Archive for the 'Students' Category

Take That, AIG

Published by Robert Pondiscio on March 20, 2009 in Education News and Students. 0 Comments

An upstate New York high school student could teach a course in character to the bonus babies of AIG.  Nicole Heise of Ithaca High School was one of The Concord Review’s six winners of The Concord Review’s Emerson Prize awards for excellence this year. But as EdWeek’s Kathleen Kennedy Manzo tells the story, she sent back her prize, a check for $800 with this note:

As you well know, for high school-aged scholars, a forum of this caliber and the incentives it creates for academic excellence are rare. I also know that keeping The Concord Review active requires resources. So, please allow me to put my Emerson award money to the best possible use I can imagine by donating it to The Concord Review so that another young scholar can experience the thrill of seeing his or her work published.

The Concord Review publishes research papers by high school scholars.  It’s a one-of-a-kind venue for its impressive young authors.  Manzo notes TCR ”has won praise from renowned historians, lawmakers, and educators, yet has failed to ever draw sufficient funding.”

It operates on a shoestring, as Founder and Publisher Will Fitzhugh reminds me often. Fitzhugh, who has struggled for years to keep the operation afloat, challenges students to do rigorous scholarly work and to delve deeply into history. His success at inspiring great academic work is juxtaposed against his failure to get anyone with money to take notice.

Young Ms. Heise noticed.  Anyone else?

Out of the Mouths of Babes

Published by Robert Pondiscio on March 13, 2009 in Students. 2 Comments

If President Obama is serious about improving education, extending the school day, week or year is not the way to do it, writes John Ashley in the Syracuse Post Standard.  “If kids want to learn then they will be smarter,” he writes.  “If they don’t want to learn, no matter how many hours they are in school, they’re not going to learn.” 

In elementary school, we should make it so kids like to come to school. If they have good memories of school when they were young, that will follow them throughout their schooling years.  We also have to make sure that we have good teachers. Bad teachers will only destroy the system.

I neglected to mention that John Ashley is 14.  Call it consumer research.

Online Education’s “1984″ Moment?

Published by Robert Pondiscio on January 15, 2009 in Higher Education, Students and Teaching. 4 Comments

People in the advertising industry still talk about a commercial for Apple Computers that aired once — and never again — during the 1984 Super Bowl.  Even if you weren’t alive then, you know it: Bald, colorless drones march in and sit listening to a projected image of Big Brother addressing them from a huge screen.  An athletic young woman chased by uniformed guards runs in carrying a large hammer.  She hurls it, and the projected image explodes in a blaze of light.  “On January 24th, Apple Computer will introduce Macintosh,” the ad concludes. “And you’ll see why 1984 won’t be like 1984.“ 

Have you seen the new ads for Kaplan University?  They may not be of the artistic calibre of “1984,” which was directed by Blade Runner director Ridley Scott, but they certainly stop you in your tracks.  A professor stands before his students in a college lecture hall and apologizes.  “The system has failed you. I have failed you,” he intones. “I have failed to help you share your talent with the world, and the world needs talent more than ever. Yet it’s being wasted by an educational system steeped in tradition and  old ideas.” He continues to speak, but now we’re watching his moving image on laptops and iPods. He is speaking to students who are seated at a kitchen table, on a living room couch and a rooftop.  “It’s time to use technology to rewrite the rules of education,” the professor says.  Like the 1984 ad, it’s not until the very last second that you find out the spot is for Kaplan. 

Kaplan University's "Desks" TV Ad

A second ad, called “Desks,” consists of a series of images of old-fashioned school desks, either alone or arrayed in visually arresting settings – on a beach, lined up on a subway platform, on the lanes of a bowling alley, on city streets, and winding their way up a mountain trail.   ”Where is it written that the old way is the right way? Where is it written that a traditional education is the only way to get an education? Where is it written that classes only take place in a classroom?” an unseen narrator asks.  ”That’s just the thing.  It isn’t written anywhere.” 

Whether these ads are successful or not for Kaplan may be beside the point.  What makes them interesting and compelling is what they say about education at large.  They challenge you to look at something familiar with fresh eyes:  Where does it say classes have to take place in a classroom?  Why can’t college come to me?  What’s the point of parking in a lecture hall for hours on end?  This may be familiar stuff for educators, but for consumers conditioned to having every itch scratched on demand, I suspect the message behind the ads will seem simple, compelling and new. Very new.

