Education reform is the name given to the goal of changing public education.
Historically, reforms have taken different forms because the
motivations of reformers have differed. However, since the 1980s,
education reform has been focused on changing the existing system from
one focused on inputs to one focused on outputs (i.e., student
achievement). In the United States, education reform acknowledges and
encourages public education as the primary source of K-12 education for
American youth. Education
reformers desire to make public education into a market (in the form of
an input-output system), where accountability creates high-stakes from
curriculum standards tied to standardized tests.
As a result of this input-output system, equality has been
conceptualized as an end point, which is often evidenced by an
achievement gap among diverse populations.
This conceptualization of education reform is based on the market-logic
of competition. As a consequence, competition creates inequality which
has continued to drive the market-logic of equality at an end point by
reproduce the achievement gap among diverse youth.
The one constant for all forms of education reform includes the idea
that small changes in education will have large social returns in
citizen health, wealth and well-being. For example, a stated motivation
has been to reduce cost to students and society. From ancient times
until the 1800s, one goal was to reduce the expense of a classical education.
Ideally, classical education is undertaken with a highly educated
full-time (extremely expensive) personal tutor. Historically, this was
available only to the most wealthy. Encyclopedias, public libraries and grammar schools are examples of innovations intended to lower the cost of a classical education.
Related reforms attempted to develop similar classical results by concentrating on "why", and "which" questions neglected by classical education. Abstract, introspective answers to these questions can theoretically compress large numbers of facts into relatively few principles. This path was taken by some Transcendentalist educators, such as Amos Bronson Alcott. In the early modern age, Victorian schools were reformed to teach commercially useful topics, such as modern languages and mathematics, rather than classical subjects, such as Latin and Greek.
Many reformers focused on reforming society by reforming education on more scientific, humanistic, pragmatic or democratic principles. John Dewey and Anton Makarenko are prominent examples of such reformers. Some reformers incorporated several motivations, e.g. Maria Montessori, who both "educated for peace" (a social goal), and to "meet the needs of the child" (A humanistic goal). In historic Prussia, an important motivation for the invention of Kindergarten was to foster national unity by teaching a national language while children were young enough that learning a language was easy.
Reform has taken many forms and directions. Throughout history and the present day, the meaning and methods of education have changed through debates over what content or experiences result in an educated individual or an educated society. Changes may be implemented by individual educators and/or by broad-based school organization and/or by curriculum changes with performance evaluations.
Related reforms attempted to develop similar classical results by concentrating on "why", and "which" questions neglected by classical education. Abstract, introspective answers to these questions can theoretically compress large numbers of facts into relatively few principles. This path was taken by some Transcendentalist educators, such as Amos Bronson Alcott. In the early modern age, Victorian schools were reformed to teach commercially useful topics, such as modern languages and mathematics, rather than classical subjects, such as Latin and Greek.
Many reformers focused on reforming society by reforming education on more scientific, humanistic, pragmatic or democratic principles. John Dewey and Anton Makarenko are prominent examples of such reformers. Some reformers incorporated several motivations, e.g. Maria Montessori, who both "educated for peace" (a social goal), and to "meet the needs of the child" (A humanistic goal). In historic Prussia, an important motivation for the invention of Kindergarten was to foster national unity by teaching a national language while children were young enough that learning a language was easy.
Reform has taken many forms and directions. Throughout history and the present day, the meaning and methods of education have changed through debates over what content or experiences result in an educated individual or an educated society. Changes may be implemented by individual educators and/or by broad-based school organization and/or by curriculum changes with performance evaluations.
History
Classical times
Plato believed that children would never learn unless they wanted to learn. In The Republic, he said, " ... compulsory learning never sticks in the mind."
An educational debate in the time of the Roman Empire
arose after Christianity had achieved broad acceptance. The question
concerned the educational value of pre-Christian classical thought:
"Given that the body of knowledge of the pre-Christian Romans was
heathen in origin, was it safe to teach it to Christian children?"
Modern reforms
Though
educational reform occurred on a local level at various points
throughout history, the modern notion of education reform is tied with
the spread of compulsory education. Education reforms did not become widespread until after organized schooling was sufficiently systematized to be 'reformed.'
In the modern world, economic growth and the spread of democracy
have raised the value of education and increased the importance of
ensuring that all children and adults have access to high-quality,
effective education. Modern education reforms are increasingly driven by
a growing understanding of what works in education and how to go about
successfully improving teaching and learning in schools.
However, in some cases, the reformers' goals of "high-quality
education" has meant "high-intensity education", with a narrow emphasis
on teaching individual, test-friendly subskills quickly, regardless of
long-term outcomes, developmental appropriateness, or broader
educational goals.
