Learning
What is the focus of our schools? What do we talk about most in our schools? Who do we think about the most in our schools? According to “The Equity Project” the focus is clearly on teachers and their salary:
The Equity Project (TEP) Charter School believes that teacher quality is
the most important factor in achieving educational equity for low income
students. Spurred by this belief, TEP reallocates its public funds by
making an unprecedented investment in attracting and retaining great
teachers. Plus an annual bonus of up to \$25,000.
They further explain that they have refined
what will make them a great
school:
"These redefined expectations are unified by
one principle: student achievement is maximized when teachers have the
time and support to constantly improve their
craft."
Don't get me wrong. I am all for teachers
getting paid more, and I fully support giving them the time they need to
"improve their craft". But TEP is going focusing on the wrong thing.
This is something I have believed for a long time. The focus of every
school should be on the learning of students in the building. Anything
else is a waste of time. Schools do not exist to provide adults with a
job, a career, or a calling. Schools exist so that kids can
learn. If kids don't learn, it doesn't matter how
much money teachers make. If kids don't learn, it doesn't matter how
much professional development the teachers receive, or how much they
observe their peers. How can you make sure students
learn?
By focusing on student
learning!
TEP says that student achievement is
important, and they better show that the low-income students they
service do indeed get higher scores if they want all \$6 million donated
for a school building. The problem is that you don't focus on student
learning by focusing nearly completely on your
teachers.
Here are my
questions for The Equity Project:
1. What do you want your students to
learn?
2. How are you going to know if they learned
it?
3. What are you going to do (in a systematic,
timely way) when they don't learn it?
Without the answers to these questions, we
don't know how this or any
school will do, regardless of how much other
stuff they may claim will "save" education.
As it so often happens,
while I was writing this, I saw this BLOGPOST from [Harvard Education
Publishing](http://www.hepg.org/blog/20), which sums it up much more
eloquently than I do.
Have a Good Life.
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