Table of Contents:
Introduction
When we came to Lincoln High School
during the week of April 12, 1993,
for our fourth visit as part of
the School Change Study, we were
already familiar with many of the
challenges this school has been
facing. We were also familiar with
the many ambitious and far-reaching
changes that the staff had been
putting into practice since Lincoln
joined the Coalition of Essential
Schools in 1988 and committed itself
to work towards whole-school change,
according to the Coalition's nine
Common Principles. (See Appendix
B for a listing of the Principles.)
Some of the major changes that Lincoln
has undertaken in the last few years
have included mainstreaming the
special education students; implementing
portfolios, other authentic assessments,
and site-based decision making;
and restructuring the schedule to
group more than half the students
into teams of about one hundred
students and four or five teachers.
Home to about eleven hundred students,
Lincoln High School is a middle-size
high school located in a suburb
in the south-central region of the
country. About 75 percent of the
students are white, 25 percent are
black, and about 40 percent come
from low-income families.
Lincoln, like all the schools throughout
the state, has been greatly affected
by the State School Improvement
Act (SSIA). Enacted in 1990, the
SSIA constituted a fundamental restructuring
of the state's educational system,
from the state department of education
down.
This spring, the blizzard of state,
district, local, and personal challenges
meant a daunting year for Lincoln
High. No wonder the faculty decided
that the coming fall was not the
time to introduce fresh changes
or revamp the schedule. Should they
take time to consider whether or
not the school should reorganize
into houses in the fall of 1994?
Or focus on rigorous instruction,
rigorous expectations in the curriculum,
and Exhibitions in the coming year?
What worthwhile goals! Planning
for houses may seem to be the more
radical and daring quest, but figuring
out how to take everyone's instruction
up a notch may be the more significant
breakthrough. As we do each time we visit a school
as part of the School Change Study,
we produced a "snapshot" based on
our observations in classrooms and
our conversations with people in
the Lincoln High School community.
For this fourth visit, we decided
to focus our snapshot on the issues
that Lincoln High School considered
of high priority at the time of
our visit. First, however, because
of the vast impact of the SSIA on
schools throughout the state, we
will begin by discussing the SSIA's
ramifications for Lincoln High School.
We will follow in Part 2 with a
discussion of other issues that
the school currently considers to
be of significant concern. Part
3 of this paper contains brief excerpts
from our notes relating to five
central issues facing Lincoln High
at this time, followed by questions
the researchers would like the reader
to consider regarding these issues. [Return to Table
of Contents] Part 1: The Impact of the SSIA
The SSIA stirs strong feelings. It
pleases reformers eager to show
how thoughtful performance assessments
can improve instruction; it bothers
penny-pinchers, worries fundamentalists,
and it threatens small-town, patronage
politics. At Lincoln High and elsewhere,
teachers cannot ignore the new order,
whatever their private feelings
about the law. The entire school
will be affected if student scores
on various tests fall below an acceptable
"threshold" set by the SSIA, and
individual teachers are already
affected by particular SSIA requirements,
especially by needing to keep portfolios
of student work in English and math.
[Return to Table
of Contents]
SSIA's Impact Statewide
The impact of SSIA on the 520 professionals
in the state department of education
was immediate and far-reaching.
Only 20 percent of the top management
staff in the department were retained.
Although most of the rank and file
kept a job, more were demoted than
promoted, and everyone was put on
one-year probation. The new organization
included a few cross-role teams,
but on balance the previous hierarchical
and centralized structure persisted.
The new commissioner has been keeping
a close watch on every division's
work and sets short timelines for
large projects. The pace is hectic
and tiring. Although in spirit the
SSIA values innovation and risk-taking,
many department staff shy away from
daring departures or creative leaps.
It is understood that anyone who
makes mistakes could be dismissed.
Turnover in the top jobs continues,
and communication across divisions
is ad hoc and sporadic.
The greatest dilemma involved moving
from a monitoring to a service orientation
and at the same time regulating
the districts. There now is a stronger
emphasis on helping districts, either
directly or by building local capacity
for their own staff development.
For example, a former math teacher
at Lincoln, now on the SSIA staff,
has worked with over seven hundred
teachers in the past year, created
a video on math portfolios, and
helped to write a hefty, five-hundred-page
explanation of the benchmarks for
scoring portfolios. She was delighted
by math teachers' receptivity and
bragged that attendance at this
year's State Council of Teachers
of Mathematics soared 300 percent
over last year. Although she misses
her students at Lincoln and could
do without a daily one-hundred-mile
commute, she finds the work stimulating
and rewarding.
The SSIA emphasizes results, but
many regulations constrain how schools
can operate. The state department
of education has issued many "program
advisories" to clarify and offer
interpretations of the SSIA, which
the recipients often see as binding,
not advisory. One observer called
the spate of guidelines "the Bubba
effect":
We've got Extended School Services
[ESS]--it's a great idea, great
program [to make up credits]--but
there was a guy in one of the
districts who needed money
for football uniforms. So he
took the ESS money and bought
the uniforms. Now we have all
sorts of regulations on what
you can use this money for.
All sorts of rules, written
to control the Bubbas of the
world.
He feels that the regulations are
neither foolish nor wise, but their
goodness is not the point:
[Regulation] kills the spirit
of SSIA. If I had to do it
over again, I'd go through
the law and anywhere it said,
"State board will be responsible
for .æ.æ. ," I would put some
kind of caveat that says, "to
the extent that it doesn't
limit local autonomy to make
decisions."
