Should We Be Supporting Virtual Schools?

There was an excellent story in the Washington Post this weekend on the pros and cons of virtual schools.  Virtual schools are sort of a hybrid between public charter schools, online learning such as Khan Academy,  and homeschooling.  Virtual schools are K-12 educational systems run by public schools to teach children at home using technology.  These are generally treated as charter schools (and thus exempt from many school regulations), but are paid for and treated as part of the public school system, usually with significant learner support expected by the at-home learning coach (e.g., parent or other similar substitute).

It is quite an extensive article, so I recommend that you read it in full here.  But here are a few of the items that stood out for me:

Some Pros:

• Virtual schools provide a different educational choice for students who can't go to school or who have been failing in traditional school.
• For parents, virtual schools are similar to homeschooling, but without the responsibility or expense of obtaining high-quality curriculum yourself.
• Technology allows students to study at their own pace and schedule, to review what they don't understand as often as necessary and to skip through the things that they do, to use multi-media rich learning materials, and, to some extent, to adjust learning to their own learning style.
• Companies are investing lots of money into curriculum development, which presumably should translate into high-quality learning tools.

Some Cons:

• Virtual schools have a pretty terrible achievement record, both in terms of test scores and in completion/graduation rates.  One study showed that only one third of the schools managed by the largest player in the business, K12 Inc, met the federal NCLB standards last year.  And the article had an example of the Colorado Virtual Academy, also managed by K12, which has achieved only a 12% on-time graduation rate, compared to 72% of other schools statewide.
• In at least some states, the Virtual schools are "locating" in the poorest, most rural counties that received the highest levels of funding support from the state, but are enrolling students from throughout the state and counting them as students in that poor county.  So, for example, the Virginia Virtual Academy counts all its students as being from its home base in Carroll County, which the state reimburses $5,421 per student.  Therefore, the 66 students enrolled who actually live in Fairfax County, which would only receive $2,716 per student if they attended their local schools, are costing the state twice as much by being counted as Carroll County students.
• Socialization can be a big issue with these students, because unlike local homeschool organizations, which foster a variety of group social and academic experiences, virtual school students receive all of their education in their own home, even starting as early as kindergarten.  Virtual schools are trying to address that issue and find more opportunities for their students to interact with their peers.
• While these companies are paying 35% less for their teachers than traditional schools, they are putting lots of money into lobbying politicians.   According to the Post, in the past six years, K12 has contributed half a million dollars to US politicians, 3/4th of which went to Republicans (who are typically stronger supporters of the school choice movement).

This is actually a subject I know a good bit about in general, because not only do I homeschool, but I used to work in the distance education field before that.  The pros and cons above (at least the ones that don't have to do with funding and lobbying) are things that we have long known about the potential and the problems with distance education.

Education via technology is sometimes the only solution for some students, such as those that are geographically remote or isolated (students in Alaska, rural Maine, or the mountains of West Virginia, for example) or who have health problems, physical disabilities, or other issues that prohibit them from attending traditional schools.  Beyond that, distance education can be a fantastic option for disciplined, self-motivated learners.

However, while that designation applies to some percentage of students who fail in traditional schools, that description does not apply to the vast majority of struggling learners.  Particularly students in poor communities have little or no home support for their learning, since they are often in full-time employed single parent or dual working parent homes, many of who are illiterate and/or do not speak English.   They do not have access to the type of "learning coaches" that is critical for making this kind of education work, particularly for elementary-aged students.  So while it sounds good to say these programs give choice to failing learners, the reality is that having these types of students trying to learn through technology at home without any support is likely to make their educational performance be even worse, not better.  

As a homeschool mom, I can attest to the fact that showing a child the best-producing, most enthralling computer-based instruction featuring the most brilliant people on the planet does not ensure that he or she will learn anything from it.  As I have stated in an earlier post, education is so much more than just giving a child wonderful instructional content.

So while I'm not saying I don't think they have potential and shouldn't play a role in the panoply of educational options we are fortunate enough to have in our country, I, personally, am suspicious about how much at least some of the schools are really dedicated to solving our educational problems, and how much they are about making their owners a substantial profit.

