Report: US only average at educating students

By Matt Buccelli

A recent sample of test score data from around the world is causing significant concern among American education observers and public officials.  The report, which tallied the math, science, and reading scores of 15 year-olds in each of the 34 countries within the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD], demonstrates mediocre results for the United States, and shows us lagging behind many other Asian and European countries.  On the 1,000 point scale of the International Student Assessment, we scored a 500 in reading, 502 in science, and 487 in math. 

The results sounded alarm bells for many public officials.  Education Secretary Arne Duncan referred to the results as "a massive wake-up call."  Added Duncan: "Have we ever been satisfied as Americans being average in anything? Is that our aspiration? Our goal should be absolutely to lead the world in education."

Representative George Miller [D-CA], the outgoing chairman of the House Education Committee, expressed similar distress. "Average won't help us regain our global role as a leader in education. Average won't help our students get the jobs of tomorrow. Average is the status quo and it's failing our country."



The disappointing results also drew attention from President Obama, who called for a new "Sputnik moment" to stimulate US investment in math and science education and scientific research in general.  In case you've been contributing in the last several years to our country's average test scores, Sputnik was the Soviet satellite launched in 1957 that caused widespread panic and outrage that our then-Cold War rivals had beat us to space.  As everyone knows, we quickly stepped up our game and put a man on the moon just 12 years later -- largely the work of rocket scientists and engineers who were mostly under 30 at the time.  If this transformation was a testament to the power of our country to course-correct and better educate our young people then, President Obama is clearly trying to channel those same energies now.

But what needs to be done to improve the country's academic performance?  Weren't we in this same position when we enacted No Child Left Behind over 8 years ago?  How many new reports need to come out before we can find a series of real solutions to an educational crisis that seems to get deeper by the day?

If this report tells us one thing, it's that mediocrity and failure within the American school system extends way beyond the thousands of "low-performing schools" across the country.  We do need a new "Sputnik moment," but we can't just throw more money at a school system that clearly isn't doing its job.  We need to comprehensively rethink our approach to education in the United States, from what and how we teach students to the way we choose to assess them, and we need to start doing it right now.

LINKS:

International test score data show US firmly mid-pack [Washington Post]
House Education Chair: US School System is 'Failing Our Country' [HuffPost]
Obama cites 'Sputnik' moment, calls for investment [Yahoo! News]

Thanksgiving Break

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone reading out there -- if you're helping us tutor right now, we're thankful for you!  If not, we've had an awesome semester so far in DC Reads, and we'll continue to keep you updated on all aspects of our tutoring and community involvement as the year progresses.


For now, we'll post another great sentence about education from Joanna Peiser, senior in the college and another member of our Advocacy Committee:


"To me, education means creating a better tomorrow for myself and others."


Agreed.  Have a great break!

Program Snapshot: Afternoons in the 3rd grade

We have four different tutoring programs within DC READS: our traditional one-to-one after-school tutoring for third graders; Saturday tutoring at libraries and community centers; morning tutoring, where we serve as de-facto teachers' assistants in classrooms for all the different elementary school grades; and then our 4th and 5th grade program, which functions as an after-school classroom run by a group of tutors and coordinators and focuses on personal development goals, writing, vocabulary, and other forms of student enrichment. Over the course of this year, we'll be posting a mixture of tutor and coordinator reflections to allow us to convey our experience as educators and mentors, while also filling our readers in on exciting developments within each of our programs.

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The following post was written by Justine Achille, a sophomore in the NHS who is currently tutoring at Kenilworth Elementary School:

The session was going to go great. I knew it. I had printed out a vocabulary activity that I made up that I knew my tutee would enjoy, and I was bringing the white board. I didn’t really have a plan as to what to do with it, but that didn’t matter. As a rule, all tutees love using white dry-erase boards, and mine is no exception. So in my mind, the day was going to be a hit, without a doubt, and at first, everything was going just as planned. We ambled through a book about a nice woman who owned “The Strawberry Inn,” and then we began to tackle my vocab worksheet.

Outside of Kenilworth Elementary

First, I should probably back-track and explain that my tutee has been obsessed with the idea of “creating a community.” When I first heard this I was completely blown away. My tutee, this little third grader, is thinking of ways to build a good community! So I asked her how she would go about doing this, excited about what kind of insight she might have about the workings of a community or town. Her reply was something along the lines of: well… we could use milk cartons…and construction paper….and…Of course. She means literally, let’s build a community. I have to say, I should have probably expected this. But nonetheless, I decided to try to work with the idea. 

Thus the vocab worksheet was full of words describing either components of a good community, or those of a bad one. Her job was to read the words, try to understand their meanings, and decide if they should be part of this imaginary community. Wanting to challenge her, I threw in some words that I knew she would not recognize, but I hoped that together we could define them, and then she could learn their meanings. The first words we came to were “GREEN SPACE,” as in parks or something of the sort; the word was circled. Perfect. Next was “SIDEWALKS,” again, circled. Great. Then we got to “LAW ENFORCEMENT”; I expected that she might not know the meaning of this one immediately, so I was prepared for her pause. She began to read the word out loud. “Law,” she said confidently, and then stopped. I gave her another second to think, but instead of moving on, she looked to me. I then began with the old standby: now, let’s try to sound it out. And so we did. Or, I should say, I did.