Another person said the SSIA speaks
warmly of outcomes, then lets the
state department stage-whisper,
"Psst, we'll tell you how to get
there." The press for monitoring
is reinforced by the legislature.
The lawmakers want to know what
the unprecedented $1.3 billion tax
increase of 1990 is buying, and
a new, legislative Office of Education
Accountability demands detailed
information on implementation. A
popular quip is that soon SSIA
may mean "State Superexpensive
Improvement Act."
[Return to Table
of Contents] The SSIA's Impact on Lincoln
Transitional tests, non-cognitive
indices, matrix-sampling, performance
levels--the technical procedures
are formidable, but the results
are clear-cut threshold numbers
for each school in the state to
shoot for in the mid-1990s. If the
threshold is exceeded by 1 percent
or more, there will be rewards in
the form of extra money for the
school, but if the site falls more
than 5 percent below the threshold,
it could be designated a school
"in crisis," which would trigger
the equivalent of a takeover by
the state, with all staff placed
on probation and improvement overseen
by a "distinguished educator." Lincoln
teachers realized this possibility.
This spring, many Lincoln students
who took the tests focused on the
multiple-choice section and slighted
the written answers to open-ended
questions, which the state eventually
weighted more heavily than the multiple-choice
items.
So far, the impact of the SSIA on
Lincoln High has been gradual and
gentle. Site-based decision making
existed at Lincoln before the SSIA
mandated it. The Youth Services
Center extended and broadened social
services already recognized as a
vital need. ESS, the second-chance
afternoon and summer catch-up option,
was introduced without controversy.
Interest in alternative assessments
predated the SSIA because Lincoln
staff took various district workshops
on testing. Teachers acknowledged
that the county has set the pace
for the rest of the state; the SSIA
codified much of the good work already
under way here. Implementing SSIA-mandated Assessments
In the past school year, the portfolio
requirement seemed to be the most
direct and visible effect of the
SSIA. The experiences of two teachers
who were "cluster leaders" (trainers
of fellow teachers) suggest a reasonably
good beginning for portfolios.
Paula Baker's Experience. Paula, a math teacher, likes the
SSIA assessments' emphasis on problem
solving and understanding: "It's
not: here's an equation, plug in
a formula." She explained why she
was pleased with her recent adoption
of a computer-assisted program from
the University of Pennsylvania for
her Algebra 1 juniors and seniors
that dovetailed with the SSIA goals:
"All the problems in the three binders
we get require applications; that's
why I like it. You don't come in
and solve 2x + 3 = 5."
She feels some uncertainty about
what lies ahead. As a cluster leader,
she attended training this summer
in grading portfolios, and later
she will coach Lincoln teachers,
who will eventually grade Lincoln
students' portfolios, with spot
checking by outsiders. She heard
rumors that next year students have
to complete a math portfolio in
order to graduate, but she is not
sure that will be so. She wonders
what to do with transfer students,
and she also wonders who is responsible
for coaxing students to finish their
portfolios. This year she relied on a mimeographed
sheet with a series of questions
for students to ask themselves about
the quantity and quality of their
portfolios. Whenever her student
teacher took over, she met individually
with students to review those questions.
The toughest challenges she sees
now are convincing students that
the portfolios are not just an add-on,
an extra chore, and fighting the
traditional view that getting the
right answer is all that matters
in math. For the portfolio items
where students have to explain how
they arrived at their solution,
she said, "Some of the work is great,
but some kids just don't care." Jane Owen's Experience. Jane
has been as involved as anyone with
the English portfolios, and she
values the focus they provide. "My
students can look at their own writing
and judge it. They know what's novice
work, and it's not just the little
bitty stuff like spelling or punctuation." She is delighted that students on
their own speak of "voice" in their
own writing (which is a trait of
the top two performance levels,
"distinguished" and "proficient").
Although most Lincoln (and other
of the state's schools') portfolios
fall in the lower categories, "novice" and "apprentice," Jane points out
the wide range of work within particular
categories, as well as the fine
line between the levels, especially
"(high) apprentice" and "(low) proficient." She thinks several aspects of the
portfolios need work. Encouraging
and training all teachers to understand
and value portfolio assessment would
be helpful. The quantity and quality
of writing done in other classes
concerns her (two of the six portfolio
papers cannot be from English class).
So does the prospect that incoming
seniors, who have dutifully saved
enough written work, will be able
to walk in and say they are done
in September, or that some seniors
may not finish work by the March
1 deadline. On balance, Jane feels
the portfolios and the accompanying
rubrics support her notions of good
writing. The process of gathering
and grading the portfolios consumes
many hours, but she says, "I still
love it. I'm glad we do it. The
record keeping is a headache. But
portfolios are wonderful." Jane, Paula, and other teachers face
two tremendous challenges: deepening
their own understanding of portfolios
and encouraging their students to
value this new requirement. After-school
and summer workshops abound. In
1993-94, at the high school level
alone, there will be twelve different
district sessions devoted to just
the assessment and scoring aspects
of portfolios. The training is not
simple or quick. As Dr. Terman,
the director of research, explained,
undoing misconceptions of the four
levels is necessary before any practice
scoring can start. Some teachers
equate each level with a letter
grade. Dr. Terman tells them, "Novice
means you are just starting.
This is a big change from A, B,
C, D, which has winners and losers.
We have to dump that philosophy." Most teachers are hungry for more
advice and assistance, when it would
be easy to play wait-and-see, in
a state that has changed its testing
program four times in the past decade.
