C & I Policy Committee meeting of June 22
I attended the Curriculum and Instruction Policy Committee meeting yesterday evening from 5:00 to 8:00. Wow! What a really frustrating meeting!
On the good side, the Board was very clear that the District staff needs to be more open with the public about what they are doing, how they are doing it and why they are doing it. Moreove, they were clear that the public needs to have a voice in shaping the decisions. Director Carr in particular was very clear and effective on this point. Director Sundquist made the point very well at the end of the meeting. A number of Board members made reference to the anxiety in the community about the LA alignment, but only Director DeBell put his finger right on it: people like and want alignment; it's standardization they don't want. The Superintendent appeared to totally miss the point. It shot right past her.
The meeting opened with a discussion of the players and the roles in the materials adoption process. The Board's role is to provide guidance and principles at the start of the process and to vote to approve or reject the recommendation at the end of the process. The current guidance from the Board is set in the materials adoption policy and is so vague as to be meaningless. The Board members then brainstormed a bit on what they would like their more robust guidance to be - this would require a policy update. The other players in a materials adoption are the Instructional Materials Committee, which is a standing committee, and the Materials Adoption Committee, which is an ad hoc committee brought together for each materials adoption. The role of the Instructional Materials Committee is to review and, presumably, approve the process taken by the Materials Adoption Committee. They do not approve the outcome, just the process. Oddly, no one could say who appointed the Instructional Materials Committee, how they got appointed or even when they got appointed. It is apparently lost in the mists of time.
Interesting footnote about the high school language arts materials adoption committee: everyone who applied to be on the committee was appointed to it. Here's another interesting fact about it: it has only one student parent on a committee of twelve. The staff, however, is perfectly satisfied with their outreach effort and sees nothing wrong with this result.
After a break, the Board reconvened (it was a meeting of the whole and only Directors Chow and Bass were absent) and were taken through a powerpoint on the status of the curriculum alignment project. It was the what when why and how of curriculum alignment.There was universal agreement by the Board members that the community engagement on alignment has been inadequate to date. Oddly, they seemed to believe that if people were just told what it was and what it wasn't - and if they were able to dispel misperceptions about it - that people would embrace the process.
Director Maier, and then, more to the point, Director Sundquist, asked about how earned autonomy would figure in all of this. Superintendent Goodloe-Johnson first gave one answer, and then, seeing that it wasn't playing well, gave another. At first she said that earned autonomy did not apply to curriculum. Then she vaguely hinted that a class that met the standards and content requirements could be substituted for a required class, but she added the caveat that it would have to be
subject to certain review. It sounded like death by bureaucracy to me. It was very clear that she was opposed to the whole idea and would make the requirements for substitution such that no course could qualify.
I'm sure the powerpoint will soon be available and you will see that it clearly goes beyond curricular alignment and into standardization of texts for the express purpose of facilitating scripted lessons. They are coy about the language, but it's there. There is no acknowledgement that curricular alignment does not require the
standardization of texts, nor do common assessments nor does professional development - all reasons given that they need to standardize texts. All of the reasons given are spurious. The only reason that survives critical review is for the central staff to write instructional guides and scripted lessons which are specific to the materials.
They may well actually risk engaging the public on this. If they do, one of the critical questions we need to ask is whether it isn't the Board's responsibility to adopt curriculum. They may say that this duty is abbrogated by the State Standards, but the District isn't aligning curriculum to the State Standards. The District is aligning curriculum to the College Readiness Standards. So, again, particularly given that Seattle Public Schools is adopting something other than the State Standards as our curriculum, isn't it the Board's responsibility to adopt curriculum? Also, make them explain in detail exactly why schools need to standardize texts. If students are supposed to learn, for example, allegory in the 10th grade, then aren't there hundreds of books that are suitable for 10th graders that all provide excellent examples of allegory? Why in the world would every class have to read the same one? That is when alignment steps over the line and becomes standardization.
I'm still pretty angry about this. In part, I'm angry that no one on the Board would speak plainly even though a number of them clearly understood the issue. I'm angry also that the Superintendent could so completely miss the point and that no one set her straight.
