G-Town Talks

What if all of our efforts in the area of school improvement only make things better for the kids who would have stayed with us anyway? Maybe our mastery level of 85-100 is improving while our drop out rate remains consistent because we just keep doing what already doesn’t work for our drop outs, only we’re doing it better?

I’m serious. We’ve made improvements in G-Town. Maybe none of them changed anything for our drop-outs.

Here’s the thing about working with kids. It’s not like managing employees where we can talk about separating one’s personal life from one’s professional life. It’s all mixed in together and sometimes it’s messy.

Take today for example. It’s only Monday and I spent a good portion of the day talking to students and parents about everything but academics. We have relationship issues, kids who were living at home when they left for the weekend and now are not, ex-boyfriend/ex-girlfriend disasters, Prom ticket sales, and kids expressing their individuality a bit too much. I swear I don’t solicit it and sometimes I wish I weren’t so approachable.

It seems there’s so much “stuff” coming through the door that I wonder how we teach kids anything. Better said, I wonder how they retain anything we teach. How do they even notice us?

I honestly would like to just stop everything and say “I don’t want to hear one more word about what he said/she said or what color your hair is today—let’s talk about your social studies class or what you’re learning in Science!”

But then I know it’s about connecting with every kid. Helping them as a whole child to deal with growing up. I know that kids are sometimes self-centered and that how they express themselves is the most important thing to them, now.

I just want to maintain focus. I want to remind every kid who’s hung up on whatever of our purpose, our mission, our academic goals. It’s my job to maintain this focus for everyone, to keep our eyes on the prize. I just don’t have it figured out yet, how to be supportive and at the same time, say “okay, enough support, let’s get focused on learning now!” Maybe I say just that more often?

G-Town students, someone, anyone, please have a meaningful conversation with me tomorrow about something that you’re learning. . . any subject will do.

Here’s another thing that  struck me about Will Richardson’s post the other day. I guess it was Will’s last question that led me again down a road I’ve been traveling for a few weeks. Will was talking about the emotional side of online learning and he says,

And why we need to teach our kids how to build networks of trusted sources they can turn to themselves for intellectual and emotional support in the process. But how can we do that if we ourselves don’t?

I’m more convinced than ever that it’s a mistake when we ask teachers to blog with students when they haven’t blogged professionally themselves. Therein lies the answer–if teachers see how much they gain through the on-line learning available in this community, they’ll want their students to experience the same thing. However, when our teachers employ blogging as another strategy without “owning it”, they end up using it much as pen and paper activities, just on the blog. And who has it figured out that we’re missing the boat?–our high school students. Teachers who jump into using the blog as a place for students to respond only to them miss the depth and social connections available, BEYOND the teacher. Our kids end up seeing blogging as another teacher thing, not even equating it with what they’re currently doing on their own. Teachers need to blog for their own learning first, then they will fully understand the opportunities available to their students. And they won’t miss a great opportunity.

Yesterday I posted about invitations that are coming my way based on my work on this blog. Miguel, Brian, Chris and Rick all comment in ways that show they get my question. Miguel and Brian mentioned the possibility that this could lead to something else, something bigger, something beyond principal or superintendent.

I don’t think there is anything bigger. For the 25-30 students who we lose as drop outs every year, there’s no job more important than mine (well, there is, but it’s being a supportive parent to them and so far that’s not a paid gig). For all students who continue to struggle with any number of things and need the best possible teachers in the most productive environment, I’m their girl. It’s my responsibility to make our school the best place it can be and I get a huge kick out of the problem solving part of this job. I LOVE to hit on something that could impact our kids–like the scheduling changes and literacy initiative. I love even more to read in the research about a school who’s turned it around and then realize we’re already on the path to doing everything in the articles. And I’m lucky enough to have a terrific faculty and staff who are game for just about anything, because they want our kids to do better too.

I’m learning patience as it takes too long to make a real impact. And I’m learning to stick around, to NOT look at those other opportunities. And the administrative opportunities are abundant in our area, like the superintendency in the nearby school district where I taught for ten years and still bleed a little purple for–didn’t apply. It was a painful decision personally, but if I go in another direction now (and I really like changing it up) G-Town goes through a couple of years of transition which can delay progress even more. And remember the march of another 25-30 kids walking out our doors without diplomas continues every year.