We began with the very first letter: e. What sound does the “e” make? She excitedly responded with “Eh! Eh! Eh!” Correct. We moved on. The “n” to my surprise, made the “Mmmm mmmm” sound. Close. But not quite. After a quizzical look up at me, I gave in. It makes the “Nuh nuh nuh” sound, I confessed. Unfortunately, the rest of the word followed in a manner much like the “n.” Without wanting to lose the whole purpose of the activity, I shook if off, chalking up her mistakes to unfamiliarity with the new word, and we began to try to dissect its meaning. Thankfully, after finding the word “force” hidden in there, we were able to come to the definition rather quickly. I think both my tutee and I were a little wary to continue, given the amount of errors we encountered with “LAW ENFORCEMENT,” but nonetheless, we proceeded cautiously through the activity. After a lot more help on my part than I had originally anticipated, we finished, and I came to a decision about how we should use the white board that day: we would review phonics.

I started by writing the letter “D” on the board and asking her to give me the sound or sounds it makes and a word that begins with that letter. Without hesitation she complied. To make it fun, I let her take a turn and quiz me – tutees seem to love feeling like they are controlling the game. She gave me a letter and then we switched back. The game continued smoothly, building her self-confidence and my confidence in her. However, when we got to “c,” things got rocky again. I know “c” is tough; who would expect it to sometimes be an “s” in disguise? Certainly not me! But nonetheless, it is something that every child needs to learn to recognize eventually. When I pushed for a second sound that this letter might make, she began guessing at random, giving me any sound she knew. With a slow nod of resignation, I once again gave in and made the sound for her.

We moved on to vowels, and to my surprise, it was “long” vowel sounds that seemed to trouble my tutee the most. She stared at the large round “O” I had written on the board, and as the seconds went by, I closed my eyes a moment and just hoped that she would come up with the right sound. She had already done the hard part and given me the short “o” at the beginning of “octopus,” but as I continued to press: and what sound does the second “o” in octopus make? I received nothing but blank stares. She finally smiled and said “ohhh! I know!” Yes, yes yes! That’s exactly right! But wait, she wasn’t finished: “ohhh! I know!” she said, “It’s the puh puh puh sound!”

I froze, and prayed that my face was not betraying my true emotions.

I was crestfallen in the truest sense of the word. I, of course, had thought her original exclamation was her answer. As she continued to smile up at me, looking completely pleased with herself, I couldn’t speak. This beautiful, enthusiastic eight year-old girl does not know the sounds of the alphabet. Dumbstruck I just sat there for a moment, but the longer I waited, the more confused she was getting, and the angrier I became on the inside. How could her school have let her move on to the third grade without making sure she knew the sound of every letter of the alphabet? How could they let such a devastating learning deficit slip through the cracks? What teacher, who spends two hundred-odd days of the year with her, had not spotted this problem, which I had picked up on in only my fourth hour of knowing her? She is in the third grade! I was appalled and outraged and frustrated and more than anything else, deeply saddened by my discovery. 

Not knowing what else to do, I slapped a smile back on. Close, I told her, let’s try it again. The day certainly was not a hit. By the end of the session my tutee was visibly dejected as one can only be from trying and failing time after time after time. Hey, I said, you did a great job today. I held out my hand, our cue for our secret handshake. Slowly, she looked up, and seeing my gesture, a smile spread across her face. At the end of that long day, I couldn’t help but feel a new sense of urgency in my position as a tutor. It’s tough days like these that make me realize how the DC public school system struggles to serve their youth, but it is smiles like the one I saw on my tutee’s face that remind me that what I can do, even though it may not be much, is enough to make a difference. This is why I tutor.

To me, education...

We're starting a new feature here on the DC Reads blog.  It's an idea born out of our excellent tutor advocacy committee, which is currently doing a yeoman's job helping to advocate for just education throughout Washington, DC.  More on that as the year progresses.

Anyway, in our last meeting we were sitting around talking about things we can include on the blog, and one of our members came up with a very simple concept: one sentence, from everyone on the committee, describing what education means to them.  Brilliant!

So from now on, throughout the year, we'll be posting one of these sentences each week.  Our inaugural sentence comes from Hannah Hill:

"To me, education is the only national tool that ubiquitously provides a forum for reform and development."

Well put.  Stay tuned for more -- and as always, happy reading!

Vincent Gray Ward 8 Town Hall Meeting

By: Hannah Klusendorf

Last week, in a crowded Ward 8 church, fifteen DC Reads coordinators and tutors gathered with nearly a thousand Ward 8-ers to hear future DC mayor, Vince Gray, overview his proposed agenda. A waning sound system and a delayed start aside, the town hall meeting provided me with some illuminating, though vague, information in regards to education. After promising to unite the Wards together to form one DC, Gray turned his attention to creating one DCPS.

Gray claimed that rumblings alleging he would “turn the clock back on education” were “ridiculous.” He spoke of his positive voting record within the Council for education reform measures – a point he brought up many times while on the campaign trail. But that night, he seemed to directly speak out against Rhee and her supporters. Following the primary election results, she did call Gray’s victory “devastating to the children of Washington, DC.” Gray reassured all that there is “only one thing that matters: improving the educational outcome for the children of the District of Columbia.” Duh.

DC is home to a broad and differing range of opinions and ideas, but I do not think (at least I strongly hope) that few find Gray’s statement to be controversial. Some, however, might take issue with his plans for actually accomplishing this necessary yet lofty task. Personally, I have yet to see a fully-realized, concrete plan for actually doing this, as was evident in the following minutes.

Gray stated his vision for a public education system that carries a child from birth to age twenty-four. He stressed the successful creation of formal early childhood education programs within the District. According to him, DC is the first “state” in America to say that there is seat in a pre-kindergarten program for every 3 and 4 year-old. DC Action for Children is working to confirm this. I also tried researching his claim, but I came up with inconclusive results. Drawing upon this supposed success, Gray went on to say that he wants to extend formal education to include children as early as six-months-old because for some children, “three years old is too late.” Not only with this access to education be beneficial for the children, but it will also teach the parents how to be better parents.