On the good side, the Board was very clear that the District staff needs to be more open with the public about what they are doing, how they are doing it and why they are doing it. Moreove, they were clear that the public needs to have a voice in shaping the decisions. Director Carr in particular was very clear and effective on this point. Director Sundquist made the point very well at the end of the meeting. A number of Board members made reference to the anxiety in the community about the LA alignment, but only Director DeBell put his finger right on it: people like and want alignment; it's standardization they don't want. The Superintendent appeared to totally miss the point. It shot right past her.
The meeting opened with a discussion of the players and the roles in the materials adoption process. The Board's role is to provide guidance and principles at the start of the process and to vote to approve or reject the recommendation at the end of the process. The current guidance from the Board is set in the materials adoption policy and is so vague as to be meaningless. The Board members then brainstormed a bit on what they would like their more robust guidance to be - this would require a policy update. The other players in a materials adoption are the Instructional Materials Committee, which is a standing committee, and the Materials Adoption Committee, which is an ad hoc committee brought together for each materials adoption. The role of the Instructional Materials Committee is to review and, presumably, approve the process taken by the Materials Adoption Committee. They do not approve the outcome, just the process. Oddly, no one could say who appointed the Instructional Materials Committee, how they got appointed or even when they got appointed. It is apparently lost in the mists of time.
Interesting footnote about the high school language arts materials adoption committee: everyone who applied to be on the committee was appointed to it. Here's another interesting fact about it: it has only one student parent on a committee of twelve. The staff, however, is perfectly satisfied with their outreach effort and sees nothing wrong with this result.
After a break, the Board reconvened (it was a meeting of the whole and only Directors Chow and Bass were absent) and were taken through a powerpoint on the status of the curriculum alignment project. It was the what when why and how of curriculum alignment.There was universal agreement by the Board members that the community engagement on alignment has been inadequate to date. Oddly, they seemed to believe that if people were just told what it was and what it wasn't - and if they were able to dispel misperceptions about it - that people would embrace the process.
Director Maier, and then, more to the point, Director Sundquist, asked about how earned autonomy would figure in all of this. Superintendent Goodloe-Johnson first gave one answer, and then, seeing that it wasn't playing well, gave another. At first she said that earned autonomy did not apply to curriculum. Then she vaguely hinted that a class that met the standards and content requirements could be substituted for a required class, but she added the caveat that it would have to be
subject to certain review. It sounded like death by bureaucracy to me. It was very clear that she was opposed to the whole idea and would make the requirements for substitution such that no course could qualify.
I'm sure the powerpoint will soon be available and you will see that it clearly goes beyond curricular alignment and into standardization of texts for the express purpose of facilitating scripted lessons. They are coy about the language, but it's there. There is no acknowledgement that curricular alignment does not require the
standardization of texts, nor do common assessments nor does professional development - all reasons given that they need to standardize texts. All of the reasons given are spurious. The only reason that survives critical review is for the central staff to write instructional guides and scripted lessons which are specific to the materials.
They may well actually risk engaging the public on this. If they do, one of the critical questions we need to ask is whether it isn't the Board's responsibility to adopt curriculum. They may say that this duty is abbrogated by the State Standards, but the District isn't aligning curriculum to the State Standards. The District is aligning curriculum to the College Readiness Standards. So, again, particularly given that Seattle Public Schools is adopting something other than the State Standards as our curriculum, isn't it the Board's responsibility to adopt curriculum? Also, make them explain in detail exactly why schools need to standardize texts. If students are supposed to learn, for example, allegory in the 10th grade, then aren't there hundreds of books that are suitable for 10th graders that all provide excellent examples of allegory? Why in the world would every class have to read the same one? That is when alignment steps over the line and becomes standardization.
I'm still pretty angry about this. In part, I'm angry that no one on the Board would speak plainly even though a number of them clearly understood the issue. I'm angry also that the Superintendent could so completely miss the point and that no one set her straight.
Comments
It is not just you, there are a huge number of angry frustrated folks that have been waiting for the board to provide leadership and accountability.