Reforms of classical education
Western classical education
as taught from the 18th to the 19th century has missing features that
inspired reformers. Classical education is most concerned with answering
the who, what, where, and when? questions that concern a majority of
students. Unless carefully taught, group instruction naturally neglects
the theoretical "why" and "which" questions that strongly concern fewer
students.
Classical education in this period also did not teach local (vernacular)
languages and cultures. Instead it taught high-status ancient languages
(Greek and Latin) and their cultures. This produced odd social effects
in which an intellectual class might be more loyal to ancient cultures
and institutions than to their native vernacular languages and their
actual governing authorities.
England in the 19th century
Before
there were government-funded public schools, education of the lower
classes was by the charity school, pioneered in the 19th century by Protestant organizations and adapted by the Roman Catholic Church
and governments. Because these schools operated on very small budgets
and attempted to serve as many needy children as possible, they were
designed to be inexpensive.
The basic program was to develop "grammar" schools. These taught only grammar and bookkeeping.
This program permitted people to start businesses to make money, and
gave them the skills to continue their education inexpensively from
books. "Grammar" was the first third of the then-prevalent system of classical education.
Joseph Lancaster
The ultimate development of the grammar school was by Joseph Lancaster and Andrew Bell who developed the monitorial system. Lancaster started as a poor Quaker
in early 19th century London. Bell started the Madras School of India.
The monitorial system uses slightly more-advanced students to teach
less-advanced students, achieving student-teacher ratios as small as 2,
while educating more than a thousand students per adult. Lancaster
promoted his system in a piece called Improvements in Education that spread widely throughout the English-speaking world.
Discipline and labor in a Lancaster school were provided by an
economic system. Scrip, a form of money meaningless outside the school,
was created at a fixed exchange rate from a student's tuition. Every job
of the school was bid-for by students in scrip, with the largest bid
winning. However, any student tutor could auction positions in
his or her classes. Besides tutoring, students could use scrip to buy
food, school supplies, books, and childish luxuries in a school store.
The adult supervisors were paid from the bids on jobs.
With fully developed internal economies, Lancaster schools
provided a grammar-school education for a cost per student near $40 per
year in 1999 U.S. dollars. The students were very clever at reducing
their costs, and once invented, improvements were widely adopted in a
school. For example, Lancaster students, motivated to save scrip,
ultimately rented individual pages of textbooks from the school library,
and read them in groups around music stands to reduce textbook costs.
Students commonly exchanged tutoring, and paid for items and services
with receipts from "down tutoring."
Lancaster schools usually lacked sufficient adult supervision. As
a result, the older children acting as disciplinary monitors tended to
become brutal task masters. Also, the schools did not teach submission
to orthodox Christian beliefs or government authorities. As a result,
most English-speaking countries developed mandatory publicly paid
education explicitly to keep public education in "responsible" hands.
These elites said that Lancaster schools might become dishonest, provide
poor education and were not accountable to established authorities.
Lancaster's supporters responded that any schoolchild could avoid
cheats, given the opportunity, and that the government was not paying
for the education, and thus deserved no say in their composition.
Lancaster, though motivated by charity, claimed in his pamphlets
to be surprised to find that he lived well on the income of his school,
even while the low costs made it available to the poorest
street-children.
Ironically, Lancaster lived on the charity of friends in his later life.
Progressive reforms in Europe and the United States
The term progressive in education has been used somewhat indiscriminately; there are a number of kinds of educational progressivism, most of the historically significant kinds peaking in the period between the late 19th and the middle of the 20th centuries.
Child-study
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
has been called the father of the child-study movement. It has been
said that Rousseau "discovered" the child (as an object of study).
Rousseau's principal work on education is Emile: Or, On Education, in which he lays out an educational program
for a hypothetical newborn's education to adulthood. Rousseau provided a
dual critique of both the vision of education set forth in Plato's Republic
and also of the society of his contemporary Europe and the educational
methods he regarded as contributing to it; he held that a person can
either be a man or a citizen,
and that while Plato's plan could have brought the latter at the
expense of the former, contemporary education failed at both tasks. He
advocated a radical withdrawal of the child from society and an
educational process that utilized the natural potential of the child and
its curiosity, teaching it by confronting it with simulated real-life
obstacles and conditioning it by experience rather than teaching it
intellectually. His ideas were rarely implemented directly, but were
influential on later thinkers, particularly Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi and Friedrich Wilhelm August Fröbel, the inventor of the kindergarten.
Horace Mann
In the United States, Horace Mann (1796 – 1859) of Massachusetts used his political base and role as Secretary of the Massachusetts State Board of Education to promote public education in his home state and nationwide. His crusading style attracted wide middle class support. Historian Ellwood P. Cubberley asserts:
No one did more than he to establish in the minds of the American people the conception that education should be universal, non-sectarian, free, and that its aims should be social efficiency, civic virtue, and character, rather than mere learning or the advancement of sectarian ends.