Accountability. Knowing what
portfolios are about--either the
fine points of scoring them or the
big curricular implications--is
only part of the story. Another
aspect is accountability. There
is much concern that the teachers
and the school could suffer more
than the students if the performances
do not rise to meet or exceed the
school's threshold; the school might
be declared "in crisis" and the
teachers put on probation. But will
anyone tolerate more student failure
or higher dropout rates? The recent
task force on restructuring high
schools, which Lincoln's principal
chaired, recommended performance-based
units of credit in place of Carnegie
units, which would increase student
accountability, assuming the performance
standards went beyond the old "minimum
competencies" adopted and trivialized
by many states in the late 1970s.
Another type of accountability encouraged
by the new assessments of student
work parallels what happens in university
doctoral programs (or should routinely
happen). As students submit draft
after draft of their dissertation,
the major professor's comments,
suggestions, and even rewriting
of sentences begin to blur the line
between the work of student and
advisor. A final draft exhibits
the talents of the professor without
obscuring the original thinking
and hard work of the student. Because
an advisor would not accept incomplete
arguments, questionable evidence,
sloppy writing, or other shortcomings
that would mar first-rate work,
the final product is significantly
better than it would have been.
In the defense, the major professor
feels free to step in on the student's
behalf if the candidate falters,
and afterwards a co-authored article
might appear. Throughout, the collaboration
is close and continuous, even as
the student carries the burden of
responsibility for designing and
doing the research. To what extent will that sort of
intimate connection mark high school
teacher-student relationships in
regard to portfolio entries? If
they are treated with anything like
the coaching a graduate advisor
gives, then the portfolio entries
will need painstaking reading and
rereading by teachers. Yet a graduate
advisor shepherds only a handful
of novices, not 120, and teaches
six hours each week (nine is considered
excessive), not twenty or twenty-five
hours. Already the time demands
on Lincoln's teachers are substantial:
collecting, sorting, filing, double-checking-the
paperwork alone is burdensome.
Even if Lincoln teachers have the
talent and stamina to provide detailed
comments on student papers, some
students would resist. In one English
class, a teacher reported, "The
students said it wasn't fair [to
have to finish a portfolio to graduate].
If you come to school and do your
work, that's all that should be
asked of you. They were really grumpy." One of Jane's students resubmitted
a paper for his portfolio without
erasing Jane's comments in the margins.
At what point does the teacher's
responsibility for that indifference
end?
Raising the Issues of Equity and
Challenging Work
It is not impossible to link the
SSIA with the teams, master schedule,
and special programs recently introduced
at Lincoln High. Making those connections
might be a fruitful exercise because
the reactions to structural change
often latch onto prickly issues
of equity and collegiality. When
this happens, the talk about teaching
and learning lapses. The irony is
that apparently very novel SSIA
initiatives (authentic assessment,
for example) raise very old issues.
Figuring out what is equitable has
been at the heart of a century of
organized effort to improve teachers' lives. Who wants "low numbers and
good students" unjustly bestowed?
The old answer--an ironclad contract
provision hammered out by union
negotiations--no longer seems ideal,
but the old questions about fairness
persist.
The larger issue is that Lincoln's
students' notions of "challenging
work" are not always the same as
that mandated by the SSIA. The students
define challenge in terms
of quantity ("They give me a lot
of work") and time--including homework,
which signifies, "You are so far
behind you now have to take work
home." Sometimes challenge is associated
with novel and strange actions:
calling an 800 number to order free
seedlings for a science project
was challenging because some students
became nervous (so nervous that
several asked their mothers to make
the call). Meeting deadlines is
a challenge to many students, also.
So is working together in groups,
or standing to speak in front of
classmates. It is rare to hear students
speak of higher-order skills, levels
of analysis, use of evidence, and
the other forms of reasoning which
the "distinguished" ranking seeks.
"My challenge?" Charles asked. "I
want to make it out of here at seventeen." [Return to Table
of Contents] Part 2: Daily Concerns and Priorities at
Lincoln High
Just because the SSIA has had a momentous
impact on Lincoln does not mean
it suffuses every aspect of a school.
Although the statewide conversation
about SSIA surfaced in some remarks
of individual teachers when they
spoke of the day-to-day concerns
in their working lives, other important
topics also arose with more frequency
and immediacy. This year, local
changes influenced day-to-day life
more than SSIA did. The expansion
of teams, shifts in the master schedule,
and a new public safety magnet program
had significant consequences for
nearly all the teachers and, to
a lesser extent, for most students.
Where to deploy teachers and students,
and then what to do within the new
configurations, were difficult and
persistent issues. These issues
were worked through in many ways
across the school.
What is crucial at top levels of
policy making may not reflect the
daily concerns and priorities of
teachers. As Ted Sizer, founder
of the Coalition, says, the "national
conversation" about schooling is
only one level at which ideas take
shape and circulate. There is also
regional, state, and local discourse
which reaffirms, modifies, ignores,
or rejects the national policy talk.
What goes on in one domain is not
necessarily what develops in other
arenas.
For instance, advocates of free public
high schools in the 1840s and 1850s
intoned the civic, religious, and
economic benefits of secondary education,
but local voters often based their
decisions on whether or not the
nearby common (elementary) school
serving their children needed the
repairs, books, and teachers which
a new high school would siphon away,
to educate only a fraction of the
town's youth. In the same years,
national political rhetoric drummed
on about slavery and its expansion,
yet in election after election,
voters were swayed by ethnic and
religious issues, especially nativism,
temperance, and anti-Catholicism.
