Rachel Wilson, Bronwen Dalton & Chris Baumann | 16th Mar 2015 10:09 AM
AMID debates about budget cuts and the rising costs of schools and degrees, there is one debate receiving alarmingly little attention in Australia. We're facing a slow decline in most educational standards, and few are aware just how bad the situation is getting.
These are just six of the ways that Australia's education system is seriously failing our kids.
1. Australian teens are falling behind, as others race ahead
The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) survey tests the skills and knowledge of 15-year-old students in more than 70 economies worldwide. And it shows that Australian 15-year-olds' scores on reading, maths and scientific literacy have recorded statistically significant declines since 2000, while other countries have shown improvement.
Although there has been much media attention on falling international ranks, it is actually this decline in real scores that should hit the headlines. That's because it means that students in 2000 answered substantially more questions correctly than students in 2012. The decline is equivalent to more than half a year of schooling.
Our students are falling behind: three years behind students from Shanghai in maths and 1½ years behind in reading.
In maths and science, an average Australian 15-year-old student has the problem-solving abilities equivalent to an average 12-year-old Korean pupil.
An international assessment of school years 4 and 8 shows that Australian students' average performance is now below that of England and the USA: countries that we used to classify as educationally inferior.
The declining education standards are across all ability levels. Analysis of PISA and NAPLAN suggests that stagnation and decline are occurring among high performing students as well as low performers.
2. Declining participation in science and maths
It has been estimated that 75% of the fastest growing occupations require science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) skills and knowledge.
The importance of STEM is acknowledged by industry and business. Yet there are national declines in Australian participation and attainment in these subjects. We are also among the bottom of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development's (OECD) 34 nations on translation of education investment to innovation, which is highly dependent upon STEM.
Fewer than one in ten Australian students studied advanced maths in year 12 in 2013. In particular, there has been a collapse in girls studying maths and science.
A national gender breakdown shows that just 6.6% of girls sat for advanced mathematics in 2013; that's half the rate for boys, and represents a 23% decline since 2004. In New South Wales, a tiny 1.5% of girls take the trio of advanced maths, physics and chemistry.
Maths is not a requirement at senior secondary level in NSW, Victoria and Western Australia, although it is compulsory in South Australia, and to a small extent in Queensland and the Northern Territory. In NSW, the requirement for Higher School Certificate (HSC) maths or science study was removed in 2001. The national curriculum also makes no requirement for maths or science study after Year 10.
Australia is just about the only developed nation that does not make it compulsory to study maths in order to graduate from high school.
A recent report by the Productivity Commission found almost one-quarter of Australians are capable of only basic mathematics, such as counting. Many universities now have to offer basic (school level) maths and literacy development courses to support students in their study. These outcomes look extremely concerning when we review participation and achievement in maths and science internationally.
3. Australian education is monolingual
In 2013, the proportion of students studying a foreign language is at historic lows. For example in NSW, only 8% studied a foreign language for their HSC, the lowest percentage ever recorded.
In NSW, the number of HSC students studying Chinese in 2014 was just 798 (635 of which were students with a Chinese background), whereas a decade ago it was almost double that number, with 1,591.
The most popular beginner language in NSW was French, with 663 HSC students taking French as a beginner in 2013. These numbers are extremely small when you consider that the total number of HSC students in NSW: more than 75,000.
These declines, which are typical of what has happened around the country, have occurred at a time when most other industrialised countries have been strengthening their students' knowledge of other cultures and languages, in particular learning English.
English language skills are becoming a basic skill around the world. Monolingual Australians are increasingly competing for jobs with people who are just as competent in English as they are in their own native language - and possibly one or two more.
4. International and migrant students are actually raising standards, not lowering them
There are many who believe that Australian education is being held back by our multicultural composition and high proportion of migrant students. This could not be further from the truth. In the most recent PISA assessment of 15 year olds, Australian-born students' average English literacy score was significantly lower than the average first-generation migrant students' score, and not significantly different from foreign-born students.
The proportion of top performers was higher for foreign-born (14%) and first-generation students (15%) than for Australian-born students (10%).
Students from Chinese, Korean and Sri Lankan backgrounds are the highest performers in the NSW HSC. The top performing selective secondary schools in NSW now have more than 80% of students coming from non-English speaking backgrounds.
5. You can't have quality education without quality teachers
While there are many factors that may contribute to teacher quality, the overall academic attainment of those entering teaching degrees is an obvious and measurable component, which has been the focus of rigorous standards in many countries.
An international benchmarking study indicates that Australia's teacher education policies are currently falling well short of high-achieving countries where future teachers are recruited from the top 30% of the age cohort.
In Australia between 1983 and 2003, the standard intake was from the top 26% to 39%. By 2012/2013, less than half of Year 12 students receiving offers for places in undergraduate teacher education courses had ATAR scores in the top 50% of their age cohort.
Teacher education degrees also had the highest percentage of students entering with low ATAR scores, and the proportion of teacher education entrants with an ATAR of less than 50 nearly doubled over the past three years. We cannot expect above-average education with below-average teachers.
6. Early learning participation is amongst the lowest in the developed world
While Australia has recently lifted levels of investment in early childhood education, this investment has not been reflected in high levels of early childhood participation. In Australia, just 18% of 3 year olds participated in early childhood education, compared with 70% on average across the OECD. In this respect, we rank at 34 out of 36 OECD and partner countries.
Australia also ranks at 22 out of 37 on the OECD league table that measures the total investment across education as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product.
While low levels of expenditure and participation curtail any system, there is more negative impact from a lack of investment in early childhood than there would be from a lack of funding further up the educational chain. Nobel prize winner James Heckmann has shown how investment in early childhood produces the greatest returns to society.
What to do?
Funding is a critical issue, and not just in terms of what you spend, but also how you spend it. Research suggests spending on early childhood, quality teaching and core curriculum have the greatest returns on investment.
There is also growing evidence to suggest that a segregated schooling system - for example, socio-economically or academically selective schools - is counterproductive and restricts social mobility. High-performing countries have school systems on a far more level playing field than Australia.
We need a long-term plan across education sectors: from early childhood, to schools, universities and TAFE, which includes plans for supporting and strengthening teacher education in all those sectors.
We also need a louder public conversation about Australian education, and lobbying to shift how we value and invest in education.
When Germany was shocked by its first performance on the 2000 PISA assessment, it started a national conversation that saw education on the front page of newspapers for the next two years. Germany's education has been improving ever since.
If Australia wants to build a strong and competitive economy, we need fewer front page articles about budget cuts, and more on reform and investment in education.
- Rachel Wilson is Senior Lecturer in Research Methodology / Educational Assessment & Evaluation at University of Sydney; Bronwen Dalton is Senior Lecturer, School of Management at University of Technology, Sydney; Chris Baumann is Senior Lecturer in Business at Macquarie University
*Source
Plan to end personalized education plans for students raises concern
A bill introduced in the state Senate this week would eliminate the requirement for teachers to complete personalized education plans for academically struggling students.
Sen. Jerry Tillman, R-Randolph, introduced the bill on Wednesday, N.C. Policy Watch reported Friday.
State law has required the plans,
also called PEPs, since 2001. They are considered a tool for complying
with the Leandro v. State of North Carolina ruling that affirms every
North Carolina child’s right to basic public education.
The bill still has a ways to go
become law, but the threat of losing the PEP requirement has some
advocates concerned about potential harm to already disadvantaged
students.
“Removing PEPs would negatively
affect a layer of accountability and has the potential to impact having
more at-risk students,” said Lissa Harris, co-founder of the advocacy
group Parents Supporting Parents. The plans are one of many components
that have been created to improve academics and provide a monitoring and
communication tool between school, parents and students by documenting
intervention plans.”
The bill, coupled with other
changes in requirements for high school diplomas, would mean students
not performing at or above grade level as measured by standardized tests
will not be ready for college or a career, Harris said.
The PEPs help students who are
not performing on grade level, she said. That group includes more than
students with disabilities, she said.
“North Carolina students have a
constitutional right to a sound, basic education,” she said. “Removing
PEPs will negatively impact North Carolina students.”
Contact Marquita Brown at (336) 373-7002, and follow @mbrownNR on Twitter.
*http://www.news-record.com/blogs/the_chalkboard/plan-to-end-personalized-education-plans-for-students-raises-concern/article_4827dbb8-c9ce-11e4-9535-c3c25f309a13.htmlSource
*http://www.news-record.com/blogs/the_chalkboard/plan-to-end-personalized-education-plans-for-students-raises-concern/article_4827dbb8-c9ce-11e4-9535-c3c25f309a13.htmlSource
Education: Start of something big
Kathy Melky says jobs as educators don't come any better than being part of the development of a new school.
Melky is principal of Cammeraygal High School, a newly-established co-educational comprehensive high school for years 7-10 on the lower North Shore of Sydney. The school opened on January 28 for year 7 students and will grow each year to eventually accommodate 500 students.
As principal, Melky says she has been involved with all aspects of planning of the school since the end of 2014.
"I've had the exciting task of working with our parent body to name the school, design the uniform and logo, and choose a motto, 'Empowered to Achieve'," she says. "I've worked closely with the architects and project managers over that time to refine the final design and physical elements of the school."
Melky is principal of Cammeraygal High School, a newly-established co-educational comprehensive high school for years 7-10 on the lower North Shore of Sydney. The school opened on January 28 for year 7 students and will grow each year to eventually accommodate 500 students.
As principal, Melky says she has been involved with all aspects of planning of the school since the end of 2014.
"I've had the exciting task of working with our parent body to name the school, design the uniform and logo, and choose a motto, 'Empowered to Achieve'," she says. "I've worked closely with the architects and project managers over that time to refine the final design and physical elements of the school."
LASG Honours Education Sector Partners
The Class of 26 of the Advanced
Management Programme simpy referred to as the AMP 26 Class of the Lagos
Business School was recently honoured by the Lagos State Government at a
breakfast meeting with Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola for their
contribution to the development of education in the state.
Other recipients of the State Awards were Dangote Industries, Total E & P Nig Ltd, Citi Bank, Globacom, Julius Berger, MTN and reputable individuals and organisations.
The reception/award ceremony, which held at the Lagos City Hall,
Catholic Mission Street, Lagos, was in recognition of their partnership
with the state government, the various interventions and the CSR support
in the state’s educational sector.
Other recipients of the State Awards were Dangote Industries, Total E & P Nig Ltd, Citi Bank, Globacom, Julius Berger, MTN and reputable individuals and organisations.
President of AMP 26, Mr. Abidemi Sonoiki, who received the award on
behalf of his coleagues, dedicated it to God, stating that his group was
encouraged to continue to support initiatives that restore and uplift
the standard of education. He noted that the efficient governance
structue of the Lagos State Government has positioned it to attract
private sector led support in the funding of some key initiatives within
the educational.
Addressing the awardees, Governor Fashola argued that governance was
more complex today than it was some 40 years ago. According to him, the
challenges government was faced with today were not the same as those
of then.
“Then government owned a few schools and had the core business of
regulation and setting standard, but now, there are thousands of
government schools. Any Initiative that supports public school in Lagos
State is a welcome development,” the governor said
Startup Aims to Provide a Bridge to Education
By Matina Stevis and Simon Clark
Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg invest in African education
MASII, Kenya—An army of teachers wielding Nook tablets and backed by investors including Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg is on a mission to bring inexpensive, private education to millions of the world’s poorest children.
In rural Kenya, 6-year-old Sharon Ndunge, sitting in a rough-built classroom with chicken-coop wire for windows, a tin roof and wooden benches, is among 126,000 students enrolled at the more than 400 Bridge International Academies that have sprung up across the country since the company was founded in 2009.
Bridge’s founders are challenging the long-held assumption that governments rather than companies should lead mass education programs. The company’s goal is to eventually educate 10 million children and make money by expanding its standardized, Internet-based education model across Africa and Asia.
The Internet and Barnes & Noble Inc. Nook tablets are used to deliver lesson plans, which are then used by teachers. The tablets also are used to collect test results from students scattered across hundreds of towns and villages and serve as a means of monitoring their progress.
“It’s like running Starbucks,” said Greg Mauro, a partner at California-based venture-capital firm Learn Capital LLC, the largest shareholder in Bridge with a 15% stake, likening it to the coffee chain with standardized systems and procedures that can be replicated across new locations. If all goes to plan, the American-run, Nairobi-based education startup will seek a stock-market listing in New York in 2017, according to Mr. Mauro.