National identity
Education is often seen in Europe and Asia as an important system to maintain national, cultural and linguistic unity. Prussia
instituted primary school reforms expressly to teach a unified version
of the national language, "Hochdeutsch". One significant reform was kindergarten,
whose purpose was to have the children spend time in supervised
activities in the national language, when the children were young enough
that they could easily learn new language skills.
Since most modern schools copy the Prussian
models, children start school at an age when their language skills
remain plastic, and they find it easy to learn the national language.
This was an intentional design on the part of the Prussians.
In the U.S. over the last twenty years, more than 70% of
non-English-speaking school-age immigrants have arrived in the U.S.
before they were 6 years old. At this age, they could have been taught
English in school, and achieved a proficiency indistinguishable from a native speaker. In other countries, such as the Soviet Union, France, Spain, and Germany this approach has dramatically improved reading and math test scores for linguistic minorities.
Dewey
John Dewey
John Dewey,
a philosopher and educator based in Chicago and New York, helped
conceptualize the role of American and international education during
the first four decades of the 20th century. An important member of the
American Pragmatist movement, he carried the subordination of knowledge to action into the educational world by arguing for experiential education
that would enable children to learn theory and practice simultaneously;
a well-known example is the practice of teaching elementary physics and
biology to students while preparing a meal. He was a harsh critic of
"dead" knowledge disconnected from practical human life.
Dewey criticized the rigidity and volume of humanistic education,
and the emotional idealizations of education based on the child-study
movement that had been inspired by Bill Joel and those who followed him.
He presented his educational theories as a synthesis of the two views.
His slogan was that schools should encourage children to "Learn by
doing."
He wanted people to realize that children are naturally active and
curious. Dewey's understanding of logic is best presented in his "Logic,
the Theory of Inquiry" (1938). His educational theories were presented
in "My Pedagogic Creed", The School and Society, The Child and Curriculum, and Democracy and Education (1916). Bertrand Russell
criticized Dewey's conception of logic, saying "What he calls "logic"
does not seem to me to be part of logic at all; I should call it part of
psychology."
The question of the history of Deweyan educational practice is a
difficult one. He was a widely known and influential thinker, but his
views and suggestions were often misunderstood by those who sought to
apply them, leading some historians to suggest that there was never an
actual implementation on any considerable scale of Deweyan progressive
education.
The schools with which Dewey himself was most closely associated
(though the most famous, the "Laboratory School", was really run by his
wife) had considerable ups and downs, and Dewey left the University of Chicago in 1904 over issues relating to the Dewey School.
Dewey's influence began to decline in the time after the Second World War and particularly in the Cold War era, as more conservative educational policies came to the fore.
The administrative progressives
Horace Mann, regarded as the father of American public education
The form of educational progressivism which was most successful in having its policies
implemented has been dubbed "administrative progressivism" by
historians. This began to be implemented in the early 20th century.
While influenced particularly in its rhetoric by Dewey and even more by his popularizers, administrative progressivism was in its practice much more influenced by the Industrial Revolution and the concept economies of scale.
The administrative progressives are responsible for many features
of modern American education, especially American high schools:
counseling programs, the move from many small local high schools to
large centralized high schools, curricular differentiation in the form
of electives and tracking, curricular, professional, and other forms of
standardization, and an increase in state and federal regulation and
bureaucracy, with a corresponding reduction of local control at the
school board level. (Cf. "State, federal, and local control of education
in the United States", below) (Tyack and Cuban, pp. 17–26)
These reforms have since become heavily entrenched, and many
today who identify themselves as progressives are opposed to many of
them, while conservative education reform during the Cold War embraced
them as a framework for strengthening traditional curriculum and
standards.
In more recent times, groups such as the think tank Reform's education division, and S.E.R. have attempted to pressure the government of the U.K. into more modernist educational reform, though this has met with limited success.
Late-20th and early 21st century (United states)
Reforms arising from the civil rights era
From the 1950s to the 1970s, many of the proposed and implemented reforms in U.S. education stemmed from the civil rights movement and related trends; examples include ending racial segregation, and busing for the purpose of desegregation, affirmative action, and banning of school prayer.
1980s
In the 1980s, some of the momentum of education reform moved from the left to the right, with the release of A Nation at Risk, Ronald Reagan's efforts to reduce or eliminate the United States Department of Education.
"[T]he federal government and virtually all state governments, teacher training institutions, teachers' unions, major foundations, and the mass media have all pushed strenuously for higher standards, greater accountability, more "time on task," and more impressive academic results".
This shift to the right caused many families to seek alternatives,
including "charter schools, progressive schools, Montessori schools,
Waldorf schools, Afrocentric schools, religious schools - or teaching
them at home and in their communities."
