Contradictions & ed deform
Has anyone else noticed that the talk and actions don’t jibe?
For example, experienced, high quality teachers are held up as the ideal; people bemoan when poor kids don’t get to have them. On the other hand, recent college graduates with five or six-weeks of summer training are held up as a model of perfection. Which is it folks?
Then there’s class size. Some people argue that class size really doesn’t matter all that much; it's only a matter of teachers trying harder. But then small class sizes with benefits touted are used as a main selling point to entice parents into both elite private and charter schools. Which is it folks?
There’s also the issue about reading. If the universal achievement of high reading levels is as important as everyone says it is, then why have school libraries been utterly abandoned in the schools where children need them most, one reason being because they have so few books in their homes?
For instance, in 1999, Oakland Unified had librarians and functioning libraries in every of its middle and high schools (14 middle schools + six comprehensive high schools = 20 secondary school librarians). Today, after ten years of the standards and accountability movement and with the closure and/or break-up of secondary
For example, experienced, high quality teachers are held up as the ideal; people bemoan when poor kids don’t get to have them. On the other hand, recent college graduates with five or six-weeks of summer training are held up as a model of perfection. Which is it folks?
Then there’s class size. Some people argue that class size really doesn’t matter all that much; it's only a matter of teachers trying harder. But then small class sizes with benefits touted are used as a main selling point to entice parents into both elite private and charter schools. Which is it folks?
There’s also the issue about reading. If the universal achievement of high reading levels is as important as everyone says it is, then why have school libraries been utterly abandoned in the schools where children need them most, one reason being because they have so few books in their homes?
For instance, in 1999, Oakland Unified had librarians and functioning libraries in every of its middle and high schools (14 middle schools + six comprehensive high schools = 20 secondary school librarians). Today, after ten years of the standards and accountability movement and with the closure and/or break-up of secondary