Mr. Mauro has invested alongside Microsoft co-founder Mr. Gates, e-Bay Inc. founder Pierre Omidyar’s Omidyar Network, textbook publisher Pearson PLC and others who already have put more than $100 million into the company, of which about 90% is equity investments, according to Bridge. Facebook Inc. co-founder Mr. Zuckerberg this month invested $10 million in the company, according to Bridge. The investment comes as the social-network company expands into emerging markets to potentially reach billions of new customers.
Mr. Gates saw “significant innovation in the approach and wanted to support it personally,” said a spokeswoman for Mr. Gates.
Bridge co-founder Shannon May said Bridge is more cost-effective than state-funded Kenyan schools and provides better teaching. Kenyan public schoolteachers spent an average of two hours and 40 minutes teaching a day, according to a 2013 World Bank report, and 45% of teachers weren’t doing their jobs: 16% were absent from school, 27% were at school but not in class and 2% were in class but not teaching. By contrast, Bridge said its teachers teach for more than eight hours each day, and there is unexcused teacher absenteeism of less than 1%.
Bridge’s revenue is in the “low double digits” of millions of dollars, Ms. May said. She estimates it will be $500 million in 10 years.
This lofty growth forecast for a company that hasn’t turned a profit rests on the hopes of people like Jacinda Ndunge, Sharon’s mother, who spends $6.50 of her monthly $100 income from her vegetable stall to send her daughter to Bridge. A big attraction for her was more attentive teachers and a smaller class size than at a free state school, she said. Bridge’s average class has 30 pupils. At some Kenyan state schools, the student-to-teacher ratio is 100-to-1, according to the teachers union.
“At state school, many times the teacher did not go to class,” Ms. Ndunge said. “Sharon comes home with homework to do and is happy to go to school.”
Bridge teachers on average make 10,000 Kenyan shillings a month, about $110, less than half what state teachers make but more than most other comparable schools, said Ms. May. There are other private, inexpensive schools, most of which are religious or organized by individual communities. Bridge said its advantage is that the quality of education is better through the use of technology and standardized procedures.
Last month, Bridge opened its first seven schools in Uganda and plans another 65 or so by year-end. It then plans to move into Nigeria by the end of 2015 and to India in the second half of 2016.
To be sure, some critics said it is a step backward for poor people to pay for education and question the standardized teaching model.
“There’s something about it that flies in the face of progress,” said David Archer, head of program development at Action Aid, a London-based nonprofit, antipoverty organization who has campaigned for universal free education for two decades. “There are individual needs of individual kids. Does this standardization zeal actually give better education to children?”
Ms. May defended Bridge’s teaching model. “Just because the class is scripted doesn’t mean the tablet is restrictive,” Ms. May said. “Children do interrupt with questions, teachers do go off script.”
Bridge’s progress comes as for-profit companies play an ever-bigger role in Africa’s development, seeking to make money through businesses that often serve a social purpose. Private-equity fundraising for investment in sub-Saharan Africa more than tripled to a record $4 billion in 2014 from the year before, according to the Washington-based Emerging Markets Private Equity Association. Private-equity firms also have invested in African health-care services, nurseries and for-profit universities.
Providing education to Africa’s poorest has historically been the domain of governments and charities. Ms. May, 38 years old, is an anthropologist who first became interested in education as a means of lifting people out of subsistence living in rural communities while she carried out postdoctoral research in China.
Along with Bridge’s other founders, she saw a business opportunity as the Kenyan government struggled to keep up with booming enrollment rates.
Bridge’s rapid expansion isn’t without potential roadblocks. “A big risk is that Bridge grows too quickly and neglects quality,” said James Tooley, a professor of education policy at the U.K.’s Newcastle University and an advocate of low-cost private schools.
Ms. May acknowledges growth comes with big and often unpredictable challenges. When moving teachers to train in Uganda, for example, Bridge staff got embroiled in a standoff with Ugandan authorities suspicious that they were possibly transferring aspiring jihadists to training camps. The situation was settled peacefully.
And in Kenya, Bridge students almost missed an important national exam because there was no government regulation in place dealing with how children not attending traditional private or public schools take such tests. The incident was eventually resolved.
“The biggest challenge that Bridge will face in any market is going to be regulatory,” said Amy Klement, a partner at Omidyar Network.
Investors said the Nook tablet is at the heart of what makes Bridge work. All class plans, tests and additional materials are uploaded on it. Teachers manually enter test results through the tablet, and every piece of information is stored electronically. Bridge also monitors teachers through the tablet. For example, if a teacher doesn’t sign into the tablet one day, Bridge can call the teacher to find out why.
“All Bridge’s systems have been designed with the view of getting to millions of students,” said David Easton, an investment director at CDC Group PLC, a London-based investor in Bridge.
A 2013 report commissioned by Bridge by an outside research firm indicates Bridge students score better in literacy and numeracy tests than peers attending nearby public schools.
But overall, separate research doesn’t show an advantage of low-cost private schools over state schools. A report by the U.K. government’s Department for International Development found “little to no evidence” low-cost private schools are better than state schools. The same department is an investor in Bridge academies.
Write to Matina Stevis at matina.stevis@wsj.com and Simon Clark at simon.clark@wsj.com
*Source
Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg invest in African education
MASII, Kenya—An army of teachers wielding Nook tablets and backed by investors including Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg is on a mission to bring inexpensive, private education to millions of the world’s poorest children.
In rural Kenya, 6-year-old Sharon Ndunge, sitting in a rough-built classroom with chicken-coop wire for windows, a tin roof and wooden benches, is among 126,000 students enrolled at the more than 400 Bridge International Academies that have sprung up across the country since the company was founded in 2009.
Bridge’s founders are challenging the long-held assumption that governments rather than companies should lead mass education programs. The company’s goal is to eventually educate 10 million children and make money by expanding its standardized, Internet-based education model across Africa and Asia.
The Internet and Barnes & Noble Inc. Nook tablets are used to deliver lesson plans, which are then used by teachers. The tablets also are used to collect test results from students scattered across hundreds of towns and villages and serve as a means of monitoring their progress.
“It’s like running Starbucks,” said Greg Mauro, a partner at California-based venture-capital firm Learn Capital LLC, the largest shareholder in Bridge with a 15% stake, likening it to the coffee chain with standardized systems and procedures that can be replicated across new locations. If all goes to plan, the American-run, Nairobi-based education startup will seek a stock-market listing in New York in 2017, according to Mr. Mauro.
Mr. Mauro has invested alongside Microsoft co-founder Mr. Gates, e-Bay Inc. founder Pierre Omidyar’s Omidyar Network, textbook publisher Pearson PLC and others who already have put more than $100 million into the company, of which about 90% is equity investments, according to Bridge. Facebook Inc. co-founder Mr. Zuckerberg this month invested $10 million in the company, according to Bridge. The investment comes as the social-network company expands into emerging markets to potentially reach billions of new customers.
Mr. Gates saw “significant innovation in the approach and wanted to support it personally,” said a spokeswoman for Mr. Gates.
Bridge co-founder Shannon May said Bridge is more cost-effective than state-funded Kenyan schools and provides better teaching. Kenyan public schoolteachers spent an average of two hours and 40 minutes teaching a day, according to a 2013 World Bank report, and 45% of teachers weren’t doing their jobs: 16% were absent from school, 27% were at school but not in class and 2% were in class but not teaching. By contrast, Bridge said its teachers teach for more than eight hours each day, and there is unexcused teacher absenteeism of less than 1%.
Bridge’s revenue is in the “low double digits” of millions of dollars, Ms. May said. She estimates it will be $500 million in 10 years.
This lofty growth forecast for a company that hasn’t turned a profit rests on the hopes of people like Jacinda Ndunge, Sharon’s mother, who spends $6.50 of her monthly $100 income from her vegetable stall to send her daughter to Bridge. A big attraction for her was more attentive teachers and a smaller class size than at a free state school, she said. Bridge’s average class has 30 pupils. At some Kenyan state schools, the student-to-teacher ratio is 100-to-1, according to the teachers union.
“At state school, many times the teacher did not go to class,” Ms. Ndunge said. “Sharon comes home with homework to do and is happy to go to school.”
Bridge teachers on average make 10,000 Kenyan shillings a month, about $110, less than half what state teachers make but more than most other comparable schools, said Ms. May. There are other private, inexpensive schools, most of which are religious or organized by individual communities. Bridge said its advantage is that the quality of education is better through the use of technology and standardized procedures.
Last month, Bridge opened its first seven schools in Uganda and plans another 65 or so by year-end. It then plans to move into Nigeria by the end of 2015 and to India in the second half of 2016.
To be sure, some critics said it is a step backward for poor people to pay for education and question the standardized teaching model.
“There’s something about it that flies in the face of progress,” said David Archer, head of program development at Action Aid, a London-based nonprofit, antipoverty organization who has campaigned for universal free education for two decades. “There are individual needs of individual kids. Does this standardization zeal actually give better education to children?”
Ms. May defended Bridge’s teaching model. “Just because the class is scripted doesn’t mean the tablet is restrictive,” Ms. May said. “Children do interrupt with questions, teachers do go off script.”
Bridge’s progress comes as for-profit companies play an ever-bigger role in Africa’s development, seeking to make money through businesses that often serve a social purpose. Private-equity fundraising for investment in sub-Saharan Africa more than tripled to a record $4 billion in 2014 from the year before, according to the Washington-based Emerging Markets Private Equity Association. Private-equity firms also have invested in African health-care services, nurseries and for-profit universities.
Providing education to Africa’s poorest has historically been the domain of governments and charities. Ms. May, 38 years old, is an anthropologist who first became interested in education as a means of lifting people out of subsistence living in rural communities while she carried out postdoctoral research in China.
Along with Bridge’s other founders, she saw a business opportunity as the Kenyan government struggled to keep up with booming enrollment rates.
Bridge’s rapid expansion isn’t without potential roadblocks. “A big risk is that Bridge grows too quickly and neglects quality,” said James Tooley, a professor of education policy at the U.K.’s Newcastle University and an advocate of low-cost private schools.
Ms. May acknowledges growth comes with big and often unpredictable challenges. When moving teachers to train in Uganda, for example, Bridge staff got embroiled in a standoff with Ugandan authorities suspicious that they were possibly transferring aspiring jihadists to training camps. The situation was settled peacefully.
And in Kenya, Bridge students almost missed an important national exam because there was no government regulation in place dealing with how children not attending traditional private or public schools take such tests. The incident was eventually resolved.
“The biggest challenge that Bridge will face in any market is going to be regulatory,” said Amy Klement, a partner at Omidyar Network.
Investors said the Nook tablet is at the heart of what makes Bridge work. All class plans, tests and additional materials are uploaded on it. Teachers manually enter test results through the tablet, and every piece of information is stored electronically. Bridge also monitors teachers through the tablet. For example, if a teacher doesn’t sign into the tablet one day, Bridge can call the teacher to find out why.
“All Bridge’s systems have been designed with the view of getting to millions of students,” said David Easton, an investment director at CDC Group PLC, a London-based investor in Bridge.
A 2013 report commissioned by Bridge by an outside research firm indicates Bridge students score better in literacy and numeracy tests than peers attending nearby public schools.
But overall, separate research doesn’t show an advantage of low-cost private schools over state schools. A report by the U.K. government’s Department for International Development found “little to no evidence” low-cost private schools are better than state schools. The same department is an investor in Bridge academies.
Write to Matina Stevis at matina.stevis@wsj.com and Simon Clark at simon.clark@wsj.com
*Source
Methodology: 2016 Best Medical Schools Rankings
For the U.S. News rankings of the Best Medical Schools for research, the
130 medical schools fully accredited in 2014 by the Liaison Committee
on Medical Education and the 26 schools of osteopathic medicine fully
accredited in 2014 by the American Osteopathic Association were surveyed
in fall 2014 and early 2015. Of
those schools, 118 provided the data needed to calculate the rankings
based on the indicators used in the medical school research model.
The same 156 medical schools were surveyed at the same time for the primary care rankings; 118 schools provided the data needed to calculate those rankings.
Both rankings are based on a weighted average of indicators, which are outlined below. The medical school research model is based on eight indicators, and the primary care model is based on seven indicators.