In the latter half of the decade, E. D. Hirsch
put forth an influential attack on one or more versions of progressive
education, advocating an emphasis on "cultural literacy"—the facts,
phrases, and texts that Hirsch asserted every American had once known
and that now only some knew, but was still essential for decoding basic
texts and maintaining communication. Hirsch's ideas remain significant
through the 1990s and into the 21st century, and are incorporated into
classroom practice through textbooks and curricula published under his
own imprint.
1990s and 2000s
Most states and districts in the 1990s adopted Outcome-Based Education
(OBE) in some form or another. A state would create a committee to
adopt standards, and choose a quantitative instrument to assess whether
the students knew the required content or could perform the required
tasks. The standards-based National Education Goals (Goals 2000) were set by the U.S. Congress in the 1990s. Many of these goals were based on the principles of outcomes-based education,
and not all of the goals were attained by the year 2000 as was
intended. The standards-based reform movement culminated in the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, which as of 2016 is still an active nationwide mandate in the United States.
OBE reforms usually had other disputed methods, such as constructivist mathematics and whole language, added onto them. Some proponents advocated replacing the traditional high school diploma with a Certificate of Initial Mastery. Other reform movements were school-to-work, which would require all students except those in a university track to spend substantial class time on a job site. See also Uncommon Schools.
Trump Administration
President
Donald Trump relegated concerns in education to state governments. This
began with the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA)
which limits the role of the federal government in school liability.
Giving states more authority can help prevent considerable discrepancies
in educational performance across different states.
ESSA was approved by former President Obama in 2015 which amended and
empowered the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965.
The Department of Education has the choice to carry out measures in
drawing attention to said differences by pinpointing lowest-performing
state governments and supplying information on the condition and
progress of each state on different educational parameters. It can also
provide reasonable funding along with technical aid to help states with
similar demographics collaborate in improving their public education
programs.
During his campaign, Trump criticized the 2010 Common Core States Standard and other cases of “federal government overreach.”
His advocacy was to give state and local governments more
responsibilities over education policies. Trump appointed Betsy DeVos as
education secretary. She also supported the idea of leaving education
to state governments under the new K-12 legislation. DeVos cited the interventionist approach of the federal government to
education policy following the signing of the ESSA. The primary approach
to that rule has not changed significantly. Her opinion was that the
education movement's populist politics or populism. encouraged reformers to commit promises which were not very realistic and therefore difficult to deliver.
Modernizing the Education System
Many opinion makers say the situation in all American social institutions
is the same. These institutions which include government, higher
education, healthcare, and mass media are still attuned with the
traditional or original economic system. There is a need to upgrade to a digital information economy.
More providers of higher education which include colleges and
universities, non-traditional entities like school districts, libraries,
and museums, and for-profit organizations will surface. All of these
stakeholders will reach out to bigger audiences and use similar tools
and technologies to achieve their goals.
An article released by CBNC.com said a principal Senate Committee will
take into account legislation that reauthorizes and modernizes the Carl
D. Perkins Act. President George Bush approved this statute in 2006 on
August 12, 2006.
This new bill will emphasize the importance of federal funding for
various Career and Technical (CTE) programs that will better provide
learners with in-demand skills. Congress can provide more students with
access to pertinent skills in education according to 21st century career
opportunities.
At present, there are many initiatives aimed at dealing with
these concerns like innovative cooperation between federal and state
governments, educators, and the business sector. One of these efforts is
the Pathways to Technology Early College High School (P-TECH).
This six-year program was launched in cooperation with IBM, educators
from three cities in New York, Chicago, and Connecticut, and over 400
businesses. The program offers students high school and associate programs focusing on the STEM curriculum.
The High School Involvement Partnership, private and public venture,
was established through the help of Northrop Grumman, a global security
firm. It has given assistance to some 7,000 high school students
(juniors and seniors) since 1971 by means of one-on-one coaching as well
as exposure to STEM areas and careers.
In 2016, Time.com published an article mentioning that one way of
reenergizing the United States economy is to provide quality education
and training opportunities for American youngsters.
There is a need to update funding streams for schools at the federal,
state, and local levels such as Pell Grants addressing the requirements
of college students. The Grant or specific amount of money is given by
the government every school year for disadvantaged students who need to
pay tuition fees in college.
Higher education
Higher
education in the United States of America has always been regarded as
exceptional worldwide although there are apprehensions regarding
expensive and quality education, unimpressive completion rates, and
increasing student debt. These issues raised doubts as to the
effectiveness of the conventional approach to higher education.
There have been numerous proposals for federal reforms to enhance the
status of higher education in the US. Some of the recommendations
included making institutions liable for students/ non-attendance or
dropping out of school, changing the obsolete accreditation process in
overseeing access to federal subsidies, and allowing access to free
education.
