Close reading is an example of how misshapen and distorted a teaching technique can become when it enters the gravitational pull of CCSSetc. The specific ways in which it has become misshapen tells us a lot about the shape of CCSS.
Where did close reading come from, anyway?
A search on good old google ngram tells us that the phrase "close reading" has been around since 1800 in some trace amounts, starting to climb post-WWII and steadily growing to a peak around 2000. This is not surprising. Calling a reading technique "close reading" is kind of like announcing your new athletic program, "fast walking."
But close reading as a technique for literary analysis began, according to some sources, in the 1920's under the tutelage of I. A. Richards, a forefather of the New School of criticism. You can google all this and pursue it at greater length. Take away that close reading is old.
It is also...well...vague. Or rather, broadly interpreted by many proponents over the decades. Some critics assert that Richards was taking a Skinnerian view of language, treating it as a behavior. And the path gets tricky because although Richards is sometimes considered important to the New Critics, the New Critics said they rejected much of his work, and then proceeded to pretty much follow it. Add to that the fact that so much of the groundwork was laid in the fertile but often hard-to-translate-into-plain-English soil of academia and high-toned scholarliness, and-- well, for our purposes, let's just note that close reading has been around as a technique for almost 100 years.
How does close reading work?
So what is it? There, too, we find a number of interpretations, and for every one of us who went to college to study Englishy Stuff, it all seems so vaguely familiar. My professors never said, "Okay, we're going to do a close reading of this text. Here's the official list of close reading steps. Follow them." I suspect my experience is not unique.
But on the occasions when I have heard about close reading, I recognized it pretty readily. Look carefully at the writer's language choices-- diction, tone, that good stuff. Know the context of his/her writing. Follow the syntax. In longer works, note the sequencing of words and ideas. Is it narrative or dramatic-- watch for specific choices accordingly.
In short, "close reading" is what many of us think of as "reading."
In thirty-five years, I've never told my students, "Okay, we're going to do a close reading now." But I direct their attention to how it makes a difference whether Frost writes "to stop without A farmhouse near" or "to stop without THE farmhouse near." We examine what Longfellow might intend in "Psalm of Life" and how the recent deaths of loved ones might inform that intention. We watch Twain eviscerate Cooper's inexact word choices. We search for allusions in the word choices of William Bradford. We try to pick apart that confounding twentieth chapter of Light in August.
So why is putting close reading with CCSS a big deal?
So when I first heard that close reading was coming to town, a-riding on the CCSS train, I thought, "No big deal. We've been doing that for years." Well, yes and no.
Close Reading 2.0 is a new animal. As Coleen Bondy learned in her LA close reading training, the new, improved, CCSS-ready version has some significant differences from the old-school version we thought we knew.
It's for hard things. In one of many training videos available on youtube, the teacher starts right in by noting that close reading is for hard things. It's kind of an odd assertion. As a teacher of pop culture, my bread and butter has long been giving close readings of ordinary pieces of writing. Twilight may be a work of light fluff, but a close reading of it unpacks how many truly indefensible and odious subtexts are lurking in its gooey pages. But no-- we are hearing repeatedly that we are supposed to use close reading for hard things.
It's for short stuff only. Short poems. Short excerpts. Little things. It's an aspect that I hardly know how to argue with, like a nutritionist who insists that we should only eat red food. I'm pretty sure there is some valuable literature out there that is more than one page long.
It must be read in a vacuum. Of all the cockamamie bits of malpractice that have been attached to reading under CCSS, this is the most cockamamied of all. The examples are legion. Read the Gettysburg Address without knowing anything about the Civil War. Read "A Modest Proposal" without being told anything about Swift or the poor of the time. Read The Sun Also Rises without knowing anything about The Great War (only, of course, don't, because it's a big long novel).
It's an easy game. Any English teacher can rattle off a dozen works that only fully give up their depth and riches if students understand a bit of context. There isn't a real teacher of literature on the planet who thinks this is a good idea. These three restrictions tie the students' hands and force them to do readings that are, contrary to the buzzwords, an inch deep at best. With just a few quick additions, CCSS whizzes have turned Close Reading into Close Reading 2.0, whch is kind of like turning wine into vinegar.
So then why is Close Reading 2.0 here?
Why Close Reading 2.0? Simple. Reading instruction is hereby turned into test prep.
Standardized test excerpts are always short, usually inpenetrably hard (or the kind of dull that passes for difficulty), and always delivered without any context at all, not even the context of the rest of the work from which they've been untimely ripped.
Close Reading 2.0 is proof (piece of evidence #2,098,387) that CCSS was built to feed the testing beast. Close Reading 2.0 is authentic assessment turned on its head. You remember authentic assessment. It was just starting to flourish when NCLB plowed it under over a decade ago. The idea was that if you were trying to teach a particular skill, your assessment should come as close as possible to actually demonstrating that skill.
What we knew back then was that if you wanted to teach reading and interpreting a full, complex work of literature, you couldn't assess that skill with a bubble test. Now, instead, our Educational Overlords say that since the assessment is going to be a machine-scorable standardized test, then that's the skill we must teach. And so instead of actual reading, we are now pushed to teach standardized test reading, and to make it look like legitimate, we'll give it the name of an old and honorable practice.
Close reading? You reformers keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Close Reading 2.0 is crap. Specifically, it is the kind of crap that only people who know nothing about reading or teaching could come up with. It is one more application of the idea that if we are only able to count X, then X must be all that counts. It is teaching redesigned to fit the test. It is educational malpractice. For English teachers, it is one line that we refuse to cross.
Thursday, January 9, 2014
Choice & Cable
School choice is the ultimate education zombie, the argument that absolutely will not die. It has been shown time and again that there are so many things wrong with school choice-- soooooooo many things-- and yet from charter school profiteers to governors of New York, people just keep opening up the tomb and letting the corpse ramble around some more.
There are a host of arguments to be made, a raft of reasons to be debated, but today I'm going to focus on just one idea. We can hack on the limbs of this shambling horror some other day. But the whole idea of school choice is, at least publicly, based on a belief in market forces and how they will bring quality. Here's the thing:
Market forces do not foster superior quality. Market forces foster superior marketability.
We are awash in examples. Does anybody think the beer or soda markets are dominated by the companies who have created the best product? Or would you like to talk about VHS vs. Betamax one more time? But let's focus on a more immediate and instructive example. Let's talk about television.
When cable television arrived, it brought with it an explosion of channels. It was exciting-- 500 channels, and something completely different on each one of them. We had choice like never before. Even tv snobs could find quality channels that served their interest. Slowly but surely, all that changed.
The drive for market share created a slow-motion race to mediocrity. So today, A&E (that used to stand for Art and Entertainment) has dumped broadcasts of Broadway classics in favor of millionaire hicks. The History Channel produces less history, more Pawn Stars. Bravo, also started as a haven for the Arts, now is the home of endless trashy drama. Most famously, nobody wants their MTV for musical reasons any more. Channels increasingly tried to create a marketable brand, aimed at a broader sector.
The marketplace did not produce greater quality. It didn't even produce much more variety, but stamped variety out as channels chased the same market shares. And there's more.
That market can't even sustain itself. It turns out that when you offer too much tv choice, the individual choices aren't self-sustaining. That's why your cable company makes you buy bundles-- because if these channels had to sustain themselves with their share of the market, they couldn't. Cut the market up into enough slices, and it won't sustain any of them.
The other long-term effect of the marketplace is to create Big Winners. Because, of course, your 500 channels are all owned by about five corporations. So as in other marketplaces (like, say, the supermarket), you don't have real choices at all. As much as fans of choice love the marketplace, the marketplace hates choice and over time, in every industry, eventually erases it. No corporation sitting on top of the heap has ever said, "We should be sure not to gain too much control of the marketplace, because then we would create less quality." (That includes, especially, Microsoft).
There's an older lesson from TV as well. Remember the Beverly Hillbillies? They were a huge hit in the late sixties, and when they were canceled they were still ranked 33rd in the ratings. But they were canceled because they appealed to the wrong audience. Advertisers wanted to market to a hipper crow. Popular was not good enough. Popular with the right people was required. Not all customers are valued equally in the marketplace (and the value of hick-mocking TV can change in forty years).
There is no example, anywhere, ever, of the marketplace creating a drive for higher quality and better products. There is a sea of examples of the marketplace pushing for products that are cheaper, have lowest common denominator cookie cutter appeal, and aim at only some of the customers. None of these are characteristics that would enhance US public schools.
There are a host of arguments to be made, a raft of reasons to be debated, but today I'm going to focus on just one idea. We can hack on the limbs of this shambling horror some other day. But the whole idea of school choice is, at least publicly, based on a belief in market forces and how they will bring quality. Here's the thing:
Market forces do not foster superior quality. Market forces foster superior marketability.
We are awash in examples. Does anybody think the beer or soda markets are dominated by the companies who have created the best product? Or would you like to talk about VHS vs. Betamax one more time? But let's focus on a more immediate and instructive example. Let's talk about television.