But take my word for it.  Read the Post article, check into the situation in your state, and if you have any opinions, pro or con, feel free to add them below.

Majority of Texas Middle and High School Students Suspended At Least Once

In the debate this week, it appears the single major word that Texas Governor Rick Perry used most often was "border."  Many uses of that term came as he talked about how dangerous things are along the Texas-Mexico border.

However, it appears that the border line isn't the only dangerous place in Texas.  A six-year study of one million students in Texas--all the 7th grade public school students in Texas in 2000, 2001, and 2002--discovered that between 7th-12th grade, nearly 60% were expelled or suspended from school at least once.  Because only a small fraction of these cases (3%) were legislatively-mandated (violations such as illegal drugs or bringing a weapon to school), it indicates that the vast majority of these suspensions or expulsions were done at the discretion of the school.

The study, which was conducted by the Council of State Governments (CSG) Justice Center in partnership with the Public Policy Research Institute at Texas A&M University,  considered many variables, including age and income level, but found that only two sub-populations in the student body had higher-than-average suspension/expulsion rates:  African Americans and student with certain learning disabilities.  The data reported that 75% of African American had some form of discipline, compared to 65% of Hispanics and 47% of white students.  For students with educational disabilities, 75% of all disabled students, and 90% of students with an emotional disability, were expelled or suspended at least once, compared to 55% of students without any recorded disability.

The report also addresses the consequences that being suspended or expelled has on student success.  Of the 60% of students who had been so disciplined, 31% were held back for at least one year (which many previous studies link to poor academic achievement and higher drop out rates) and 10% officially dropped out (the study also notes that the system underreports how many students have actually dropped out but haven't completed the official paperwork confirming that decision).  Among the 40% who made it through school without suspensions or expulsions, 5% repeated at least one grade and 2% officially dropped out before graduation.  Even worse was the correlation between suspensions and expulsions to being involved in actual crimes; of those who had been so disciplined, almost a quarter eventually became involved in the juvenile justice system, compared to only 2% among the non-disciplined population.

The problem with reports like this is that they are only dealing with numerical correlations, not cause and effect.  So how people interpret the results probably depends on whether your world view is more Hobbesian (who described the life of man as "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”) or Rousseau-ian (who argued that poor human institutions warp people's natural tendencies towards both self-sufficiency and compassion).  That is, some people think that the high number of drop-outs and juvenile offenders among those who have been disciplined is just common sense; their innate bad behavior and/or anti-social principles showed up in school, and was properly disciplined, before they engaged in actual crimes or stopped bothering with school.   Thus, the students' bad character was the cause of both the suspension/expulsion and the dropping out/juvenile crime.  Others, however, wonder to what extent such harsh discipline actually caused the high drop out and juvenile justice figures.  This side would argue that when struggling students are banned from school (for a short term or permanently), that encourages them to spend their time with "bad influences" and/or have more time and opportunity to get into trouble.  In addition, students who have been suspended or expelled probably have more negative feelings about school--either around their ability to succeed there, or whether it is a hostile and unfair, rather than a nurturing and encouraging, place to be, which effects their decisions about whether or not to continue their education and to pursue fields outside the illegal alternative available to them.  The study, however, does not contain the kind of information that helps to support or refute either interpretation.

And I don't know about you, but my immediate reaction to these findings were "They suspend or expel 60%?  Surely they can't have THAT many "bad" students in Texas!  If so, the Wild, Wild West ethos must still rule in the Lone Star state."   But am I just uninformed?  How far from the "norm" is a 60% suspension/expulsion rate?  It turns out that is a hard question to answer, because the study had a more comprehensive database and addressed the question in a way that hadn't been done before.  So I was never able to find a national average for suspensions and expulsions (although, I will  admit, this was not an exhaustive effort....given that this blog is done with the time and money I have to spare after everything else I do).  But I did find at least some information in my home state of North Carolina.