Strengths-based education
This
uses a methodology that values purposeful engagement in activities that
turn students into self-reliant and efficient learners. Holding on to
the view that everyone possesses natural gifts that are unique to one's
personality (e.g. computational aptitude, musical talent, visual arts
abilities), it likewise upholds the idea that children, despite their
inexperience and tender age, are capable of coping with anguish, able to
survive hardships, and can rise above difficult times.
Career and Technical Education
President
Donald Trump signed the Strengthening Career and Technical Education
for the 21st Century Act (HR 2353) on July 31, 2018. This is the first
law the American president signed that made meaningful amendments to the
federal education system.
It reauthorizes the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act,
a $1.2 billion program modified by the United States Congress in 2006.
Legislators have repeatedly rebuffed the efforts of Trump and
education secretary Betsy DeVos to implement school choice programs
funded by the federal government. The move to change the Higher
Education Act was also deferred. Business and education groups such as the Council of Chief State School Officers as well as the National Governors Association commended the US Congress for its prompt work during the past month. However, some advocacy organizations like Advanced CTE and Association for Career and Technical Education are apprehensive that said law can urge states to set passive laws for Career and Technical Education.
The new legislation takes effect on July 1, 2019 and takes the
place of the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education (Perkins IV)
Act of 2006. Stipulations in Perkins V enables school districts to make
use of federal subsidies for all students' career search and
development activities in the middle grades as well as comprehensive
guidance and academic mentoring in the upper grades.
At the same time, this law updates and magnifies the meaning of
"special populations" to include homeless persons, foster youth, those
who left the foster care system, and children with parents on active
duty in the United States armed forces.
Contemporary issues (United States)
Overview
In the first decade of the 21st century, several issues are salient in debates over further education reform:
- Longer school day or school year
- After-school tutoring
- Charter schools, school choice, or school vouchers
- Smaller class sizes
- Improved teacher quality
- Improved training
- Higher credential standards
- Generally higher pay to attract more qualified applicants
- Performance bonuses ("merit pay")
- Firing low-performing teachers
- Internet and computer access in schools
- Track and reduce drop-out rate
- Track and reduce absenteeism
- English-only vs. bilingual education
- Mainstreaming or fully including students with special educational needs, rather than placing them in separate special schools
- Content of curriculum standards and textbooks
- What to teach, at what age, and to which students. For example, at what age should children normally learn to read? Should all teenagers study algebra, or would it be more useful for them to take a mathematics class focused on statistics or personal finances?
- Funding, neglected infrastructure, and adequacy of educational supplies
- Student rights
Funding levels
According to a 2005 report from the OECD,
the United States is tied for first place with Switzerland when it
comes to annual spending per student on its public schools, with each of
those two countries spending more than $11,000 (in U.S. currency).
Despite this high level of funding, U.S. public schools lag behind the
schools of other rich countries in the areas of reading, math, and
science.
A further analysis of developed countries shows no correlation between
per student spending and student performance, suggesting that there are
other factors influencing education. Top performers include Singapore,
Finland and Korea, all with relatively low spending on education, while
high spenders including Norway and Luxembourg have relatively low
performance.
One possible factor is the distribution of the funding. In the US,
schools in wealthy areas tend to be over-funded while schools in poorer
areas tend to be underfunded.
These differences in spending between schools or districts may
accentuate inequalities, if they result in the best teachers moving to
teach in the most wealthy areas.
The inequality between districts and schools led to 23 states
instituting school finance reform based on adequacy standards that aim
to increase funding to low-income districts. A 2018 study found that
between 1990 and 2012, these finance reforms led to an increase in
funding and test scores in the low income districts; which suggests
finance reform is effective at bridging inter-district performance
inequalities.
It has also been shown that the socioeconomic situation of the students
family has the most influence in determining success; suggesting that
even if increased funds in a low income area increase performance, they
may still perform worse than their peers from wealthier districts.
Starting in the early 1980s, a series of analyses by Eric Hanushek indicated that the amount spent on schools bore little relationship to student learning.
This controversial argument, which focused attention on how money was
spent instead of how much was spent, led to lengthy scholarly exchanges. In part the arguments fed into the class size debates and other discussions of "input policies." It also moved reform efforts towards issues of school accountability (including No Child Left Behind) and the use of merit pay and other incentives.
There have been studies that show smaller class sizes and newer buildings
(both of which require higher funding to implement) lead to academic
improvements. It should also be noted that many of the reform ideas that
stray from the traditional format require greater funding.
