Posted on November 4, 2010
Education historian Diane Ravitch zoomed in on San Diego Unified in her recent book, examining the battles over school reform under former Superintendent Alan Bersin.
She concluded that Bersin had chosen the wrong way to change schools, imposing changes from the top. We did a Q&A with her this summer about that book and her thoughts on San Diego.
Now that San Diego Unified has opted for a different, grassroots model of school reform, Ravitch visited San Diego for a talk last night with teachers, parents and community members.
I sat down for a quick chat with her beforehand.
On critical thinking, a pillar of the school district's new reform plans:
These things are not easily measured. A month ago I spoke at an event in Los Angeles and a teacher told me that she gave students word problems every September, saying, "Give me strategies to solve the problem." The kids would say, "You start by eliminating the wrong answers."
What that suggests and symbolizes is a lack of critical thinking, an inability to think creatively or originally. We're not encouraging those things.
On what to keep in mind as San Diego Unified takes a bottom-up approach to reform:
The dangers are things can be so decentralized that there's no sense of direction. It's
How Einstein Started Solving Its Math Problem| 6:36 pmThe math scores at Einstein Academy didn't add up. Kids aced math in the younger grades at the South Park school, a respected charter with enviable test scores.
Yet when they hit algebra, their scores plummeted. Three years ago, just 9 percent of eighth graders in its sister middle school were proficient in algebra on state tests — even kids who seemed to be math whizzes before.
Instead of jumping on algebra and assuming that something was amiss in eighth
Not-So-Required Reading on Teacher Tenure| 2:14 pmWant to learn more about teacher tenure? After you learn the basics with our explainer on teacher job protections, check out these articles and studies to learn more:
• Try this very probing article to understand why teachers fought so hard for tenure in the first place. Time Magazine provides some of the same history in a quicker read. Hat tip to reader Erik Bruvold to recommending it!
• The think tank National Council on Teacher Quality focused on improving the teaching pool as a key way to help schools. It gave California a D- for getting rid of
Teachers' job protections are probably the most toxic topic in education, so much so that educators even disagree over what to call them.
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