As the crowd loudly clapped at this remark, I could not help but think about and question what this proposed system. Clearly, this idea hopes to replant the Harlem Children's Zone in DC, but how exactly will this move look? How much will DC's version resemble this model. What will this program for six-month-olds be? Is it a glorified child care? What does a post-secondary program look like for a twenty-four-year-old still in DCPS? Is it a variation of college or more vocational in nature? Gray’s statements raised many more questions than they answered. He did not elaborate on any specifics of his vision of a DCPS extending from the cradle to adulthood If someone did not know of Geoffery Canada's Harlem Children Zone was prior to this meeting, then he or she would not have any clue as to what Gray's plan even means for DC. Moreover, he prefaced this whole conversation with “We will work on these when we get into better times.” Considering the current state of the economy and the eventual budget cuts DCPS most likely faces, can Gray even guarantee that these broad plans will be enacted?

Another policy that lacked specificity pertained to charter schools. According to him, 30,000 students in DC attend these schools; some parents clearly prefer them. “We,” Gray stated, “Need to work to make sure that public schools are great, too.” Both systems should grow and develop, and parents should be able to choose type of school their children attend. Working with a program that serves in public schools, I agree wholeheartedly with Gray’s statement. Although I had hoped that he would offer concrete ways to promote the growth of public schools, I was glad that at least our mayor is aware of this public school need.

In regards to high school, Gray talked about the merits of developing career and technical components in every high school across the city, so “that kids who want to go to work after the twelve-grade have a set of marketable skills.” Once again, he did not offer a timeline for such plans, reiterating, “We will work on these when we get into better times.” I agree that college is not the life path for every student in the United States. Vocational training would be invaluable for those not planning on pursuing a higher level of education. However, I wished that Gray mentioned the need to foster a college-going culture within DCPS. Attending college is not so unattainable goal as many students might think. True, Gray did bring up the University the District of Columbia and the need to show pride for our state university. He did not, though, link the University to DCPS and its potential college students.

As Gray left the education question to pursue other areas of interest and answer audience questions, I still wanted more. True, the nature of this town hall was not to outline his exact plans for DC. At the time of the town hall, the mayoral election was still a week away. Clearly, he was going to stay away from anything too controversial less he bite the hand that feeds him.

Gray’s speech was a verbal victory lap of sorts. Ward 8 alone gave him 10,500 votes in his primary win. Combined with Ward 7’s 14,500 votes, he received nearly 34% of his votes from these two wards. Being with nearly a thousand community members all clamoring to have their questions answered and their voices heard made me realize the power of an engaged community. Now, that Vincent Gray can officially claim the title of DC’s mayor, I look forward to learning more about his ideas for DCPS. I want to know the specificities of his administration’s idea of education reform. DC Reads started before Rhee assumed the Chancellorship, and it will continue to survive in a Rhee-less DC. Hopefully, Gray’s plans can support our own mission and vision for DCPS.

If you want to learn more about the Ward 8 Town Hall Meeting, the entire event is available to watch here. 

DC Reads Program Snapshot: 4th and 5th Grade

We have four different tutoring programs within DC READS: our traditional one-to-one after-school tutoring for third graders; Saturday tutoring at libraries and community centers; morning tutoring, where we serve as de-facto teachers' assistants in classrooms for all the different elementary school grades; and then our 4th and 5th grade program, which functions as an after-school classroom run by a group of tutors and coordinators and focuses on personal development goals, writing, vocabulary, and other forms of student enrichment. Over the course of this year, we'll be posting a mixture of tutor and coordinator reflections to allow us to convey our experience as educators and mentors, while also filling our readers in on exciting developments within each of our programs.

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Coordinator Reflection: Matt Buccelli

This past Thursday in our 4th and 5th grade classroom at Houston Elementary School, we had a "poetry café" to celebrate some of the work our students have been doing and give them a chance to share their creative material. For the previous two weeks, we had been teaching a unit on poetry and its different styles. After going over basic poetry terms like rhyme, couplet, alliteration, stanza, and syllable using the rap song "I Can," by Nas, we spent four classes teaching our kids to write acrostics, haiku, cinquains, and free verse poems. During each class, students had the chance to share their work quietly with a friend or individual teacher, but we intentionally put off having kids share their poems with the class and instead reminded our students during each lesson that if they behaved well and continued to worked hard, our efforts at writing would build up to a class spent sharing our poetry and eating treats. In each class building up to the poetry café, every student in class wrote at least one poem in each style; some who finished early wrote more, while others chose to draw illustrations to go along with their poems. Many of our students had the opportunity to draw illustrations but chose to write more poems instead.



So by the time we had our café last Thursday, each student had plenty of material to work with. We began the class with a 30 minute game of "Jeopardy!" to review the vocab words (one "Word of the Day" each day) that we had been learning, with the winning team getting first dibs on the cookies and brownies we brought as treats. Then we rearranged the room so that the clusters of desks normally scattered across the middle were moved to the walls and we could all make a circle with teachers and students sitting together on the floor. Once the whole class had had a chance to get a plate of cookies and brownies and a drink, one of our teachers introduced each student and allowed them to share their poetry. Each student was instructed to pick one piece of work to share -- once the entire class had gone, students who wished to share another poem were the given the opportunity to do so.

Aside from being lots of fun, I think the poetry café really demonstrates some of the ways that programs like DC Reads can enrich the academic experience of our kids. Our 4th graders have an excellent teacher in Ms. Crump at Houston, but with all the learning standards and academic material to cover during normal school hours, even if writing and poetry are part of the curriculum (as they should be -- and are in Ms. Crump's class), it can be hard for even the most skilled teacher to find time to work in something like the poetry café. While DC Reads, in all of our programs, spends a lot of time working on basic literacy skills and teaching academic material, like our Words of the Day and the poetry terms we introduced, we also have a lot of freedom and leeway to incorporate a celebration like the one we had last Thursday, which was great on so many levels. Not only was it a fun after-school activity; as a class, it also allowed all of us -- teachers and students -- to celebrate the hard work and learning we've already done together in this young year, while further building the relationships, trust, and goodwill between us and our students that will help us set the stage for more learning to take place in the coming weeks and months.