When cable television arrived, it brought with it an explosion of channels. It was exciting-- 500 channels, and something completely different on each one of them. We had choice like never before. Even tv snobs could find quality channels that served their interest. Slowly but surely, all that changed.
The drive for market share created a slow-motion race to mediocrity. So today, A&E (that used to stand for Art and Entertainment) has dumped broadcasts of Broadway classics in favor of millionaire hicks. The History Channel produces less history, more Pawn Stars. Bravo, also started as a haven for the Arts, now is the home of endless trashy drama. Most famously, nobody wants their MTV for musical reasons any more. Channels increasingly tried to create a marketable brand, aimed at a broader sector.
The marketplace did not produce greater quality. It didn't even produce much more variety, but stamped variety out as channels chased the same market shares. And there's more.
That market can't even sustain itself. It turns out that when you offer too much tv choice, the individual choices aren't self-sustaining. That's why your cable company makes you buy bundles-- because if these channels had to sustain themselves with their share of the market, they couldn't. Cut the market up into enough slices, and it won't sustain any of them.
The other long-term effect of the marketplace is to create Big Winners. Because, of course, your 500 channels are all owned by about five corporations. So as in other marketplaces (like, say, the supermarket), you don't have real choices at all. As much as fans of choice love the marketplace, the marketplace hates choice and over time, in every industry, eventually erases it. No corporation sitting on top of the heap has ever said, "We should be sure not to gain too much control of the marketplace, because then we would create less quality." (That includes, especially, Microsoft).
There's an older lesson from TV as well. Remember the Beverly Hillbillies? They were a huge hit in the late sixties, and when they were canceled they were still ranked 33rd in the ratings. But they were canceled because they appealed to the wrong audience. Advertisers wanted to market to a hipper crow. Popular was not good enough. Popular with the right people was required. Not all customers are valued equally in the marketplace (and the value of hick-mocking TV can change in forty years).
There is no example, anywhere, ever, of the marketplace creating a drive for higher quality and better products. There is a sea of examples of the marketplace pushing for products that are cheaper, have lowest common denominator cookie cutter appeal, and aim at only some of the customers. None of these are characteristics that would enhance US public schools.
Wednesday, January 8, 2014
StudentsFirst Flashback
A year ago, like many teachers, I was quietly plugging away in my classroom, only slightly aware of the rumblings of CCSS off in the distance. I've found it instructive lately to go back and look at some of what was being said, and how it has panned out since.
One gem I ran across was this piece from the StudentsFirst blog in which Eric Lerum explains why CCSS is super swell and everyone should want to give it a big educational kiss on the lips and addresses the first pushback. How could we have responded if we knew then what we know now? The original text is in italics. My comments will be in red.
Recent efforts to roll back Common Core (our latest Policy Brief on Common Core can be read here) adoption and implementation are troubling. Legislative proposals in Alabama, Colorado, Idaho, Indiana, Missouri, and South Carolina threaten the progress already made in these states to ensure schoolchildren are ready to compete with their peers in other states and around the world.
As it turned out, that was just the beginning. At last count, Mercedes Schneider found pushback in 23 states.
We've come to expect resistance to change and reform from a variety of special interests over the past few years. That’s because education reform puts students' interests ahead of adults' priorities, often for the first time, and that threatens the adults. What is different -- and concerning -- about the recent pushback against Common Core, however, is that it appears to be motivated not by a desire to protect the status quo, but rather by a desire to deliver on a political agenda at the cost of students.
The two threads offered here are familiar. First, it's for the children. Even the strongest proponents forget to sing that song, instead offering that we need to stop coddling the children or cutting them off from the excessive confidence of their white suburban mothers. Second, the pushback is just politics. The repeated notion that opponents are confined to Tea Party Tinhat Wing republicans or motivated by Obama Derangement Syndrome still has legs, though more and more media are recognizing that opposition comes from all across the political spectrum.
Let's be clear: retreating from the implementation of Common Core standards puts equity among schoolchildren across the country at risk. Current state standards highlight disparities among expectations for students; what might constitute proficiency in one state is considered failing in another. It makes no sense to continue under a structure that lets U.S. students reach college and compete for jobs in a global workforce unprepared and unable to compete, even when they have done all of their homework and passed all of their graduation requirements.
The StudentsFirst hallmark-- prove your point by asserting really hard. "Let's be clear" means "I am not going to explain how we know this." No links, no data, not even anecdotal evidence. Just assertion. You would think by now, we would be awash in tales of people who finished school but found themselves unemployable on the global scale, or US employers searching fruitlessly for American hires. A year later-- nothing.
Moreover, when students in different states are held to different standards, comparative growth is difficult to analyze, which makes improvement in our schools hard to achieve. Common Core makes it possible to measure the progress of students from state to state against the same metrics, enabling policymakers to make better decisions regarding everything from adoption of instructional methods to resource allocations to professional development.
Turns out we already knew this was baloney last year because the Brown Center Report on American Education had already laid out that scoring disparities were worse within states than between states. The rest of this paragraph because it once again tips the reformers' hand. We need national standards so that we can make national comparisons. Why? Asa classroom teacher I have never thought, "Gee, if only I could give my students a test that would allow me to compare them with students in Utah, because then I could make better lesson plans for next week." No, we need the national standards so that we can make national comparisons to inform national decisions about national materials, methods, curriculum, and materials. The real need for national standards and national tests is to better data-drive a national school district.
A 2010 study by the Fordham Institute found the Common Core Standards stronger than 33 states' standards in both English Language Arts and math. Even states like Massachusetts and California, with some of the more rigorous state standards in the nation, chose to adopt the Common Core because the benefits outweighed any risks of switching over (also, notably, up to 15 percent of the state’s standards can be shaped to a state’s own interests and needs; and Massachusetts, as a lead member of an assessment consortium, helps develop the assessments administered to their students).
Most of the arguments propelling the current wave of concern regarding Common Core are unfounded and blatantly misconstrue the facts. First, there is no question that Common Core would improve academic standards for students. All of the states listed above that are considering withdrawal from Common Core or the testing consortia had standards equal to or less rigorous than the Common Core, except for Indiana's ELA standards. In some cases, particularly Idaho and Missouri, their standards were among the worst in the nation.
Mercedes Schneider has done the definitive take-downs of Fordham and their study. I have nothing to add-- this is all bunk.
Furthermore, Common Core is neither federally imposed nor a national curriculum, where 45 states plus the District of Columbia voluntarily adopted Common Core as a means of raising the quality and rigor of their state academic standards. Common Core establishes high learning expectations for students that are consistent regardless of district or state. This initiative does not prescribe pedagogy and there are no federal bureaucrats telling teachers how to teach the material or prescribing any particular curriculum framework. Instead, Common Core outlines internationally benchmarked skills that students should know and allows districts and schools adopt their own curricula and instructional materials aligned to the standards.
Nobody believes this any more, either. Even supporters have started referring to CCSS as a federal program. Note the careful wording-- "there are no federal bureaucrats telling teachers..." No, there are just state bureaucrats and corporate curriculum writers doing so, as highly incentivized to do so by the feds. And a year later, we still have seen no sign of the international benchmarks that are supposedly a foundation of CCSS.
By focusing on unfounded fears of federal interference, state policymakers are overlooking the huge benefit of Common Core to educators. Teachers have overwhelmingly signed on to the rigorous standards movement. We're already seeing a huge influx of new ideas and innovations for learning materials and professional development tools. Most of these leverage new technology and online platforms that make tools, tips, and lesson plans more accessible to teachers looking to improve their craft and reach students in ways they never have been able to before. Best of all – many of these are teacher-driven. One such site, Achieve the Core, represents a joint effort by the two national teacher unions, the National Education Association (NEA) and American Federation of Teachers (AFT) to supply teachers with Common Core implementation tools.
Yes, those federal interference fears are totally unfounded. Well, unless you count Duncan's attempt to influence local decisions in both California and New York. And NEA and AFT continue to experience anger and agitation from their members. (Check out the comments section of this NEA puff piece on CCSS). And a year later, achievethecore.org is not exactly awash in thousands of lesson ideas.
Among educators I've talked to about this, there is a tangible excitement about the potential impact these could have in the classroom and on the teaching profession as a whole. Many teachers began implementing Common Core in their lessons as soon as sample standards were released to the public. Legislators and parent groups should support this groundswell of teacher enthusiasm towards bringing rigorous standards and creative lessons to students.
Yeah, keep saying it and it may be true.
There should be no doubt that with Common Core, states have embarked on the right path. It is true that implementation has been difficult, but states are making progress. The hard work of adopting new standards and assessments is something every state has done in the past, and these transitions are complex. Yet the move to Common Core is notable for something different, even extraordinary. For perhaps the first time, states – and the school leaders, educators, and communities responsible for our children – are able to do this work together. Let's make sure that states' efforts to do the best for our students are not thwarted by those who seek to use unfounded fears to make political points.