[Return to Table
of Contents]
Teaming and Scheduling
This year, nearly everyone's life
was influenced by the spread of
teaming. The expansion last fall
put all ninth- and tenth-graders
on six teams, created a new cross-age
eleventh/twelfth-grade team, and
continued the interdisciplinary
American studies pairings. Although
the public safety magnet is not
called a team, all the teachers
involved in it shared the task of
creating a viable new program. In
addition, teachers at the school
who were not on teams were affected
by the teams' need for elective
courses in the two periods that
their students were "off team." Initial Confusion in Scheduling
In the experience of some teachers,
teaming and scheduling are practically
synonymous. Some disappointed teachers
had imagined the schedule would
include a second planning period,
and its absence infuriated them.
Others knew that on early drafts
of the master schedule, what originally
seemed to be second planning periods
were actually designed as slots
for each team to create whatever
classes their students needed or
wanted. The opportunities to do
that were constrained by an unexpected
influx of students who showed up
in early September. Although Lincoln attracted fewer
freshmen than it anticipated--open
enrollment throughout the summer
let students move on and off the
rolls--there were more juniors and
seniors than expected, including
quite a few former dropouts. Extra
sections had to be scheduled during
the team slot, and it was impossible
to restrict those classes to students
from the same team. The fall flux
was compounded by problems with
new scheduling software (MacSchool)
and well-intentioned volunteers
who input data without knowing all
the intricacies of a master schedule
for a school of this size.
The faculty made it through an upside-down
September. English teacher Patty
Palmer found forty students in her
fourth period, with the overflow
sitting on bookcases, footstools,
and window ledges. History teacher
Ted Stewart had twenty-seven freshmen
and sophomores mistakenly assigned
to him first and second period.
In one course, a week after school
began, the teacher heard several
boys admit they had already taken
the class. Roberta Coles lost four
of her Algebra 1 students for a
month, as they spent the period
in the lunchroom. Counselor Betty
Greenfield remembered schedules
that read "no teacher" for several
periods. "We knew they were on the
eleventh/twelfth-grade team, and
were in one of four rooms, but parents
looked at that and went bananas." Issues of Workload and Tracking
Reassignments corrected the major
imbalances in classroom assignments.
But if no classrooms still burst
at the seams, the issue of overall
student load continued to prompt
discussion. It was no secret that
some teachers had considerably fewer
students than others. At a well-attended
curriculum committee meeting in
February, Andrea Marler said that
twelve teachers (excluding special
educators) had fewer than eighty-nine
students. In her opinion, the schedule
should eventually change so all
teachers enjoyed the ratio envisioned
by the Coalition of no more than
eighty students for every teacher.
For many teachers, the bigger issue
was not how many but which students
were assigned to them. Several teachers
who had previously taught applied
math and science courses with "low
numbers and good kids"--classes
of twenty where everyone had already
passed algebra--now had larger numbers
and a wide range of students, including
10 percent who failed all their
ninth-grade classes. The discussion
among several young teachers about
a possible schedule change to pair
physics and pre-calculus students
as well as Algebra 2 and chemistry
students sparked pointed comments
about some teachers' hogging the
best students. No one team seemed
blessed with disproportionately
more above-average students--which
could happen if all the freshmen
taking geometry (the top math kids)
end up on one ninth-grade team.
The possibility of tracking arose
within the teams, not among them.
Because the teams had all their
students (or nearly all, in some
cases) for four hours, it was possible
to reschedule within that block
of time. Resorting according to
students' mathematical ability was
the starting point for several teams.
The goal was not to create advanced
or remedial sections of the same
subject, but instead to distinguish
algebra, pre-algebra, geometry,
and Algebra 2 students, so separate
classes could be filled appropriately.
A few other teams depended on their
ECE (special education) teacher
for assistance with their poorest
students, or for periodically teaching
classes so the teammates could meet.
Not every team retracked, and the
most blatant segregation of ECE
students was quickly vetoed by the
administration. Furthermore, one
team used their open period to create
what might seem a form of tracked
instruction--an "A.C.T lab" tailor-made
for the college bound. So many others
wound up there, however (closed
out of electives or unsure what
else to take), that the average
pre-test score was only nine, and
the teacher eventually decided to
divide the class into small groups
that would follow two-week rotations
through basic skills units. All in all, the variety of approaches
to diversity which the Lincoln teams
took mirrors the national divisions
of opinion on heterogeneous or homogeneous
grouping. It is extremely hard to
reach universal agreement on grouping
students, even within a school that
says it rejects formal tracking.
How Do Teachers Form Teams?
Scheduling the teams also raised
the significant question of who
would work with whom. Last spring,
many teachers signed up for a schedule,
not for particular teammates. They
saw slots with particular courses
already written in. Picking what
and when they would teach swayed
more decisions than the knowledge
of who else would be on the same
team. Although some people had ideas
about who their teammates might
be, it was rare that anyone had
the information which the oldest
team, Zephyr, had, where it was
clear who wanted to be there. And
with Zephyr's history and reputation
well known, the type of team it
would be, not just who would be
on it, presented no real mystery,
in contrast to many brand new teams
without an identity. By last winter, potential teammates
for the fall began to seek each
other and to discuss what courses
they would prefer to teach and who
else might round out their team.