Are we seeing online education’s 1984?  It’s all but impossible to see watershed moments as they happen, but it’s sure easy with the hindsight of 25 years:  Trivia fans will be interested to learn the Apple spot was not the only commercial for computers to run during the 1984 Super Bowl.  Bill Bixby pitched RadioShack personal computers in one; Alan Alda  hawked Atari computers in the other.

Whitmire’s Swan Song

Published by Robert Pondiscio on January 6, 2009 in Education News, Parents and Students. 2 Comments

One of the real good guys education journalism is saying farewell, for now at least, from ink-stained wretchdom.  Richard Whitmire, USA Today editorial writer and Why Boys Fail edublogger, has taken a buyout and bows out with a piece in today’s paper “How to turn Obama’s success into gains for black boys.”

There’s no question Obama was elected by Americans of all races and ethnicities to be president of all America. But many hope that his presidency will have a profound impact on one group most in need, African-American boys.

Whitmire notes that the American Dream “remains a more distant hope for black boys than it does for any other group.”  And while there’s potency in the symbolic value of an Obama presidency, that’s not enough. 

What matters today is determining how to leverage Obama’s historic achievement into a fresh beginning for black boys. Confidence is important, but it’s not sufficient. As Obama often says, success begins with parents willing to take responsibility, set limits and turn off the TV. But successful education reforms have shown that the right academic atmosphere can help overcome dysfunctional family situations.

He specifically touts a focus on literacy, modeling the practices of successful schools like Washington’s Key Academy, and creating college mentoring programs for young black males.  ”These are all reforms worthy of support,” Whitmire concludes.  “Obama’s symbolism is undeniably powerful, but it will take more than symbolism to go beyond yes-we-can sloganeering.”

Quo vadis, Whitmire?

What It Takes: Mentors, Motivation, Moxie and Moms

Published by Leanna Landsmann on June 24, 2008 in Education Leadership, Parents and Students. 2 Comments

Every June we’re treated to cap and gowned seniors en route to their high-school graduations, proud families in tow. We smile and give them a ‘thumbs up.’ But we must also pause to see the drop outs as clearly as the graduates.

How did these students persevere when so many with so much more fail? What’s in their secret sauce? Can it be bottled for others?

One million students drop out of high school each year. The literature is packed with reasons: poverty, lack of college-bound culture at home, poor performing schools, low expectations and high pressure to reject academic success, too few great teachers and counselors. What more can the “village” it takes to raise a child do to prevent this?

As board chair of Greatschools.net, an organization that helps parents put their kids on a path to college, I stew about this more than your average Jane. After umpteen decades of ‘school reform,’ I’m angry we’re still slogging in place.

So I look forward each March to a call asking, “Do you want to review scholarship applications again this year?” I drop everything to pour over submissions from high-achieving, low-income New York City seniors who, if chosen, will get a generous four-year free ride to college from a family foundation with a bold-face name. From several hundred applicants, three-dozen are chosen to be interviewed. From that group, the foundation selects 25.

Continue reading ‘What It Takes: Mentors, Motivation, Moxie and Moms’

Boys Will Be Boys

Published by Robert Pondiscio on June 16, 2008 in Students and Teaching. 1 Comment

Washington PostBy next fall, approximately 500 public schools nationwide will offer single-sex classes, reports the Washington Post.

The approach is based on the much-debated yet increasingly popular notion that girls and boys are hard-wired to learn differently and that they will be more successful if classes are designed for their particular needs.

I know lots of teachers who favor single-sex ed, but not one for this reason. It’s all about classroom management. I have no idea if elementary school boys learn differently (I doubt it). But they act differently, and suffer by comparison to the girls in the room in terms of behavior, attention, and energy level. That’s reason enough to make single-sex classrooms a more widespread option.

No Clear Cut Answers for Bullying

Published by Robert Pondiscio on June 9, 2008 in Students. 0 Comments

It’s one of the most difficult and frustrating challenges faced by teachers and administrators. Balancing the rights of the accused and the accuser in cases of bullying and harassment in school. Sharon Noguchi of the San Jose Mercury News turns in an excellent report on the dilemma, noting that short of kicking a bully out of school, even when educators do a lot they are often accused of doing too little to appease parents and ease victims’ fears.