There should be no doubt? Why? For fans of data-driven instruction, these folks sure don't want to provide much actual support for what they have to say. Is it extraordinary that states are able to work together, or is that just further proof that this is a federally-driven, corporate-manufactured program?
In some ways this piece can make us all nostalgic for February, 2013, when many of us were still clueless about just how bad CCSSec was, and CCSS supporters were still sure they were being opposed only by a splinter of easily-marginalized political activists. The good news for us is that we have learned a lot since this piece first ran. The bad news for them is that they have not. I have saved one little detail for last.
I did not locate this article through some deep or wandering search. StudentsFirst posted it on their twitter feed just this week. Apparently they think it's still on point. Good for their opponents to know.
One gem I ran across was this piece from the StudentsFirst blog in which Eric Lerum explains why CCSS is super swell and everyone should want to give it a big educational kiss on the lips and addresses the first pushback. How could we have responded if we knew then what we know now? The original text is in italics. My comments will be in red.
Recent efforts to roll back Common Core (our latest Policy Brief on Common Core can be read here) adoption and implementation are troubling. Legislative proposals in Alabama, Colorado, Idaho, Indiana, Missouri, and South Carolina threaten the progress already made in these states to ensure schoolchildren are ready to compete with their peers in other states and around the world.
As it turned out, that was just the beginning. At last count, Mercedes Schneider found pushback in 23 states.
We've come to expect resistance to change and reform from a variety of special interests over the past few years. That’s because education reform puts students' interests ahead of adults' priorities, often for the first time, and that threatens the adults. What is different -- and concerning -- about the recent pushback against Common Core, however, is that it appears to be motivated not by a desire to protect the status quo, but rather by a desire to deliver on a political agenda at the cost of students.
The two threads offered here are familiar. First, it's for the children. Even the strongest proponents forget to sing that song, instead offering that we need to stop coddling the children or cutting them off from the excessive confidence of their white suburban mothers. Second, the pushback is just politics. The repeated notion that opponents are confined to Tea Party Tinhat Wing republicans or motivated by Obama Derangement Syndrome still has legs, though more and more media are recognizing that opposition comes from all across the political spectrum.
Let's be clear: retreating from the implementation of Common Core standards puts equity among schoolchildren across the country at risk. Current state standards highlight disparities among expectations for students; what might constitute proficiency in one state is considered failing in another. It makes no sense to continue under a structure that lets U.S. students reach college and compete for jobs in a global workforce unprepared and unable to compete, even when they have done all of their homework and passed all of their graduation requirements.
The StudentsFirst hallmark-- prove your point by asserting really hard. "Let's be clear" means "I am not going to explain how we know this." No links, no data, not even anecdotal evidence. Just assertion. You would think by now, we would be awash in tales of people who finished school but found themselves unemployable on the global scale, or US employers searching fruitlessly for American hires. A year later-- nothing.
Moreover, when students in different states are held to different standards, comparative growth is difficult to analyze, which makes improvement in our schools hard to achieve. Common Core makes it possible to measure the progress of students from state to state against the same metrics, enabling policymakers to make better decisions regarding everything from adoption of instructional methods to resource allocations to professional development.
Turns out we already knew this was baloney last year because the Brown Center Report on American Education had already laid out that scoring disparities were worse within states than between states. The rest of this paragraph because it once again tips the reformers' hand. We need national standards so that we can make national comparisons. Why? Asa classroom teacher I have never thought, "Gee, if only I could give my students a test that would allow me to compare them with students in Utah, because then I could make better lesson plans for next week." No, we need the national standards so that we can make national comparisons to inform national decisions about national materials, methods, curriculum, and materials. The real need for national standards and national tests is to better data-drive a national school district.
A 2010 study by the Fordham Institute found the Common Core Standards stronger than 33 states' standards in both English Language Arts and math. Even states like Massachusetts and California, with some of the more rigorous state standards in the nation, chose to adopt the Common Core because the benefits outweighed any risks of switching over (also, notably, up to 15 percent of the state’s standards can be shaped to a state’s own interests and needs; and Massachusetts, as a lead member of an assessment consortium, helps develop the assessments administered to their students).
Most of the arguments propelling the current wave of concern regarding Common Core are unfounded and blatantly misconstrue the facts. First, there is no question that Common Core would improve academic standards for students. All of the states listed above that are considering withdrawal from Common Core or the testing consortia had standards equal to or less rigorous than the Common Core, except for Indiana's ELA standards. In some cases, particularly Idaho and Missouri, their standards were among the worst in the nation.
Mercedes Schneider has done the definitive take-downs of Fordham and their study. I have nothing to add-- this is all bunk.
Furthermore, Common Core is neither federally imposed nor a national curriculum, where 45 states plus the District of Columbia voluntarily adopted Common Core as a means of raising the quality and rigor of their state academic standards. Common Core establishes high learning expectations for students that are consistent regardless of district or state. This initiative does not prescribe pedagogy and there are no federal bureaucrats telling teachers how to teach the material or prescribing any particular curriculum framework. Instead, Common Core outlines internationally benchmarked skills that students should know and allows districts and schools adopt their own curricula and instructional materials aligned to the standards.
Nobody believes this any more, either. Even supporters have started referring to CCSS as a federal program. Note the careful wording-- "there are no federal bureaucrats telling teachers..." No, there are just state bureaucrats and corporate curriculum writers doing so, as highly incentivized to do so by the feds. And a year later, we still have seen no sign of the international benchmarks that are supposedly a foundation of CCSS.
By focusing on unfounded fears of federal interference, state policymakers are overlooking the huge benefit of Common Core to educators. Teachers have overwhelmingly signed on to the rigorous standards movement. We're already seeing a huge influx of new ideas and innovations for learning materials and professional development tools. Most of these leverage new technology and online platforms that make tools, tips, and lesson plans more accessible to teachers looking to improve their craft and reach students in ways they never have been able to before. Best of all – many of these are teacher-driven. One such site, Achieve the Core, represents a joint effort by the two national teacher unions, the National Education Association (NEA) and American Federation of Teachers (AFT) to supply teachers with Common Core implementation tools.
Yes, those federal interference fears are totally unfounded. Well, unless you count Duncan's attempt to influence local decisions in both California and New York. And NEA and AFT continue to experience anger and agitation from their members. (Check out the comments section of this NEA puff piece on CCSS). And a year later, achievethecore.org is not exactly awash in thousands of lesson ideas.
Among educators I've talked to about this, there is a tangible excitement about the potential impact these could have in the classroom and on the teaching profession as a whole. Many teachers began implementing Common Core in their lessons as soon as sample standards were released to the public. Legislators and parent groups should support this groundswell of teacher enthusiasm towards bringing rigorous standards and creative lessons to students.
Yeah, keep saying it and it may be true.
There should be no doubt that with Common Core, states have embarked on the right path. It is true that implementation has been difficult, but states are making progress. The hard work of adopting new standards and assessments is something every state has done in the past, and these transitions are complex. Yet the move to Common Core is notable for something different, even extraordinary. For perhaps the first time, states – and the school leaders, educators, and communities responsible for our children – are able to do this work together. Let's make sure that states' efforts to do the best for our students are not thwarted by those who seek to use unfounded fears to make political points.
There should be no doubt? Why? For fans of data-driven instruction, these folks sure don't want to provide much actual support for what they have to say. Is it extraordinary that states are able to work together, or is that just further proof that this is a federally-driven, corporate-manufactured program?
In some ways this piece can make us all nostalgic for February, 2013, when many of us were still clueless about just how bad CCSSec was, and CCSS supporters were still sure they were being opposed only by a splinter of easily-marginalized political activists. The good news for us is that we have learned a lot since this piece first ran. The bad news for them is that they have not. I have saved one little detail for last.
I did not locate this article through some deep or wandering search. StudentsFirst posted it on their twitter feed just this week. Apparently they think it's still on point. Good for their opponents to know.
Allies & Opponents
In contentious times like these, who should get our attention? Our support? Our opposition? It seems confusing, but I think I have an answer, or at least what brings clarity for me.
Yesterday the question ripping through the blogosphere was how to sort out allies and opponents. Are the Kochs opposing CCSS just as leverage to destroy public ed? Are progressive CCSS foes being played in this battle?
These are not new questions in the struggle for the soul of public schools. We've already become so accustomed to the current school reformy stuff landscape that we sometimes forget how....odd? unexpected? appalling?.... that public schools are under attack from Democrats, that Rhee and Duncan and Obama are supposed to be progressives. Or that some sharp, insightful criticism of CCSS comes from people who see the details clearly but add them up to get Communist Takeover.
When I was a union president facing a contentious contract negotiation and, ultimately, a strike, I learned that you have to take every idea on its own merit. You cannot look at the people around you, sort them into Friends and Foes, and then always agree with your friends and always disagree with your foes. I also learned that many people really want to have things that simple. Just tell me who I'm supposed to follow, and I'll do it. Don't keep asking me to think or help decide-- just tell me I should follow that guy right there and I will go ahead and imprint on him like a happy little gosling.