It has been shown that some school districts do not use their
funds in the most productive way. For example, according to a 2007
article in the Washington Post,
the Washington, D.C. public school district spends $12,979 per student
per year. This is the third highest level of funding per student out of
the 100 biggest school districts in the United States. Despite this high
level of funding, the school district provides outcomes that are lower
than the national average. In reading and math, the district's students
score the lowest among 11 major school districts—even when poor children
are compared only with other poor children. 33% of poor fourth graders
in the United States lack basic skills in math, but in Washington, D.C., it's 62%. According to a 2006 study by the Goldwater Institute, Arizona's public schools spend 50% more per student than Arizona's
private schools. The study also says that while teachers constitute 72%
of the employees at private schools, they make up less than half of the
staff at public schools. According to the study, if Arizona's public
schools wanted to be like private schools, they would have to hire
approximately 25,000 more teachers, and eliminate 21,210 administration
employees. The study also said that public school teachers are paid
about 50% more than private school teachers.
In 1985 in Kansas City, Missouri,
a judge ordered the school district to raise taxes and spend more money
on public education. Spending was increased so much, that the school
district was spending more money per student than any of the country's
other 280 largest school districts.
Alternatives to public education
In the United States, private schools
(independent schools) have long been an alternative to public education
for those with the ability to pay tuition. These include religious schools, preparatory and boarding schools, and schools based on alternative paradigms such as Montessori education. Over 4 million students, about one in twelve children attend religious schools in the United States, most of them Christian.
Montessori pre- and primary school programs employ rigorously tested scientific theories
of guided exploration which seek to embrace children's natural
curiosity rather than, for instance, scolding them for falling out of
rank.
Home education
is favored by a growing number of parents who take direct
responsibility for their children's education rather than enrolling them
in local public schools seen as not meeting expectations.
School choice
Economists such as Nobel laureate Milton Friedman advocate school choice to promote excellence in education through competition and choice.
A competitive "market" for schools eliminates the need to otherwise
attempt a workable method of accountability for results. Public education vouchers
permit guardians to select and pay any school, public or private, with
public funds currently allocated to local public schools. The theory is
that children's guardians will naturally shop for the best schools, much
as is already done at college level.
Though appealing in theory, many reforms based on school choice
have led to slight to moderate improvements—which some teachers' union
members see as insufficient to offset the decreased teacher pay and job
security. For instance, New Zealand's
landmark reform in 1989, during which schools were granted substantial
autonomy, funding was devolved to schools, and parents were given a free
choice of which school their children would attend, led to moderate
improvements in most schools. It was argued that the associated
increases in inequity and greater racial stratification in schools
nullified the educational gains. Others, however, argued that the
original system created more inequity (due to lower income students
being required to attend poorer performing inner city schools and not
being allowed school choice or better educations that are available to
higher income inhabitants of suburbs). Instead, it was argued that the
school choice promoted social mobility and increased test scores
especially in the cases of low income students. Similar results have
been found in other jurisdictions. Though discouraging, the merely
slight improvements of some school choice policies often seems to
reflect weaknesses in the way that choice is implemented rather than a
failure of the basic principle itself.
Teacher tenure
Critics
of teacher tenure claim that the laws protect ineffective teachers from
being fired, which can be detrimental to student success. Tenure laws
vary from state to state, but generally they set a probationary period
during which the teacher proves themselves worthy of the lifelong
position. Probationary periods range from one to three years.
Advocates for tenure reform often consider these periods too short to
make such an important decision; especially when that decision is
exceptionally hard to revoke.
Due process restriction protect tenured teachers from being wrongfully
fired; however these restrictions can also prevent administrators from
removing ineffective or inappropriate teachers.
A 2008 survey conducted by the US Department of Education found that,
on average, only 2.1% of teachers are dismissed each year for poor
performance.
In October 2010 Apple Inc. CEO Steve Jobs had a consequential meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama to discuss U.S. competitiveness and the nation's education system.
During the meeting Jobs recommended pursuing policies that would make
it easier for school principals to hire and fire teachers based on
merit.
In 2012 tenure for school teachers was challenged in a California lawsuit called Vergara v. California.
The primary issue in the case was the impact of tenure on student
outcomes and on equity in education. On June 10, 2014, the trial judge
ruled that California's teacher tenure statute produced disparities that
" shock the conscience" and violate the equal protection clause of the California Constitution. On July 7, 2014, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan commented on the Vergara decision during a meeting with President Barack Obama
and representatives of teacher's unions. Duncan said that tenure for
school teachers "should be earned through demonstrated effectiveness"
and should not be granted too quickly. Specifically, he criticized the
18-month tenure period at the heart of the Vergara case as being too short to be a "meaningful bar."
Barriers to reform
A study by the Fordham Institute found that some labor agreements with teachers' unions may restrict the ability of school systems to implement merit pay and other reforms. Contracts were more restrictive in districts with high concentrations of poor and minority students. The methodology and conclusions of the study have been criticized by teachers' unions.
Another barrier to reform is assuming that schools are like businesses—when in fact they are very different.