Four of the data indicators are used in both the research and primary care ranking models. They are the student selectivity admissions statistics (MCAT, GPA and acceptance rate) and faculty-to-student ratio. The medical school research model factors in research activity; the medical school primary care model adds a measure of the proportion of graduates entering primary care specialties.
[See the Best Medical Schools rankings.]
Quality assessment (weighted by 0.40)
Peer assessment score (0.20 for the research medical school model; 0.25 for the primary care medical school model): In fall 2014, medical and osteopathic school deans, deans of academic affairs and heads of internal medicine or the directors of admissions were asked to rate programs on a scale from 1 (marginal) to 5 (outstanding). Survey populations were asked to rate program quality for both research and primary care programs separately on a single survey instrument.
Those individuals who did not know enough about a school to evaluate it fairly were asked to mark "don't know." A school's score is the average rating of all the respondents who rated it. Responses of "don't know" counted neither for nor against a school. About 30 percent of those surveyed responded.
Assessment score by residency directors (0.20 for the research medical school model; 0.15 for the primary care medical school model): In fall 2014, residency program directors were also asked to rate programs using the same 5-point scale on two separate survey instruments.
One survey dealt with research and was sent to a sample of residency program directors in fields outside primary care, including surgery, psychiatry and radiology. The other survey involved primary care and was sent to residency directors designated by schools as involved in clinical practice.
Survey recipients were asked to rate programs on a scale from 1 (marginal) to 5 (outstanding). Those individuals who did not know enough about a program to evaluate it fairly were asked to mark "don't know."
A school's score is the average rating of all the respondents who rated it. Responses of "don't know" counted neither for nor against a school.
For the purpose of calculating this year's rankings, the residency director surveys for the three most recent years were averaged and weighted by 0.20 in the research model and by 0.15 in primary care.
For the second year in a row, the medical schools themselves supplied the names of all of the residency program directors who were sent either of the residency program director surveys. Assessment data were collected by Ipsos Public Affairs.
Research activity (weighted by 0.30 in the research medical school model only; not used in the primary care medical school ranking model): In the rankings of research medical schools, the weighting of the total dollar amount of grants awarded by the National Institutes of Health and of NIH grant funding per faculty member was set so that each accounts for 0.15 of the overall score.
Total research activity (0.15): This is measured by the total dollar amount of National Institutes of Health research grants awarded to the medical school and its affiliated hospitals, averaged for 2013 and 2014. An asterisk next to this data point indicates that the medical school did not include grants to any affiliated hospitals in its 2014 total.
Average research activity per faculty member (0.15): This is measured by the dollar amount of National Institutes of Health research grants awarded to the medical school and its affiliated hospitals per full-time faculty member, averaged over 2013 and 2014. Both full-time basic sciences and clinical faculty were used in the faculty count. An asterisk next to this data point indicates that the medical school did not include grants to any affiliated hospitals in its 2014 total.
Primary care rate (0.30 in the primary care medical school model only; not used in research medical school ranking model): The percentage of a school's M.D. or D.O. graduates entering primary care residencies in the fields of family practice, pediatrics and internal medicine was averaged over 2012, 2013 and 2014.
Student selectivity (0.20 in the research medical school model; 0.15 in the primary care medical school model)
Median MCAT total score (0.13 in the research medical school model; 0.0975 in the primary care medical school model): This is the median total Medical College Admission Test score of the 2014 entering class.
Median undergraduate GPA (0.06 in the research medical school model; 0.045 in the primary care medical school model): This is the median undergraduate grade-point average of the 2014 entering class.
Acceptance rate (0.01 in the research medical school model; 0.0075 in the primary care medical school model): This is the proportion of applicants to the 2014 entering class who were offered admission.
Faculty resources (0.10 in the research medical school model; 0.15 in the primary care medical school model): Faculty resources were measured as the ratio of full-time science and full-time clinical faculty to full-time M.D. or D.O. students in 2014.
Overall rank
Indicators were standardized about their means, and standardized scores were weighted, totaled and rescaled so that the top school received 100; other schools received their percentage of the top score.
Specialty rankings: These rankings are based solely on ratings by medical school deans and senior faculty from the list of schools surveyed. They each identified up to 10 schools offering the best programs in each specialty area. Those receiving the most nominations in the top 10 appear in the rankings.
Those schools receiving the most votes in each specialty are numerically ranked in descending order based on the number of nominations they received, as long as the school or program received seven or more nominations in that specialty area. This means that schools ranked at the bottom of each specialty ranking have received seven nominations.
Rank Not Published: Rank Not Published means that U.S. News did calculate a numerical ranking for that school or program, but decided for editorial reasons that since the school or program ranked below the U.S. News cutoff that U.S. News would not publish the ranking for that school or program.
U.S. News will supply schools/programs listed as Rank Not Published with their numerical rankings, if they submit a request following the procedures listed in the Information for School Officials.
Schools/programs marked as Ranked Not Published are listed alphabetically. For both research medical schools and primary care medical schools, we have numerically ranked the top three-fourths of the schools. The bottom quarter of the research medical schools and primary care medical schools are listed as Rank Not Published.
Unranked: Unranked means that U.S. News did not calculate a numerical ranking for that school or program. The school or program did not supply U.S. News with enough key statistical data to be numerically ranked by U.S. News. Schools or programs marked as Unranked are listed alphabetically and are listed below those marked as Rank Not Published.
The same 156 medical schools were surveyed at the same time for the primary care rankings; 118 schools provided the data needed to calculate those rankings.
Both rankings are based on a weighted average of indicators, which are outlined below. The medical school research model is based on eight indicators, and the primary care model is based on seven indicators.
Four of the data indicators are used in both the research and primary care ranking models. They are the student selectivity admissions statistics (MCAT, GPA and acceptance rate) and faculty-to-student ratio. The medical school research model factors in research activity; the medical school primary care model adds a measure of the proportion of graduates entering primary care specialties.
[See the Best Medical Schools rankings.]
Quality assessment (weighted by 0.40)
Peer assessment score (0.20 for the research medical school model; 0.25 for the primary care medical school model): In fall 2014, medical and osteopathic school deans, deans of academic affairs and heads of internal medicine or the directors of admissions were asked to rate programs on a scale from 1 (marginal) to 5 (outstanding). Survey populations were asked to rate program quality for both research and primary care programs separately on a single survey instrument.
Those individuals who did not know enough about a school to evaluate it fairly were asked to mark "don't know." A school's score is the average rating of all the respondents who rated it. Responses of "don't know" counted neither for nor against a school. About 30 percent of those surveyed responded.
Assessment score by residency directors (0.20 for the research medical school model; 0.15 for the primary care medical school model): In fall 2014, residency program directors were also asked to rate programs using the same 5-point scale on two separate survey instruments.
One survey dealt with research and was sent to a sample of residency program directors in fields outside primary care, including surgery, psychiatry and radiology. The other survey involved primary care and was sent to residency directors designated by schools as involved in clinical practice.
Survey recipients were asked to rate programs on a scale from 1 (marginal) to 5 (outstanding). Those individuals who did not know enough about a program to evaluate it fairly were asked to mark "don't know."
A school's score is the average rating of all the respondents who rated it. Responses of "don't know" counted neither for nor against a school.
For the purpose of calculating this year's rankings, the residency director surveys for the three most recent years were averaged and weighted by 0.20 in the research model and by 0.15 in primary care.
For the second year in a row, the medical schools themselves supplied the names of all of the residency program directors who were sent either of the residency program director surveys. Assessment data were collected by Ipsos Public Affairs.
Research activity (weighted by 0.30 in the research medical school model only; not used in the primary care medical school ranking model): In the rankings of research medical schools, the weighting of the total dollar amount of grants awarded by the National Institutes of Health and of NIH grant funding per faculty member was set so that each accounts for 0.15 of the overall score.
Total research activity (0.15): This is measured by the total dollar amount of National Institutes of Health research grants awarded to the medical school and its affiliated hospitals, averaged for 2013 and 2014. An asterisk next to this data point indicates that the medical school did not include grants to any affiliated hospitals in its 2014 total.
Average research activity per faculty member (0.15): This is measured by the dollar amount of National Institutes of Health research grants awarded to the medical school and its affiliated hospitals per full-time faculty member, averaged over 2013 and 2014. Both full-time basic sciences and clinical faculty were used in the faculty count. An asterisk next to this data point indicates that the medical school did not include grants to any affiliated hospitals in its 2014 total.
Primary care rate (0.30 in the primary care medical school model only; not used in research medical school ranking model): The percentage of a school's M.D. or D.O. graduates entering primary care residencies in the fields of family practice, pediatrics and internal medicine was averaged over 2012, 2013 and 2014.
Student selectivity (0.20 in the research medical school model; 0.15 in the primary care medical school model)
Median MCAT total score (0.13 in the research medical school model; 0.0975 in the primary care medical school model): This is the median total Medical College Admission Test score of the 2014 entering class.
Median undergraduate GPA (0.06 in the research medical school model; 0.045 in the primary care medical school model): This is the median undergraduate grade-point average of the 2014 entering class.
Acceptance rate (0.01 in the research medical school model; 0.0075 in the primary care medical school model): This is the proportion of applicants to the 2014 entering class who were offered admission.
Faculty resources (0.10 in the research medical school model; 0.15 in the primary care medical school model): Faculty resources were measured as the ratio of full-time science and full-time clinical faculty to full-time M.D. or D.O. students in 2014.
Overall rank
Indicators were standardized about their means, and standardized scores were weighted, totaled and rescaled so that the top school received 100; other schools received their percentage of the top score.
Specialty rankings: These rankings are based solely on ratings by medical school deans and senior faculty from the list of schools surveyed. They each identified up to 10 schools offering the best programs in each specialty area. Those receiving the most nominations in the top 10 appear in the rankings.
Those schools receiving the most votes in each specialty are numerically ranked in descending order based on the number of nominations they received, as long as the school or program received seven or more nominations in that specialty area. This means that schools ranked at the bottom of each specialty ranking have received seven nominations.
Rank Not Published: Rank Not Published means that U.S. News did calculate a numerical ranking for that school or program, but decided for editorial reasons that since the school or program ranked below the U.S. News cutoff that U.S. News would not publish the ranking for that school or program.
U.S. News will supply schools/programs listed as Rank Not Published with their numerical rankings, if they submit a request following the procedures listed in the Information for School Officials.
Schools/programs marked as Ranked Not Published are listed alphabetically. For both research medical schools and primary care medical schools, we have numerically ranked the top three-fourths of the schools. The bottom quarter of the research medical schools and primary care medical schools are listed as Rank Not Published.
Unranked: Unranked means that U.S. News did not calculate a numerical ranking for that school or program. The school or program did not supply U.S. News with enough key statistical data to be numerically ranked by U.S. News. Schools or programs marked as Unranked are listed alphabetically and are listed below those marked as Rank Not Published.
Throw More Money at Education
It’s become almost conventional wisdom that throwing more money at public education doesn’t produce results. But what if conventional wisdom is wrong?
A new paper from economists C. Kirabo Jackson, Rucker Johnson and Claudia Persico suggests that it is. To disentangle correlation from causation, they look at periods from 1955 through 1985 when courts ordered governments to spend more on schools, from kindergarten through 12th grade. They then track how students in those areas did, up through 2011. The result is a very detailed long-term picture of the effect of spending more money on education.
The economists find that spending works. Specifically, they find that a 10 percent increase in spending, on average, leads children to complete 0.27 more years of school, to make wages that are 7.25 percent higher and to have a substantially reduced chance of falling into poverty. These are long-term, durable results. Conclusion: throwing money at the problem works.
Here’s the hitch: The authors find that the benefits of increased spending are much stronger for poor kids than for wealthier ones. So if you, like me, are in the upper portion of the U.S. income distribution, you may be reading this and thinking: “Why should I be paying more for some poor kid to be educated?” After all, why should one person pay the cost while another reaps the benefits?
Well, let me try to answer that. There are several good reasons.
First, if you're an upper-income American, you probably do derive some direct benefit. When poor Americans become better workers, it doesn’t just boost their wages. It also boosts the profitability of the companies where they work. If you own stock in such a company (and I hope you do), the value of those shares will go up if American worker productivity increases.
There might be even bigger, though less direct, effects from having a more-educated populace. The more industries can use U.S. workers instead of Chinese workers, the more industries will base their production in the U.S. This will feed local economies, boosting the profits of stores and other service businesses. That also feeds into your stock portfolio.