Well, we can't do that. As we keep discovering, the territory is confusing and complicated. We have, at least, the following players on the field right now:
People who support CCSSetc as a way to get their hands on the billions of tax dollars connected to education.
People who support CCSS as a way to make schools better; we just have to get rid of testing.
People who oppose CCSSetc because it's trying to privatize public ed.
People who oppose CCSSetc because government schools are the indoctrination wing of a totalitarian government.
People who support CCSSetc because rich people and/or the government must know what they're doing.
People who opposed CCSSetc because rich, powerful amateurs have no place redesigning education
People who oppose CCSSetc because they think the standards and material are lousy education
And the list goes on. Add to it people are simply pretending to be one thing while hiding their true agenda, and now we're down the rabbit hole of astro-turf activist groups and "philanthropists" out to buy their way to success.
Before you know it, we're into paranoid brain-bending. Are these guys trying to get us to defend CCSS so that they can accuse us of defending it so that their opponents will force it through? We would be better off trying to guess which glass has the iocane powder in it.
I continue to believe that our best move is to avoid the US political game of tribes and teams, where we "ally" ourselves with someone and agree to support each others' play no matter what. I suspect that is at least part of how teachers ended up betrayed by the national union leadership-- the Democrats are our allies, prominent Democrats say CCSS is swell, therefor, we will support CCSS.
The betrayal of union leadership is a fine example of how political calculations can lead you to betray your core principles. But the school reform has scrambled everything.
Hell, the school reform battle has even scrambled the language. After twelve years (Happy birthday, NCLB), the federally-leveraged enforcement of educational malpractice is not a challenge to the status quo-- it IS the status quo. These Masters of Reforming Our Nations Schools aren't championing reform at all; they've simply repackaged "stay the course" as "reform."
And if language is higgledy-piggledy, then politics are likewise upended. Progressive, conservative, left, right, Democrat, GOP-- none of it means anything. There are people wearing any and all of those labels who vehemently oppose CCSSetc, and there are people wearing any and all of those labels who support it whole-heartedly.
But here's the clarity part.
I think defining the movements in terms of CCSS guarantees confusion, because it lumps together people who want to save public schools, and people who want to see them destroyed. They may look like natural allies because they share an enemy. But their desired outcomes are the exact opposite.
Instead, let's define ourselves in terms of the real goal, the real intended outcome. Let's talk about what we want to see on the educational landscape when everything is done.
I'm starting to think of myself not as an opponent of CCSS and reformy stuff, but as a supporter of the traditional US public school. I've written about why before and will do so again, but this is already getting rambly. So let's just say that I will continue to support, push, agree with, pass along the words of, cheer for, and do whatever I can to further the work of people who believe in returning the public school system.
Yes, that's a slog, because people have spent so much time denigrating that system, insisting that it failed. We know that's not true, and the fight over the past year has done two things-- it has allowed supporters to amass the writing and analyses that disproves the allegations of failure. It has also allowed Americans to get a taste of the alternative, and it tastes awful. And no, I don't mean I want to go back in time to one-room schoolhouses and McGuffy Readers. The traditional US public school system that I know is vibrant and robust and filled with great teachers who are always growing into the future. One of the strengths of the system was always that it could move forward.
Being a supporter of US public schools rather than just an opponent of CCSSetc has another advantage. Supporters of US public schools are unified in what we want to see. Supporters of reformy stuff have a hundred different outcomes in mind, and the closer they get to the finish line, the more they will pull themselves apart in a hundred different directions. They can steal the pie, but then they have to divide it up.
Divide and conquer. Co-opt and betray. We can make ourselves crazy with this stuff. Instead, let's ignore the labels and keep our eyes on the ultimate goals. As you travel, you'll meet lots of folks who will share the path for a little while. But the best traveling companions are those who are headed to the same destination.
People who want to destroy US public education are not my friends, whether they are supporting CCSS or opposing it. I think it might be that simple. People who think they can support CCSS and support public education at the same time? Well, we need to talk.
Yesterday the question ripping through the blogosphere was how to sort out allies and opponents. Are the Kochs opposing CCSS just as leverage to destroy public ed? Are progressive CCSS foes being played in this battle?
These are not new questions in the struggle for the soul of public schools. We've already become so accustomed to the current school reformy stuff landscape that we sometimes forget how....odd? unexpected? appalling?.... that public schools are under attack from Democrats, that Rhee and Duncan and Obama are supposed to be progressives. Or that some sharp, insightful criticism of CCSS comes from people who see the details clearly but add them up to get Communist Takeover.
When I was a union president facing a contentious contract negotiation and, ultimately, a strike, I learned that you have to take every idea on its own merit. You cannot look at the people around you, sort them into Friends and Foes, and then always agree with your friends and always disagree with your foes. I also learned that many people really want to have things that simple. Just tell me who I'm supposed to follow, and I'll do it. Don't keep asking me to think or help decide-- just tell me I should follow that guy right there and I will go ahead and imprint on him like a happy little gosling.
Well, we can't do that. As we keep discovering, the territory is confusing and complicated. We have, at least, the following players on the field right now:
People who support CCSSetc as a way to get their hands on the billions of tax dollars connected to education.
People who support CCSS as a way to make schools better; we just have to get rid of testing.
People who oppose CCSSetc because it's trying to privatize public ed.
People who oppose CCSSetc because government schools are the indoctrination wing of a totalitarian government.
People who support CCSSetc because rich people and/or the government must know what they're doing.
People who opposed CCSSetc because rich, powerful amateurs have no place redesigning education
People who oppose CCSSetc because they think the standards and material are lousy education
And the list goes on. Add to it people are simply pretending to be one thing while hiding their true agenda, and now we're down the rabbit hole of astro-turf activist groups and "philanthropists" out to buy their way to success.
Before you know it, we're into paranoid brain-bending. Are these guys trying to get us to defend CCSS so that they can accuse us of defending it so that their opponents will force it through? We would be better off trying to guess which glass has the iocane powder in it.
I continue to believe that our best move is to avoid the US political game of tribes and teams, where we "ally" ourselves with someone and agree to support each others' play no matter what. I suspect that is at least part of how teachers ended up betrayed by the national union leadership-- the Democrats are our allies, prominent Democrats say CCSS is swell, therefor, we will support CCSS.
The betrayal of union leadership is a fine example of how political calculations can lead you to betray your core principles. But the school reform has scrambled everything.
Hell, the school reform battle has even scrambled the language. After twelve years (Happy birthday, NCLB), the federally-leveraged enforcement of educational malpractice is not a challenge to the status quo-- it IS the status quo. These Masters of Reforming Our Nations Schools aren't championing reform at all; they've simply repackaged "stay the course" as "reform."
And if language is higgledy-piggledy, then politics are likewise upended. Progressive, conservative, left, right, Democrat, GOP-- none of it means anything. There are people wearing any and all of those labels who vehemently oppose CCSSetc, and there are people wearing any and all of those labels who support it whole-heartedly.
But here's the clarity part.
I think defining the movements in terms of CCSS guarantees confusion, because it lumps together people who want to save public schools, and people who want to see them destroyed. They may look like natural allies because they share an enemy. But their desired outcomes are the exact opposite.
Instead, let's define ourselves in terms of the real goal, the real intended outcome. Let's talk about what we want to see on the educational landscape when everything is done.
I'm starting to think of myself not as an opponent of CCSS and reformy stuff, but as a supporter of the traditional US public school. I've written about why before and will do so again, but this is already getting rambly. So let's just say that I will continue to support, push, agree with, pass along the words of, cheer for, and do whatever I can to further the work of people who believe in returning the public school system.
Yes, that's a slog, because people have spent so much time denigrating that system, insisting that it failed. We know that's not true, and the fight over the past year has done two things-- it has allowed supporters to amass the writing and analyses that disproves the allegations of failure. It has also allowed Americans to get a taste of the alternative, and it tastes awful. And no, I don't mean I want to go back in time to one-room schoolhouses and McGuffy Readers. The traditional US public school system that I know is vibrant and robust and filled with great teachers who are always growing into the future. One of the strengths of the system was always that it could move forward.
Being a supporter of US public schools rather than just an opponent of CCSSetc has another advantage. Supporters of US public schools are unified in what we want to see. Supporters of reformy stuff have a hundred different outcomes in mind, and the closer they get to the finish line, the more they will pull themselves apart in a hundred different directions. They can steal the pie, but then they have to divide it up.
Divide and conquer. Co-opt and betray. We can make ourselves crazy with this stuff. Instead, let's ignore the labels and keep our eyes on the ultimate goals. As you travel, you'll meet lots of folks who will share the path for a little while. But the best traveling companions are those who are headed to the same destination.
People who want to destroy US public education are not my friends, whether they are supporting CCSS or opposing it. I think it might be that simple. People who think they can support CCSS and support public education at the same time? Well, we need to talk.