While North Carolina generally collects suspension and expulsion data in a different way--it is much more focused on the number of missed days, rather than the percentage of students--I did find one report from the state Department of Education that stated that in 2006, approximately 10% of North Carolina students had short-term suspensions.  That statistic was for the entire school system, but let's just assume that percentage applies to middle and high schoolers, since that is what the Texas study covered.  But that is just short term discipline, and doesn't include long-term suspensions or expulsions.  I believe the Texas study said that 70% of its disciplinary actions were short-term, so if we apply the same statistics to North Carolina and round out the numbers (generously), then that would mean that about 15% of North Carolina students had been suspended or expelled in 2006.  

If that figure was accurate, then that would indicate that about four times the number of secondary students in Texas had been suspended or expelled, compared to those in North Carolina (in terms of percentages, not in actual numbers, since Texas is a much larger state).  Is Texas so wild that four times as many student misbehave?  Or is something else going on?

There was one other interesting data analysis that was included in the report.  The researchers actually divided the schools into three different categories, based on such demographics as family income level, percentage of immigrants or migrants, size of school, etc., and predicted whether disciplinary actions would be at a low, average, or high level.  But when they looked at the three categories, they found that about half reported the "expected" number, but a little less than a quarter had higher than expected percentages, while a bit more than a quarter had lower than expected numbers of disciplinary actions.  This was true regardless of expected level of school, size of school, type of school, or year of analysis.  And the good news was that those that had fewer percentages of students suspended or expelled certainly did no worse than those with average or even high numbers of disciplined students.

So the bottom line is, looking at the entire Texas secondary school system, is that suspending or expelling students is associated with dropping out or getting involved with the juvenile justice system.  But individual schools have a lot of discretion about whether or not they suspend or expel students.  Those who have a more lenient disciplinary system don't do any worse than the schools with higher percentages of disciplined students.  But there is obviously a lot of leeway between schools about who--and how many--are being suspended or expelled.

And either Texas is a LOT tougher on students than North Carolina, or they have a LOT more bad seeds--like four times as many.   Whether you think that is good or bad...well, like I said in paragraph 5 above, that probably depends more on your underlying assumptions about people than any statistics I can report.

What Education is Supposed to Be About

It's getting to be that time of year when, whether you are student or teacher, homeschool or institutionalized school, we're all just ready for school to be over. ( Of course, most homeschoolers I know continue to homeschool over the summer as well, but usually in a more laid-back way, especially since most of the group classes, coops, and projects are suspended during the traditional school "summer vacation" period.)  It is not a season when most of us wax eloquently about the wonders of schools, especially these days when the end-of-the-year focus is so fixed on standardized tests and numerical quantifications of our students' performance. 

So it was such a treat last night when, as I was reading Gary D. Schmidt's latest wonderful book, Okay For Now, when I came upon a beautiful passage that reminded me what education is really supposed to be about.

In this book, set in 1968, 8th grader Doug Swieteck (who also appeared in Schmidt's Newbery Honor award-winning book, The Wednesday Wars) is the sole transplant to a new junior high in a new town who is attending a pre-school orientation for new students.  Divided alphabetically, Swieteck is assigned to the principal's section, where he has to listen to rule after rule after rule of school regulations--being on time, boys keeping their hair short (1968, remember), girls keeping their skirts long, etc.  He acts up a bit and is excused to go to the bathroom.

On the way there, he overhears what the science teacher, Mr. Ferris, is tell the other group of incoming students.  Here is what Mr. Ferris tells them:

"Within a year, possibly by next fall," he was saying, "something that has never before been done, will be done.  NASA will be sending men to the moon.  Think of that.  Men who were once in classrooms like this one will leave their footprints on the lunar surface."  He paused.  I leaned in close against the wall so I could hear him.  "That is why you are sitting here tonight, and why you will be coming here in the months ahead.  You come to dream dream.  You come to build fantastic castles into the air.  And you come to learn how to build the foundations that make those castles real.  When the men who will command that mission were boys your age, no one knew that they would walk on another world someday.  No one knew.  But in a few months, that's what will happen.  So, twenty years from now, what will people say of you?  'No one knew then that this kid from Washington Irving Junior High School would grow up to do".....what?  What castle will you build?"