One of the biggest crocks of Malarkey around was the math curriculum being the state standards. It clearly is not so and the board awards Admin a continuing free violation pass by allowing the EDM pacing plan.
Interesting that someone on the board finally noticed they should be setting direction for adoptions before the whole process moves very far. Otherwise we will see the high school math materials calamity extended to all future adoptions. Process begins and then 12 months down the road the board says: Wow!!! thats what you came up with? ... how did that happen? ... oh well I guess thats what we shall buy .. even though few of us think this stuff is worth using.
There is nothing happening that really assures adequate community engagement when the plan is:
Friday afternoon check the board agenda for whatever may be flying in as an introductory item 5 days later.
Nice to see your report that the board may actually take Governance more seriously.
I thought that the Director Sundquist had great potential but have seen most of his votes as pointless rubber stamping. Most school boards are cheerleaders for admin. This has certainly been the case in Seattle for far too long. It will be great to see the board members hopefully transform themselves into Governing Actors instead of mindless reactors. No wonder Cheryl Chow will not be there.
Did anyone at the meeting provide evidence that alignment, in and of itself, increases academic achievement?
I would be interested in reading any studies on alignment that would address the particular academic challenges of SPS.
Great thought....evidence that alignment, in and of itself, increases academic achievement? ...measured increased achievement....what an idea ... rather than Central Office Admin's research shows ... while never citing the actual research.
This is like Best Practices in math ... there is zero evidence most of what the SPS pushed as best practices over the last five years were in fact best practices. What was measured was a continually expanding achievement gap and large college remediation rates.
Alignment with standards does not mean diddle ... if the sound instruction is not present. The Discovering Math series is a great example ... alignment is OK but execution is an absolute disaster. "Explicit Instruction" is needed and DM has hardly any.
Proven materials are available and the SPS goes for experimental brand X. ... but it aligns well ... so what.
I'm glad someone (Sherry Carr) was asking the hard questions.
It can be found at the Math home page, under Family Resources. Called Developing College Readiness.
http://www.seattleschools.org/area/math/index.xml
WV: mathyl, how ironic
I will continue to harangue the school board and SPS over these issues, and fight where and when I can to keep SPS from becoming another failed urban district. I am all too aware of the importance of education for all our children to walk away from this fight. But in this battle, as a mother lion, I must keep my own child out of harm's way. Her four years in high school are too fragile, too important, to risk them to what appears to me to be a grand experiment whose facilitators have done little to prepare for.
I believe my next step will be to help Charlie get elected to the school board. Give us your contact info Charlie and I'll come on board with 30+ years of marketing and graphic design. :-)
Works challenging, in-depth problems, beyond homework problems, in a group of 3 – 5 students either after school, in the evenings, or on weekends.
Oh my goodness! If they do challenging in-depth homework problems in groups of 2 or 6 before school they won't be ready for college!
AND families can do NOTHING to help! (blank page)
Who wrote this thing? And won't it be interesting if it is removed with in the week and replaced with nothing?
Bruce WV is the "word verification" you have to type in to post--I believe Seattle Citizen started us all posting it when it seems apt (or just funny!).
As for the College Readiness document, it's actually kinda good. It is actually what math professors and other professors want, along with strong math knowledge and skills.
But it isn't written in a way that is clear and it isn't really the right document for part of what the Family can do to help. It's an argument for teaching math as more than a bunch of algorithms, teaching conceptual understanding AND logic AND perseverance. HOWEVER, as much as I completely agree that those are the appropriate goals, the appropriate college readiness factors, I do not see the implementation of "reform" math as getting us there. I see it interfering with building the logical framework and the emphasis on group work and process over result interferes with growing individual perserverence. Not because reform math is terrible, but because it is a pendulum swung too far and because it is often poorly implemented.
So all that understanding abstraction and logical thinking, well that has to be built up from learning the structure of mathematics, learning how it all fits together, learning the language of mathematics, not simply playing around in group activities to create one's own language and structure.
Well, here's an example of a logical fallacy. The document says that A is an example of B. A implies B.
Not A does not imply Not B.