Monday, January 6, 2014
Standardized Competition
The average citizen can be excused for not entirely understanding the Masters of Reforming Our Nation's Schools, because they often speak out of both sides of their mouths. For instance, MoRONS are big fans of standardization, but they also like school choice.
Mind you, they know better that to say "school choice" any more, a phrase that has become education politics kryptonite. On google's ngram viewer, "school choice" peaks in 2002 and has been dropping precipitously in popularity ever since. So we don't talk about school choice any more-- we just promote the flowering of charter schools and cyber schools and the creation of a "robust marketplace" where students can have access to quality education blah blah blah. The rhetoric has changed, but the goal has not-- students who can take their portable funding with them as they choose among schools that are vying in the marketplace.
Except, at the same time, we have the rise of Reformy Stuff clustered around the CCSS. Let's skip here for a moment the argument where you say, "Oh, but the CCSS are not a national curriculum." Have CCSS resulted in de facto national curriculum imposed through federal fiat and testing regimens? I suppose we could argue that another day (though frankly at this point I think that argument belongs on the same day that we argue about the flat earth), but for now, even media and supporters are no longer bothering to maintain the non-federal fiction about CCSS.
No, we live now in a world in which people think having every school in the country teaching the same content at the same time is a great idea. It should be possible for a peripatetic pupil to plop down in any classroom in the country and not miss a beat.. In fact, some states really like the idea of scripting. For some educational thought leaders, a perfect world is one in which every teacher is saying exactly the same word at exactly the same moment.
Ignoring for a moment just how creepy that idea is (spoiler alert: very), how, in that brave new standardized world, would schools compete?
Competition has always existed between schools. It's why schools are part of te formula for property values-- do you want a house in the district with the great science department, or the one with the award winning music program?
But in a brave new CCSS world, all schools are teaching the same stuff at the same time in pretty much the same way (maybe reading the same words from the same script), exactly how are schools supposed to compete?
Personalizing the instruction? That can't be it, because "personalized instruction" now means "plunking student down in front of computer to interact with software we've paid a nice licensing fee to use." That experience would be identical at any of the Brave New Schools.
Better teachers? In Brave New School, teachers are just content delivery specialists. Most will only have a shelf life of two-three years and no experience to bring to bear. Everyone now knows that teachers who have been in the classroom for years are the worst and should be pushed out so they can be replaced with enthusiastic new teachers. So I guess Brave New Schools will compete based on staff enthusiasm, though with regular deep staff churn, it's going to be hard to market teachers sight unseen.
Test scores? But but but-- if all schools are doing the same teacher-proof programs, shouldn't all Brave New Schools be getting the same test results? So that's a wash.
School leaders? Perhaps this is the key. A Steve Perry or Michelle Rhee could be the key. They don't need to have actually ever successfully done anything. I have called Rhee a celebrity spokesmodel, the Kim Kardashian of ed reform (and I'm going to keep doing it till it catches on), but the fact is she's making mega bucks for opening her mouth while I'm still blogging and teaching English in obscurity, so really, which one of us really understands how to play this game (spoiler alert: not me). Wave enough money at these guys, and you could recruit some real heavy hitters as school leaders. We've already got sports figures and rap stars in the ed biz. What kid wouldn't want to go to school with The Rock as principal?
Maybe those leaders would come up with new ways for Brave New Schools to compete. "Hey look-- at our school all the content delivery specialists wear funny hats!" Or fun lunches. Or a cooler mascot.
No if Brave New CCSS Schools are all doing the same things, and it really doesn't matter who the teachers are or the students are or where the school is or what kind of population it serves, then there IS no basis for competition in a marketplace.
So it's possible that CCSS and attendant Reformy Stuff actually tolls the death knell of school choice, and that with Masters of Reforming Our Nation's Schools fully empowered, vouchers and choice and other market-based reform is going to be killed dead deader deadest.
Of course, there's another possibility.
That other possibility is that the rules for Brave New CCSS Schools will not apply to everybody. It's possible that once we've dumped a giant pile of CCSS fertilizer on public schools, the marketplace will be ruled by schools that can say, "Hey, come over here where we aren't buried under a pile of soul-crushing educationally maladaptive baloney. Come over here where we let teachers teach and students are recognized as actual human beings instead of data-generating drones."
The other possibility is that one goal of Reformy Stuff is to take one group of runners in the race of life and tie their ankles together and duct-tape their hands to their heads so that another group of runners, the special group, the elite group, the group composed of The Right People, can have an unencumbered run at the finish line. The other possibility is that standardization is just for proles and drones, and that real education is to be reserved for only a certain few.
Mind you, they know better that to say "school choice" any more, a phrase that has become education politics kryptonite. On google's ngram viewer, "school choice" peaks in 2002 and has been dropping precipitously in popularity ever since. So we don't talk about school choice any more-- we just promote the flowering of charter schools and cyber schools and the creation of a "robust marketplace" where students can have access to quality education blah blah blah. The rhetoric has changed, but the goal has not-- students who can take their portable funding with them as they choose among schools that are vying in the marketplace.
Except, at the same time, we have the rise of Reformy Stuff clustered around the CCSS. Let's skip here for a moment the argument where you say, "Oh, but the CCSS are not a national curriculum." Have CCSS resulted in de facto national curriculum imposed through federal fiat and testing regimens? I suppose we could argue that another day (though frankly at this point I think that argument belongs on the same day that we argue about the flat earth), but for now, even media and supporters are no longer bothering to maintain the non-federal fiction about CCSS.
No, we live now in a world in which people think having every school in the country teaching the same content at the same time is a great idea. It should be possible for a peripatetic pupil to plop down in any classroom in the country and not miss a beat.. In fact, some states really like the idea of scripting. For some educational thought leaders, a perfect world is one in which every teacher is saying exactly the same word at exactly the same moment.
Ignoring for a moment just how creepy that idea is (spoiler alert: very), how, in that brave new standardized world, would schools compete?
Competition has always existed between schools. It's why schools are part of te formula for property values-- do you want a house in the district with the great science department, or the one with the award winning music program?
But in a brave new CCSS world, all schools are teaching the same stuff at the same time in pretty much the same way (maybe reading the same words from the same script), exactly how are schools supposed to compete?
Personalizing the instruction? That can't be it, because "personalized instruction" now means "plunking student down in front of computer to interact with software we've paid a nice licensing fee to use." That experience would be identical at any of the Brave New Schools.
Better teachers? In Brave New School, teachers are just content delivery specialists. Most will only have a shelf life of two-three years and no experience to bring to bear. Everyone now knows that teachers who have been in the classroom for years are the worst and should be pushed out so they can be replaced with enthusiastic new teachers. So I guess Brave New Schools will compete based on staff enthusiasm, though with regular deep staff churn, it's going to be hard to market teachers sight unseen.
Test scores? But but but-- if all schools are doing the same teacher-proof programs, shouldn't all Brave New Schools be getting the same test results? So that's a wash.
School leaders? Perhaps this is the key. A Steve Perry or Michelle Rhee could be the key. They don't need to have actually ever successfully done anything. I have called Rhee a celebrity spokesmodel, the Kim Kardashian of ed reform (and I'm going to keep doing it till it catches on), but the fact is she's making mega bucks for opening her mouth while I'm still blogging and teaching English in obscurity, so really, which one of us really understands how to play this game (spoiler alert: not me). Wave enough money at these guys, and you could recruit some real heavy hitters as school leaders. We've already got sports figures and rap stars in the ed biz. What kid wouldn't want to go to school with The Rock as principal?
Maybe those leaders would come up with new ways for Brave New Schools to compete. "Hey look-- at our school all the content delivery specialists wear funny hats!" Or fun lunches. Or a cooler mascot.
No if Brave New CCSS Schools are all doing the same things, and it really doesn't matter who the teachers are or the students are or where the school is or what kind of population it serves, then there IS no basis for competition in a marketplace.
So it's possible that CCSS and attendant Reformy Stuff actually tolls the death knell of school choice, and that with Masters of Reforming Our Nation's Schools fully empowered, vouchers and choice and other market-based reform is going to be killed dead deader deadest.
Of course, there's another possibility.
That other possibility is that the rules for Brave New CCSS Schools will not apply to everybody. It's possible that once we've dumped a giant pile of CCSS fertilizer on public schools, the marketplace will be ruled by schools that can say, "Hey, come over here where we aren't buried under a pile of soul-crushing educationally maladaptive baloney. Come over here where we let teachers teach and students are recognized as actual human beings instead of data-generating drones."
The other possibility is that one goal of Reformy Stuff is to take one group of runners in the race of life and tie their ankles together and duct-tape their hands to their heads so that another group of runners, the special group, the elite group, the group composed of The Right People, can have an unencumbered run at the finish line. The other possibility is that standardization is just for proles and drones, and that real education is to be reserved for only a certain few.