In late January, one teacher exclaimed,
"The rush is on! Suddenly every
way you turn, someone's soliciting
somebody to join or form a team." A young teacher agreed the negotiations
began early, but he regretted that
he had made his specific intentions--that
he would accept what in fact was
his second choice-known so soon:
"It's sort of like poker, and I
showed my cards too early." It is noteworthy that few of the
teachers who considered shifting
teams rejected or despised the notion
of teaming. They were willing to
give it a try and saw potential
which had not been fully realized
in their first effort at teaming.
Occasionally, a teacher who felt
misplaced formed a partnership with
one other teacher on the team, as
in coordinating work on a science
research project with work on an
English portfolio entry. Sometimes
a docile teammate was not hostile
to teaming and was not a saboteur,
but the reluctance to volunteer
annoyed the adventuresome. As one
younger teacher reported,
Dave Jackson never says, "No
we can't do that." He'll go
along with whatever you put
forward. He doesn't contribute
much. He won't say, "We shouldn't
do that," but he rarely says,
"Let's do this." He is really
saying, "Leave me alone. I
want to teach math."
In contrast, another teacher stifled
his misgivings about a teammate's
new interdisciplinary unit. Although
he believed a particular topic would
have been a better choice because
it was more local and familiar--and
in his opinion, therefore more meaningful
to students--he welcomed the energy
and excitement so much that he went
along with a topic he privately
considered obtuse.
As those examples suggest, temperament,
disposition, and interpersonal chemistry
outweighed disagreement about curriculum,
pedagogy, or assessment in determining
how well a team meshed. It is true
that some teams shared common views
of good teaching (and in one case
their stated view was an unapologetic
defense of "traditional values," which they defined as homework and
failure for unacceptable work).
Other teams differed on educational
strategy, particularly on how rigidly
structured and teacher-directed
classes should be; but the key to
whether or not they cohered seemed
to be personality factors more than
educational philosophy. Challenges for the Public Safety
Magnet
Although not formally called a team,
the teachers working in the new
Public Safety Magnet have to be
a team of sorts if this elective
program is to draw enough students
to maintain current staffing. Freshmen
move through various rotations--fire
science, radio communications, emergency
medical-technician training, emergency
driving, law enforcement, and physical
training--and later pick areas of
specialization. Challenges which vocational-technology
educators often face confront this
program. One huge issue is recruitment.
Convincing potential recruits that
skills acquired in this program
lead to good jobs after graduation
is a hurdle; local fire and police
hiring usually rules out students
fresh from high school. Lincoln's
relations with its feeder middle
schools are not perfect; one major
feeder warns some students bound
for college to avoid Lincoln. The
district will not wait long for
the numbers to rise. Unless the
program draws more students soon,
the extra start-up dollars and staffing
the program has enjoyed so far will
be pared. Buying up-to-date equipment
is not cheap, even though this program
looks well-funded to academic teachers
who get by on comparatively small
discretionary funds (about two hundred
dollars per year). Just buying the
necessary gear for fire science
costs $740 per student. Another dilemma is creating a strong
program with an identity kids value,
without thereby isolating the program
from the rest of the high school
(a risk increased by the physical
separation of much of the program
in a building on the back edge of
the campus, an eight- or ten-minute
hike across or around the track).
Furthermore, it has been disappointing
to teachers that many students enrolled
in the courses lack the motivation
to pursue earnestly any of the public
safety areas. Whatever reason prompted
them to sign up for the courses
was not strong enough to sustain
their interest, teachers report.
It has not been easy to think creatively
about imaginative instruction since
the above-mentioned concerns arose
early in the program's short history.
The goal of weaving together academic
and vocational course work remains
elusive. There are first steps and
small starts, such as a new teacher's
relating his social studies unit
on heroes to the law enforcement
course. Several observers felt that
the academic demands within the
specializations need "more meat" and "high and consistent expectations," while acknowledging that the program
is young and still taking shape.
[Return to Table
of Contents]
Interpersonal Concerns
When students and teachers shared
what was important in their days
at school, they often mentioned
issues unrelated to state, district,
or local change initiatives. A wide
range of concerns were on the minds
of Lincoln staff as they thought
about their own lives. Discipline,
personal safety, race relations
and other personal priorities--that's
what they were coping with, more
than the fine print in the nine
hundred pages of SSIA legislation. Insuring a Safe Environment
The endless work high schools everywhere
do in order to establish and maintain
a stable and calm environment is
a high priority for many Lincoln
staff. No one claims that the school
is out of control, rowdy, or unsafe;
in fact, they acknowledge that the
huge problems many students bring
with them would be much worse without
the valued help from the Youth Services
staff, other administrators, and
community social service staff.
Even so, order is on the minds of
many teachers. Some of the concerns
involve relatively modest infractions--smoking
in the bathrooms, swearing in the
halls, sloppiness with food and
drinks--and their total suppression
could create more disorder than
would be eliminated. Routine disciplinary
matters, such as cuts and tardies,
are handled almost entirely by several
teams; other teachers, especially
the heavy referral writers, want
faster and tougher action from the
assistant principals. To some teachers, orderliness means
reasonable manners and simple courtesies.
One English teacher was dismayed
by her students' rudeness to a guest
speaker dressed in period attire
who gave a dramatic reading of Dickens.
Several read magazines, others talked
or slept, and one sucked a lollipop
and stuck out her blue tongue to
the speaker. A few students later
tried to apologize to the speaker,
who quit after twenty minutes, but
other students asked, "We don't
have to write him a thank you note,
do we?" Yet on previous special
occasions, when there were guest
musicians or field trips, for example,
the same students behaved decently.