If you own your own business, you might need to hire some low-income people. If those people are better readers, better at doing simple math, more efficient at everyday tasks, and just more productive in general, that cuts down on the time and money you need to spend fixing their mistakes.
Next, having more educated poor people makes for a better civil society. Suppose you live in, say, Chicago, or some other city that hasn’t enjoyed as big a drop in crime as New York or Los Angeles. I bet you don’t enjoy having to worry about driving or walking through unsafe neighborhoods. I also bet you would like to walk around downtown without fear of getting mugged. It might also be nice not to have to live behind the isolating walls of a gated community.
One way to reduce crime, of course, is to pay for more police and increase incarceration rates. But another way is to improve education. Economists Lance Lochner and Enrico Moretti found in 2003 that education decreases crime. An educated populace is a well-socialized populace. There is also the fact that better education leads to higher wages for poor people, reducing the incentive for them to engage in crime.
At the risk of sounding grandiose, let me go even further: Education is really the difference between a cohesive society and a collection of people who happen to live next to each other. This was understood well by Fukuzawa Yukichi, Japan’s version of Ben Franklin. After Japan opened up to the West in the mid-1800s, Fukuzawa volunteered for Japan’s first diplomatic mission to the U.S. He returned convinced that universal education was the key to transforming Japan into the equal of the Western nations. His ideas were influential, and Japan to this day has one of the world’s best education systems.
Detractors of our public education system point out that the U.S. already spends as much on public education as many other developed countries -- 5.5 percent of gross domestic product, compared with only 3.5 percent in Japan, 4.9 percent in Canada, 5 percent in South Korea and 5.9 percent in Finland. Many view increased education spending as a giveaway to powerful and greedy teachers’ unions.
But maybe the U.S. spends more because it needs to spend more. The U.S. has more inequality and more poor people than those countries. Just as some countries naturally need to spend more on health care than others, the U.S. might naturally need more education spending.
The argument for more education spending, of course, isn't at odds with the need to make our schools more efficient. Education-reform movements such as charter schools -- which are also effective mainly for poor kids -- don’t clash with the idea of higher spending. We can do both, and each may help the other.
So this is one problem the U.S. really should consider throwing more money at.
To contact the author on this story:
Noah Smith at nsmith150@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor on this story:
James Greiff at jgreiff@bloomberg.net
A new paper from economists C. Kirabo Jackson, Rucker Johnson and Claudia Persico suggests that it is. To disentangle correlation from causation, they look at periods from 1955 through 1985 when courts ordered governments to spend more on schools, from kindergarten through 12th grade. They then track how students in those areas did, up through 2011. The result is a very detailed long-term picture of the effect of spending more money on education.
The economists find that spending works. Specifically, they find that a 10 percent increase in spending, on average, leads children to complete 0.27 more years of school, to make wages that are 7.25 percent higher and to have a substantially reduced chance of falling into poverty. These are long-term, durable results. Conclusion: throwing money at the problem works.
Here’s the hitch: The authors find that the benefits of increased spending are much stronger for poor kids than for wealthier ones. So if you, like me, are in the upper portion of the U.S. income distribution, you may be reading this and thinking: “Why should I be paying more for some poor kid to be educated?” After all, why should one person pay the cost while another reaps the benefits?
Well, let me try to answer that. There are several good reasons.
First, if you're an upper-income American, you probably do derive some direct benefit. When poor Americans become better workers, it doesn’t just boost their wages. It also boosts the profitability of the companies where they work. If you own stock in such a company (and I hope you do), the value of those shares will go up if American worker productivity increases.
There might be even bigger, though less direct, effects from having a more-educated populace. The more industries can use U.S. workers instead of Chinese workers, the more industries will base their production in the U.S. This will feed local economies, boosting the profits of stores and other service businesses. That also feeds into your stock portfolio.
If you own your own business, you might need to hire some low-income people. If those people are better readers, better at doing simple math, more efficient at everyday tasks, and just more productive in general, that cuts down on the time and money you need to spend fixing their mistakes.
Next, having more educated poor people makes for a better civil society. Suppose you live in, say, Chicago, or some other city that hasn’t enjoyed as big a drop in crime as New York or Los Angeles. I bet you don’t enjoy having to worry about driving or walking through unsafe neighborhoods. I also bet you would like to walk around downtown without fear of getting mugged. It might also be nice not to have to live behind the isolating walls of a gated community.
One way to reduce crime, of course, is to pay for more police and increase incarceration rates. But another way is to improve education. Economists Lance Lochner and Enrico Moretti found in 2003 that education decreases crime. An educated populace is a well-socialized populace. There is also the fact that better education leads to higher wages for poor people, reducing the incentive for them to engage in crime.
At the risk of sounding grandiose, let me go even further: Education is really the difference between a cohesive society and a collection of people who happen to live next to each other. This was understood well by Fukuzawa Yukichi, Japan’s version of Ben Franklin. After Japan opened up to the West in the mid-1800s, Fukuzawa volunteered for Japan’s first diplomatic mission to the U.S. He returned convinced that universal education was the key to transforming Japan into the equal of the Western nations. His ideas were influential, and Japan to this day has one of the world’s best education systems.
Detractors of our public education system point out that the U.S. already spends as much on public education as many other developed countries -- 5.5 percent of gross domestic product, compared with only 3.5 percent in Japan, 4.9 percent in Canada, 5 percent in South Korea and 5.9 percent in Finland. Many view increased education spending as a giveaway to powerful and greedy teachers’ unions.
But maybe the U.S. spends more because it needs to spend more. The U.S. has more inequality and more poor people than those countries. Just as some countries naturally need to spend more on health care than others, the U.S. might naturally need more education spending.
The argument for more education spending, of course, isn't at odds with the need to make our schools more efficient. Education-reform movements such as charter schools -- which are also effective mainly for poor kids -- don’t clash with the idea of higher spending. We can do both, and each may help the other.
So this is one problem the U.S. really should consider throwing more money at.
To contact the author on this story:
Noah Smith at nsmith150@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor on this story:
James Greiff at jgreiff@bloomberg.net
Where Have All The Teachers Gone?
This is the canary in the coal mine.
Several big states have seen alarming drops in enrollment at teacher training programs. The numbers are grim among some of the nation's largest producers of new teachers: In California, enrollment is down 53 percent over the past five years. It's down sharply in New York and Texas as well.
In North Carolina, enrollment is down nearly 20 percent in three years.
"The erosion is steady. That's a steady downward line on a graph. And there's no sign that it's being turned around," says Bill McDiarmid, the dean of the University of North Carolina School of Education.
Why have the numbers fallen so far, so fast?
McDiarmid points to the strengthening U.S. economy and the erosion of teaching's image as a stable career. There's a growing sense, he says, that K-12 teachers simply have less control over their professional lives in an increasingly bitter, politicized environment.
The list of potential headaches for new teachers is long, starting with the ongoing, ideological fisticuffs over the Common Core State Standards, high-stakes testing and efforts to link test results to teacher evaluations. Throw in the erosion of tenure protections and a variety of recession-induced budget cuts, and you've got the makings of a crisis.
The job also has a PR problem, McDiarmid says, with teachers too often turned into scapegoats by politicians, policymakers, foundations and the media.
"It tears me up sometimes to see the way in which people talk about teachers because they are giving blood, sweat and tears for their students every day in this country. There is a sense now that, 'If I went into this job and it doesn't pay a lot and it's a lot of hard work, it may be that I'd lose it.' And students are hearing this. And it deters them from entering the profession."
While few dispute the shortage itself, Benjamin Riley, head of the group Deans for Impact, a new consortium of 18 reform-minded deans of colleges of education, thinks it's not yet clear why potential teachers are turning away.
"The honest answer is: We don't know. There is nothing that has been done rigorously, in a way that's empirically defensible saying, 'We know this is why the number has dropped,' " Riley says.
Isabel Gray is a senior art history major at Millsaps College in Mississippi. She is passionate about exploring a career in K-12 teaching. But, as graduation nears, she's also having second thoughts about a profession that, she feels, is obsessed with testing and standards.
"You want to find the right balance between being a really good teacher and still meeting those standards and not just teaching toward the test, really retaining that material and not just being taught, you know, testing strategies. And it's hard to find that balance. And there's just so much that's changing" in education, she says.
The teacher employment picture is, of course, local and regional. One part of a state may have too many elementary teachers, while another may have too few. And the gaps vary by specialty — with many places facing serious shortages in areas including science, math and special education.
Riley worries there may be a national mismatch that few are looking at deeply.
"The question, and one that needs to be empirically investigated, is 'Are we overproducing certain kinds of teachers school districts aren't looking for and under-producing certain types of teachers that schools and other types of employers are desperately looking for?' "
There are, of course, alternative teacher certification programs across the U.S. including Teach for America. But TFA, too, has seen large drops in enrollment over the past two years.
One possible path out of this crisis is to pay teachers more.
But, across the country, proposals to boost pay or give teachers merit pay have stalled or been scrapped altogether.
An analysis just out from Georgetown's Edunomics Lab argues that boosting class size for great teachers would save money that could then be funneled into bonuses for those educators taking on a larger load. The savings would come largely from a reduction in the overall teaching force, angering teachers unions and their allies.
Riley says his group, Deans for Impact, is all for giving teachers a raise — if it's tied to better training that leads to higher graduation rates and other improved student outcomes.
"If we could really take control of the profession and increase the rigor such that teachers are effective from Day 1, I think that will prove to the public at large that this is an investment worth making, and one worth increasing."
In spite of all the noise and politics, surveys show that public school teachers still believe it's an incredibly satisfying job helping children learn.
Several big states have seen alarming drops in enrollment at teacher training programs. The numbers are grim among some of the nation's largest producers of new teachers: In California, enrollment is down 53 percent over the past five years. It's down sharply in New York and Texas as well.
In North Carolina, enrollment is down nearly 20 percent in three years.
"The erosion is steady. That's a steady downward line on a graph. And there's no sign that it's being turned around," says Bill McDiarmid, the dean of the University of North Carolina School of Education.
Why have the numbers fallen so far, so fast?
McDiarmid points to the strengthening U.S. economy and the erosion of teaching's image as a stable career. There's a growing sense, he says, that K-12 teachers simply have less control over their professional lives in an increasingly bitter, politicized environment.
The list of potential headaches for new teachers is long, starting with the ongoing, ideological fisticuffs over the Common Core State Standards, high-stakes testing and efforts to link test results to teacher evaluations. Throw in the erosion of tenure protections and a variety of recession-induced budget cuts, and you've got the makings of a crisis.
The job also has a PR problem, McDiarmid says, with teachers too often turned into scapegoats by politicians, policymakers, foundations and the media.
"It tears me up sometimes to see the way in which people talk about teachers because they are giving blood, sweat and tears for their students every day in this country. There is a sense now that, 'If I went into this job and it doesn't pay a lot and it's a lot of hard work, it may be that I'd lose it.' And students are hearing this. And it deters them from entering the profession."
While few dispute the shortage itself, Benjamin Riley, head of the group Deans for Impact, a new consortium of 18 reform-minded deans of colleges of education, thinks it's not yet clear why potential teachers are turning away.
"The honest answer is: We don't know. There is nothing that has been done rigorously, in a way that's empirically defensible saying, 'We know this is why the number has dropped,' " Riley says.
Isabel Gray is a senior art history major at Millsaps College in Mississippi. She is passionate about exploring a career in K-12 teaching. But, as graduation nears, she's also having second thoughts about a profession that, she feels, is obsessed with testing and standards.
"You want to find the right balance between being a really good teacher and still meeting those standards and not just teaching toward the test, really retaining that material and not just being taught, you know, testing strategies. And it's hard to find that balance. And there's just so much that's changing" in education, she says.
The teacher employment picture is, of course, local and regional. One part of a state may have too many elementary teachers, while another may have too few. And the gaps vary by specialty — with many places facing serious shortages in areas including science, math and special education.
Riley worries there may be a national mismatch that few are looking at deeply.
"The question, and one that needs to be empirically investigated, is 'Are we overproducing certain kinds of teachers school districts aren't looking for and under-producing certain types of teachers that schools and other types of employers are desperately looking for?' "
There are, of course, alternative teacher certification programs across the U.S. including Teach for America. But TFA, too, has seen large drops in enrollment over the past two years.
One possible path out of this crisis is to pay teachers more.
But, across the country, proposals to boost pay or give teachers merit pay have stalled or been scrapped altogether.