Here :
which does eventually talk about Algebra, Trig, etc. (I ran across this via Google. It was linked from a UW document.)
Telling the Truth is a wake-up call to freshman that college is not a continuation of high school. By Dr Steve Zucker.
Dr Stephen Wilson has the following advice on college readiness. Note the emphasis on long division.
AND families can do NOTHING to help! (blank page)
In regard to families helping the answer is clear ... transfer to Shoreline.
Dorothy said:
It is actually what math professors and other professors want, along with strong math knowledge and skills.
That would be the strong math skills and knowledge that this district fails to develop.
Cleveland STEM is an attempt to build the 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th floors of a building while neglecting to build any other floors. Same wisdom promised "Automaticity" of Arithmetic Facts while buying calculators for primary school as needed by EDM.
Dr. Askey said:
#4 The NCTM authors of their Standards had the strange notion that it is possible to teach conceptual understanding without developing technical skill at the same time.
That strange notion is still a major thrust in SPS math.
This strange notion was most in evidence at Cleveland 2006-2009 with UW guidance using IMP.
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So does the Governance body called the Board have any plans for dealing with their adopted k-12 math fiasco? Apparently not.
Curriculum and Instruction in the SPS for math .... it would be hard to find worse materials than:
EDM - CMP2 - Discovering
I can find only a few poorer possible choices:
.... TERC/Investigations ...CMP ...Core-Plus ... IMP
However, after completion of the Discovering Series materials (Alg I, Geo, Alg 2) students move on to Calc, statistics, etc
Are the students (and I know they are not the majority) who take calc, statistics, AP calc, etc adequately prepared for college?
Is it only the students that only complete Alg I, Geo., Alg II, not prepared for college? Or is it all of SPS graduates, even the ones who do take higher level math classes.
And, do we use a standard, traditional, set of materials to teach the higher level classes? I haven't heard much about those materials.
Dan??
And, BTW, Dan is correct, Shoreline adopted Prentice Hall for HS math. Discovering was one of three sets of materials that they considered, but they disqualified it early on.
The district has had a big push on increasing the number of students enrolled in AP Calc. Unfortunately there has been no push to prepare students to be in AP Calc. I am not sure about current AP scores, the test is scored from 1 lowest to 5 highest, in the past the district has had high schools where the AP Calc (AB) scores averaged less than 2.0.
From 2002 to 2007 at Seattle Central Community College, the percent of recent high school graduates placed below collegiate math classes for first math class was 78%. A full 50% of those recent high school grads placed into the equivalent of high school math 1 or lower.
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The board continues to fund and approve the same nonsensical direction and kinds of instructional materials that produced such incredibly poor results. .... Clearly they still Do NOT Get It.
conference of the Association of Independent Maryland Schools. There were 130 math teachers from private schools in the audience."
First he commented on something another panelist said: "the
principal of a major boy's private school in Baltimore. Before being the Principal of the Upper School he was the Academic Dean and before that Head of the Mathematics
Department. He said something which I found truly astonishing. He thinks so highly of technology (i.e. he has made his students so dependent on calculators) that he tells his students that when they visit colleges they should
interview the chair of the mathematics department and find
out if they allow the use of calculators. If they don't then
they should consider the college to not be a good fit."
Then, he claimed that if a student is not prepared to take calculus when entering college, it appears that they likely never will be.
"It was extraordinarily difficult to get numbers to demonstrate that fact. I finally found one large state university which had them. Of its over 5,000 recent students who had placed into college algebra (material they could have learned in high school) only 7.5% of them ever successfully completed 1 semester of calculus.
The lesson is that if you don't prepare a student for college level mathematics before they go to college, then it is very unlikely that they will ever successfully take college level mathematics, thus excluding from their life-options many many careers."
One would think that a college professor would say kids need trig or solving quadratics, but no, they don't get mentioned. Instead:
"First: Entering freshmen need to know how to add, subtract, multiply and divide. They need to be able to do this quickly, easily, and thoughtlessly for numbers, fractions, decimals and polynomials. There is no better
preparation for the next step in mathematics than an intimate familiarity with our number system. If a student cannot add or divide fractions and do long division quickly and easily then they do not have the necessary depth to move on to the next stage."