Thank you, Mr. Ferris, and thank you, Gary Schmidt, for reminding us all what it is that we teachers and student get to do together.

How Do You Know When You Are Done?

Even though we homeschool, we are in our final push towards the end of "school."  Now, most of the homeschoolers I know consider that they homeschool year round.  However, at least in our community, most of the organized classes and coops and sports and such are organized around the traditional school calendar of August/September through April/May/June.  To some extent, that is just a practical economic decision--lots of facilities that host homeschoolers during the day when most students are in school can make a lot more money over the summer by running camps.  But I think most of us enjoy the break from the scheduled events and having to prepare classes and events for multiple students beyond our own, and use the summer to just homeschool on our own and to do the typical summer things with vacations and swimming and the like.  At least for us, summer is a good time to catch up on some of those things that we don't tend to do in groups--things like grammar and spelling and such.

But how do you know when you are done?  When you are homeschooling, which means you basically have the same teacher in the same "school" for as many years as you homeschool?

In our case, our local homeschool group holds an annual student showcase on the first Saturday in June each year.  Participating families get a table on which to display whatever they want to share about what they have been doing for the past 12 months.  We invite family members, friends, neighbors, and the general public to come, which helps the community better understand all the things that homeschoolers do. In addition, our children get to hear from someone besides US about the quality and interesting nature of the work they have been doing for the past year.  It is also an opportunity for the parents to assess all the things we have accomplished over the year (given that, overachievers that we tend to be, we tend to focus on all the things we HAVEN'T gotten around to doing), and that is a really good feeling.

Everyone does their showcase exhibits differently, but for the past several years, our family's focus has been on creating an electronic portfolio.  We create a DVD of me interviewing my son about what he thinks are the highlights from the past year in the different disciplines---language arts, history, science, math, art, etc.  The visuals behind his discussion of favorite or most valuable aspects of the past year's learning are photos or videos that relate to the project he is describing.  For us, that is the best way to remember, re-evaluate, and record all the many things we've done over a year of homeschooling.

However, since he is now in middle school (hence the name of this blog, right?),  I'm also starting to think about how to know when we are DONE done--as in, done with homeschooling and ready to move on to college or employment (or some combination of the two).    There was a great article in the Washington Post about that yesterday in their education section.  Entitled "How high school should really end," it describes one high school's graduation requirements beyond the typical standardized test.  Seniors at this school must develop a portfolio that demonstrates (1) their plans for the coming year; (2) proof of their competency in the major subject areas; and (3) the positive impact they have had on the world.  They must also present the results of a senior year project in which they show major learning through a significant project in the topic of their choosing.

I love this kind of thing as an end to our pre-collegiate education, and plan to do something like this when my son gets to an appropriate age and level.  I think that any student who can pull off the above will be ready to take on the world, whether it is through college, work, travel, volunteerism, or the other paths that young adults follow.

How NOT to Respond to Reports Critical of Wake County School Board

In case you missed the latest in the agony and the ecstasy that is the Wake County Public School System (WCPSS), here are this week's headlines for the leading educational stories in the local paper, the News and Observer:
3/12/11 (School Board Member) Goldman's child sent to out-of-zone school, soon followed by
3/15/11 (WCPSS Superintendent) Tata to look into transfer
(Short version: Board Member Goldman's middle school daughter was one of only 15 students out of the 140,000+ students in the system to receive a little-used administrative procedure to transfer out of her usual school choices that requires merely an oral request, rather than the more extensive paperwork necessary for traditional transfer requests.)

3/15/11 Play nice, audit tells board
(Short version: An outside audit conducted by Superintendent Tata's educational training organization concluded that the WCPSS school board's public fighting, disrespect for fellow board members, and even name calling was damaging the school system's image with the public and overshadowing all the good work the schools were doing. You can read the entire 52 page audit on the WPCSS website using this link.)