Saturday, January 4, 2014
The Gadfly Made a Video [Updated]
[Update: Today somebody over at Fordham apparently took a look at this and responded, a bunch, on twitter while I was busy teaching students about the past's intrusion on the present in Light in August. I mention that last part as an example of the odd juxtapositions that can happen when the interwebs intersect with the meat world. At any rate, while you might have been hoping that Fordham's tweets were some sort of epic thunder at my offensive mockery, they were more on the order of clarification and mockery of my mockery, which is of course only fair. At any rate, since this is my first go-round with a thinky tank, I've added some of that dialogue to the original piece where it can all be viewed in context.]
Mike Petrilli over at Fordham went and made himself a wacky video. And it is...um... Well, remember when your sad uncle used to get drunk and dance with the stuffed animals in your sister's room? This is...um... well, it has higher production values. And it tells us way more about these folks than they probably meant to share.
Petrilli is the junior half of Finn and Petrilli, the thought leaders who have steered Fordham Institute to a leadership role in education reform based on... well, based on something. They most recently scored big by getting a bundle of Gates money to examine CCSS and another bundle to help spread the word how awesome CCSS is. So kind of like one of those labs that does research on health effects of tobacco sponsored by R J Reynolds. I'm not going to unpack all of that here-- you can read a much more thorough account by the invaluable Mercedes Schneider on her blog.
Bottom line: these guys are members of the Masters of Reforming Our Nation's Schools club.
You can watch the video here. Or you can save that pleasure until after reading about it. Or you can just never watch it ever. I'm going to talk about what we can learn about these folks from this video, and while it may seem like I'm making some big stretches based on just a little 2:20 clip, it's becoming apparent over the course of this blog that that is what I do. So here we go.
INTRO
I suspect that one motivation for making this video was to show that the Fordham gang are just as "fun" and "zany" as anybody out there. However, they tip their hand immediately.
First, we show a clip of the original source material ("What does the fox say") just in case, you know, people don't get it. It's the kind of thing you do when the only frame of reference you have is your own, like your annoying aunt or that know-it-all at the library or NBC news try to tell you about something cool that has been famous already for six months, but they only just learned about it and it never occurs to them that other people might know things that they do not.
There are only two possibilities here. Either nobody at Fordham thought to say, "You know, the original has 300 million hits and thousands of other parody versions-- I don't think we need to explain to anyone what we're doing," or they know that their audience is so disconnected from current culture that this will have to be explained to them the same way you have to explain Netflix to your great-grandmother.
But showing us the clip isn't enough. Mike Petrilli laughs at it. Specifically, he laughs at the jump cut to "What does the fox say." He means to laugh as if this reveal is the most hilarious things since Gene Hackman poured soup into Peter Boyle's lap. He actually laughs as if he is trying to imitate the way that "humans" laugh at things they believe are "funny."
So if the goal of this clip was to show that the Fordham folks are zany fun guys, just like the rest of us, that ship has sailed (and been blown up in the harbor) within the first twenty seconds.
A QUICK PHONECALL
Petrilli is interrupted by a phone call. It's from Mr. Broad (and we finally have confirmation, for those of who weren't certain, that "Broad" rhymes with "Toad"). Petrilli has a conversation with him as if Broad had never heard of Fordham before, all so that we can set up the lead in line, which really ought to be "What does the gadfly say"-- but Petrilli muffs it and so we get "What does Gadfly say?"
You might call that a small thing. But I'm a part-time hack musician as well as a hack writer, and I tend to automatically distrust people with a tin ear. And this is a very produced video-- it's not like we couldn't have gone back and done it right.
[Update: Pamela Tatz, editorial associate at Fordham, was late to the twitter party, but offered Since we're apparently tweeting you corrections...Mike meant to say "What does Gadfly say." We were trying to squeeze syllables. :). So it's an artistic choice. She alsocorrectly pointed out that SNL also opened their parody with a clip of the original. Since I am one of those old farts who complains that SNL has never been as good since John Belushi died, I had missed that and stand corrected. I stand by my critique of the opening line, but I will spare everyone the English teachery lesson on how meter is more important than syllable count.]
This sequence gives us our first straight on view of Petrilli's face. As an English teacher, you sometimes regret that you don't have more opportunity to use some really great words, like "unctuous" and "supercilious." Petrilli's face corrects that problem. Maybe it's just anticipation for the wacky shenanigans to follow, but he already looks damned pleased with himself. It's not quite Bitchy Resting face, but it's still kind of annoying.
THEN THE FUN
I'll take back half of my deduction for tin ear, because while it might have been autotuned a tad, Petrilli's voice is more than up to the demands of the song. Kudos, sir. [Update: Joe Portnoy, media manager st Fordham, assures me via twitter that there is no autotuning. Fair enough. I thought I might have detected a faint autotunetang, but it could easily have just been a production artifact.And Mike Petrilli himself tweets that vocal credit goes to @brainofmatter & @VictoriaEHSears]
But the lyric itself is interesting, because it requires Petrilli to reduce the major players to a single simple sentence. So "Randi whines" and "Diane's become a kook." Criticism of the critics- no surprise there. But "Arne says 'sorry'"? Did Fordham just call Duncan an apologist? Well, maybe not, but it's fun to hear it that way. And it certainly wasn't a tribute to his stalwart leadership. "Michelle fires them all" is also an interesting choice of defining characteristic.
And then all musical holy hell breaks loose. Again, credit to Petrilli for swinging for the fences. He attacks the lyric with-- well, I'm not sure. Anger? Heartburn? Kind of like the awkward kid in school who isn't really sure why that other kid always gets a solo and he doesn't, so he's going to sing hard. So hard. He's going to sing like a boss. He's going to sing the hell out of this. He's going to kick each note like he's punching back at every jerk who ever gave him a swirly.
The office staff (mostly young enough to be interns) is game. We're all in shirtsleeves-- see? no sports coats on, just like the video = wacky relaxed shenanigans! The film editor is fast enough to keep the general awkwardness from really registering, but watch it a few too many times and you can tell that the think tank did not test for dancing skills when hiring. There is one piece of sound judgment here-- at no point do they attempt any of the backup dance moves from the video. And Petrilli looks very proud of his dance moves, but in his defense, he does not suck.[Update: Petrilli tweeted that last line and responded "I shall now die happy."]
At this point we're replacing the nonsense lines from the original song with nonsense lines from Fordham's policy recommendations, so I'm enjoying the parallel. Did Petrilli mean to suggest that "Smaller classes? We say no" was the equivalent of "Ringdindingdingdingdading"? Probably not, but I'm going to go ahead and draw that conclusion anyway.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Final effect? People making wacky shenanigans out of policy ideas that are being used to destroy public education? It's a hard thing to parse-- how would "Springtime for Hitler" have come across if it had been staged by the Nazis themselves? I am not meaning to suggest that Fordham = Nazis, but I do wonder what we're to make of people making themselves look more ridiculous that we could make them look on purpose.
It is part of the tone deafness problem. I want to shake them and say, "Did you not see this? Do you not know how you look, both awkward and opposite-of-cool, while making jokes about policies being used to destroy peoples' careers?" Somehow while shooting for cool and relaxed and with it, they've hit uncool and callous, thereby suggesting that they are imbued with so much hubris and arrogance that they either can't see or don't care (because only unimportant people will be bothered, and they don't matter). Perhaps Petrilli and his well-smooched tuchus have been insulated from honest opinions from so long that he just doesn't know. This is the education industry equivalent of those bankers' videos of obscenely wealthy parties, the Christmas cards from wealthy apartments, the total lack of understanding of what things are like out there on the street, because the street is just for the commoners who don't matter.
It's an oddly fascinating train wreck. Is it awesomely funny because it's so awful, or is it too awful to be funny? Whatever the case, it gives a strong 2:20 feel for what sort of attitude permeates Fordham, and it is just as bad as we ever imagined. Maybe worse.
[Update: I'll note that Michelle Gininger, media relations manager at Fordham (which is starting to feel more like a PR firm than a thinky tank) also passed along some of the tweetage. Additionally, Joe Portnoy tweeted "So far this wins for favorite negative review of #WhatDoesGadflySay." So Fordham's response to this blog fell somewhat short of full Darth Vader or even medium Donald Trump. Make of that what you will. At the very least, I think they showed better judgment in how they responded to the video review than they did in making the actual video in the first place.]
Mike Petrilli over at Fordham went and made himself a wacky video. And it is...um... Well, remember when your sad uncle used to get drunk and dance with the stuffed animals in your sister's room? This is...um... well, it has higher production values. And it tells us way more about these folks than they probably meant to share.
Petrilli is the junior half of Finn and Petrilli, the thought leaders who have steered Fordham Institute to a leadership role in education reform based on... well, based on something. They most recently scored big by getting a bundle of Gates money to examine CCSS and another bundle to help spread the word how awesome CCSS is. So kind of like one of those labs that does research on health effects of tobacco sponsored by R J Reynolds. I'm not going to unpack all of that here-- you can read a much more thorough account by the invaluable Mercedes Schneider on her blog.
