Where is Public Education Headed?

 

     Many of us have begun to wonder where education is headed as January 20, 2017 moves closer to the present. Some have mused, "Our lives will be relatively unaffected by the election". I wonder if you asked a public school teacher or administrator if their professional lives have been relatively unaffected by any of the past several election cycles? I don't think so. Many political mandates and policies have arisen; many initiatives have materialized as politicians jockey to achieve their favored educational goal. Language and descriptions may change, but the underlying political directions, one way or the other, usually don't change. Let's examine the historical role of local, state, and federal government as it relates to education.

     From the beginning of our country a 'well educated citizenry' was considered important 'for the general welfare of the people'. Depending on your interpretation of the Constitution, the responsibility for education either lies with the federal (and state and local) governments to promote the general welfare of the people or this responsibility lies solelywith the state and local governments. A history buff will tell you that this has been a long-standing philosophical tug of war. The 10th Amendment stipulates that any power not specifically delegated to the United States is reserved to the States. Does the federal government have a role to play in education? In the 1800's the federal government granted land and surplus funds to the states for the support of public education. Even during these early times, education was one of the largest expenses of state and local government just as it is today and many states used the funds to support education. Fast forward to 2016 and you will find few public school systems that don't depend on federal monies received to support ongoing operational costs. You will find few states that can afford to ignore these federal dollars. And certainly few local communities can afford to pay for their public schools solely through citizen-supported taxation.

     This philosophical difference people hold about the federal government's role in education has contributed to those politicians who try to abolish or lessen the federal Department of Education and the cabinet level roles. Without a federal Department of Education and the public tax dollars that support and advocate for access to public education for all, education becomes less public and more competitive. Some in our country, in our state, in our cities and towns will have the means to afford education and some will not. We can see this in our 'public' health system. 

     Back to January 20, 2017. President-elect Trump has chosen Betsy DeVos as his Secretary of Education to head up the Department of Education. Reportedly, she has not worked in schools as a teacher nor superintendent. She is a 'school choice' advocate and supports school vouchers and charter schools, philosophically and financially with big political donations. Reportedly, Trump himself is a product of an independent high school (which today charges about $36,000/year tuition) which he left for a military high school education (which is a private academy which charges about $14,000-$41,000 plus fees per year depending on whether one is a boarding student). According to a 2013 PICUS report, the Maine 2010 per pupil cost was $12,259.  Even this lower yearly student cost of $12,259 would be beyond many Maine families.

     Without a federal Department of Education and its historical initiatives, states would be free to envision and enact their own education goals. This is what many southern states tried to do for years. The wealthy were able to control much of the access to education and over time were coerced by federal courts to comply with equal access and education for all laws. The education mantra was separate schools and vouchers then, and now we see a President, cabinet level people, and perhaps, a Congress, willing to at least use the same language as was used in the 1960-70's. Will their actions be the same? Could we now count on Jeff Sessions as Trump's Attorney General to advocate and diligently pursue litigation to ensure equal access to integrated public schools for all?

     This bears watching.

 

 

 

 



The Role of Mass Media

    

The Role of Mass Media



The mass media plays an important, and changing, role in our society. Web media, including the internet and social media, has joined the ranks of the more conventional TV, radio, newspapers and other sources. Anyone can very easily publish various entertainment and informational pieces with little effort. In a perfect world everything in print would be factual. In a perfect world everyone who writes and exchanges ideas for public consumption would have good intentions. Reality faces us and we know we do not live in a perfect world. Sometimes that which we read is not factual. Perhaps the truth has been distorted by errors, omissions or deletions. Perhaps unintentionally or purposefully. Each and everyone of us is obligated to read these sources with thoughtful and inquiring minds and seek out reliable sources of information to either corroborate or dispel that which is printed. We, individually and collectively, are responsible for truthful 'news'.
     The changing nature of news outlets contributes to the varying level of trust one can have in public news today. One only has to look nationally at the increasing consolidation of media ownership into fewer and fewer hands, resulting in message dominance, increasingly with political overtones. The race for amassing viewers who need to be entertained listening to news has hijacked the conventional purpose of news in a free democracy. If a story is 'spun' with 'facts', with enough intensity, duration, energy, passion, the audience then broadens and surely then the story has become true, even if it isn't. In the race to be the first to publish a story, who spends time to research the complete history of the story? Who spends time to corroborate the veracity of the facts being offered? And, equally important, who spots the editorial process? What about the website that pops up on the internet? Who is the author(s)? What about that Monkey Survey that collects supposedly true and representative data upon which news articles and reports are based?
     Having worked in education for many years, backed up with a liberal arts college education, I can attest to the changing nature of the message the public is being served on mass media's public education platter today. The message is in many respects replete with errors, omissions, deletions, distortions. The political message being spun about how our public schools have been failing our kids and society, en masse, since our race with Russia to be the first to travel to the moon, is inaccurate. Compared to today, that message took years to take hold. Tweets, Facebook posts, blogs, Instagrams, all capable of sending millions of messages instantaneously today, effectively eliminate time for researching issues prior to release to the public. Public education news become sound bites of negativism. Sound bites. Each and every one of us has a civic duty to become well versed about all of the facts about the state of our schools, locally, state, and nationally. Preschool, K-12, and postsecondary institutions. Many schools perform very well. Some schools do need assistance. These schools usually are those where there are large concentrations of students with lower socioeconomic backgrounds. Testing outcomes, including the SAT, usually are correlated with socioeconomic background. Rightfully, these schools need support to lift up the children attending into higher aspirations and achievement. However, the real takeaway here is that academic conditions mirror social conditions. And schools have minimal capacity to find parents good jobs so they can feed their children healthy food; to give families affordable, stable homes and health care, to reduce the violence children are exposed to. In other words, schools can't do much to change the social conditions that contribute to a child living in poverty  and daily arriving at school tired, hungry, afraid, academically delayed. A quick reminder of most psychological research will tell us that our basic needs for safety, food and love must be met prior to any of the other higher needs such as learning.  A good book, with reliable sources cited, to read to begin the journey to understanding the state of public education is, "The Reign of Error" by Diane Ravitch. She traces the present day, "Race to the Top" and other national and state 'school improvement' initiatives that have been inflicted upon public schools today back to the earliest days of insidious intentional school segregation and poverty. She reveals the 'follow the money', yellow brick road illusion of modern day school improvement which is accomplishing a big transfer of public education dollars into the coffers of private wealthy individuals/businesses. Public education money which could be spent on teaching students to read, write, calculate, think critically....become successful citizens.
     Locally, let's start with complete information about our schools. It's everyone's responsibility to know all the facts about student achievement, facilities, and yes, even in Brunswick, the efforts made to avoid segregating students based on socioeconomic factors. Our administrative staff and teachers are diligent about integrating all students and advocating for the robust support services any student may need for academic and social achievement. We need to advocate for new facilities (and maintain our newer schools) that can accommodate modern educational practices that support teaching and learning activities. And most of all, we need to celebrate the successes of our schools and the students and teachers working within them together everyday. There are many astounding achievements that are newsworthy! And to accomplish all of these things, the press, the 'tweeter' journalists, us bloggers.... ALL of us would do well to know the complete history of whatever the issue and the related facts.