Cossaboon 1
Ashlee Cossaboon
EDEF607
Dr. Morrison
Final Paper
12/15/10
Throughout the semester we have studied many ideas about how the
American educational system should be run. While I have found many of the authors’ ideals to be too impractical and idealistic, here I sit to inscribe my own ideal refiguring of the United States school system. In my utopian educational system the curriculum would be balanced and include an Essentialist focus with a peppering of Social Reconstructionism, schools would be federally and equally funded, and schools would be held accountable through standardized testing (with realistic goals) and by professional inspectors who would provide both advice and a public performance score for the school. Putting my proposed system into place is virtually impossible because it would infringe upon state rights, require much more funding than is currently allocated, anger those who disagree with the values of
Social Reconstructivism, and upset people who want their money to go only to their children, or at least to children in their locality.
The eight goals of public education listed by Richard Rothstein in his book
Grading Education: Getting Accountability Right are hard to refute (Rothstein 14).
We currently have a focus on basic academic skills and knowledge in our curriculum, and I believe that this is necessary; we just have to make sure that this 2 focus does not become the only aspect of our curriculum that carries weight. I believe that it is important that we have an Essentialist curriculum, which embraces both the traditional canon of education and the new skills that will be important for our students’ success in the modern world. One example offered by Don Kauchak and Paul Eggen is the addition of technology and multicultural classes into the curriculum (Kauchak and Eggen 203). In my ideal world, the public education curriculum would never be stagnant. Through his essentialist speaker, William H.
Schubert states, “[t]aking a cue from one of the greatest [perennialists] of all […], I recall that Socrates warned that the unexamined life is not worth living. I want to add that the unexamined curriculum is not worth offering” (Schubert 16).
Essentialism takes the Perennialist curriculum that has been built over centuries and incorporates new, pertinent skills. Essentialism focuses on arming children with the tools that they need to survive in today’s society.
In my utopian society, this Essentialist curriculum would include some aspects of Social Reconstructionism, but only if they could be related to important
Essentialist skills. There are ways to foster discussions and activities that confront social injustice while learning basic academic knowledge and skills. In his book, The
Moral and Spiritual Miseducation of America’s Children, H. Svi Shapiro focuses on
Social Reconstructionism and argues that our current system of social mobility is harming our society. While there are flaws in the current educational system, I do not think that Social Reconstructionism alone is the answer. Basic academic knowledge and skills come first. Cossaboon 3
One easy way that we would incorporate Social Reconstructionism would be through cooperative learning as discussed by Shapiro (Shapiro 64). When I was teaching in China, we did group work in class every day except on the day of finals.
This way some of the stronger students could explain and “pull along” the students who had trouble understanding. This system worked very well for me: I assigned each group member a job, I rotated the jobs frequently (sometimes four times in one class period), and I circulated through the classroom to make sure that the “A- students” were explaining and encouraging and not just completing all the work for their group.
In an ideal world, in addition to a curriculum focused on Essentialism with a touch of Social Reconstructionism, my schools would be equipped with certified psychologists, nutritionists, and a pro-active physical education curriculum. Due to my own personal experiences in high school, I liked the emphasis that Rothstein placed on students learning emotional and physical health (Rothstein 14-15). With that in mind, I was terribly troubled when I read the results of Rothstein’s poll.
School board members, state legislators, and the author all listed emotional health as the least important goals for schools (Rothstein 43). How are teachers supposed to achieve all of the other goals on the list if their students are in emotional upheaval? Emotional and physical health are a minimum requirement for my
Essentialist/Social Reconstructionism curriculum to be successful.
Another requirement for the success of this system would, of course, be funds. In my dream educational system, schools would be federally and equally funded. A. R. Sadovnik states, 4
The debates over academic issues, begun at the turn of the twentieth
century, may be defined as the movement between pedagogical
progressivism and pedagogical traditionalism. This movement focuses
not only on the process of education but on its goals. At the center of
these debates are the questions regarding the type of education
children should receive and whether all children should receive the
same education. Although many of these debates focused on
curriculum and method, they ultimately were associated with the
question of equity versus excellence. (Sadovnik 72)
In my utopian world, we would be able to achieve excellence and equity. Students would have grades and other assessments, but they would receive equal funding.
Though the United States has a long history of states’ rights, I feel strongly that education should be federally funded. The clear answer to the current inequity in schools seems to be to federalize the school system. If everyone’s money goes into one pot then it would be easier to dole out equal amounts. In my tax system, families would not receive tax breaks for having children. It seems illogical that because people are increasing the population, straining our resources, and receiving public services by having children that they should pay less money into the communal money pot.
Linda Darling-Hammond points out that the stark differences in funding in our current system are not a global issue. She states,
Unlike most countries that fund schools centrally and equally, the
wealthiest U.S. public schools spend at least ten times more than the Cossaboon 5
poorest schools—ranging from over $30,000 per pupil at the wealthy
schools to only $3,000 at the poorest. These disparities contribute to a
wider achievement gap than in virtually any other industrialized
country in the world. (Darling-Hammond 6)
I think that we need a federal system that can equalize the amount of money spent on education between states. When Rothstein approached this idea, he seemed to contradict himself; he stated that he doesn’t believe in a federal monitoring system, but he does believe in a federal funding program (Rothstein 143-147). I don’t believe that you should have one without another. If I’m a New Jersey resident whose tax money is being exported to support education in Mississippi, I want the federal system that is taking my money to also be monitoring where that cash is going and to be holding that state accountable.