The only other direction I can imagine traveling is one that can impact even greater numbers of kids. But I don’t know what that would be and maybe that’s back to the readers’ comments on the previous post. Perhaps accepting invitations outside of my normal, comfortable work life leads in those directions. Right now I only want to accept those invitations, like working at High School’s New Face next summer, that help me learn new ways to improve me and to improve G-Town. I’m just not sure I should head elsewhere when we haven’t reached our destination–better achievement through a better experience and graduation for every kid in our district.  It just takes so dang long to get there.

It’s a mistake to ask teachers to blog with their students. It causes anxiety and worry about too many things. Teachers may worry that their own writing will be judged. They worry about inappropriate comments and linking to undesirable places and people. They also figure they don’t have anything to say.

That’s why I say “forget blogging with your kids.” Blog for you, for your own learning. Read what everyone out there has to say about education, about students, about NCLB, about techie stuff, about learning. Worry about your own growth first. Look for ideas you can use in your classroom. Learn. When you learn and grow, your students benefit.

Then blog with your kids. But don’t do it just to blog. Do it when a question in the class inspires you. Do it on a topic that inspires your students. Blog with your kids when someone wants to dig deeper. Don’t take a simple, well done pen and paper assignment and turn it into a blog project.

Blog with your kids for the right reasons. Don’t do it poorly just to say you’re blogging as an instructional tool. That’ll just turn all of you off to blogging. Do it for yourself first. Get it right for you. Then you’ll get it right for kids.

Let me dream for a moment. I’ve written before about initiatives in G-Town and our efforts to improve. As a fiscally responsible principal, I’ve always tried to make those changes with little impact to our budget. But now, with our Governor’s proposed increase to foundation aid, I’m really starting to think about how we could improve. Like a full 9-12 summer school program, with transportation, offered to our students here for free. Most of our kids who drop out do so because they fall behind on credits earned, due to lack of attendance, or lack of effort, or intense needs that warrant a reduced course load each year. They most often can’t get to the neighboring summer school (30 miles away) and they sure can’t afford it.

The five year plan. Super Seniors. Most kids don’t stick around for that fifth year. I treasure every student who does stay for the long haul. And when they do stay, they still count as drop outs in our accountability rate with the State. More and more are sticking around. Too many are dropping out–about 24 per year.

But what if I could offer them the chance to gain credits in July and August, attendance and effort the only cost? Keep them on track to graduate in four years with kids their age? Make it a palatable schedule, so they’ll come? Would this be a significant improvement on the path to graduation in four years, enough to entice my reluctant learners to stay with me?

And I haven’t even talked about offering booster courses for kids on the fence. . . or enrichment. . . or more community college courses. . . or intensive academic intervention services. And fewer class periods in our school day, because those kids on track to graduation have plenty of time to get in their credits and then we could spend longer than our 38 minutes per period. 38 minutes is nothing. Fewer but longer class periods with summer school to help our reluctant learners stay on track. And hey, I’m just getting started, I’ve only been thinking about this since Thursday. What will happen when our entire faculty starts to dream like this?

Chris Lehmann is the principal at the Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia. Whenever he posts, I read. He is the kind of colleague who I wish was at the district next door, so that I could call him about common issues and see him at principals’ meetings. Instead, I get to consider ideas with him, through blogging, which is a very close second to the district next door.

This morning I read a post by him that is so thought provoking and is written with such passion, by both writers, that I have to share it with you here. Please read his whole post, it’s well worth your time, if you teach, have taught, or will ever teach.

The message Mr. Lehmann delivers in the end of the post is a must read for every teacher in our country. I couldn’t possibly say it better as Chris writes,

Dan, you’re bright and multi-talented, you could do any number of jobs really well, and I know someone will soon offer you a job to leave teaching. They’ll offer you more money and more societal prestige, and given that you still think about how you almost became a CPA, you’ll probably be tempted. So I’m going to tell you something that my boss Steve told me the first time someone offered to triple my salary to leave teaching and go work for them (hey, it was the dot.com 90s in NYC, what can you do?) He said, “If you want to go do something else, go do it. The offers won’t go away, but more importantly, you need to decide what you want from your life. If you want to be a teacher, teach. This is the life, this is the pay, and you’ve got to decide what you want. If this is what you want, do it, don’t apologize for it, and don’t spend your time second-guessing it.”

