry and save for my motorcycle, my focus is here - focused on my number one – my doctorate.