More serious danger occasionally
flares, as suddenly as one of the
UPS jets that periodically roars
over the school in descent to the
airport four miles away: an arrest
for dealing drugs; a student's death-threat
against a teacher in his journal;
two guns in school within two weeks;
a public safety kid's fighting another
student as they wait to assist police
officers with a volunteer program
in an elementary school; a manic-depressive,
paranoid student calling a teacher
the antichrist and a Nazi (in the
previous year he was removed from
the building in a straitjacket).
Fortunately, violence on campus
against teachers is not a tragedy
Lincoln has suffered, and the worst
assault in the last two years--a
star athlete's stabbing of his ex-girlfriend--happened
away from school. Sometimes rumor
outstrips reality--the Zephyr student
at the crime scene did not shoot
the bus driver--and sometimes teachers
know about incidents only because
the administration does not try
to hide what happened. The tone
in the hallways is not tense or
fearful, but public safety has
a second meaning to those teachers
who wonder when the next eruption
might occur. Dealing with Race Relations
Race relations are an important concern
to some teachers. "I get accused
of racism at least once a week by
a misbehaving African-American," one teacher reported, and others
agreed that many black students
periodically claim prejudice to
explain away teacher behavior they
resent. On the other hand, several
blacks who saw Roots last
year in American studies later called
several of Lincoln's black teachers
"Uncle Tom" or "Aunt Jemima." Most
staff see tolerance and acceptance
between black and white students,
but wonder if it goes much beyond
that. Athletes with teammates of
other races seem the most respectful
and friendly to each other. Some
teachers are puzzled and hurt by
black students' withdrawing from
their efforts to reach out. One
English teacher was jolted by a
boy's announcement that no book
written by a white man and no class
taught by a white teacher could
ever benefit him. "He is turning
off possibilities. Here I am, a
white teacher. I don't know if I
can get through to Tyrone, but I'll
try. I thought I had rapport, but
it was all in my head. That hurts."
Few black students seemed as outspoken
and adamant as Tyrone. Comments
about race relations were as likely
to mention disruptive black students
as to suggest white racism. The
white students rarely volunteered
observations about race unless asked
directly; then they claimed that
some black students get away with
mischief in the halls and the cafeteria,
which they themselves would be punished
for. They wondered if teachers are
scared of being called "racist" to the point of ignoring or overlooking
minor violations. Maintaining Fairness
As in most high schools, fairness
is an important issue to students,
and it is not race but athletics
that evokes the strongest feelings
as well as the most disagreement
among students. Although students
boasted of the schools' winning
teams and enjoyed playing for the
school, a few students thought some
teams received too many resources
and publicity at the expense of
other teams, especially junior varsity
teams and girls' teams. On a topic
like new uniforms, their information
was often secondhand (from a friend's
friend) or incomplete (they didn't
know who had them in previous years),
so clarification by the administration
or coaches might clear up their
confusion and diminish the resentment.
Students also differed in regard
to athletes' grades. Several felt
athletes were unduly favored, especially
in season. One football player argued
that he and his teammates worked
hard and sought help: "If we get
a bad grade, we keep asking the
teachers if there's anything we
can do. Other kids will just say,
forget it, but when the report cards
come, they'll be the ones to holler." Other student priorities also involve
matters of fairness. Grading that
seems arbitrary and capricious is
resented, whether it is too harsh
or too lenient. Losing points for
delaying a presentation when a partner
is absent caused just as much unhappiness
as the announcement, "Depending
on how everybody does, we'll determine
whether or not this is a test." Students bound for college wonder
if admissions offices unjustly discount
a high grade-point average from
Lincoln while honoring GPAs from
local high schools with stronger
academic reputations. A few have
heard one teacher say that an A
from Lincoln is considered the equivalent
of a C from more prestigious high
schools. Other students are concerned
about scholarships and doubt they
have explored all the possibilities.
Several who seem eligible are not
even aware that they have not done
the necessary research. Another type of justice the students
seek is consistency. Students think
it is unfair if a teacher is absent-minded,
moody, or unpredictable. They resent
a course that alternates between
interesting and boring projects.
They prefer that one teacher would
not say, "I'm not a woman; I don't
change my mind," or tell the girls,
"I don't want you to get your hands
dirty." To a lesser extent, they
regret a lack of consistency within
a team. When they evaluated teachers,
they almost always mentioned individuals,
rather than generalizing about the
team as a group.
On balance, students feel they get
a fair shake at Lincoln. The stories
of isolated episodes and occasional
lapses seem to be the exceptions,
not the rule--predictable reactions
from high-schoolers quick to point
out anything that rankles. Interviewers
had to probe to bring forth many
of the anecdotes recorded here.
Often the conversation would begin:
"What's happening here?" "Nothing
much, really. Let me think. I'm
trying to think of anything that's
happening. It's really about the
same."
From some lethargic students, the
low affect is as revealing as anything
they say. From LaTonya and others,
outspokenness comes easily:
I come home and see my mom sitting
on the bed. Her feet hurt.
She has trouble paying the
bills; works overtime, too.
I won't let my kids see me
struggling to pay bills. I
want to go to an all-girls
college. No distriction [sic]
there. People call me square.
I want my brain working for
me, not just my body.
LaTonya associates the SSIA with
portfolios, and as a junior she
began to save papers and pick her
best work to include in the portfolio.