If you have an experience from site that you want to share, please contact me at mrb73@georgetown.edu so we can feature it on the blog!

Happy reading,

Matt

Rhee Out, Henderson In

By: Hannah Klusendorf

Since Adrian Fenty's defeat in the DC mayoral primary, there has been much speculation as to the fate of his right-hand woman, Michelle Rhee. After all, she did support Fenty's bid for re-election, and while campaigning for him, she hinted that a victory for Grey would mean resignation for her. It’s no secret that Gray and Rhee have had a pretty rocky relationship in the past. When asked about the possibility of keeping Rhee, Grey responded, "Well, we'll see."

Apparently, Gray and Rhee saw something. 

This Wednesday, October 13th, Rhee announced that she would resign as DC Public Schools Chancellor at the end of the month. Gray picked, Kaya Henderson, DC's Deputy Chancellor, as Rhee's interim successor. She first got involved with education reform and policy by working for Teach for America as a middle school Spanish teacher in the Bronx and as the executive director of Teach for America-DC. After her TFA stint, Henderson served Vice-President for Strategic Partnerships in Rhee's The New Teacher Project. She also launched alternative teaching certification programs, including the DC Teaching Fellows Program. Most importantly for all you Georgetown readers, Henderson is a Hoya twice over; she received her undergraduate and master's degrees at Georgetown. 

According to Rhee, "She's everything you'd want in a leader. She has the ability to motivate people. She's a critical thinker, and she's an innovative thinker." In light of this glowing praise, why did Gray appoint Henderson, a clear supporter of many Rhee policies? What does Henderson's chancellorship mean for the students of DCPS? 

In Henderson, Gray inherits in many ways a mini-Rhee. Both subscribe to the same vision of education reform, chiefly that student success depends most heavily on teacher quality. Henderson was Rhee’s first appointee, and they have been working together for the past decade. In the controversial firing of 98 central office staff members in 2008, Henderson, as deputy chancellor of “human capital,” played an important role. Despite Henderson’s close relationship to Rhee and her policies, Gray and his staff must have seen something in Henderson. Although she successfully negotiated a new labor pact with the Washington Teachers’ Union that bases job security on classroom performance rather than tenure, Henderson maintains a decent relationship with the teachers’ union president, George Parker whose union backed Gray in the primary. Also, according to at least one senior education adviser to Gray, Henderson’s political and presentational skills are stronger than those of Rhee’s. 

Whatever the reasons may be for Henderson’s appointment, one must wonder how she fits into Gray’s message of “community engagement and collaboration.” He has said that he “has no intention of micromanaging DCPS,” but how much freedom will Henderson – someone the Gray camp considers to be a permanent chancellor replacement – have to continue with the reforms set in motion by Rhee or even to forge a different path? 

According to Henderson, "Our responsibility is to deliver the goods, no matter what the situations our students are in. The reform is in the schoolhouse.” I look forward to watching how she intends on reforming the schoolhouse as the new Chancellor of DCPS.

Ward 7 Promise Neighborhood Celebration

This Saturday, several DC Reads coordinators attended a neighborhood celebration to mark the awarding of a $500,000 federal grant to the Parkside-Kenilworth community in Ward 7 for the planning and implementation of a new Promise Neighborhood. The site in Ward 7 is one of 21 across the country that was recently selected by the U.S. Department of Education for its Promise Neighborhood Planning Grant program, and it includes Kenilworth Elementary School, which is one of the places where we tutor on Friday afternoons.

Location of the new Promise Neighborhood (click to enlarge)

DC's Promise Neighborhood will be modeled, in part, after the Harlem Children's Zone in New York, which spans a 100 block radius and takes a community-based approach to improving educational outcomes for kids. The idea is that by working to comprehensively build communities, we will also insure that students achieve at a higher level; both the Harlem Children's Zone and the Promise Neighborhood planned for DC seek to foster a safe, nurturing environment for kids by combining good schools, after-school programs, and other opportunities to engage youth with affordable housing and health care, job training, and other so-called "wraparound services" for adults.

The celebration on Saturday took place at the Mayfair Mansions, a sprawling complex of several apartment buildings in the Promise Neighborhood community. There was free food and a live DJ who led several games of musical chairs with the children in attendance. There were also two ponies. At one point, about two dozen people got up to do the Cha-Cha Slide, which drew Noelle's excitement, and she did an awesome job following along.

Noelle does the Cha-Cha Slide

Several community-based organizations that will be involved with the new Promise Neighborhood were also in attendance, so it was good for DC Reads to be present and explain our role in the community. Certainly our tutoring program plays a big part in offering the kind of comprehensive support for kids that the Kenilworth-Parkside neighborhood will aim to encourage with its new grant, and we did a lot of networking with the other organizations that were out on Saturday. The woman representing Head Start, which helps low-income kids go to preschool, actually turned out to be the grandmother of one of my tutees in the fourth and fifth grade program at Houston Elementary School, which is located just outside of the Promise Neighborhood area. Aside from being a nice coincidence, I think this really illustrates why DC Reads tries to establish its presence in the communities where we serve. The more we can show up and make connections with people who have a stake in our success, the more successful we will ultimately be.


For more information on the Parkside-Kenilworth Promise Neighborhood, check out their website. We'll also keep you updated on its progress as the year progresses.