And the element that I think more closely matches that imperfect College Readiness document, the following about being mature and responsible for one's own learning, have enough conceptual understanding that one can learn new things on their own.
"And this is harder to grasp because it doesn't affect admissions or placement, but is extremely important. I wish my students were capable of picking up a textbook and learning the material on their own. After all,
that's what they have to do in most college math courses."
Generally speaking the students who went to community college were probably not on the college "track" in HS, and may not have taken the higher level math classes. So to say that 50% of these students place in math 1 or lower at community college doesn't really answer my question, though it is a shocking fact.
Do you have any idea how kids that take the higher level math classes fare in a 4 year college? Are they well prepared?
Cliff Mass got involved in this as he saw the level of mathematical competence declining annually in entering students this was confirmed by UW math placement test. The placement test was redesigned which gave a slight uptick for the initial year and then the decline continued.
I'll see if I can find references to the tests results for you.
There was the letter signed by 57 UW profs that teach freshman attesting to this drop in skill level.
http://www.seattlepi.com/local/353199_math29.html
Very very scary.
Thanks, Dan.
First, all of the board members present made clear that they want the public to be part of the alignment process. Sherry Carr spoke more than once about the need not just to inform the public and teachers (and with regard to high school curriculum, students) but to do so early enough in the process that they have the opportunity to shape the process. This was echoed by Director Debell. Director Sundquist talked about an expectation that each significant district project – which he considers curriculum and textbook adoption to be – should begin with an explicit articulation of what the level of public involvement and engagement will be. Directors Carr, DeBell, Sundquist and Matin-Morris all also expressed concerns about the makeup of the LA adoption committee and the lack of public representation on the committee.
The district pushed back consistently on all of this. MGJ directly challenged Carr’s statement that the public should have a role in shaping the curriculum alignment process. She also disagreed that teachers hadn’t been given the opportunity to be heard in the LA adoption process, and said that she has told teachers that it is unfair for them to complain that they have not been heard if they have failed to first go to her and the CAO with their concerns. And district staff defended the makeup of the LA adoption committee.
Second, the board and the district disagree as to the board’s role in curriculum alignment. The district’s position is that alignment is the “means” and is done solely by the district, while the “ends” is textbook adoption, and it is only at this point that the board has a role in the process, by either approving or disapproving the district’s textbook recommendations. District attorneys present at the meeting pointed to state statutes and to board policy C21 (http://www.seattleschools.org/area/policies/c/C21.00.pdf) in support of their position that even though the board is responsible for adopting curriculum, curriculum alignment isn’t really adoption of a new curriculum and therefore doesn’t involve the board.
Director DeBell responded to the Superintendent’s means/ends analysis by noting that the Board is responsible for adopting curriculum and a course of study, and that if the district is adopting a four-year LA course of study he considers that a board decision; that as a board governance matter, he does not want the district’s alignment process to substitute for curriculum adoption. He stated that where the district is contemplating major changes in the LA curriculum, involving both new texts and new graduation requirements, that it begins to look like a curriculum adoption that requires a public process. Director Sundquist stated that regardless of the legal terminology involved, the public will view curriculum alignment as a substantial change, and that it is necessary to come up with a process and policy that allows for public involvement, because the risk of not doing so is that public opinion “will find expression in the board’s textbook adoption votes” because there will be no other mechanism to address public concerns. The district folks present were completely tone deaf to all of this, but MGJ finally heard what Sundquist was saying and acknowledged late in the evening that curriculum alignment does represent a fundamental shift in approach and that there needs to be ongoing conversation about it on the C & I committee.