An analysis just out from Georgetown's Edunomics Lab argues that boosting class size for great teachers would save money that could then be funneled into bonuses for those educators taking on a larger load. The savings would come largely from a reduction in the overall teaching force, angering teachers unions and their allies.
Riley says his group, Deans for Impact, is all for giving teachers a raise — if it's tied to better training that leads to higher graduation rates and other improved student outcomes.
"If we could really take control of the profession and increase the rigor such that teachers are effective from Day 1, I think that will prove to the public at large that this is an investment worth making, and one worth increasing."
In spite of all the noise and politics, surveys show that public school teachers still believe it's an incredibly satisfying job helping children learn.
Decide Between Online, Blended Courses
If you’re thinking of continuing your education, a program combining face-to-face interaction and online learning could be the
right option for you.
The approach, typically called blended or hybrid learning, generally refers to an educational program delivered partly online and partly on campus.
Some experts say hybrid learning appeals more to traditional college students than adults who want to continue their education. Regardless, nontraditional students can still benefit from blended learning, says Susan Gautsch, director of online learning at the University of Southern California’s Sol Price School of Public Policy.
"I think it certainly meets the needs of people’s lives," Gautsch says, noting that many students who take blended learning classes at USC's public policy school are professionals with full-time jobs and families.
"Blended learning can be a great resource for students who may have been out of school for an extended period of time," says Som Seng, director of marketing for UMassOnline. The University of Massachusetts system offers a blended master's degree in health informatics and management. "It can be a natural transition between everyday life and returning to school."
When deciding between a blended learning program or a fully online program, experts suggest considering some facts beforehand.
[Learn how to succeed in an online course.]
1. Research has shown that blended learning may have academic advantages. One reason to consider blended learning: it might combine the greatest strengths of online and face-to-face education.
The U.S. Department of Education published a review of the research on blended learning in 2010, which found that blended learning approaches are often more effective than more traditional face-to-face instruction and that they incorporate learning and teaching elements that are not found in purely online or face-to-face courses.
"Blended learning is really the best of both worlds," says Christine Shakespeare, assistant vice president of continuing and professional education at Pace University.
A 2011 research review published by Kaplan Inc. also found that blended learning programs can potentially offer more personalized, student-focused and flexible forms of teaching than would be found in the face-to-face-only classroom.
Michael Karp, a faculty member at USC's Keck School of Medicine, is a second-year student in the university's executive Master of Health Administration blended program within the public policy school. He says it combines the flexibility of online lectures and assignments with a face-to-face curriculum that involves additional lectures, visits to medical sites and work on additional projects.
"I needed something flexible for my schedule, and once I started researching the structure of the program at the Price School, it made a great deal of sense," he said in an email.
2. Students will need to plan ahead when it comes to showing up to class. When it comes to arriving on campus for the face-to-face component of a class, students should make sure that they are aware of the required dates well beforehand, Shakespeare says.
Students definitely need to prepare, Shakespeare says, especially when it comes to having a backup plan in the case of a family emergency during the in-person class, for instance, or making sure you won’t have to work a shift at your job at that time.
It can also be essential to learn about the consequences of a missed face-to-face class and whether alternatives are offered, she says.
"Students need to understand how much flexibility there is in the face-to-face experience," Shakespeare says. "If they have to come to campus, they need to understand that ahead of time."
3. Experts say many nontraditional students choose fully online over blended learning. While some schools do offer blended learning options, for many nontraditional students, fully online learning is the more obvious, or more suitable, choice, says Carol Twigg, president and CEO of the National Center for Academic Transformation, a nonprofit that aims to redesign academic programs using information technology.
"Adults make decisions based on flexibility and convenience," Twigg says.
At Pace University, hybrid courses are offered in a few disciplines at the school, such as the registered nurse to bachelor's in nursing program and a master’s program in homeland security, though these classes take place mostly online, Shakespeare says.
She adds that she believes enrollment in the latter program is not as high as it would be had the class been offered fully online. Polls conducted by the school have indicated that many students feel purely online courses are a more realistic option than hybrid classes, she says.
"My takeaway is that the students like the idea in theory, but there are very few who can make time in their lives, even if it’s just two or three times a semester, to be physically present on campus," Shakespeare says.
[Find out how to convince an employer to pay for an online degree.]
4. Hybrid learning gives students an opportunity to network and interact with other students. Gautsch says meeting in person as opposed to only online has its benefits when it comes to strengthening your professional network.
"Building relationships in person over time makes for great strong ties," Gautsch said in an email.
Seng agrees, noting that blended learning enables both in-person and online student interaction, each of which has its own advantages.
"A huge benefit is the ability to be able to meet and connect with classmates both online and in person," she says.
The approach, typically called blended or hybrid learning, generally refers to an educational program delivered partly online and partly on campus.
Some experts say hybrid learning appeals more to traditional college students than adults who want to continue their education. Regardless, nontraditional students can still benefit from blended learning, says Susan Gautsch, director of online learning at the University of Southern California’s Sol Price School of Public Policy.
"I think it certainly meets the needs of people’s lives," Gautsch says, noting that many students who take blended learning classes at USC's public policy school are professionals with full-time jobs and families.
"Blended learning can be a great resource for students who may have been out of school for an extended period of time," says Som Seng, director of marketing for UMassOnline. The University of Massachusetts system offers a blended master's degree in health informatics and management. "It can be a natural transition between everyday life and returning to school."
When deciding between a blended learning program or a fully online program, experts suggest considering some facts beforehand.
[Learn how to succeed in an online course.]
1. Research has shown that blended learning may have academic advantages. One reason to consider blended learning: it might combine the greatest strengths of online and face-to-face education.
The U.S. Department of Education published a review of the research on blended learning in 2010, which found that blended learning approaches are often more effective than more traditional face-to-face instruction and that they incorporate learning and teaching elements that are not found in purely online or face-to-face courses.
"Blended learning is really the best of both worlds," says Christine Shakespeare, assistant vice president of continuing and professional education at Pace University.
A 2011 research review published by Kaplan Inc. also found that blended learning programs can potentially offer more personalized, student-focused and flexible forms of teaching than would be found in the face-to-face-only classroom.
Michael Karp, a faculty member at USC's Keck School of Medicine, is a second-year student in the university's executive Master of Health Administration blended program within the public policy school. He says it combines the flexibility of online lectures and assignments with a face-to-face curriculum that involves additional lectures, visits to medical sites and work on additional projects.
"I needed something flexible for my schedule, and once I started researching the structure of the program at the Price School, it made a great deal of sense," he said in an email.
2. Students will need to plan ahead when it comes to showing up to class. When it comes to arriving on campus for the face-to-face component of a class, students should make sure that they are aware of the required dates well beforehand, Shakespeare says.
Students definitely need to prepare, Shakespeare says, especially when it comes to having a backup plan in the case of a family emergency during the in-person class, for instance, or making sure you won’t have to work a shift at your job at that time.
It can also be essential to learn about the consequences of a missed face-to-face class and whether alternatives are offered, she says.
"Students need to understand how much flexibility there is in the face-to-face experience," Shakespeare says. "If they have to come to campus, they need to understand that ahead of time."
3. Experts say many nontraditional students choose fully online over blended learning. While some schools do offer blended learning options, for many nontraditional students, fully online learning is the more obvious, or more suitable, choice, says Carol Twigg, president and CEO of the National Center for Academic Transformation, a nonprofit that aims to redesign academic programs using information technology.
"Adults make decisions based on flexibility and convenience," Twigg says.
At Pace University, hybrid courses are offered in a few disciplines at the school, such as the registered nurse to bachelor's in nursing program and a master’s program in homeland security, though these classes take place mostly online, Shakespeare says.
She adds that she believes enrollment in the latter program is not as high as it would be had the class been offered fully online. Polls conducted by the school have indicated that many students feel purely online courses are a more realistic option than hybrid classes, she says.
"My takeaway is that the students like the idea in theory, but there are very few who can make time in their lives, even if it’s just two or three times a semester, to be physically present on campus," Shakespeare says.
[Find out how to convince an employer to pay for an online degree.]
4. Hybrid learning gives students an opportunity to network and interact with other students. Gautsch says meeting in person as opposed to only online has its benefits when it comes to strengthening your professional network.
"Building relationships in person over time makes for great strong ties," Gautsch said in an email.
Seng agrees, noting that blended learning enables both in-person and online student interaction, each of which has its own advantages.
"A huge benefit is the ability to be able to meet and connect with classmates both online and in person," she says.
The 6 Technologies That Will Change the Face of Education
Makerspaces, wearable technologies and adaptive learning technologies
are three of the six technologies that will have a profound impact on
higher education within the next five years, according to the NMC Horizon Report: 2015 Higher Education Edition, released Wednesday by the New Media Consortium and the Educause Learning Initiative.
The annual report is developed by a panel of higher education experts to identify major developments in education technology and technological trends that will help shape teaching and learning in the near future. The researchers also identify the six most significant challenges facing education in the coming years.
Technological developments are sorted into three categories: those whose impact will be felt soon (or is being felt now), those that will come into p[lay in the mid-term (two to three years) and those that are a bit further out on the horizon (four to five years).
The Near Term: 1 Year or Less
Leading off the 2015 list of important technological developments in the near term is BYOD, followed by the flipped classroom.
BYOD made this list this year, according to the report, not because it's new or having a major effect on IT spending at this point but because of the growing evidence that BYOD is leading to productivity gains and allowing for more personalized instruction and learning.
"The link between the use of personal devices and increases in productivity gets stronger each passing year as more organizations adopt BYOD policies," according to the report. "The integration of personal smartphones, tablets, and PCs into the workflow supports an on-the-go mentality, changing the nature of work and learning activities so that they can happen anywhere, at anytime. Employers and higher education institutions are finding that when given the opportunity to choose their device, users are saved from the effort and time needed to get accustomed to new devices and can therefore accomplish tasks with more ease and efficiency."
The flipped classroom, which also appeared in last year's Horizon Report as a significant near-term technological development, is a model of teaching in which traditional methods of instruction instruction are experienced outside of the classroom — and where classroom time is spent discussing, rather than presenting, material.
About 29 percent of faculty in the United States are now using flipped instruction to some degree, and another 27 percent plan to add it to their repertoire within a year.
According to the report: "Flipped learning is seen as especially suited for higher education because the rearranging of class time gives students in large introductory lecture courses more opportunity to engage and interact with their peers. Instructors also make more efficient use of their time by focusing on content that is especially challenging for students — handheld clickers in large seminars are often paired with this method in order to help understand students' comprehension of material and customize discussions accordingly."
The Mid-Term: 2 to 3 Years
In the mid-term, researchers identified makerspaces and wearable technologies as significant technological developments.
The report defined makerspaces as "community-oriented workshops where tech enthusiasts meet regularly to share and explore electronic hardware, manufacturing tools, and programming techniques and tricks."
These spaces are, according to the researchers, becoming increasingly relevant owing to a dramatic shift in "what types of skillsets have real, applicable value in a rapidly advancing world. In this landscape, creativity, design and engineering are making their way to the forefront of educational considerations, as tools such as 3D printers, robotics, and 3D modeling Web-based applications become accessible to more people. Proponents of makerspaces for education highlight the benefit of engaging learners in creative, higher-order problem solving through hands-on design, construction and iteration. The question of how to renovate or repurpose classrooms to address the needs of the future is being answered through the concept of makerspaces, or workshops that offer tools and the learning experiences needed to help people carry out their ideas."
Wearable technologies are also becoming increasingly relevant to education.
"Wearable technology is poised to see significant growth in the coming years, spurring experimentation in higher education because the demand for wearables is seen to be coming in large part from college-aged students; a recent poll showed that 21 percent of U.S. adult students use wearables," the report noted. "Further, another report by GlobalWebIndex revealed that 71 percent of students ages 16 to 24 want to use wearable technology such as smart watches, wristbands or glasses."
Consumers are adopting wearables at a faster pace than academic institutions. Universities for the most part have yet to incorporate wearables formally into the curriculum, except in athletics and medicine, where the applications are obvious.
The Long Term: 4 to 5 Years
Researchers identified adaptive learning technologies and the Internet of Things as the two most significant technological developments hitting education in the next four to five years.
Adaptive technology is seen as a means to break free of a "one-size-fits-all" approach to education and is suited well for online and hybrid learning environments, "where student activities are conducted virtually and can be monitored by software and tracking applications," the report noted.