This week in education: New page on the Huffington Post

The Huffington Post has just launched a new education page as part of its sprawling website. For those of you who read the Huffington Post (and those who don't!), the page follows the same basic layout as the rest of the website, with top stories and relevant education news running down the center, flanked by video links and columns by various players in the education world.

Portraying the new page as a response to the growing interest throughout the country in education issues, Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington asserted in a post to the main website that America is having an "education moment." We at DC Reads certainly hope she's right: from our ongoing work in schools, we know that fixing the education system in America will not be easy. Still, tackling this eminently pressing issue with the thought, care, and critical thinking it deserves requires as much of a sense of urgency as this country can possibly muster. The more informed people are about not only achievement gaps and other struggles in urban schools, but also the stagnation and mediocrity of the US education system as a whole, the more we can encourage innovation and find diverse, well-thought out solutions that tackle the array of tangling and complex issues that have long complicated efforts to improve public schools.

To view the Huffington Post education page, click here. From now on, it will also appear as a link in our sidebar.

Happy reading!

Will Rhee stay or go?

By Matt Buccelli

After City Council Chairman Vincent Gray's triumph over incumbent Mayor Adrian Fenty in the September 14 DC mayoral primary, the jury is still out on what Gray's victory may mean for the future of DC Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee. During Gray's tenure as council chair, he and Rhee have maintained a rocky relationship, and on the day after the primary, Rhee chose to characterize the result as "devastating for the children of Washington, DC." (ouch) Over the course of the campaign, Rhee signaled that she wouldn't work for Gray should he win, and given her engagement to the current mayor of Sacramento, California, she may be ready to skip town anyway. For his part, Gray remained mum during his bid for the mayoralty about whether or not he would keep Rhee, and has refused to make any decisions on administrative personnel until he is officially the mayor; even in heavily Democratic DC, the presumptive mayor-to-be still has to at least go through the motions of a general election in November.

Basically, we're unlikely to hear anything for awhile. But that shouldn't stop us from speculating anyway on what Gray's victory means for the Chancellor and for the future of DC education policy as a whole.



Rhee and other prominent Fenty supporters suggested during the more heated stages of the campaign that a Gray victory would bring Washington, DC and its education system back to the "old days" of inefficiency, embarrassment, and failure, but this seems like hyperbole. On education and other matters, Gray's platform throughout his campaign was basically to continue Fenty's reforms, but to listen more to local communities. One of the major knocks on both Fenty and Rhee that created a fundamental weakness for Gray to exploit was the mayor and chancellor's brash style and perceived inability to listen to complementary voices. As far as matters of substance go, however, Gray has indicated that he is determined to continue the basic track of school reform initiated by Rhee, with a few tweaks. Reading Gray's education plan, the main difference seems to be his insistence that he will solicit community input and foster a more "collaborative approach" to education reform. (To read Gray's educational platform, as seen on his campaign website, click here)

It is reasonable to debate the merits of Gray's commitment to "collaboration" versus Rhee's more dictatorial style: arguably, Rhee has been able to get more done in her three years at the helm of DC schools because she has been so hard-charging. And it is easy for detractors of Gray's approach to deride his love for deliberation and community input as a recipe for not actually getting anything done. The bottom line, however, is that regardless of whether or not Rhee stays or goes, her current boss was voted out because the people her policies are affecting most -- the residents of DC's poorest neighborhoods, along with teachers and parents of students in the city's most underperforming schools -- were turned off by her brash demeanor and low regard for community engagement and support. In the Chancellor's own words: "cooperation, collaboration and consensus building are way overrated." Feeling disenchanted, the people whose support Rhee failed to bring along voted for someone who has promised to listen more. If Rhee isn't committed to at least moderating her approach, she should probably leave too.

Many of the Chancellor's reforms, such as her streamlining of administrative operations at the DCPS central office, have resulted in a school district that is leaner, less wasteful, and more efficient. School facilities have been improved. Textbooks now get delivered on time. And student achievement, as measured by standardized test scores, has at least ticked up -- although elementary school literacy did drop this year by 4 percent.

Still, despite these measures of success, there are legitimate issues surrounding the future of school reform in Washington, DC. What role will charter schools play? Teachers must be held accountable, an issue whose cross Rhee chose to bear, but do standardized test scores really provide a fair assessment of teacher and student performance? Does the district rely excessively on these tests, and does this damage the quality of education that students receive in the classroom by mandating that teachers "teach to the test?" How else can we insure that teachers and schools are doing their job? What else do we need to help children coming from difficult life circumstances succeed in the classroom?

These are not easy questions to answer, but the only way that the challenges they present will be met successfully is if education reform in DC, to paraphrase an article that recently appeared in The Root magazine, is done with the people it affects, instead of to them. Michelle Rhee has enjoyed some notable successes during her tenure with DCPS, but this is something that she hasn't seemed to grasp. Whether it's her or somebody different, the next chancellor of DC public schools under Vince Gray will need to have a better understanding that truly good leadership requires the support and buy-in of those who are being led.

Welcome Back! Fall 2010

Hey readers!

Welcome back to the DC Reads Just Education blog. After a busy three weeks of tutor recruitment and training, DC Reads is finally back in the saddle and doing what we do best -- helping kids learn to read, that is. We sent our first tutors to site this afternoon, and we've got a busy week and year ahead, with more morning tutoring sessions, additional afternoon times, and a new after-school classroom curriculum for fourth and fifth graders that we developed and used for the first time this summer.

DC Reads is back, and that means our flagship blog, Just Education, is too. Last year we debuted the blog as a project of our awesome Advocacy Committee, and we look forward to developing the blog further in the coming weeks and months. When you read our blog, you can expect to find updates on our work in and outside of the classroom, along with individual analysis about DC Public Schools and the broader public education system in which we tutor. We will also look to connect you with a wide range of material concerning the education system in DC and across the country, from the Washington Post education page to other online resources. Throughout the year, we will continue to attend Chancellor's forums and other public events designed to connect the DC community with the progress of its school system.