Most of her educational views are
traditional. She believes, for example,
that a real college requires individual
work, not teamwork, so she worries
that cooperative assignments are
poor preparation for the future.
She prefers to read a textbook's
explanation than to trust what one
teacher tells her or to trust what
her classmates think. She likes
the idea of ability grouping and
advanced-placement courses; she
says a friend of hers at Central
High who already has college credits
"is starting with a foot in the
door and I'm just knocking on the
door."
No legislative decree could possibly
address every priority in the day-to-day
life of students and teachers. Even
if the SSIA were nine thousand rather
than nine hundred pages long, adolescents
and adults would still be pursuing
personal priorities unrelated to
the law. Even so, the distance between
the new educational goals of SSIA
and the less novel, but very urgent,
concerns about safety, race relations,
and fairness mean that the priorities
of educational reform and its intended
beneficiaries are not always the
same.
[Return to Table
of Contents] The Fifty Schools Project: A New
Priority
This spring Lincoln joined the Coalition's
Fifty Schools Project, a new initiative
to encourage vanguard schools to
extend the transformations already
under way. Started and run by the
Coalition of Essential Schools,
the Fifty Schools Project involves
"clusters" of schools supporting
one another as they push the reform
agenda to become exemplary Essential
schools by putting all the nine
Common Principles into daily practice.
A Coalition coordinator works with
all of the schools as they move
quickly in their change efforts. Lincoln's successful application
mentioned the possibility of creating
"houses" for the 1994-95 school
year, perhaps three houses with
approximately four hundred students
in each one. Conversation about
this change has just begun, and
so far the main advantage which
people foresee is greater personalization
by virtue of the Coalition's 80-to-1
student-teacher ratio.
The prospect of houses raises many
of the same nitty-gritty concerns
that arose this year and last as
the number of teams expanded. Issues
such as the allocation of teachers
and students, the schedule, electives,
parity among teams, and students' wariness of teaming could easily
surface if houses arise. One parent
asked,
How do you give our students
what they want or need in every
house when many teachers aren't
certified to teach everything
at every level? What if one
house is weaker than another?
Would I want my child there?
If not, nobody's child should
have to be there. And with
open enrollment, will incoming
freshmen pick Lincoln if they
feel they'll never see two-thirds
of their classmates?
Other teachers elaborated the metaphor
to give shape to their thoughts.
One asked, "Will we build a house
designed by an architect who knows
our needs? Or are we buying in order
to renovate? If so, will we paint
over old wallpaper or remove it?" This teacher wondered if a house
would be too confining for the juniors
and seniors. "Maybe we need more
doors or attic space there." Isolation
worried a former Lincoln teacher:
"Can they do it without walls? Maybe
fences?" Another metaphorical reflection
spoke of furnishings in considering
how much would change: "Some pieces,
like large, overstuffed chairs,
are comfortable, serviceable, and
match the new furniture. Other items,
like a plaid orange and green sofa,
just have to go."
The language of architecture and
interior design fits the current
rhetoric of restructuring, but it
does not necessarily fit images
of good teaching and learning. Within
the houses there might be Exhibition
rooms, but what sort of valued work
is to be demonstrated and shown
off? If there are separate houses
for younger and older students,
perhaps the stairwell between them
is the set of competencies and knowledge
which will let them move up, if
Lincoln decides to move away from
Carnegie units as the basis of promotion. A major challenge ahead is thinking
through how the houses will not
only allow but encourage and even
require the type of instruction
and learning which Lincoln (and
the Coalition) seeks. Will houses
leave it up to individual teachers
to decide whether or not they are
comfortable with change? Instead
of thinking first of structure,
it may be advisable to focus initially
on teaching and learning. Just what
is the shared vision within the
faculty of high expectations, honors
work, good Exhibitions (as mentioned
in the sixth Common Principle),
and productive group work? After deciding what it is the staff
earnestly agrees to do with and
for students, then the value of
houses might be determined properly.
Otherwise, Lincoln risks repeating
the history of houses. Twenty to
twenty-five years ago, many high
schools adopted this configuration
and soon realized that teaching
and learning had not changed very
much. Instead of dismantling the
shopping mall high school, they
built a batch of mini-malls. The Fifty Schools initiative offers
teachers another opportunity to
reaffirm their beliefs and make
those convictions real by shaping
plans for 1994-95. The talk of new
structures can go hand in hand with
conversation about instruction,
and it is heartening when those
meetings include previously skeptical
colleagues, draw out the talents
of the rookies, and revitalize the
senior faculty. Considering new
possibilities--remaining open to
creative ideas and well-intentioned
suggestions--does more than build
faculty camaraderie. It may be the
way to bring closer together the
priorities of individual faculty
members and the SSIA mandates. [Return to Table
of Contents]
Part 3: Issues for Discussion
The following are excerpts from our
notes about five issues related
to school change. The excerpts are
followed by questions to prompt
reflection. Although we originally
addressed the questions to the Lincoln
staff, we invite the reader, also,
to take a few minutes to read and
consider the following five items.
[Return to Table
of Contents] Justice, Equity, and Fair Play
I think the Coalition of Essential
Schools is about justice, equity,
and fair play. I think the
biggest stumbling block we
all face is that a lot of teachers
today haven't yet seen that
pulling kids up is better than
separating them. They still
see themselves as agents who
protect the middle class from
the lower class. It's real
easy to say, "I came up the
hard way, so you should be
able to also." It's not just
here, of course. How many middle-class
taxpayers out there really
care about anyone below them?