"While adaptive learning technologies are still at least four years away from widespread use in higher education, a number of studies highlight their potential for transforming traditional learning paradigms...."
The researchers noted that the next step in extending the use of adaptive learning technologies is the development of standards and best practices.
The Internet of Things was the final technological development identified by the researchers as one that will have a major impact on education in the coming years.
"Use of IoT in educational environments is finally coming into focus as terms such as 'hypersituation' are being coined to explain the potential of IoT in learning situations," according to the report. "Hypersituating is the ability to amplify knowledge based on the user's location. In other words, learners that carry connected devices with them can benefit from a host of interdisciplinary information that is pushed to them from their surroundings. For instance, a learner exploring a city with a rich historical past can explore their environment through an architectural, political, or biological lens, depending on how the surroundings are equipped. IoT can also create an environment where learners are informed by crowdsourced contributions and observations from the community via networked objects."
The complete report is freely available as of today at go.nmc.org/2015-hied.
The annual report is developed by a panel of higher education experts to identify major developments in education technology and technological trends that will help shape teaching and learning in the near future. The researchers also identify the six most significant challenges facing education in the coming years.
Technological developments are sorted into three categories: those whose impact will be felt soon (or is being felt now), those that will come into p[lay in the mid-term (two to three years) and those that are a bit further out on the horizon (four to five years).
The Near Term: 1 Year or Less
Leading off the 2015 list of important technological developments in the near term is BYOD, followed by the flipped classroom.
BYOD made this list this year, according to the report, not because it's new or having a major effect on IT spending at this point but because of the growing evidence that BYOD is leading to productivity gains and allowing for more personalized instruction and learning.
"The link between the use of personal devices and increases in productivity gets stronger each passing year as more organizations adopt BYOD policies," according to the report. "The integration of personal smartphones, tablets, and PCs into the workflow supports an on-the-go mentality, changing the nature of work and learning activities so that they can happen anywhere, at anytime. Employers and higher education institutions are finding that when given the opportunity to choose their device, users are saved from the effort and time needed to get accustomed to new devices and can therefore accomplish tasks with more ease and efficiency."
The flipped classroom, which also appeared in last year's Horizon Report as a significant near-term technological development, is a model of teaching in which traditional methods of instruction instruction are experienced outside of the classroom — and where classroom time is spent discussing, rather than presenting, material.
About 29 percent of faculty in the United States are now using flipped instruction to some degree, and another 27 percent plan to add it to their repertoire within a year.
According to the report: "Flipped learning is seen as especially suited for higher education because the rearranging of class time gives students in large introductory lecture courses more opportunity to engage and interact with their peers. Instructors also make more efficient use of their time by focusing on content that is especially challenging for students — handheld clickers in large seminars are often paired with this method in order to help understand students' comprehension of material and customize discussions accordingly."
The Mid-Term: 2 to 3 Years
In the mid-term, researchers identified makerspaces and wearable technologies as significant technological developments.
The report defined makerspaces as "community-oriented workshops where tech enthusiasts meet regularly to share and explore electronic hardware, manufacturing tools, and programming techniques and tricks."
These spaces are, according to the researchers, becoming increasingly relevant owing to a dramatic shift in "what types of skillsets have real, applicable value in a rapidly advancing world. In this landscape, creativity, design and engineering are making their way to the forefront of educational considerations, as tools such as 3D printers, robotics, and 3D modeling Web-based applications become accessible to more people. Proponents of makerspaces for education highlight the benefit of engaging learners in creative, higher-order problem solving through hands-on design, construction and iteration. The question of how to renovate or repurpose classrooms to address the needs of the future is being answered through the concept of makerspaces, or workshops that offer tools and the learning experiences needed to help people carry out their ideas."
Wearable technologies are also becoming increasingly relevant to education.
"Wearable technology is poised to see significant growth in the coming years, spurring experimentation in higher education because the demand for wearables is seen to be coming in large part from college-aged students; a recent poll showed that 21 percent of U.S. adult students use wearables," the report noted. "Further, another report by GlobalWebIndex revealed that 71 percent of students ages 16 to 24 want to use wearable technology such as smart watches, wristbands or glasses."
Consumers are adopting wearables at a faster pace than academic institutions. Universities for the most part have yet to incorporate wearables formally into the curriculum, except in athletics and medicine, where the applications are obvious.
The Long Term: 4 to 5 Years
Researchers identified adaptive learning technologies and the Internet of Things as the two most significant technological developments hitting education in the next four to five years.
Adaptive technology is seen as a means to break free of a "one-size-fits-all" approach to education and is suited well for online and hybrid learning environments, "where student activities are conducted virtually and can be monitored by software and tracking applications," the report noted.
"While adaptive learning technologies are still at least four years away from widespread use in higher education, a number of studies highlight their potential for transforming traditional learning paradigms...."
The researchers noted that the next step in extending the use of adaptive learning technologies is the development of standards and best practices.
The Internet of Things was the final technological development identified by the researchers as one that will have a major impact on education in the coming years.
"Use of IoT in educational environments is finally coming into focus as terms such as 'hypersituation' are being coined to explain the potential of IoT in learning situations," according to the report. "Hypersituating is the ability to amplify knowledge based on the user's location. In other words, learners that carry connected devices with them can benefit from a host of interdisciplinary information that is pushed to them from their surroundings. For instance, a learner exploring a city with a rich historical past can explore their environment through an architectural, political, or biological lens, depending on how the surroundings are equipped. IoT can also create an environment where learners are informed by crowdsourced contributions and observations from the community via networked objects."
The complete report is freely available as of today at go.nmc.org/2015-hied.
Drop in Applications Spurs Changes at Law Schools
A radically changed job market since the financial meltdown – in
which law firms have retrenched, salaries have fallen and many new
attorneys have struggled to find a job that puts their J.D. to use – has
led to a precipitous drop in law school applications.
Enrollment in 2013 was down 24 percent from what it was in 2010, making law school a bit more of a buyer’s market. So even as hiring shows signs of recovery and average starting pay inches up from the post-crash low of $78,700 for the class of 2011 to about $82,400 for 2013 grads, many schools are dreaming up new ways to make their programs stand out.
More than a dozen schools now offer some form of a compressed program, an innovation pioneered by Northwestern Law School in Illinois in 2009. Brooklyn Law School launched a two-year option last summer, for example, in which students start by accumulating six credits over the summer, then take 14 credits in the fall and 15 or 16 each term thereafter, with three-credit intersessions between semesters and an externship during the second summer.
[Check out the best law schools in photos.]
Regardless of how you crunch the credits, the load makes for an intense two years. “It’s clearly not for everybody,” says Brooklyn Law President and Dean Nick Allard. “It’s for highly motivated, highly qualified and mature students.” He notes that most of the 30 students in the first class arrived from the work world.
It’s no coincidence that these programs appeal to a more seasoned student, agrees Drexel Law School Dean Roger Dennis, who notes that one aim of starting the Philadelphia school's two-year program was to appeal to a wider audience. While not required, work experience is strongly preferred for admission to Northwestern’s accelerated program.
In another nod to shifting economic realities, law schools have been expanding their interdisciplinary options. Stanford Law School, for one, now offers 27 joint J.D. degrees; possible add-ons include computer science, bioengineering, public policy and medical degrees.
In addition to its unusual post-J.D. master’s program in space, cyber and telecommunications law, the law school at the University of Nebraska—Lincoln boasts one joint degree in law and public health and another that adds gerontology, both of which Dean Susan Poser sees as being increasingly attractive in the highly regulated hospital and nursing home industries.
And while joint law and MBA degrees are nothing new, some schools are now packing business studies directly into the J.D. curriculum. Northwestern, for instance, collaborates with the university’s Kellogg School of Management to offer law students a concentration in business enterprise, and the law school operates the Entrepreneurship Law Center, where students team up to advise small businesses.
[See some stats on top law schools in this infographic.]
Beyond using class time to teach skills like writing briefs and reading a balance sheet, law schools are rapidly implementing other sorts of practical training. Some emphasize simulation; others, real-world experience. “There’s quite a lot of momentum in experiential education,” says Daniel Rodriguez, dean of Northwestern's law school.
Other schools have borrowed a page from medicine to incorporate clinical rotations or “residencies.” At New York Law School, 3Ls now spend the entire year in three 10-week clinical rotations that have them working with officials at the New York City Law Department and on civil litigation at the Legal Aid Society, for example.
In one of the most radical reforms, Elon University School of Law in North Carolina will introduce a complete overhaul of its curriculum this year. The program will shift to trimesters so students graduate in two and a half years and can prep for the February bar exam and enter the job market in the spring. The new curriculum is much more intentionally sequenced; shadowing a litigator leads to participation in moot court and then to a residency with a trial and appellate practice firm, for example.
“The real innovation here was to take legal education and make it logically progressive,” says Luke Bierman, dean of the Elon law school. “We want to make sure students learn each part before they move on.”
While experiential learning is the latest buzzword in legal education, the extent to which students can truly participate in proceedings remains highly regulated by the American Bar Association, which accredits law schools.
“You cannot give legal advice to somebody unless you are a licensed attorney,” Nebraska’s Poser points out. So clinics that serve real clients are typically limited to third-year students certified by their state supreme court to work under the supervision of a lawyer.
The limitations frustrate some educators, who can see the potential for even greater innovation. Rodriguez believes that falling enrollments could jeopardize some law schools, ultimately pressuring the ABA to allow greater freedom of movement.
Enrollment in 2013 was down 24 percent from what it was in 2010, making law school a bit more of a buyer’s market. So even as hiring shows signs of recovery and average starting pay inches up from the post-crash low of $78,700 for the class of 2011 to about $82,400 for 2013 grads, many schools are dreaming up new ways to make their programs stand out.
More than a dozen schools now offer some form of a compressed program, an innovation pioneered by Northwestern Law School in Illinois in 2009. Brooklyn Law School launched a two-year option last summer, for example, in which students start by accumulating six credits over the summer, then take 14 credits in the fall and 15 or 16 each term thereafter, with three-credit intersessions between semesters and an externship during the second summer.
[Check out the best law schools in photos.]
Regardless of how you crunch the credits, the load makes for an intense two years. “It’s clearly not for everybody,” says Brooklyn Law President and Dean Nick Allard. “It’s for highly motivated, highly qualified and mature students.” He notes that most of the 30 students in the first class arrived from the work world.
It’s no coincidence that these programs appeal to a more seasoned student, agrees Drexel Law School Dean Roger Dennis, who notes that one aim of starting the Philadelphia school's two-year program was to appeal to a wider audience. While not required, work experience is strongly preferred for admission to Northwestern’s accelerated program.
In another nod to shifting economic realities, law schools have been expanding their interdisciplinary options. Stanford Law School, for one, now offers 27 joint J.D. degrees; possible add-ons include computer science, bioengineering, public policy and medical degrees.
In addition to its unusual post-J.D. master’s program in space, cyber and telecommunications law, the law school at the University of Nebraska—Lincoln boasts one joint degree in law and public health and another that adds gerontology, both of which Dean Susan Poser sees as being increasingly attractive in the highly regulated hospital and nursing home industries.
And while joint law and MBA degrees are nothing new, some schools are now packing business studies directly into the J.D. curriculum. Northwestern, for instance, collaborates with the university’s Kellogg School of Management to offer law students a concentration in business enterprise, and the law school operates the Entrepreneurship Law Center, where students team up to advise small businesses.
[See some stats on top law schools in this infographic.]
Beyond using class time to teach skills like writing briefs and reading a balance sheet, law schools are rapidly implementing other sorts of practical training. Some emphasize simulation; others, real-world experience. “There’s quite a lot of momentum in experiential education,” says Daniel Rodriguez, dean of Northwestern's law school.
Other schools have borrowed a page from medicine to incorporate clinical rotations or “residencies.” At New York Law School, 3Ls now spend the entire year in three 10-week clinical rotations that have them working with officials at the New York City Law Department and on civil litigation at the Legal Aid Society, for example.
In one of the most radical reforms, Elon University School of Law in North Carolina will introduce a complete overhaul of its curriculum this year. The program will shift to trimesters so students graduate in two and a half years and can prep for the February bar exam and enter the job market in the spring. The new curriculum is much more intentionally sequenced; shadowing a litigator leads to participation in moot court and then to a residency with a trial and appellate practice firm, for example.
“The real innovation here was to take legal education and make it logically progressive,” says Luke Bierman, dean of the Elon law school. “We want to make sure students learn each part before they move on.”