Legal barriers to reform are low in the United States compared to
other countries: State and local governance of education creates
"wiggle room for educational innovators" who can change local laws or
move somewhere more favourable. Cultural barriers to reform are also
relatively low, because the question of who should control education is
still open.
There are factors that can impede innovations in K-12 education. One could be “Site-Based Decision Making Councils”
composed of teachers and some parents who vote on school rules and
regulations, adoption of curriculum, hiring of new mentors, and other
related matters. There are times attendance in meetings is not adequate
or stakeholders are not represented properly. The belief is small
meetings attended by a few individuals may not be ideal for innovation.
Turnover of teachers is another possible hindrance to such innovations.
The learning process is adversely affected because of frequent teacher
resignations and replacements. Constant changing of mentors leads to
waste of resources and dormant thinking influenced by policies, systems,
and traditions.
Internationally
Education for All
Education 2030 Agenda refers to the global commitment of the
Education for All movement to ensure access to basic education for all.
It is an essential part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The roadmap to achieve the Agenda is the Education 2030 Incheon Declaration and Framework for Action, which outlines how countries, working with UNESCO and global partners, can translate commitments into action.
The United Nations, over 70 ministers, representatives of
member-countries, bilateral and multilateral agencies, regional
organizations, academic institutions, teachers, civil society, and the
youth supported the Framework for Action of the Education 2030 platform.
The Framework was described as the outcome of continuing consultation
to provide guidance for countries in implementing this Agenda. At the
same time, it mobilizes various stakeholders in the new education
objectives, coordination, implementation process, funding, and review of
Education 2030.
Taiwan
In other parts of the world, educational reform has had a number of different meanings. In Taiwan
in the 1990s and first decade of the 21st century a movement tried to
prioritize reasoning over mere facts, reduce the emphasis on central
control and standardized testing. There was consensus on the problems.
Efforts were limited because there was little consensus on the goals of
educational reforms, and therefore on how to fix the problems. By 2003,
the push for education reform had declined.
Motivations
Education
reform has been pursued for a variety of specific reasons, but
generally most reforms aim at redressing some societal ills, such as poverty-, gender-, or class-based
inequities, or perceived ineffectiveness. Current education trends in
the United States represent multiple achievement gaps across
ethnicities, income levels, and geographies. As McKinsey and Company
reported in a 2009 analysis, “These educational gaps impose on the
United States the economic equivalent of a permanent national
recession.”
Reforms are usually proposed by thinkers who aim to redress societal
ills or institute societal changes, most often through a change in the
education of the members of a class of people—the preparation of a
ruling class to rule or a working class to work, the social hygiene of a
lower or immigrant class, the preparation of citizens in a democracy or
republic, etc. The idea that all children should be provided with a
high level of education is a relatively recent idea, and has arisen
largely in the context of Western democracy in the 20th century.
The "beliefs" of school districts are optimistic that quite literally "all students will succeed", which in the context of high school graduation examination in the United States,
all students in all groups, regardless of heritage or income will pass
tests that in the introduction typically fall beyond the ability of all
but the top 20 to 30 percent of students. The claims clearly renounce
historical research that shows that all ethnic and income groups score
differently on all standardized tests and standards based assessments and that students will achieve on a bell curve.
Instead, education officials across the world believe that by setting
clear, achievable, higher standards, aligning the curriculum, and
assessing outcomes, learning can be increased for all students, and more
students can succeed than the 50 percent who are defined to be above or
below grade level by norm referenced standards.
States have tried to use state schools to increase state power, especially to make better soldiers and workers. This strategy was first adopted to unify related linguistic groups in Europe, including France, Germany and Italy.
Exact mechanisms are unclear, but it often fails in areas where
populations are culturally segregated, as when the U.S. Indian school
service failed to suppress Lakota and Navaho, or when a culture has widely respected autonomous cultural institutions, as when the Spanish failed to suppress Catalan.
Many students of democracy
have desired to improve education in order to improve the quality of
governance in democratic societies; the necessity of good public
education follows logically if one believes that the quality of
democratic governance depends on the ability of citizens to make
informed, intelligent choices, and that education can improve these
abilities.
Politically motivated educational reforms of the democratic type are recorded as far back as Plato in The Republic. In the United States, this lineage of democratic education reform was continued by Thomas Jefferson, who advocated ambitious reforms partly along Platonic lines for public schooling in Virginia.
Another motivation for reform is the desire to address
socio-economic problems, which many people see as having significant
roots in lack of education. Starting in the 20th century, people have
attempted to argue that small improvements in education can have large
returns in such areas as health, wealth and well-being. For example, in Kerala, India in the 1950s, increases in women's health were correlated with increases in female literacy rates. In Iran,
increased primary education was correlated with increased farming
efficiencies and income. In both cases some researchers have concluded
these correlations as representing an underlying causal relationship:
education causes socio-economic benefits. In the case of Iran,
researchers concluded that the improvements were due to farmers gaining
reliable access to national crop prices and scientific farming
information.