The biggie, however, was this one:
3/17/11 Schools lost Wake's trust, report says
(Short version: The WCPSS accrediting agency, AdvancED, is giving the school board one year to clean up its act or risk the system losing accreditation. AdvancED accused the Republican majority of alienating much of its constituency by giving inadequate notice of major action and ignoring data when making major policy decisions. Because the system's governance had created "a climate of uncertainty, suspicion, and mistrust throughout the community," AdvancED gave WCPSS its second toughest rating, Accreditation Warning," which means that it is a serious problem that must be addressed within a year in order to remain accredited. You can read the entire 15 page report on the WCPSS website using this link.)

That story broke, by the way, two days after Superintendent Tata presented his budget cuts for the 2011-2012 school year, and on the same day as Tata was meeting with officials of the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights, which is investigating WCPSS' elimination of its diversity policy.

My two-bit response to all this good news is:

YA THINK?
After a year in which school board meetings have become a zoo, with many citizens regularly protesting and even getting arrested, while the board members insult each other in front of the public, AND the NAACP is bringing lawsuits and administrative actions against the system, AND our school system has been publicly criticized from such national figures as the Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, former president Bill Clinton, and even Steven Colbert, AND just plain old residents such as myself are writing blog posts like Wake School Board Majority Should Be Ashamed....yes, I think it is reasonable to say that there are some serious governance issues here.

However, how are the Republicans responding to these critiques? Well, good old Apex Representative and NC House Majority Leader Paul Stam (sponsor of the bill to give tax credits to families who pull their children out of school in order to send them to private school or homeschools, which I wrote about in this blog post) is one of several Republicans who have introduced a bill to effectively bypass the well-established tradition among ALL of American education of outside accreditation, and instead create a state-run accrediting agency. The bill would also PROHIBIT any North Carolina higher education institutions (colleges, universities, or community colleges) from considering whether or not a candidate's high school is accredited when making admission, scholarship, or loan decisions. (You can read the full text of the bill, HR 342: High School Accreditation, through this link.)

I'm sorry, but I think this is the same "heads in the sand" thinking that I criticized the WCPSS board in my post Why Wake County Board Should Continue Accreditation with AdvancED. I know it sounds naive to say this, but if there is anything that should be above politics, it should be our children's future. A community will come to pieces if it can't trust the people responsible for their children's education. That is the point of OUTSIDE, NON-POLITICAL, UNBIASED accreditation agencies like AdvancED. They aren't Republicans, pushing more charter schools and lower budgets, etc., and they aren't Democrats, pushing more early intervention and social programs for disadvantage populations, etc. They come in without an agenda, and say, Are the policies fair? Are children being treated equally? Are people--teachers, administrators, support staff, and even BOARD MEMBERS--do their jobs right at the level of quality that the public deserves to expect? They also have a regional and national perspective, and can comment on how a system is doing vis-a-vis their peers in the state, area, and country.

A state agency will be immediately suspect of bias. Even if it can avoid a partisan bias, which seems difficult, given the increasing involvement of the NC legislature in educational issues, it will certainly seem to have a bias to continue accreditation of NC schools to maintain the state's reputation. I mean, isn't that why it is being created? What purpose would it serve but to provide NC schools with some alternative accreditation if AdvancED pulls their, as they are threatening to do in Wake and Burke county (coincidentally enough, most, if not all, of the co-sponsors of the bill come from those two counties).

Also, this view point is very provincial. Outside this state, college specify requirements of accreditation from regional accrediting organizations, so it would not help with the thousands of NC graduates who want to attend higher ed institutions outside of North Carolina. However, it would probably diminish the national reputation of North Carolina colleges and universities, not to mention setting a bad precedent of the legislature messing around in the UNC admissions policies. ( And I thought the Republicans were supposed to be the party of less government interference....)

Wake County can not continue to ignore the big rifts in our community over school issues. But things seem to be getting better since Superintendent Tata came on board. The Board has been acting more professionally. They actually managed to go on a weekend retreat and come back with something constructive. The WCPSS has been open about these critical reports and have posted them on their websites. I think the general mood is hopeful that some healing and compromises can take place. However, that is only possible if people feel that they have been listened to and respected, even if there are disagreements and ultimately their positions don't win. And it only works if people feel like they can trust their school system.

In my opinion, HR 342 would only make things worse, not better.