ICYMI – I wrote about Virginia ed politics here. About this week’s interagency agreements here. Nat Malkus, Rick Hess, and I discuss the goings on here on The Report Card.
I was at a gathering recently, and a Silicon Valley person who had transitioned into education was talking about how he approaches personnel decisions—basically using data: replacing lowest-performers each year. Essentially, the idea is that it’s a coin flip, but if your selection process is genuinely reliable, the odds will be in your favor.
A more traditional education person in the conversation had a host of questions—about support, counseling, and various other things.
The exchange was fascinating to watch because they were talking past each other and quite literally didn’t understand one another or what was being said. It was a real Mars–Venus culture clash.
We have to figure out how to talk the same language because we’re staring down a serious problem. The past few days have seen a flurry of articles from writers who are not traditional characters on the education beat. And they point up a culture clash that isn’t R and D, left or right—it’s more about who thinks we have a serious problem and who thinks the erosion of standards isn’t a big deal, or is acceptable in service of other goals.
What these three recent stories have in common is stark takes calling attention to an issue that doesn’t get enough attention: it’s not only poor, Black, or Hispanic students struggling in schools. Subpar learning is widespread.
Andrew Rice wrote about the situation in tony Montclair, New Jersey, for New York Magazine.
At The Argument Kelsey Piper dug into the UCSD math issue, which is hardly only a problem at UCSD or in California.
She followed it up with a look at what this is actually about and why, despite howls of protest from people who are OK with the status quo, no one is saying everyone will be an engineer, we’re talking about pretty low-level skills that can be universal. And what no one seems to be talking about is the skilled part of skilled trades, you have to be able to do math to be successful if you chose to do something besides college. Actually more. Technical jobs require more math than sociology.
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This is the kind of math we’re talking about at the 8th-grade level. If you’re not able to do this you’re going to struggle in the skilled trades or higher education.
Where does it all lead? Rose Horowitch dug into that for The Atlantic.
All three articles are worth reading, and all three point up a real problem whether you approach it from the vantage point of personal agency, freedom, and choice—or American competitiveness.
The only thing missing? Political traction to address it in too many places. As Tom Kane notes in the New York Magazine article:
What’s stunning is just how much professionals tolerate—and, in some cases, contribute to—obfuscation as a matter of course. We’ve discredited measurement, transparency, and the idea that performance matters, and we’ve baked it into the political price.
Perhaps that’s why political traction for such an obvious, and real, problem is so elusive?
*That’s a misquote. The actual statement from the damaged Apollo 13 was, “we’ve had a problem.” You can listen here.
Friday Fish Porn
Here’s Bellwether’s managing partner Rebecca Goldberg with a nice one in the Roaring Fork Valley of Colorado (from a few weeks ago when it was warmer, if you missed the context clues). Good time to point you toward Bellwether’s new strategic plan for the next several years, learn more here.
This picture is part of this one of a kind archive with hundreds of pictures of education types and their relatives with fish from rivers, lakes, and streams all over the world. Send me yours.
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