A couple of my friends in private
industry say to me, "You can't
educate those kids. You're
wasting your time." Unless
we sell them on what we're
doing, reform is going to fall
flat.
-An assistant principal
For Discussion:
- What in the Coalition's nine
Common Principles speaks to
"justice, equity, and fair
play"?
- How does Lincoln "sell them
on what we're doing"?
- In what ways are kids tracked
at Lincoln High? What purpose
does tracking serve and who
does it harm or help? What
other strategies are possible?
[Return to Table
of Contents] How is Teaming Working?
In an excerpt from an April 1993
conversation between Robert Hampel
and an assistant principal, Robert
Hampel asked, "What evidence do
you trust the most to know how the
teams are doing?
The assistant principal gave the following response to Robert Hampel:
Are they playing with time, using
it differently? for themselves
or for kids? Or both?
Have they made any interdisciplinary
units?
Do the kids help plan the curriculum?
Zephyr does some of that, for
example.
Is there any self-assessment,
and are students invited to
evaluate the team?
What type of information is shared
at team meetings? Brand new
teams usually talk about student
behavior in one or two classes.
Later it changes and there's
more time on teaching strategies--alternatives
they've tried or just thought
about--and their expectations
for kids.
They stopped asking me to sit
in on so many team meetings.
Early on, some teams wanted
me to be the chair, and scold
the absentees or the one who
reads the newspaper. But if
there are never any requests,
that can be a sign of a totally
ineffective team.
For Discussion:
- What are other signs of a strong
and productive team?
- Of the assistant principal's
six indicators, which one would
you choose if you had to pick
just one? Why is that the best?
- What is the purpose of teaming?
What do we hope it will accomplish
on students' behalf?
[Return to Table
of Contents]
Expectations and Tracking
The following is a statement made
by an assistant principal in a Fifty
Schools grant application: Teachers at Lincoln continue
to discuss expectations for
students. There is a lack of
consensus that all students
can learn well. We have made
great strides in untracking
students, through mainstreaming
and creating eight (heterogeneous)
teams. Teams have not coordinated
their curricula, nor have we
developed a clear focus on
what kids should know and be
able to do well. We're struggling
with developing an integrated
curriculum approach on teams
and with developing a schoolwide
philosophical focus to complete
the big jump from a shopping
mall high school to a concentration
on academic essentials. Student
choice versus meeting students' diverse needs is a controversial
issue. We consider our students
as customers and teacher work
as our product. Some of our
faculty find this analogy difficult
to understand, interpreting
that we need to please students
with lots of variety in course
selection instead of understanding
that student needs are met
with high expectations and
integrating student-as-worker
learning.
For Discussion:
- What does "academic essentials" mean to the faculty?
- What will be reliable evidence
in the future that the "big
jump" from a shopping mall
to an Essential school has
in fact happened?
[Return to Table
of Contents]
Instruction and Assessment
The following is an excerpt of conversation
between a School Change Study interviewer
(I) and a Lincoln High science teacher
(T). I: How do you know that what you're
doing is working?
T:
I do a lot of different things.
Especially in chemistry, there's
a lot of problem solving that
takes place. That's pretty
good feedback right there.
If you can solve a problem,
you know what you're doing.
I also set up labs where you
have to apply what we've done
without any instruction. In
a lot of labs, it's "do this,
do that." But I'll say, "Here,
figure it out."
I:
So that would come after there's
been some practice?
T:
Sure. After you think they understand,
can do it on paper, then see
if they can apply it in a lab.
We do a lot of that.
I:
Being a non-chemistry person,
could you give me an example
of a concept you teach and
how you follow it through?
T:
We're doing gas laws, basically
common-sense laws: if you increase
the pressure on something,
then its volume will be reduced.
After they've seen the laws
and can work the laws on paper,
I give them a pop can. Heat
water in it, then invert it
into cold water, and the can
immediately compresses. Then
they're asked to explain why
that happens, in writing:"This
is what I saw happened, this
is why I think it happens."
I:
Individually?
T:
Usually in groups, in fours.
I:
How about informally? What do
you look for informally?
T:
If they have a question, I usually
try to question them until
they have the right answer
instead of giving them the
right answer. I find out how
far back they have to go before
they can give you an answer.
For Discussion:
- Assume you are on T's team.
How would you develop an interdisciplinary
unit with T so your subject
linked with his unit on gas
laws?
- It has been said that authentic
assessments blur the line between
teaching and testing. Is that
true for T?
[Return to Table
of Contents] Is Restructuring Being Rushed?
A top official in the district has
said: "People like to microwave
projects. But we can't microwave
restructuring. We have to avoid
the microwave syndrome."
For Discussion:
- So far, has the district avoided
microwaving? If so, how?
- In your own teaching, think
of a time when you microwaved
an innovation, moving quickly
to do something new. What difference
would extra "cooking" time
have made?
[Return to Table
of Contents]
The Lincoln research team was headed
by Robert L. Hampel, professor at
the University of Delaware and author
of The Last Little Citadel (1986).
The other members of the Lincoln
team were Laraine Hong, a former
elementary and college teacher,
now working for the Bellevue, Washington,
school district and author of a
forthcoming Teachers College Press
book recounting a stormy year in
her elementary school; and Neill
Wenger, a cognitive psychologist
who has taught in elementary school,
consulted for the Pew Foundation,
and is currently co-authoring a
multimedia textbook.
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