Despite the fact that I read the 23 feeds into my RSS aggregator, including CNN, on a daily basis, I still enjoy reading the Buffalo News and Dunkirk Observer, our local newspapers. For me, nothing signals the relaxed feel of a Sunday like a fresh pot of coffee and the Buffalo News. Yesterday, I read an editorial by Editor Margaret Sullivan that’s worth talking about on G-Town Talks.

Ms. Sullivan writes about the changes to the Buffalo News website in her article, “Web site will breathe new life into News”. Currently when I go to this website it’s not a source of daily news, nor is it even easy to get to someone who’s writing for the News if I’d like to comment about something that I’ve read. Margaret writes about the proposed changes with excitement and for good reason. The newspaper as we’ve always known it needs to evolve, to reinvent itself, or risk replacement by other means of information, namely the Internet.

Ms. Sullivan talks about the need to “put breaking local news on the site” and to offer “much more interactivity with readers, and a number of staff written blogs”. She acknowledges the need for change further by stating, “with young people far more attuned to the Internet than to print, the viability of newspaper journalism is at risk.”

I’ve been reading my RSS aggregator and blogging since July and I can honestly say that it’s changed the way I read and the way I interact with information. For the first time, when I read the newspaper, it’s active. I want to follow through with the ideas generated by a piece, I want to add what I think to the conversation—but it isn’t a conversation, it’s a newspaper. Therein lies the need for change, we’re changing as readers and as learners, and that dictates a change for newspapers.

Yes, Margaret, you need blogs so that your reporters can enter the conversation. And as you and your reporters already know, the conversation will become much richer and much more valuable because of your connections. The feedback you receive will be immediate and more frequent as it’s much more likely that I’ll click on “comment” than remember an article and then send an email or a letter.

Ms. Sullivan writes,

I am convinced that newspapers provide something critically important that other media often do not: depth, thoughtfulness, investigative skills and an enterprising (rather than reactive) approach to news. It may sound melodramatic but I believe it’s true: If newspapers crumble, so does a cornerstone of American democracy.”

It’s a very good thing that the News is entering the blogosphere and adding Internet delivery. Through G-Town Talks and my Bloglines account, that same depth, thoughtfulness, and research have enriched my own reading and learning. The Buffalo News, with a wealth of experience, intellect, and investigative writing, has a tremendous amount to offer. The only question left is “how do they sustain revenue when so much of our intellectual property can be found for free online?”

We have a recurring theme here in G-Town surrounding our students and academic achievement. As our teachers analyze data and discuss new literacy strategies, I keep hearing the same thing. Our students don’t want to think.

It seems that they really prefer assignments that are specifically spelled out and require only regurgitation of facts. When we ask them to really think about something, to investigate, to reflect, and to respond, they are reluctant. Our kids continually ask the teacher for the answer or for reassurance that they’re on the right track, that the answer is what the teacher is looking for.

Our graduates struggle with this same analysis and reflection, this same critical thought, when they hit college. It leaves me wondering how we got to this point. I graduated from high school 26 years ago and I have strong recall of numerous projects and position papers/speeches, including one from sixth grade. I felt well prepared to analyze and to think critically, it’s obviously a way of thinking on which I rely in my current profession.

So when did we stop asking students to really think and learn? Did our focus on the students at the bottom cause this shift? Did we start spoon feeding students and continue to the point where we are now? I’m curious how this shift occurred and certain that it’s time to make a change.

Melvina Phillips also said that it’s our moral imperative to teach every student the literacy skills needed to succeed in school and beyond. The moral imperative. That makes sense to me.

Not just, “I teach, the kid either gets it or not–it’s his problem, not mine. They should have the skills they need before they get to me.”

When Melvina said that we have a moral imperative to teach every child, it made perfect sense to me, but not to everyone in that auditorium. I wanted to stand up, face our faculty and say kindly, “Every teacher who doesn’t believe he has a moral imperative to teach all students these literacy strategies, kindly exit the building and find a new career.”  

I wonder who should have walked out the door?