While experiential learning is the latest buzzword in legal education, the extent to which students can truly participate in proceedings remains highly regulated by the American Bar Association, which accredits law schools.
“You cannot give legal advice to somebody unless you are a licensed attorney,” Nebraska’s Poser points out. So clinics that serve real clients are typically limited to third-year students certified by their state supreme court to work under the supervision of a lawyer.
The limitations frustrate some educators, who can see the potential for even greater innovation. Rodriguez believes that falling enrollments could jeopardize some law schools, ultimately pressuring the ABA to allow greater freedom of movement.
Why I’m a Public-School Teacher but a Private-School Parent
Last week, I observed a high-school English
class on a campus without bells. The school didn’t need them: Every
student showed up for class promptly, and they remained attentive until
the last minute—without packing their books early or lining up at the
door. San Luis Obispo Classical Academy (SLOCA) is a private school in
Central California that promotes "personal character" and "love of learning,"
and the tangible difference between this environment and that at the
public high school in the area was stunning to me—even though I'm a
veteran public-school teacher. And even though my own daughter is in her
second year of preschool at SLOCA.
I’ve also spent the last four decades
exclusively at public schools—either attending them, coaching at them,
or teaching at them. I have dedicated my life to them, as have all of my
good friends. I even superficially loathe the local Catholic school for
its elitist attitudes and alleged recruiting techniques. But as my
daughter embarks on her K-12 journey, my wife and I are leaning toward
this small, 322-student private school for one really simple reason: The
kids take pride in their personal character, and they admit that they
love learning.
My 4-year-old daughter, for now, is just like
them. And I’ve always found that it’s exponentially more fun,
fulfilling, and productive to engage in activities with other people who
have "bought in" to whatever they’re doing with the same level of
enthusiasm. For me, this has been true in grad school, baseball
practice, watching football on TV—anything, really. For my daughter,
this happens when she’s learning about personification, reciting poetry,
and being a good human.
Personally, I was struck by the degree of
student buy-in at SLOCA—which serves just 32 high-school
students—compared to a typical public school nearby. In 90 minutes of
observing the private-school class, there were zero interruptions, zero
yawns, and zero cell phones. All 15 students, ranging from sophomores to
seniors, had their homework successfully reviewed within the first five
minutes of class; they all had their pens and notepads in front of them
without being asked. As I listened to their interactions, it became
clear, too, that they were engaged. They laughed when one of them made a
joke about Frederick II being excommunicated a second time, and they
lightly knocked on their desks when they liked a classmate's comment—a
delightful custom I had never heard of. Each of them, moreover, answered
a question from the teacher at least twice. Other than these moments,
there was no noise, not a single distraction—and I was struck by the
apparent absence of gender lines or observable differences between the
youngest and oldest students in the class. Throughout those 90 minutes,
they seemed like a group of old friends, united by a love of learning.
That the teacher was fluent in that day’s
topic, the Holy Roman Empire, was clear in at least two ways: One, she
answered every question thoroughly, without hesitation; two, I could
actually hear every word she said, in the tone and volume she intended.
She didn't have to yell to be heard, and she didn't speak quickly in
fear of interruption. She could subtly emphasize certain words, and her
jokes landed. Observing this class, I started daydreaming about what, if
given the chance, I would teach these kids—not how I would teach these kids.
* * *
As I am writing this, I am observing a
different class—one at the 825-student public high school where I teach.
The educator’s passion is evident, and his typed lesson plans are
immaculate and thoughtful. It's not completely clear how fluent he is in
the subject matter, however, because he has been interrupted or
distracted by 20 things in 20 minutes: a pencil being sharpened, a paper
bag being crumpled and tossed, a few irrelevant jokes that ignite
several side conversations, a tardy student sauntering in with a smirk, a
student feeding yogurt to a friend, a random class clown outside the
window, and the subsequent need to lower the blinds, to name a few. The
teacher is probably distracted by a disconcerting suspicion that he’s
talking primarily to himself. For the past half hour, I've been thinking
about how I would teach this class—not what I would teach this class.
I know most of the kids in this public school:
They're not hurtful or malicious, and most of them aren't even
consciously rude. They’re just "cool" by default, the opposite of being
intrinsically "stoked" or "pumped" (to borrow a few words from their
vocabulary) about learning. It’s not a classroom-management issue in
this case. The teacher could outlaw food and cellphones, but there would
still be jokes, fidgeting, students with passes to or from another
place—something to distract them. No matter how diligently he teaches
them about the appropriate time to sharpen a pencil, there will still be
this culture of coolness, the norm of disengagement.
SLOCA charges between roughly $3,000 and $7,000 per student in annual tuition—thousands less than the average cost of private high schools in the Western U.S., which according to some estimates is $29,000.
And according to school figures, SLOCA also doles out $50,000 a year in
need-based scholarships, as well as about $52,000 in tuition discounts.
Granted, SLOCA’s tuition is probably too high for many families, but I
don’t think the cost of attendance explains why SLOCA is such a special
place—the biggest visible difference between my public-school students
and their counterparts at SLOCA has little to do with money or natural
brilliance (or, if it does, it isn't apparent or even relevant to me).
Just like their public-school peers, the kids at SLOCA wear jeans and
hoodies, and none of them seem to be any kind of genius; in fact, one of
them was a student of mine at the public school, which he still attends
part-time (I’ll get to him later). The biggest visible difference is
that, at SLOCA, personal engagement is "cool." And any interruption is
going to annoy everybody—not just the teacher.
In general, the teens at the public school
don’t appear to have bought into an educational environment like that at
SLOCA—and for good reason: There's nothing to buy. It’s difficult for
them to show personal choice in their schooling because they’re
obligated to be there regardless of whether they want to. As in many
states, California law explicitly prohibits the school from requiring
that parents pay for anything;
at this particular institution, the administration even forbade an
English teacher from asking parents to buy their kids tickets to an
inexpensive play. After tax dollars, support for everything from
extracurriculars to learning materials is expected to come through
fundraisers, and schools can’t require that the students—the actual
beneficiaries—participate in the fundraisers themselves. I completely
understand and support the valid reasons behind these kinds of rules,
both on conflict-of-interest grounds and, especially, in defense of
equality. To me, however, that doesn’t negate the unfortunate,
unintended consequence: When the kids aren’t obligated to invest their
time and energy in a group project, they’re allowed to play it cool.
Meanwhile, at SLOCA, the students—if only
because they’re attending the school—seem to declare that they want an
academic experience unavailable at mainstream institutions. Though SLOCA
does have a few small athletic teams and host a couple of dances, the
students here visibly favor their studious environment—one that lacks
the gyms and swimming pools and other fun amenities available at some
public schools. During the day, they’re willing to surrender their
personal technology—phones are prohibited during school hours—and,
presumably, the intimate gossip that comes with those devices. According
to one teacher, "none of them date each other" because "it would be
weird for them [in this environment]."
Likewise, if the parents are paying tuition at
an independent school—one that advertises an alternative approach to
education and promotes a "love of learning" as its cornerstone—they are
publicly claiming a stake in a specific curriculum and pedagogy.
They’re not simply accepting the title of "stakeholder" at the school
that’s chosen for their kids because of, say, geography. And they’re not
choosing the school because of something like superior facilities,
either; SLOCA’s campus doesn’t boast any material advantage over nearby
public schools. Far from it: SLOCA’s campus sits on an old elementary
school that the district abandoned years ago and is now leasing out on a
temporary basis. In fact, the district now wants the buildings back to
establish a new public elementary school for academically accelerated students, meaning that SLOCA will have to relocate again. Undeterred, the parents continue to give it their time and money.
I noticed the same effect of "buying in" when I
used to teach Advanced Placement English at another public school. By
law, anyone was allowed to take the class, but the school encouraged
every interested student to get a signature from a former teacher to
vouch for his or her qualifications. The simple act of taking the
initiative to procure a signature was enough to show "buy-in": On the
first day of school, every student had made a tiny but significant act
that showed that they had chosen to be in this class. This served as
implicit evidence that they cared about their education, at least a
little bit.
I was once one of those students. As a teenager
enrolled in a public high school in Northern California, I often wore a
T-shirt with an angel proclaiming "Do not trust the government!" and
earned the average grades that came relatively easy to me. Near the time
of graduation, my father told me that he saw no point in investing in
my college tuition because academics were clearly not my priority. So I
started bussing tables and save up money for college on my own, and once
it was me paying for my own education, I was angry rather than relieved
when a professor canceled class; I constantly calculated how much each
hour was costing me, and my grades skyrocketed.
Today, despite my excitement about kids who "geek out"
about education, I hope my empathy for and belief in public-school
students are evident, if only for my choice of occupation. I’m not
trying to be combative, but I do find it ironic that many people who
argue against private schools work in the private sector. For 20 years, I
have deliberately invested my life in teaching public-school kids,
coaching them, and advocating for the ones who don’t have the same
support that other kids have. In fact, I chose to teach in a
public high school precisely because I pitied the children who felt
forced to be at school, who felt trapped like I did when I was their
age. I spend my own time and money advising clubs, tutoring
those who struggle with English, helping students apply for college,
and, sometimes, feeding kids who aren’t sure if they’re going to have
dinner. On a daily basis, even as I’m surrounded by a million competing
interests and distractions, I work hard to make their compulsory
experience something for which they would volunteer.
And I should note that, in expressing my
concern about public schools, I’m not talking about individual
students—all of whom I care for, respect, and support. Most of these
kids are wonderful people, and some of them are fantastic students. Nor
am I talking about individual teachers or classes. After all, statistics show
that public-school teachers have comparably more classroom experience
and qualifications. From what I’ve seen, public-school teachers are just
as talented as, if not more talented than, their private-school
counterparts; I’ve observed countless public-school classes in which
students were, indeed, "stoked" about a particular lesson. And private
schools for their part undoubtedly have bouts of misbehavior and poor
choices.
I am, however, concerned about the general
culture at public schools—at least at the ones I’ve seen—of
disengagement and compulsory learning. So when it comes to my daughter, I
opt to invest a little more—to ensure she’s immersed in a community
where it’s acceptable, and even admirable, to show natural enthusiasm
for knowledge. I trust this particular private school, one that was
created by like-minded parents, will best set her up for success. After
all, numerous studies corroborate
what teachers and parents have always observed: A student’s habits and
beliefs are significantly affected by his or her friends. Schools like
SLOCA, fantastic as it may seem, are possible as long as the students
and their parents are willing to buy in. Unfortunately, the critical
mass of engaged students and parents that’s integral to creating this
environment seems to be lacking at many of today’s public schools. And
it may be impossible to attain when everything is both free and
compulsory.
Of course, everything I’ve said until now is
from my perspective as a parent and teacher. So, wanting to see what an
actual student has to say about the issue, I recently sat down with the
aforementioned teen who, as part of a unique arrangement, continues to
attend the public school where I teach while taking a couple of classes
at SLOCA. A typical junior who has a 3.4 GPA and takes few honors
courses, the student emphasized that while he really likes his peers and
teachers—and the opportunities he has to play soccer—at the public
school, he prefers the classes at the academy. "At SLOCA, the kids
really want to learn, and they want to be focused," he told me. "At [the
public school], some kids don’t, and that puts a damper on things. And
then the teachers unfortunately focus on [those kids]." He used the word
"damper" again when I asked, hypothetically, what would happen if a
SLOCA class were infused with 10 additional disengaged students. And
that same word came up yet again when I asked him about ways in which
public schools should handle the distracting "cool" kids who pollute
classroom environments: "There’s no way to change that. You’d have to
take them out of the class, but you don’t have the right to segregate
them. Who gets to decide who’s putting the damper on [whom]?"
He’s right: Nobody gets to decide who puts the
damper on whom. As taxpayers and citizens, American individuals are
entitled to pursuing their own happiness, whether that entails an
emphasis on athletics, church, real estate, you name it. For my family,
we choose to emphasize a specific learning environment. And though we’re
by no means martyrs for carving out $600 a month for tuition and aren’t
sacrificing in the same way that many disadvantaged families do,
we’re certainly not frittering away our disposable income in an attempt
to give our daughter an unfair advantage. We’ve simply made a choice,
and that in part means we live in a modest apartment designed for
college students.