I think the board wants to keep unique and successful programs like Roosevelt’s LA Options, but that the district has no interest in doing so. Director DeBell argued that to the extent that alignment helps address weaknesses in course offerings it is a good thing, but that the district shouldn’t overcompensate and go to standardization; that he wants to hold on to what the district has done in the past 15 years that is really valuable and keep existing rich course offerings. The Superintendent stated that the district is definitely not standardizing curriculum, and talked about the need to “have conversations” about whether course offerings like the LA Options program might meet the new aligned college readiness standards. However, she also took the position that earned autonomy comes into play only as part of the performance review process and is not relevant to the alignment process. And Cathy Thompson’s quick response to DeBell was that it would be difficult to produce standard curriculum guides if they followed his approach. When Director Carr noted that the current teacher contracts include provisions for site-based decision-making and asked what the district had done to bring the teachers along with alignment, Cathy responded that the contractual provisions regarding site-based decision making don’t have anything to do with curriculum.
I think that there is some wishful thinking going on on the part of board members. My impression is that the Superintendent isn’t missing the board’s points – she just disagrees with them. She is talking about “having conversations” about keeping programs like LA Options in order to reassure the board, but keeping these kinds of classes doesn’t at all fit into what the district is doing with curriculum alignment. The district people at the meeting said that four years of LA would be required, and that although some existing classes might meet the new standards, many would likely fall into the elective category.
The meeting ended with a decision to continue to address curriculum alignment through the C & I committee going forward – although the committee doesn’t meet again until late August. Although the district has pushed back on its earlier time frame of buying LA textbooks in August, when the district asked if it was ok to continue with LA adoption efforts during the next two months the Board did not give the district a clear yes or no. My guess is that absent the “no”, the district will continue to plow ahead.
Does anybody know anything about this meeting? And if so, was the LA staff person honest in her summary of how RHS feels about this LA alignment?
And lastly, what should we be doing at this point? Letters to the board?
SPS Mom: Some RHS LA teachers started a google group about the alignment:
SPSaligning
(I'm not sure if you have to do something to join first)
On June 19th, one of the teachers who had attended the meeting posted a letter to the District staff summarizing what they took away from it: RHS LA staff letter.
Every time a thread like this comes up, I am astonished at how little respect and trust this district seems to have for their own teaching staff. Faculty need guidelines, sure, but why does the district think they need to be provided with identical texts or SCRIPTED LESSONS? Are they that concerned about the skill level of their teachers?
There is an interesting document about the RHS LA Department's philosophy at the link that Maureen provided. That philosophy is why I am in the middle on this alignment.
Helen Schisnke
Did you ever wonder how we got to this place where the District says that they have no cause for confidence that every teacher is teaching to the Standards?
In 2001, Superintendent Joseph Olchefske declared that Seattle Public Schools had completed its conversion to a Standards-based Learning System. Those of you who were around at the time may remember filling in the other eye of your daruma. With that announcement, Joseph declared that the teachers were teaching to the Standards (or beyond).
So what happened?
What happened is that the principals failed to properly supervise the teachers. The principals didn't do the work (visit classrooms, review syllabi and lesson plans) to confirm that teachers were teaching to the Standards. I don't know that teachers ever really were all that faithful to the Standards, but without any supervision their fidelity lapsed all the more quickly.
So now the District is once again dedicating itself to the Standards. But there's no one in the District leadership with a 2001 vintage daruma - all of those people are gone, so there's no one in the District leadership who knows that we have been down this road before, so there's no one in the District leadership who will ask "What will we do differently this time to prevent a repetition of our previous failure?", so there's no plan to do anything different this time, so they will repeat their previous failure.
Unless the principals visit the classrooms, unless the principals review the syllabi and lesson plans, unless the principals do the work to confirm that the teachers are teaching to the Standards (or beyond), then there is no cause to believe that they will AND as momma snark noted, they are actually much more free than the Superintendent would like you to believe.
There is one difference this time, the MAP assessments. Supposedly, if a whole classroom shows up as ignorant of some critical content, the MAP will reveal that. Of course the same is true of the WASL, and I don't recall anyone using WASL results as evidence that a teacher wasn't covering the curriculum.
That said, let's look at the RHS AP HG experiment in standardization and similar curriculum. Reasons for this included shared professional development and uniformity, all the teachers passionate and working together to create a common curriculum. So....