Parents of harassment victims insist school authorities don’t react quickly or forcefully enough to protect their children – even as school officials say they’re working harder than ever to prevent and respond to bullying and aggression.

“We’re trying to help on a daily basis,” Los Gatos-Saratoga Union School District Superintendent Cary Matsuoka tells the paper. “But there’s only so much we can control in the world of 14-, 15-year-old adolescents.”

Poetic Justice

Published by Robert Pondiscio on June 3, 2008 in Students. Closed

More than two dozen young people who broke into Robert Frost’s former Vermont home for a party and trashed the place are being required to take classes in his poetry as part of their punishment. Homer Noble Farm, an unheated farmhouse on a dead-end road, which is now part of Middlebury College, was vandalized last December at a party attended by more than 50 people. The Associated Press reports about 25 ultimately entered pleas, or were accepted into a program that allows them to wipe their records clean, provided they undergo the Frost instruction.

“I guess I was thinking that if these teens had a better understanding of who Robert Frost was and his contribution to our society, that they would be more respectful of other people’s property in the future and would also learn something from the experience,” said prosecutor John Quinn.

On Wednesday, Frost biographer Jay Parini attempted to show the vandals the error of their ways and the redemptive power of poetry. “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,” he thundered, citing Frost’s The Road Not Taken. He called the line symbolic of the need to make choices in life.

Frost might also have observed that good fences make good neighbors.

“Why You’re Not Going On The Trip”

Published by Robert Pondiscio on May 29, 2008 in Students and Teaching. 1 Comment

Great post by teacher blogger Jose Vilson (hat tip: Joanne Jacobs) on giving kids what they need, instead of what they want. This is what enforcing classroom consequences looks like. Or should.

I care for you, and that’s why you’re not going on the trip tomorrow. Other teachers may protect you at their leisure. They may argue that you need the attention, and that you’ve deserved it academically, and to an extent they’re right. Yet, something makes my head itch at the thought that I’d let a repeat cutter attend a trip with students who truly deserve it. And of course, we know it’s not just you. The crew you hang out with influences your decisions to miss out on my afternoon announcements, my calls to you for better behavior and respect for all teachers, not just the ones you feel like respecting.

Read the whole thing here. First-rate stuff. I hope his administration backs him up.

The Busiest Generation

Published by Robert Pondiscio on May 27, 2008 in Parents and Students. 0 Comments

Our kids are harder working than we ever were…and dumber. This paradoxical observation courtesy of Anne Applebaum of the Washington Post:

Without question, Americans, whether wealthy or just upwardly mobile, are nowadays obsessed with preparing their children for a super-competitive, globalized job market. They will therefore go a long way — switching neighborhoods, borrowing money, creating color-coded spreadsheets — to get their children into high schools that force them to study and that test them regularly.

Those who play the game most intensively are often rewarded: The child who takes 15 Advance Placement courses, plays the clarinet in three orchestras, runs a Cambodian refugee camp in the summer and eschews lunch all winter really does have a better chance of getting into college than the child who plays kickball after school in the empty lot next door.

Yet, at the same time, Applebaum notes, many parents retain “a kind of nostalgia for a pre-industrial America, one in which childhood involved breaking horses and building rafts….Today’s children always seem to be working harder than yesterday’s children, having less fun and taking more tests, at least according to everyone I know.”

More strangely, our nostalgia also clashes with the other important American education narrative, the one that focuses on the 46 percent of high school seniors who test below the “basic” level in science (only 2 percent qualify as ” advanced“), the ” Dumbest Generation” of semiliterates glued to their cellphones, and the number of teenagers, a stunning one-third of the total, who drop out of high school. Since 38 percent of these teenagers recently told one survey that they dropped out because “I had too much freedom and not enough rules in my life,” it’s no surprise that solutions to the dropout crisis often involve imposing stricter school regimens, with more organized hours of teaching, more pressure and, yes, more testing.

Thus, Applebaum concludes, our kids are both stupider than we were and harder working.