Check back frequently for updates and new developments, and if you're helping us tutor this semester, have an awesome first week!

The Degree of Education: Why Georgetown Is and Should Be Expanding its Influence in Education

By: Marc Patterson

When Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, came to the town hall meeting in Gaston Hall on Monday May 3rd, he gave encouraging words on the power of education to transform lives. “We cannot let any child fall through the cracks, regardless of the difficulties they face at home…poverty is never destiny,” Duncan pressed the crowd of teachers, parents and Georgetown students. I cannot help but feel the disconnect however, because despite the thriving network of tutors Georgetown has created, not to mention one of the highest matriculation rates into Teach For America in the country, no Georgetown student has the opportunity to seriously engage education as a field of study through this university. In order to train both informed political advocates for education reform and teachers who will demand the reform they need to be effective, Georgetown needs a program in education. The University’s Jesuit tradition and value of social justice demand it.

I talked with Professor Heather Voke who has been the central proponent of establishing a center for education here at Georgetown. “There is a great body of knowledge about what works in the classroom, what doesn’t work in the classroom,” she says. Subjects would include education theory, development psychology and practical fieldwork. Professor Voke teaches such classes as Civic Engagement & Public Education in the Philosophy department. The center for education would fill a wider need for intellectual debate over education reform.

Despite the NCES results, Washington D.C. has been a shining exception to nationwide data. These gains can be attributed to the concerted efforts being made by trained educators coming to tackle the district’s unique challenges and to after school programs. A major contributor to the efforts, Georgetown University’s DC Reads program has been rapidly expanding over the last couple of years, and has been achieving great results. Students in the low-income schools that are served are not only reading closer to grade level, but their parents are becoming more involved in their education, and third graders are talking about going to college. And Washington DC has been by no means the only place to experience success. Renowned author Dave Eggers’ emerging ‘826 Valencia’ writing centers are stepping up their efforts across the country. On a school level, charter schools like Roxbury Prep in Boston and Harlem Children’s zone in New York have created models that are bringing disadvantaged students up to speed with the nation’s best.[1] What all of these efforts have in common is the recognition of education as a matter of social justice. They attract dedicated and enthusiastic instructors and in turn encourage them to be innovative in their educational techniques. These approaches to education are challenging the bounds of being a teacher.

The recommendations made by the House Committee on Education panel titled “Building on What Works in Charter Schools” suggest instead that we need to focus on transforming struggling public schools on the model of what has worked in the successful charter schools. What education methods are being employed at KIPP (Knowledge is Power Program) schools? How does Roxbury Prep motivate its teachers? Charter schools are the “laboratories for innovation” waiting for their findings to be scaled and implemented. A degree in education at Georgetown University would provide the setting for in-depth research about effective and innovative educational techniques.

Teacher retention rates are closely examined in Freedman, et. al’s study “In It for the Long Haul…” in the Journal of Teacher Education.[2] The study takes students from the Multicultural Urban Secondary English (MUSE) credential and MA program at University of California Berkeley, and tracks their careers in schools. Their statistics show that graduates of the MUSE program have higher retention rates than the national average, with results after 5 years of 73% of teachers remaining in classroom teaching compared to a national average of 54%. Well trained teachers remain teaching because they are better equipped to have an impact on their students. Better quality teachers therefore lead to more results in the classroom, encouraging the teacher to remain and in turn the entire American education system benefits.

‘At the end of the day the problem lies in the teachers unions. They demand too much money for their lazy teachers who work only nine months of the year and who couldn’t care less about the achievement of their students.’

This kind of attitude is the single biggest barrier that we face to training and keeping good teachers. The sense of disrespect for the teaching profession played a deciding role in the Georgetown University administration crushing an effort to implement an education minor in the college last year. Professor Voke commented that there was “a resistance to the idea of education because it isn’t a professional field. It doesn’t have the same kind of status as say law or medicine. I think the resistance is that we don’t want to have that sort of stigma associated with Georgetown University.” In many ways, the fact that this stigma exists makes it even more urgent that Georgetown adopt an education program to prove that teachers can break this mold.

The purpose of the book “Teachers Have It Easy: The Big Sacrifices and Small Salaries of America’s Teachers”[3] by Dave Eggers et. al is to show that in fact teachers do not fit this mold at all. It illustrates through painstaking detail the duties of a teacher to debunk the image that teaching is not actually challenging and anyone can teach with little or no training. The effect is that thousands of great young teachers are leaving the profession early due to the low morale created by the stigma, low pay and lack of recognition.

The best way to tackle this problem is at the source of the nation’s most well respected professions. The top Universities in the United States need to embrace the academic field of education as a rigorous science, worthy of a status as high as the challenges it poses in our society. By giving the most motivated students the opportunity to delve into the complexities of education, the Universities will be at once changing the image of the teaching profession and creating the next generation of Teaching Professionals that will be advocates for further progress in the field.

According to Professor Voke, our next step towards this goal is “creating an academic community of people who are interested in the study of education. To bring together the faculty and students who are interested but don’t know about one another, who want to share knowledge.” The DC Reads advocacy committee is a start. Please join us.

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[1] House Committee on Education & Labor “Building on What Works in Charter Schools” June 4, 2009.

[2] Freedman, S. W., et. al., “In It for the Long Haul: How Teacher Education Can Contribute to Teacher Retention in High-Poverty, Urban Schools.” Journal of Teacher Education v. 60 no. 3 (May/June 2009) p. 323-37. Proquest. Web. 14 April 2010.