Bottom line: these guys are members of the Masters of Reforming Our Nation's Schools club.
You can watch the video here. Or you can save that pleasure until after reading about it. Or you can just never watch it ever. I'm going to talk about what we can learn about these folks from this video, and while it may seem like I'm making some big stretches based on just a little 2:20 clip, it's becoming apparent over the course of this blog that that is what I do. So here we go.
INTRO
I suspect that one motivation for making this video was to show that the Fordham gang are just as "fun" and "zany" as anybody out there. However, they tip their hand immediately.
First, we show a clip of the original source material ("What does the fox say") just in case, you know, people don't get it. It's the kind of thing you do when the only frame of reference you have is your own, like your annoying aunt or that know-it-all at the library or NBC news try to tell you about something cool that has been famous already for six months, but they only just learned about it and it never occurs to them that other people might know things that they do not.
There are only two possibilities here. Either nobody at Fordham thought to say, "You know, the original has 300 million hits and thousands of other parody versions-- I don't think we need to explain to anyone what we're doing," or they know that their audience is so disconnected from current culture that this will have to be explained to them the same way you have to explain Netflix to your great-grandmother.
But showing us the clip isn't enough. Mike Petrilli laughs at it. Specifically, he laughs at the jump cut to "What does the fox say." He means to laugh as if this reveal is the most hilarious things since Gene Hackman poured soup into Peter Boyle's lap. He actually laughs as if he is trying to imitate the way that "humans" laugh at things they believe are "funny."
So if the goal of this clip was to show that the Fordham folks are zany fun guys, just like the rest of us, that ship has sailed (and been blown up in the harbor) within the first twenty seconds.
A QUICK PHONECALL
Petrilli is interrupted by a phone call. It's from Mr. Broad (and we finally have confirmation, for those of who weren't certain, that "Broad" rhymes with "Toad"). Petrilli has a conversation with him as if Broad had never heard of Fordham before, all so that we can set up the lead in line, which really ought to be "What does the gadfly say"-- but Petrilli muffs it and so we get "What does Gadfly say?"
You might call that a small thing. But I'm a part-time hack musician as well as a hack writer, and I tend to automatically distrust people with a tin ear. And this is a very produced video-- it's not like we couldn't have gone back and done it right.
[Update: Pamela Tatz, editorial associate at Fordham, was late to the twitter party, but offered Since we're apparently tweeting you corrections...Mike meant to say "What does Gadfly say." We were trying to squeeze syllables. :). So it's an artistic choice. She alsocorrectly pointed out that SNL also opened their parody with a clip of the original. Since I am one of those old farts who complains that SNL has never been as good since John Belushi died, I had missed that and stand corrected. I stand by my critique of the opening line, but I will spare everyone the English teachery lesson on how meter is more important than syllable count.]
This sequence gives us our first straight on view of Petrilli's face. As an English teacher, you sometimes regret that you don't have more opportunity to use some really great words, like "unctuous" and "supercilious." Petrilli's face corrects that problem. Maybe it's just anticipation for the wacky shenanigans to follow, but he already looks damned pleased with himself. It's not quite Bitchy Resting face, but it's still kind of annoying.
THEN THE FUN
I'll take back half of my deduction for tin ear, because while it might have been autotuned a tad, Petrilli's voice is more than up to the demands of the song. Kudos, sir. [Update: Joe Portnoy, media manager st Fordham, assures me via twitter that there is no autotuning. Fair enough. I thought I might have detected a faint autotunetang, but it could easily have just been a production artifact.And Mike Petrilli himself tweets that vocal credit goes to @brainofmatter & @VictoriaEHSears]
But the lyric itself is interesting, because it requires Petrilli to reduce the major players to a single simple sentence. So "Randi whines" and "Diane's become a kook." Criticism of the critics- no surprise there. But "Arne says 'sorry'"? Did Fordham just call Duncan an apologist? Well, maybe not, but it's fun to hear it that way. And it certainly wasn't a tribute to his stalwart leadership. "Michelle fires them all" is also an interesting choice of defining characteristic.
And then all musical holy hell breaks loose. Again, credit to Petrilli for swinging for the fences. He attacks the lyric with-- well, I'm not sure. Anger? Heartburn? Kind of like the awkward kid in school who isn't really sure why that other kid always gets a solo and he doesn't, so he's going to sing hard. So hard. He's going to sing like a boss. He's going to sing the hell out of this. He's going to kick each note like he's punching back at every jerk who ever gave him a swirly.
The office staff (mostly young enough to be interns) is game. We're all in shirtsleeves-- see? no sports coats on, just like the video = wacky relaxed shenanigans! The film editor is fast enough to keep the general awkwardness from really registering, but watch it a few too many times and you can tell that the think tank did not test for dancing skills when hiring. There is one piece of sound judgment here-- at no point do they attempt any of the backup dance moves from the video. And Petrilli looks very proud of his dance moves, but in his defense, he does not suck.[Update: Petrilli tweeted that last line and responded "I shall now die happy."]
At this point we're replacing the nonsense lines from the original song with nonsense lines from Fordham's policy recommendations, so I'm enjoying the parallel. Did Petrilli mean to suggest that "Smaller classes? We say no" was the equivalent of "Ringdindingdingdingdading"? Probably not, but I'm going to go ahead and draw that conclusion anyway.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Final effect? People making wacky shenanigans out of policy ideas that are being used to destroy public education? It's a hard thing to parse-- how would "Springtime for Hitler" have come across if it had been staged by the Nazis themselves? I am not meaning to suggest that Fordham = Nazis, but I do wonder what we're to make of people making themselves look more ridiculous that we could make them look on purpose.
It is part of the tone deafness problem. I want to shake them and say, "Did you not see this? Do you not know how you look, both awkward and opposite-of-cool, while making jokes about policies being used to destroy peoples' careers?" Somehow while shooting for cool and relaxed and with it, they've hit uncool and callous, thereby suggesting that they are imbued with so much hubris and arrogance that they either can't see or don't care (because only unimportant people will be bothered, and they don't matter). Perhaps Petrilli and his well-smooched tuchus have been insulated from honest opinions from so long that he just doesn't know. This is the education industry equivalent of those bankers' videos of obscenely wealthy parties, the Christmas cards from wealthy apartments, the total lack of understanding of what things are like out there on the street, because the street is just for the commoners who don't matter.
It's an oddly fascinating train wreck. Is it awesomely funny because it's so awful, or is it too awful to be funny? Whatever the case, it gives a strong 2:20 feel for what sort of attitude permeates Fordham, and it is just as bad as we ever imagined. Maybe worse.
[Update: I'll note that Michelle Gininger, media relations manager at Fordham (which is starting to feel more like a PR firm than a thinky tank) also passed along some of the tweetage. Additionally, Joe Portnoy tweeted "So far this wins for favorite negative review of #WhatDoesGadflySay." So Fordham's response to this blog fell somewhat short of full Darth Vader or even medium Donald Trump. Make of that what you will. At the very least, I think they showed better judgment in how they responded to the video review than they did in making the actual video in the first place.]
Friday, January 3, 2014
Test Administration Ethics
I've been perusing Pennsylvania's DOE "Ethical Standards of Test Administration," the study of which is required in order to pass your PA Assessment Administrator quiz (otherwise you lack the wisdom to proctor The Test). Because that whole business is farmed out to Data Recognition Corporation, it's hard to know how much of the ESTA to attribute to bureaucrats and how much springs from the fertile minds of corporate data wranglers.
The link is there in case you want to wade through this in its entirety. I just want to take a few moments of my blizzard-related late start to hit the highlights.
The ESTA are broken into three sections-- before, during, and after test administration-- and each is split into do's and don't's. The ESTA document is six pages long, so let me just highlight some selected instructions representative of my own categories.
Communicate to students, parents, and the community what the test does and does not measure, when and how it will be administered, and how the results will be used.
I am particularly interested in that "what it does not measure" line, because supporters of reformy stuff have been remarkably quiet on what the uber-tests are NOT good for. If someone is willing to admit what the tests won't do, we might be able to make some progress in that conversation.
Maintain a positive attitude about testing.
This instruction is repeated three times. Seriously? It's the leading portion of the instructions with the subtext, "Be a happily obedient minion!"
Teach to the Pennsylvania Core Standards*.
Look- The Core and The Test are conjoined twins sharing one brain. I understand people who deny that, because I was in that place once, but here is the sixty gazillionth clue that these babies were never meant to crawl a separate path. Use the Core to prepare for the test. Use the test to measure the teaching of The Core. Without each other, neither has a puspose.
Make contingency plans for unexpected disruptions during testing. All school personnel must know what to do in the event of a fire alarm, bomb threat, HAZMAT incident, unruly student, etc
There's something special about equating an unruly student and a HAZMAT incident. This is the best of a series of instructions with the subtext "We're going to assume that test day is the first day you have ever worked in this school building ever and that you therefor have no knowledge of how anything works there."