And so, in my ideal educational system, there would be a federal accountability system. While some people believe that the current federal accountability system (NCLB) was created to make public schools fail; I believe that most people honestly just wanted a way to gauge school quality and improve the system (Kohn 85). I don’t see a problem with high-stakes testing, except for the very fact that it is high-stakes. I believe that testing and creating standards is important to our education system, but that the expectations need to be more realistic and that our system should include more reward-based and less consequence-based incentives. I think that we should use testing and that students and teachers should be held accountable for the results; however, the grading scale cannot be arbitrary, 6 as some of our earlier readings indicated the Advanced/Proficient/Basic system currently in place is. We should test basic academic skills and subjects.
I agree with Stan Karp that schools should be measured on their progress with each child (Karp 55). He states:
Under AYP, the only thing that counts is the number of students who
score above the passing level on the state test. So on a test like New
Jersey’s High School Proficiency Assessment, where a passing score is
200, helping a bilingual special education student from a low-income
household raise his/her test score from, say, 50 to 199 counts for
nothing. In fact, such a score counts as a failure in four different
subgroups. Moving a student from 199 to 200 is success. (Karp 55)
In this hypothetical scenario, I can see that the school is being unfairly punished when they were improving; however, I do believe that if the student has not reached the required 200 score, that she should receive a failing score and have to retake the test. There should be differences in the ways school accountability and student accountability are measured. I believe that schools should be held accountable by professional evaluators, similar to the English system. The school should be judged by more complex methods, similar to those of the early NAEP. In my ideal system local school boards would control the money which is equally provided to each district, schools which perform at or above acceptable levels would continue to receive their funding directly to the school board, and schools which perform below acceptable levels would receive extra funds but also receive strict restrictions as to Cossaboon 7 how the money could be spent (they would also have more frequent and intensive inspections).
It would take a revolution to install my ideal educational system in the U.S. I agree with David F. Labaree that the idea of equal education for all citizens is impractical, even if it is desirable, in a capitalist state with socio-economic stratification. To fix the problem of funding would be impossible without a revolution—a complete overhaul of our governmental system and the foundations of our country. Equally funding schools violates the principles of capitalism and states’ rights, which has been engrained in the fabric of this country since the beginning. While this is not my personal belief, many Americans would ask: Why should my hard-earned money be taken out of my child’s school district—restricting his/her resources and education—to fund the education of someone else’s child?
The Declaration of Independence states that all Americans have the right to the
“pursuit of happiness;” it doesn’t guarantee a right to happiness or an equal starting point to reach it—every person’s race is a different length, they have different abilities, and they have different hurdles to jump (if they want to run the race at all).
Another issue, addressed by Gene V. Glass in his book, Fertilizers, Pills, and
Magnetic Strips: The Fate of Public Education in America, stems from our innate fear of and lack of concern for the Other. In her book Newly Born Woman, Hélène Cixous writes,
It is the other in a hierarchically organized relationship in which the
same is what rules, names, defines, and assigns “its” other. With the
dreadful simplicity that orders the movement Hegel erected as a 8
system, society trots along before my eyes reproducing to perfection
the mechanism of the death struggle: the reduction of a “person” to a
“nobody” to the position of “other”—the inexorable plot of racism.
There has to be some “other”—no master without a slave, no
economico-political power without exploitation, no dominant class
without cattle under the yoke, no “Frenchmen” without wogs, no
Nazis without Jews, no property without exclusion—an exclusion that
has its limits and is part of the dialectic. If there were no other, one
would invent it. (Cixous 71)
Unfortunately, it would be difficult to find support for equal funding for education until people begin to think of all races as equal.
Likewise, the addition of Social Reconstructionism activities into the curriculum may upset some parents and teachers. While I can see why teaching the difference between right and wrong is important in the classroom; whose ideas of right and wrong would we be teaching? Should the government mandate Standards of Morality? That sounds like a slippery slope towards the dystopian world of 1984, and I would like Big Brother to stay far away from my little educational utopia.
While it is lovely to dream, I believe the difficulties facing my educational ideal are insurmountable. Cossaboon 9
Works Cited
Cixous, Hélène. “Sorties: Out and Out: Attacks/Ways Out/Forays.” The Newly Born
Woman. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1986. Print.
Darling-Hammond, Linda. “1: From ‘Separate but Equal’ to ‘No Child Left Behind’:
The Collision of New Standards and Old Inequalities.” Many Children Left
Behind: How the No Child Left Behind Act is Damaging Our Children and Our
Schools. Boston: Beacon Press, 2004. Print.
Glass, Gene V. Fertilizers, Pills, and Magnetic Strips: The Fate of Public Education in
America. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing, 2008. Print.