[3] Clements Calegari, Ninive; Eggers, Dave; Moulthroup, Daniel. “Teachers Have It Easy: The Big Sacrifices and Small Salaries of America's Teachers.” New York: The New Press, 2005.

WMATA service cuts could affect DCPS students

By: Jake Schindler

According to Washington Post education columnist Bill Turque, several student-only bus routes that serve DCPS turned up on a list of possible WMATA service cuts. On Friday, he wrote about the issue on his D.C. Schools Insider blog:

“D.C. public schools do not have yellow school buses that take students to regular school programs, but WMATA serves some schools with special bus lines that are for students only. On the list of possible route cuts are the buses that serve Watkins Elementary and Peabody Elementary; Deal Middle and Sousa Middle; Anacostia High, Eastern High, McKinley High, Spingarn High and Wilson High; and Duke Ellington School of the Arts.”

Of the schools listed, two (Sousa and Anacostia) are in Wards 7 and 8. In addition, the Duke Ellington School of the Arts is just a few blocks from Georgetown, and serves students from all over the District. Transportation is an issue of great importance for DCPS families, not only because of the lack of school buses, but because students in D.C. are not restricted to attending schools in a specific ward or neighborhood, as is the case in many other cities. Parents can send their children to any school in the District, but a lack of reliable transportation may limit their options.

It’s easy to see how this could have a disproportionate effect on the underserved communities of the 7th and 8th Wards. Without public transit, parents who lack the time or resources to drive their children across the District each morning would have few alternatives to their neighborhood public school, regardless of its quality.

Fortunately, WMATA is saying that the school routes are not in danger, and that even if they were to be cut, they would be replaced by alternate bus or rail routes. This is reassuring news. But fewer service cuts for cash-strapped Metro could mean even more fare hikes on top of those introduced earlier this year. Either way, it could soon become more difficult for a lot of D.C. students to get to school.

Bill Turque’s article can be found at:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcschools/2010/04/are_metros_dedicated_school_li.html

For more on Metro’s budget woes:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/08/AR2010040803905.html

Encouraging Dreams of Higher Education in D.C. Public Schools

By: Hannah Klusendorf

Below is an opinion I wrote for The Hoya for the April 13th edition. The link is http://www.thehoya.com/opinion/encouraging-dreams-higher-education-dc-public-schools, but I posted the article just in case. In the article, I presented how severe the education gap is in D.C. and how Georgetown students specifically can/should rally around D.C. issues like education reform. As I wrote, a Georgetown degree will mean nothing if we do not use the knowledge it represents to serve the community as a whole. Hope you like it!

Our high school senior selves probably wished at one point or another that they had never heard of the college admissions process and SATs. For many students in the District, however, ignorance is not bliss. Rather, it equates to low wages and limited career options.

According to a 2006 report, 68 percent of students across the country graduate from high school in five years; 48 percent enroll in college within 18 months of graduating from high school; and 23 percent receive degrees within five years of entering college. In the District, only 43 percent graduate from high school in five years; 29 percent enroll in college within 18 months of graduating from high school; and 9 percent receive a college degree within five years of enrolling. In Wards 7 and 8, just 33 percent of students graduate from high school, and 5 percent receive a college degree.

A high school diploma alone cannot support a family. Eighty percent of the fastest-growing job sectors in the United Sates require some postsecondary education. Seventy percent of college-educated males earn more than their high school-educated counterparts. Likewise, female college graduates earn about 80 percent more than female high school graduates. D.C. children will face a future of diminished life opportunities if no one takes up their cause.

As a coordinator for D.C. Reads, I see firsthand the students, schools and struggles these statistics represent. Part of our program includes a curriculum specifically geared toward cultivating a college-going culture in the fourth grade at Houston Elementary in Ward 7.

Every Friday, a group of tutors and coordinators meets with these dozen or so students to discuss what it means to go to college and be a college student. The fourth-graders knew that one needs to study hard in order to attend college, but they lacked the vocabulary to understand what that entailed. SATs, applications, scholarships and high school extra-curricular activities are now topics Houston’s fourth grade can grasp. But more importantly than knowing what an SAT is, the students can comprehend why one goes to college and what one does when one arrives on campus.

We stress to the students that the college experience consists of much more than simply going to class. One need only walk through Red Square to see a diverse body of interests represented by T-shirts, flyers and bake sales. Painters, singers, basketball stars and political activists all walk these halls. The interests we cultivate here influence and factor into our career and life choices after graduation.

Many D.C. public school students, however, do not realize the value of learning outside the classroom in college. Scott, a fourth-grader at Houston and an avid television watcher, once dreamed of taking the online college classes he saw advertised on TV. Because a Georgetown student took the time to have a meaningful conversation with Scott, he now wants to go to a university where perhaps he will find a club dedicated to TV fandom. If he and the other fourth-graders of Houston Elementary continue on this college-conscious path, no goal of theirs is impossible.

As Georgetown students, we are in a pivotal position to help foster a college-going culture within the District of Columbia Public Schools system. We are all veterans of the admissions process and soon-to-be beneficiaries of a university degree. DCPS need more Joe and Jane Hoyas to become a part of its mission to create a postsecondary culture. As D.C. residents, we, along with educators and community leaders, share in the responsibility of bolstering college graduation rates. We need to see past Georgetown’s front gates and realize the grass is not greener on the other side of Healy Lawn.

Social justice issues like educational reform require more time and effort than four years here can afford, but Georgetown and its student body of women and men for others can have an impact in the DCPS system. Programs such as D.C. Reads are committed to alleviating the educational gaps in Wards 7 and 8. A Georgetown degree will mean nothing if we do not use the knowledge it represents to serve the community as a whole. Scott and his classmates deserve the right to one day complain about the college admissions process, too.