Well, my son had a teacher who pretty much followed the textbook. Read the chapter, answer some worksheets on Key Terms and Key Ideas and on to the next chapter. Very very much NOT a college level course nor a college level classroom experience. I had a chat with a friend of his who had a different teacher. I asked her about AP HG. She said that what was a shock and really hard for her was that the teacher taught/discussed all sorts of stuff that wasn't in the text, but that they were expected to read and learn the text on their own. That the class lessons didn't really follow the topics in the text, so it was quite challenging. I replied Ah, well, that's the way it is in college, that's the way AP classes are supposed to be. (reflecting of the increased depth, rigor, personal responsibility and higher order thinking of college.) Well, she said, she was in 10th grade and was not ready for that yet nor had she asked for it.
So much for common curriculum, common assessments, common experience and all that bunkum.
"...AP classes are supposed to be. (reflecting of the increased depth, rigor, personal responsibility and higher order thinking of college.) Well, she said, she was in 10th grade and was not ready for that yet nor had she asked for it..."
I dont know the US system very well and am wondering what age 10th graders are... 16?
Wow, that's a lot of an education system to expect of 16 year olds, even bright ones, who are in the throes of adolescence...
In New Zealand when I and my older kids went to school, we were focused on a multiple subject national school leaving certificate examination (School Certificate) in 5th Form (3rd year of high school, age around 16) - five subjects for 'average' kids, six for the 'brights', multiple subject University Entrance exams in 6th Form (4th year, age around 17) and multiple subject Scholarship exams in 7th Form (5th year - most kids around 18) for those who were going on to university... Your scholarship results determined what kind of funding assistance you would receive - A or B Bursary... for most kids, university education (in my time) ended up being totally free of tuition and book costs...
New Zealand now has a National Qualifications Authority in place which co-ordinates qualifications in secondary schools and in post-school education and training...
http://www.nzqa.govt.nz
So how does the District believe that they are going to enforce their "fidelity of implementation" or "alignment" or whatever they choose to call it this time? Are they going to send principals into the classrooms or are they going to send coaches in?
it is interesting that SPS leadership doesn't have that experience or point of reference to draw from. I was especially curious when Steve Scher asked Dr GJ what was happening in our district before her time, before the call for these changes. I don't have the exact quotes, but she did not have answers and seemed to think it was inappropriate for her to comment on SPS management or policies of the past, even if to draw parallels or distinctions.
Mama Snark said "...if teachers just nodded, smiled, and closed their doors to teach what made sense to them?"
I would agree that generally, teachers know what is best for their students and should be responsible for and trusted with developing curriculum, planning lessons and teaching. I do not want them to have to do this in the closet. It feels haphazard and just kicks the standardization and alignment questions down the line.
That being said, if I was forced to teach a book that made absolutely no sense for me to to teach to a given group of students, or if I knew that other materials would help my students reach the standards more effectively, I am not sure what I would do as a Seattle Public School teacher. Bring up the issue with my principal? Go to the board? The Super? Quit? Or stick to what I know as a seasoned professional and trust my instincts?
It seems to me that all this talk of "alignment" really puts the teachers in a tough position. I always say I would love to teach in the public system again, but then I read this stuff and I'm not so sure.
Interesting that people are willing to spend $20,000 a year to have their kids taught by teachers who are trusted to make their own professional discretion when it comes to materials and curriculum. Does the district think this movement toward standardization will woo back those private school parents? Hmmmm...
The following year we transferred our son to a new middle school where they were assigned 4 books to read over the course of 7th grade. They were California Blue, The Giver, The Pearl, and The Outsiders. All great books. They did essays on the books, participated in several critical thinking assignments, and engaged in in depth discussion via socratic seminars and the such. And, the teacher could truly evaluate the quality of my sons work and his understanding, as it was a book that he was familiar with. My son loved the class, and surprise, LOVED each of those books. But he was truly held accountable for his work, and had to work very hard for his B-.
I say this not in defense of standardization, but in defense of some sort of alignment. Some teachers and schools are fantastic and do a great job, but others don't. With some alignment we could at least expect some consistency across the board. That's not to say that every 9th grader reads the same book at the same time, but perhaps some guidelines are in order - 9th graders must read 1 classic novel, 1 tragedy, etc.