Education Reform – Page 3 – Embrace the Absurd

A Chronic Problem

I’d like to think that we have progressed well beyond 2012 when a district asked me to help them create a dynamic dashboard to support instruction, using only indicators that were updated annually. I’d like to think that, but …

Looking Back at the Future of Assessment

Describe your vision for the future of assessment. Now try to do it without jargon or buzzwords; with enough detail that someone might be able to implement it, but not so much that it’s obsolete before it happens. A lesson from the past on picturing the future.

25% More

There’s only so many wings you can pile on your plate at the Super Bowl party. There’s only so much trash you can squeeze into each $2 trash bag from the transfer station after the party. There’s only so much you can fit into a school year. We need to make choices.

Finishing The Race

We know the pattern in education. A new idea or intervention emerges from academia. We get excited, implement it (often without fidelity), disrupt everything, gradually lose interest, try to return to the status quo until the next big idea comes along. We cannot afford to repeat that pattern with regard to undoing systemic racism. The disruption is too great, and the stakes are too high.

2 + 2 = ?

I’ve been thinking about “2+2” quite often recently. Somewhat less often than I think about Taylor Swift but more often than I think about the Roman Empire, which truth be told, is more often that you might think.

Back to School. Way Back.

As another school year begins, my thoughts are on high schools. Not so much on what should or shouldn’t be taught in AP courses (or whether there should even be AP courses), who should or shouldn’t be allowed to play on particular sports teams, or on whether later start times will actually translate into teensContinue reading “Back to School. Way Back.”

Time’s Up. Pencils Down.

As evidenced by the Apple Watch on my wrist and the Food Diary sitting on my desk, I am a firm believer in if first you don’t succeed, try, try, again. When you fall down, you pick yourself up again. I’ve even managed to convince myself that I understand why if you fall seven times,Continue reading “Time’s Up. Pencils Down.”

Testing Democracy

After 25 years, an article about the Massachusetts Teachers Association opposing the MCAS tests is not exactly “Man Bites Dog” material. Whether you are celebrating, commiserating, or merely commemorating the 25th anniversary of the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System this summer, you know that one constant across the MCAS quarter century has been the opposition ofContinue reading “Testing Democracy”

Affirming and Actionable Assessment

As I took in the post-decision analysis in the wake of the affirmative action ruling something jumped out at me. Among those lamenting the Supreme Court’s decision, two very different arguments were being made in support of the importance of colleges and universities being able to use race as a factor in their admissions process.Continue reading “Affirming and Actionable Assessment”

To Dreaming Things That Never Were

“You see things; and you say, ‘Why?’ But I dream things that never were; and I say, ‘Why not?’” – George Bernard Shaw The quote above is from Shaw’s play, or collection of plays, Back to Methuselah. I’ve read that the full play covers the time period from Adam and Eve in theContinue reading “To Dreaming Things That Never Were”