Of course, not everyone agrees with me. Vox editor Matthew Yglesias claims the country should tax private schools even more because, "At best private school is a private consumption good, like buying your kids expensive clothes." Gawker writer John Cook argues that private school should be illegal. A "public school dad" recently published a "plea to private school parents"
on ABC.com that efforts like mine to "get the best education possible
in the land of the free … sucks on a bunch of levels." And at least
70,000 people on Facebook liked the "manifesto" against private schools written by Slate senior
editor Allison Benedikt, whose many points included: "If you send your
kid to private school" then you are "a bad person … ruining one of our
nation’s most essential institutions."
Public schools have my tax money, my lifelong
employment, and almost anything else they need of me; pulling my
daughter—one student—out of the system is probably the least of its
worries. And on a more abstract level, the above criticisms fail to
acknowledge the cumbersome, almost fixed nature of the dominant culture
I’ve seen at public schools—one that occasionally isolates students who
love learning, are teased by the "cool" kids and even bullied into
joining the masses. No matter how much she voluntarily recites
Shakespeare, the student I envision my daughter becoming would never be
able to single-handedly transform a public school into an environment
that is cool to learning.
These private-school critics, of course, are
free to do whatever they want with her own personal time and money.
Admitting that she’s "judgemental," Benedikt says one reason she "feels
so strongly about public schools" is that, while some teens like to read
Walt Whitman, "getting drunk before basketball games … did the same
thing" for her. My girl deserves to be in a place where she won’t face
diatribes from judgmental students who call her names just because she
chooses to buy into her own educational aspirations. She should have the
opportunity to read Whitman with sober, like-minded friends knowing
that they, too, are getting what they bought in for.
Obama announces 'let girls learn' education effort, first lady to promote in Japan, Cambodia
By DARLENE SUPERVILLE, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — Saying every girl "has value," President Barack Obama announced a more focused government effort Tuesday to help tens of millions of girls around the world attend and stay in school. Michelle Obama said she's heading to Japan and Cambodia later this month to promote it.
Obama said that, as the father of "two fabulous, extraordinary, awesome young women," he wants to help make sure that "no girl out there is denied her chance to be a strong, capable woman." Yet more than 60 million girls are being denied schooling for a variety of reasons, he said.
Obama said the U.S. works quietly to support educating girls, but its many programs must become a single, coordinated strategy.
"We're making it clear to any country that's our partner or wants to be our partner that they need to get serious about increasing the number of girls in school," Obama said, announcing the "Let Girls Learn" initiative at the White House with the first lady standing beside him.
Mrs. Obama said the issue is personal for her because "I see myself in these girls. I see our daughters in these girls."
The Obamas are parents of teenagers Malia, 16, and Sasha, 13, and say their own success would have been impossible without education. During their travels, they encourage young people to focus on education; in the U.S., Mrs. Obama urges students to pursue education after high school.
As part of the effort, Mrs. Obama said her office and the Peace Corps will work jointly to highlight community-based solutions.
The Peace Corps already has thousands of volunteers at work in more than 60 developing countries. Its "Let Girls Learn" program will begin in Albania, Benin, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Georgia, Ghana, Moldova, Mongolia, Mozambique, Togo and Uganda.
Mrs. Obama will travel alone to Tokyo and Kyoto, Japan, from March 18-20 and Siem Reap in northwestern Cambodia from March 21-22, the White House said.
The first lady said she will visit with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's wife, Akie, "who also shares our passion for girls' education and is eager to partner with us in this work." Obama traveled to the close U.S. ally on a state visit last April; a reciprocal visit by the prime minister is expected soon.
In Cambodia, Mrs. Obama said she will meet Peace Corps volunteers and visit a school where "community-driven solutions are changing girls' lives."
Cambodia is an interesting choice for the first lady.
Obama reluctantly became the first U.S. president to visit Cambodia in late 2012. At the time, White House officials insisted that Obama was only going to the southeast Asian nation because Cambodia was the host for two annual regional summits he has made a point of attending.
Cambodia has been led since 1985 by Prime Minister Hun Sen, who has a reputation for ruthlessness and a low tolerance for opposition.
Mrs. Obama said the new initiative is as much about students in the U.S. as it is about educating girls abroad. She said she wants to help youngsters in America learn about the sacrifices girls around the world make to get their education.
"I want our young people to be awed by these girls, but more importantly I want them to be inspired and motivated by these girls," Mrs. Obama said.
___
Follow Darlene Superville on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/dsupervilleap
Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Saying every girl "has value," President Barack Obama announced a more focused government effort Tuesday to help tens of millions of girls around the world attend and stay in school. Michelle Obama said she's heading to Japan and Cambodia later this month to promote it.
Obama said that, as the father of "two fabulous, extraordinary, awesome young women," he wants to help make sure that "no girl out there is denied her chance to be a strong, capable woman." Yet more than 60 million girls are being denied schooling for a variety of reasons, he said.
Obama said the U.S. works quietly to support educating girls, but its many programs must become a single, coordinated strategy.
"We're making it clear to any country that's our partner or wants to be our partner that they need to get serious about increasing the number of girls in school," Obama said, announcing the "Let Girls Learn" initiative at the White House with the first lady standing beside him.
Mrs. Obama said the issue is personal for her because "I see myself in these girls. I see our daughters in these girls."
The Obamas are parents of teenagers Malia, 16, and Sasha, 13, and say their own success would have been impossible without education. During their travels, they encourage young people to focus on education; in the U.S., Mrs. Obama urges students to pursue education after high school.
As part of the effort, Mrs. Obama said her office and the Peace Corps will work jointly to highlight community-based solutions.
The Peace Corps already has thousands of volunteers at work in more than 60 developing countries. Its "Let Girls Learn" program will begin in Albania, Benin, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Georgia, Ghana, Moldova, Mongolia, Mozambique, Togo and Uganda.
Mrs. Obama will travel alone to Tokyo and Kyoto, Japan, from March 18-20 and Siem Reap in northwestern Cambodia from March 21-22, the White House said.
The first lady said she will visit with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's wife, Akie, "who also shares our passion for girls' education and is eager to partner with us in this work." Obama traveled to the close U.S. ally on a state visit last April; a reciprocal visit by the prime minister is expected soon.
In Cambodia, Mrs. Obama said she will meet Peace Corps volunteers and visit a school where "community-driven solutions are changing girls' lives."
Cambodia is an interesting choice for the first lady.
Obama reluctantly became the first U.S. president to visit Cambodia in late 2012. At the time, White House officials insisted that Obama was only going to the southeast Asian nation because Cambodia was the host for two annual regional summits he has made a point of attending.
Cambodia has been led since 1985 by Prime Minister Hun Sen, who has a reputation for ruthlessness and a low tolerance for opposition.
Mrs. Obama said the new initiative is as much about students in the U.S. as it is about educating girls abroad. She said she wants to help youngsters in America learn about the sacrifices girls around the world make to get their education.
"I want our young people to be awed by these girls, but more importantly I want them to be inspired and motivated by these girls," Mrs. Obama said.
___
Follow Darlene Superville on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/dsupervilleap
Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Law allows parents to opt out their children from controversial Ontario sex-education curriculum
TORONTO — As Ontario finally revealed on Monday an update to a
sex-education curriculum that’s stagnated since 1998, parents were told
they could pull their children out of some but not all of the lessons.
“It’s actually in the Education Act that a parent has the right to withdraw their child from content they don’t want their child to receive,” Education Minister Liz Sandals said in an interview.
That could be anything from a novel in English class (some people object to Harry Potter books because they glorify witchcraft) to evolution.
The revamped sex-ed curriculum includes lessons about technology and sexuality — such as the dangers of sexting or sending nude photos online — and begins with discussions about healthy relationships and anatomy as early as Grade 1.
For some parents, discussions of anal sex or contraception in Grade 7 might raise eyebrows, but Ms. Sandals said the material relating to sex is only about 10% of the lengthy document. It also includes health lessons about nutrition and why physical activity is important. Those are efforts to combat childhood obesity, just as the sex-ed lessons seek to address sexually transmitted infection (STI) rates that have climbed among teens while the number of unplanned pregnancies has fallen.
That trend shows the old curriculum did a good job teaching about contraception, but may have not done enough to explain there’s more than one way to get an STI. That’s why the new guidelines include more discussion about safe oral and anal sex, the Education Minister said. The new lessons will be introduced starting in September.
Former premier Dalton McGuinty pulled back on similar changes in 2010 in response to a vocal minority opposed to the evidence-based reforms. Demonstrations are planned for the provincial legislature on Tuesday, both for and against the new curricula.
Parents have the right to pull their children from sex-ed classes, but it’s a “real rarity,” said Bob Schreader, vice-president of the Ontario Catholic School Trustees’ Association. That group and the Institute for Catholic Education supported the curriculum throughout its development.
“As a Catholic community, we’re going to ensure our children get that information, but we are going to do it through a Catholic lens,” Mr. Schreader said. He said parents’ concerns can often be allayed by talking to teachers instead of pulling their children from classes.
There is no province-wide process to follow if parents want to opt
out. Each school board deals with such matters differently, usually
under equity policies for religious or conscientious accommodation.
Some schools still send out letters or permission forms before sex ed begins, but not all. Michael Barrett, president of the Ontario Public School Boards’ Association, advises parents to talk to their children’s teachers if they are concerned about the material.
Ms. Sandals also noted that schools are not required to provide alternative assignments or tests if children are pulled from class, so it’s important to understand if material will be covered in other ways or not.
And some aspects of the new health curriculum can’t be avoided — explaining why it’s OK that some families are different, and not teasing other students because they have “two mommies” or two fathers, for instance.
This portion of the curriculum was enshrined in Ontario law under an anti-bullying bill in 2012, as well as under provincial human-rights legislation.
“The human-rights pieces [of curriculum], you’re not going to be able to exempt your [child] from those,” Mr. Barrett said.
“It’s actually in the Education Act that a parent has the right to withdraw their child from content they don’t want their child to receive,” Education Minister Liz Sandals said in an interview.
That could be anything from a novel in English class (some people object to Harry Potter books because they glorify witchcraft) to evolution.
The revamped sex-ed curriculum includes lessons about technology and sexuality — such as the dangers of sexting or sending nude photos online — and begins with discussions about healthy relationships and anatomy as early as Grade 1.
For some parents, discussions of anal sex or contraception in Grade 7 might raise eyebrows, but Ms. Sandals said the material relating to sex is only about 10% of the lengthy document. It also includes health lessons about nutrition and why physical activity is important. Those are efforts to combat childhood obesity, just as the sex-ed lessons seek to address sexually transmitted infection (STI) rates that have climbed among teens while the number of unplanned pregnancies has fallen.
That trend shows the old curriculum did a good job teaching about contraception, but may have not done enough to explain there’s more than one way to get an STI. That’s why the new guidelines include more discussion about safe oral and anal sex, the Education Minister said. The new lessons will be introduced starting in September.
Former premier Dalton McGuinty pulled back on similar changes in 2010 in response to a vocal minority opposed to the evidence-based reforms. Demonstrations are planned for the provincial legislature on Tuesday, both for and against the new curricula.
Parents have the right to pull their children from sex-ed classes, but it’s a “real rarity,” said Bob Schreader, vice-president of the Ontario Catholic School Trustees’ Association. That group and the Institute for Catholic Education supported the curriculum throughout its development.
“As a Catholic community, we’re going to ensure our children get that information, but we are going to do it through a Catholic lens,” Mr. Schreader said. He said parents’ concerns can often be allayed by talking to teachers instead of pulling their children from classes.
Kevin Van Paassen for National PostOntario
Education Minister Liz Sandals unveils the province's revised Health
and Physical Education curriculum at a press conference at Queen's Park
in Toronto, Monday, Feb. 23, 2015.
Some schools still send out letters or permission forms before sex ed begins, but not all. Michael Barrett, president of the Ontario Public School Boards’ Association, advises parents to talk to their children’s teachers if they are concerned about the material.
Ms. Sandals also noted that schools are not required to provide alternative assignments or tests if children are pulled from class, so it’s important to understand if material will be covered in other ways or not.
And some aspects of the new health curriculum can’t be avoided — explaining why it’s OK that some families are different, and not teasing other students because they have “two mommies” or two fathers, for instance.
This portion of the curriculum was enshrined in Ontario law under an anti-bullying bill in 2012, as well as under provincial human-rights legislation.
“The human-rights pieces [of curriculum], you’re not going to be able to exempt your [child] from those,” Mr. Barrett said.
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