Upcoming Field Trip to the National Museum of American History

By: Kelly McAllester

When you tutor for D.C. Reads you often have unexpected revelations. Some of these revelations, such as when you discover a book your tutee truly loves to read, make every struggle up to that point worth it. Some, however, make you wish you could do something more than just help children learn to read a couple hours a week.

This was the case when I discovered last semester that many of the kids I was tutoring had never visited the National Mall, or been to a single Smithsonian Institution museum. Think back to your own third and fourth grade memories. How many field trips had you been on by the time you left elementary school? I personally remember visiting the state capital, an old mine, and a historic colonial village in the fourth grade alone. It isn’t right that the kids we tutor haven’t been exposed to some of the best museums in the country which are not only located in the same city where they live, but are also free!

When I brought the topic up in an Advocacy Committee meeting, I discovered other tutors and coordinators where thinking what I was thinking. So we decided to take action.

As a result, a sub-committee of the Advocacy Committee is currently planning a field trip for the students we tutor to visit the National Museum of American History and have lunch on the National Mall. The date for the trip has been tentatively set as Sunday, May 2nd, so this past Saturday I went with a group of fellow students to the museum to scope things out.

While the museum doesn’t offer tours to school groups, they do have a very useful website full of activities for all age groups, time periods, and historical themes at this address: http://historyexplorer.americanhistory.si.edu/.

While at the museum we decided to plan a trip around five exhibits: The American Presidency: A Glorious Burden, First Ladies at the Smithsonian, Communities in a Changing Nation: The Promise of 19th-Century America, The Price of Freedom: Americans at War, and a theatrical reenactment of the Greensboro lunch counter sit-in. We plan on using these exhibits not only to engage the students in the history of their nation but also to introduce in a concrete way the various important roles Americans have played in forming our country and the different careers every student can aspire to have as an adult: doctor, scientist, activist, educator, even the President. All of these careers require the solid education D.C. Reads promotes.

I hope that the planned field trip will not only be fun, informative, and inspirational, but also set up a precedent of D.C. Reads acting not only as a tutoring organization but also as a group that exposes students in D.C. to a broader sense of the world they live in and how they can fit into that world as an adult.

Hopefully next semester we will explore dinosaur bones, space shuttles, and Jackson Pollock! Until then, however, I will keep you updated on our progress and hopefully post some pictures of the trip itself.

Chancellor's Forum Recap

By: Matt Buccelli

Last Wednesday night, I went with several other tutors and coordinators to one of DCPS chancellor Michelle Rhee's monthly community forums. This one took place at Kimball Elementary School in Ward 7, and the was centered around the district’s attempts to develop an action plan for improving DCPS high schools.

After an introduction by Chancellor Rhee, one of her deputies detailed how and why DC is moving forward with its plan to improve secondary schools. Rhee’s deputy said that DCPS is currently engaged in a three-phase plan for secondary school transformation --- after coming to agreement on expectations for high school students and tactics for moving forward, the school district will examine student performance and best practices from other urban school districts, and then create a final plan for meeting its expectations. In other words, DCPS’ “Vision for DCPS Secondary Schools,” as the forum was billed, is in its infancy.

The lady representing the district pointed out repeatedly that while DCPS would like to see more of its students go to college, the plan for improving secondary schools is designed to prepare high schoolers for “long-term success in the labor market.” That preparation, she clarified, can come in the form of a college degree, or simply in terms of giving students the basic skills and resources in high school so that they can become good citizens and productive members of society. But her PowerPoint presentation did contain two seemingly obvious but nonetheless telling graphs: one demonstrating significantly higher average lifetime incomes attributed to higher degrees of educational attainment, another connecting higher educational attainment to lower unemployment. Preparing students on the district-wide level for long-term success, then, necessarily involves sending more kids to college. But the DCPS “working draft” does also focus heavily on youth development, and includes as goals that students “serve and volunteer in school or community,” and “explore personal interests, aptitudes and skills.” So it’s not only a college thing --- that’s just a large part of the equation.

After the DCPS presentation, a panel of DCPS principals and other district officials took questions from community attendees. The questions stressed the need for more guidance counselors, better resources in some schools, and effective implementation of the draft plan. One question that I thought was particularly pertinent asked why DCPS, in the questioner’s view, doesn’t work more effectively with various community organizations throughout DC. Obviously DC Reads and DCPS work very collaboratively. But the questioner seemed discouraged by DCPS’ lack of engagement with non-educational community organizations. If high schools are going to encourage their students to “serve and volunteer in school or community,” that would seem to be an essential link.

In the van back to Georgetown from the event, the consensus among the four other tutors and coordinators I was with seemed to be that the DCPS plan represented good vision and forward thinking on the part of the school district, but lacked specifics for implementation. I would have to agree. I was encouraged by the fact that this is hopefully going to be an ongoing initiative. It seems that in the climate of school reform, high schoolers get sort of lost in the shuffle --- I was actually surprised to see that while students under No Child Left Behind are required to be tested once every year from third grade through eighth grade, the law only demands one high school evaluation. So DCPS gets points for understanding that high school represents the critical final stage in a child’s development that cannot be ignored.

The working draft is fairly detailed, which is also good sign. The emphasis on graduating good citizens was also commendable. But with the plan in its early stages, there are a lot of blanks that need to be filled in as far as how the district will follow through on goals for its high schools that should also get credit for being fairly ambitious. Will DCPS develop stronger relationships with community organizations to insure that students have the opportunity to pursue their extra-curricular goals? More questions remain: is this plan going to get the significant time and attention it will need to be successful? Or will it drop down the list of Chancellor Rhee’s priorities?

I think there’s a lot of potential in this latest effort by DCPS, but as with most things there is going to need to be effective follow-through. If anyone else attended the forum, what did you think?