Make sure the testing environment is comfortable and has appropriate lighting.
There is also a series of instructions for which the subtext is "We're going to assume that you are as smart as stone."
Do not... possess unauthorized copies of state tests.
One would think that The Tests contain directions to a lost city of gold, and I suppose given the amount of corporate investment opportunity resting on the backs of all this reformy stuff, that's not entirely off the mark. But there are tons of instructions dictating a level of safety and security usually reserved for matters of national security or the ingredients for Col. Sanders chicken coating. Test administrators are admonished not to look at the tests long enough to memorize questions, not to copy anything down, not to "discuss, disseminate or otherwise reveal contents of the test to anyone." The precious must be kept secret and safe.
Do not... coach or provide feedback to students. Do not...erase or change student answers.
Because you're just a teacher, you've probably never given a test before. Don't help the students at all. Don't read portions of the test to them. Don't answer any questions about the test. Don't "alter, influence or interfere" with the test in any way. Subtext? "We know that we have highly motivated school districts to cheat on these. Rather than try to address how we have created a systemic incentive to cheat, we're just going to tell you real hard not to."
The directions suggest that the Commonwealth's subcontractor for this gig is used to dealing with untrained unmotivated minimum-wage grunts, because the directions are straight from the Spell Everything Out For You On The Assumption That You Will Do What You're Told, No More, No Less manual. This is not how professionals speak to other professionals; this is how semi-professionals position themselves for future appearances in a courtroom.
But I do give these guys credit, because they have brought something new to the Orders for the Minions table, and that's the title. Let's look at it again.
Ethical Standards of Test Administration.
Damn. Doesn't that sound fine? Doesn't it sound like a higher calling, a noble undertaking? Yes, this is a far, far better test I administer than I have ever administered before.
I can totally see this catching on. Fast food restaurants will present training sessions about Ethical Principles of Hamburger Preparation. Shop 'n' Save will train its workers in Ethical Methods of Scanning Groceries. My garbage collectors will pause at the curb to have philosophical discussions-- "Yes, we could throw this bag of trash on the truck as you've described. But would that be the ethical way to load the garbage?"
I assume that the use of use of "ethical" here is supposed to serve a couple of purposes. One is to position these instructions as having a stronger moral imperative than the instructions on hooking up a blu-ray player. And that helps fuel the most important subtext here-- "You are not just a wage slave hired by the state's contractor to deliver and protect their proprietary, revenue-generating material, but a person tasked to follow a higher imperative sewn into the very fabric of the moral universe." And yet, I have to conclude that in this case "being ethical" means "doing as you're told."
The guiding vision here is "maintaining the integrity of the test environment" and the "validity of the test," and boy, couldn't we all just write a few thousand words about what high stakes testing (prepared by corporate edu-biz for the state to use in implementing reformy stuff) has to do with those two goals. I don't have time, so let's just say this-- I would LOVE to maintain the integrity of my classroom environment, and would welcome the chance to see some valid tests.
Hey, I don't have such a high opinion of myself professionally that I'm above administering a lowly standardized test. And during the day, I'm "subject to assignment," so the district could tell me that my job is to watch grass grow or snow melt, and that would be my job (poor use of district resources, but still my job).
But this feels a lot like sticking me under a fast-food-preserving heat lamp and telling me I'm on vacation in Hawaii. It feels like telling a six-year-old you have a "super important job" for him before handing him Klondike wrappers to put in the wastebasket.
Tell me what to do. Give me my instructions. Just don't lie to me about them. And understand that I may find it ethical to make fun of you.
*PA is one of those states that has its own version of The Core because either A) we can totally do better or B) it's politically expedient to distance ourselves from CCSS. You decide. As with other similar states, the differences between our core and The Core are on par with the differences between Mary kate and Ashley Olsen.
The link is there in case you want to wade through this in its entirety. I just want to take a few moments of my blizzard-related late start to hit the highlights.
The ESTA are broken into three sections-- before, during, and after test administration-- and each is split into do's and don't's. The ESTA document is six pages long, so let me just highlight some selected instructions representative of my own categories.
Communicate to students, parents, and the community what the test does and does not measure, when and how it will be administered, and how the results will be used.
I am particularly interested in that "what it does not measure" line, because supporters of reformy stuff have been remarkably quiet on what the uber-tests are NOT good for. If someone is willing to admit what the tests won't do, we might be able to make some progress in that conversation.
Maintain a positive attitude about testing.
This instruction is repeated three times. Seriously? It's the leading portion of the instructions with the subtext, "Be a happily obedient minion!"
Teach to the Pennsylvania Core Standards*.
Look- The Core and The Test are conjoined twins sharing one brain. I understand people who deny that, because I was in that place once, but here is the sixty gazillionth clue that these babies were never meant to crawl a separate path. Use the Core to prepare for the test. Use the test to measure the teaching of The Core. Without each other, neither has a puspose.
Make contingency plans for unexpected disruptions during testing. All school personnel must know what to do in the event of a fire alarm, bomb threat, HAZMAT incident, unruly student, etc
There's something special about equating an unruly student and a HAZMAT incident. This is the best of a series of instructions with the subtext "We're going to assume that test day is the first day you have ever worked in this school building ever and that you therefor have no knowledge of how anything works there."
Make sure the testing environment is comfortable and has appropriate lighting.
There is also a series of instructions for which the subtext is "We're going to assume that you are as smart as stone."
Do not... possess unauthorized copies of state tests.
One would think that The Tests contain directions to a lost city of gold, and I suppose given the amount of corporate investment opportunity resting on the backs of all this reformy stuff, that's not entirely off the mark. But there are tons of instructions dictating a level of safety and security usually reserved for matters of national security or the ingredients for Col. Sanders chicken coating. Test administrators are admonished not to look at the tests long enough to memorize questions, not to copy anything down, not to "discuss, disseminate or otherwise reveal contents of the test to anyone." The precious must be kept secret and safe.
Do not... coach or provide feedback to students. Do not...erase or change student answers.
Because you're just a teacher, you've probably never given a test before. Don't help the students at all. Don't read portions of the test to them. Don't answer any questions about the test. Don't "alter, influence or interfere" with the test in any way. Subtext? "We know that we have highly motivated school districts to cheat on these. Rather than try to address how we have created a systemic incentive to cheat, we're just going to tell you real hard not to."
The directions suggest that the Commonwealth's subcontractor for this gig is used to dealing with untrained unmotivated minimum-wage grunts, because the directions are straight from the Spell Everything Out For You On The Assumption That You Will Do What You're Told, No More, No Less manual. This is not how professionals speak to other professionals; this is how semi-professionals position themselves for future appearances in a courtroom.
But I do give these guys credit, because they have brought something new to the Orders for the Minions table, and that's the title. Let's look at it again.
Ethical Standards of Test Administration.
Damn. Doesn't that sound fine? Doesn't it sound like a higher calling, a noble undertaking? Yes, this is a far, far better test I administer than I have ever administered before.
I can totally see this catching on. Fast food restaurants will present training sessions about Ethical Principles of Hamburger Preparation. Shop 'n' Save will train its workers in Ethical Methods of Scanning Groceries. My garbage collectors will pause at the curb to have philosophical discussions-- "Yes, we could throw this bag of trash on the truck as you've described. But would that be the ethical way to load the garbage?"
I assume that the use of use of "ethical" here is supposed to serve a couple of purposes. One is to position these instructions as having a stronger moral imperative than the instructions on hooking up a blu-ray player. And that helps fuel the most important subtext here-- "You are not just a wage slave hired by the state's contractor to deliver and protect their proprietary, revenue-generating material, but a person tasked to follow a higher imperative sewn into the very fabric of the moral universe." And yet, I have to conclude that in this case "being ethical" means "doing as you're told."
The guiding vision here is "maintaining the integrity of the test environment" and the "validity of the test," and boy, couldn't we all just write a few thousand words about what high stakes testing (prepared by corporate edu-biz for the state to use in implementing reformy stuff) has to do with those two goals. I don't have time, so let's just say this-- I would LOVE to maintain the integrity of my classroom environment, and would welcome the chance to see some valid tests.
Hey, I don't have such a high opinion of myself professionally that I'm above administering a lowly standardized test. And during the day, I'm "subject to assignment," so the district could tell me that my job is to watch grass grow or snow melt, and that would be my job (poor use of district resources, but still my job).
But this feels a lot like sticking me under a fast-food-preserving heat lamp and telling me I'm on vacation in Hawaii. It feels like telling a six-year-old you have a "super important job" for him before handing him Klondike wrappers to put in the wastebasket.
Tell me what to do. Give me my instructions. Just don't lie to me about them. And understand that I may find it ethical to make fun of you.
*PA is one of those states that has its own version of The Core because either A) we can totally do better or B) it's politically expedient to distance ourselves from CCSS. You decide. As with other similar states, the differences between our core and The Core are on par with the differences between Mary kate and Ashley Olsen.
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