Karp, Stan. “3:NCLB’s Selective Vision of Equality: Some Gaps Count More than
Others.” Many Children Left Behind: How the No Child Left Behind Act is
Damaging Our Children and Our Schools. Boston: Beacon Press, 2004. Print.
Kauchak, Don and Eggen, Paul. “Educational Philosophy: The Intellectual
Foundations of American Education.” Introduction to Teaching: Becoming a
Professional Fourth Edition. New York: Pearson, 2011. Print.
Labaree, David F. How to Succeed in School Without Really Learning: The Credentials
Race in American Education. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.
1997. Print.
Rothstein, Richard. Grading Education: Getting Accountability Right. Washington,
D.C. and New York: Economic Policy Institute and Teachers College Press.
2008. Print.
Sadovnik, A. R. “Chapter 3: The History of Education.” Exploring Education. Boston:
Pearson Publishing, 2006. Print. 10
Schubert, William H. “Perspectives on Four Curriculum Traditions.” Curriculum
Planning. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2000. Print.
Shapiro, H. Svi. Losing Heart: The Moral and Spiritual Miseducation of America’s
Children. New York and London: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. 2006. Print. Cossaboon 11
607 Final Paper Rubric Level of Performance Distinguished Proficient Basic Unsatisfactory
Written paper-mechanics, Spelling, There are 4-9 There are 10- There are 15+ formatting, feel punctuation, spelling, 15 spelling, spelling, (15%) grammar, and punctuation, punctuation, punctuation, phrasing are grammar, grammar, grammar, flawless or and/or and/or and/or there are only phrasing phrasing phrasing 1-3 errors. errors. errors. errors.
Length and The writing is The writing is Length and/or formatting are generally dull and formatting are correct (e.g. engaging, but unengaging. incorect margins, font has some dry Though the size, page spots. In paper has The writing has minimum) general, some little it is focused interesting personality. The writing is and keeps the parts, the The reader compelling. It reader's reader finds it quickly loses hooks the attention. difficult to interest and reader and maintain stops reading. sustains interest interest 7.5 pts or throughout. 12.75 pts 10.5 pts below
13.5-15 pts Bibliography and in-text APA format is APA format is There are Format of the references– format of used accurately used with frequent document is references and minor errors. errors in APA not (7%) consistently in format. recognizable as the paper and APA. For this, please use resources on the 5.95 pts available on WebCT, meet “References" 4.9 pts 3.5 pts or with me or with someone at page. below library or LARC if you have 7 pts any questions about how to do proper APA. Organization The ideas are The ideas are In general, the The writing is arranged arranged writing is not logically (8%) logically. They logically. They arranged organized. flow smoothly are usually logically, Frequently, from one to clearly linked although ideas fail to another and are to each other. occasionally make sense clearly linked to For the most ideas fail to together. The each other. The part, the reader make reader cannot reader can can follow the sense identify a follow the line line of together. The line of of reasoning. reasoning. reader is reasoning and fairly clear loses interest. 7.2 -8 pts 6.8 pts about what writer 4 pts or below intends. 12
5.6 pts
Level of Performance Distinguished Proficient Basic Unsatisfactory
Quality of What do Does Student Something is Multiple things response you think everything responds to this lacking, listed are lacking, schools listed in question, below: listed below: (complete- should be proficient level, showing an ness, seeking to but also has understanding connection do? What “something” of possible s to course would be extra – perhaps options for content) the specific a very original school goals end goals take on the and their 70% that you question, useful philosophical seek? examples, underpinnings. insightful (17.5%) connections, an 14.875 points extra thoroughness, or an in-depth 12.25 points 8.75 or below connection to course content
17.5 points Is public, tax Does Student Something is Multiple things support everything responds to this lacking, listed are lacking, necessary to listed in question, below: listed below: meet this proficient level, showing an goal for but also has understanding every child? “something” of how schools (should extra – perhaps are currently schools be a very original financed as well publicly take on the as other funded?) question, useful possible ways examples, that they could insightful be funded. (17.5%) connections, an extra 14.875 points thoroughness, or an in-depth 12.25 points 8.75 or below connection to course content
17.5 points How would Does Student Something is Multiple things you hold everything responds to this lacking, listed are lacking, schools listed in question, below: listed below: accountable proficient level, showing an for meeting but also has understanding these end “something” of how schools goals? extra – perhaps are currently a very original held (17.5%) take on the accountable as question, useful well as other Cossaboon 13
examples, possible means insightful ways to hold connections, an schools extra accountable for thoroughness, meeting goals. or an in-depth 12.25 points 8.75 or below connection to 14.875 points course content. 17.5 points What Does Student Something is Multiple things difficulties everything responds to this lacking, listed are lacking, would we listed in question, below: listed below: face in trying proficient level, showing an to shift from but also has understanding where we “something” of the are to where extra – perhaps intersections you want us a very original between to be in take on the education and education? question, useful politics, examples, economics, insightful historical and (17.5%) connections, an cultural forces. extra thoroughness, 14.875 points or an in-depth 12.25 points 8.75 or below connection to course content
17.5 points
Total ______/100