Strategies
Reforms can be based on bringing education into alignment with a society's core values.
Reforms that attempt to change a society's core values can connect
alternative education initiatives with a network of other alternative
institutions.
Digital education
The movement to use computers more in education naturally includes
many unrelated ideas, methods, and pedagogies since there are many uses
for digital computers. For example, the fact that computers are
naturally good at math leads to the question of the use of calculators
in math education. The Internet's communication capabilities make it
potentially useful for collaboration, and foreign language learning. The
computer's ability to simulate physical systems makes it potentially
useful in teaching science. More often, however, debate of digital
education reform centers around more general applications of computers
to education, such as electronic test-taking and online classes.
The idea of creating artificial intelligence led some computer scientists to believe that teachers could be replaced by computers, through something like an expert system;
however, attempts to accomplish this have predictably proved
inflexible. The computer is now more understood to be a tool or
assistant for the teacher and students.
Harnessing the richness of the Internet is another goal. In some
cases classrooms have been moved entirely online, while in other
instances the goal is more to learn how the Internet can be more than a
classroom.
Web-based international educational software is under development
by students at New York University, based on the belief that current
educational institutions are too rigid: effective teaching is not
routine, students are not passive, and questions of practice are not
predictable or standardized. The software allows for courses tailored to
an individual's abilities through frequent and automatic multiple intelligences
assessments. Ultimate goals include assisting students to be
intrinsically motivated to educate themselves, and aiding the student in
self-actualization. Courses typically taught only in college are being
reformatted so that they can be taught to any level of student, whereby
elementary school students may learn the foundations of any topic they
desire. Such a program has the potential to remove the bureaucratic
inefficiencies of education in modern countries, and with the decreasing
digital divide, help developing nations rapidly achieve a similar
quality of education. With an open format similar to Wikipedia, any
teacher may upload their courses online and a feedback system will help
students choose relevant courses of the highest quality. Teachers can
provide links in their digital courses to webcast videos of their
lectures. Students will have personal academic profiles and a forum will
allow students to pose complex questions, while simpler questions will
be automatically answered by the software, which will bring you to a
solution by searching through the knowledge database, which includes all
available courses and topics.
The 21st century ushered in the acceptance and encouragement of
internet research conducted on college and university campuses, in
homes, and even in gathering areas of shopping centers. Addition of
cyber cafes on campuses and coffee shops, loaning of communication
devices from libraries, and availability of more portable technology
devices, opened up a world of educational resources. Availability of
knowledge to the elite had always been obvious, yet provision of
networking devices, even wireless gadget sign-outs from libraries, made
availability of information an expectation of most persons. Cassandra B. Whyte
researched the future of computer use on higher education campuses
focusing on student affairs. Though at first seen as a data collection
and outcome reporting tool, the use of computer technology in the
classrooms, meeting areas, and homes continued to unfold. The sole
dependence on paper resources for subject information diminished and
e-books and articles, as well as on-line courses, were anticipated to
become increasingly staple and affordable choices provided by higher
education institutions according to Whyte in a 2002 presentation.
Digitally "flipping" classrooms is a trend in digital education that has gained significant momentum. Will Richardson,
author and visionary for the digital education realm, points to the
not-so-distant future and the seemingly infinite possibilities for
digital communication linked to improved education. Education on the
whole, as a stand-alone entity, has been slow to embrace these changes.
The use of web tools such as wikis, blogs, and social networking sites
is tied to increasing overall effectiveness of digital education in
schools. Examples exist of teacher and student success stories where
learning has transcended the classroom and has reached far out into
society.
Creativity is of the utmost importance when improving education.
The "creative teachers" must have the confidence through training and
availability of support and resources. These creative teachers are
strongly encouraged to embrace a person-centered approach that develops
the psychology of the educator ahead or in conjunction with the
deployment of machines.
Creative teachers have been also been inspired through
Crowd-Accelerated Innovation. Crowd-Accelerated Innovation has pushed
people to transition between media types and their understanding thereof
at record-breaking paces.
This process serves as a catalyst for creative direction and new
methods of innovation. Innovation without desire and drive inevitably
flat lines.
Mainstream media continues to be both very influential and the
medium where Crowd-Accelerated Innovation gains its leverage. Media is
in direct competition with formal educational institutions in shaping
the minds of today and those of tomorrow. [Buchanan, Rachel footnote]
The media has been instrumental in pushing formal educational
institutions to become savvier in their methods. Additionally,
advertising has been (and continues to be) a vital force in shaping
students and parents thought patterns.
Technology is a dynamic entity that is constantly in flux. As
time presses on, new technologies will continue to break paradigms that
will reshape human thinking regarding technological innovation. This
concept stresses a certain disconnect between teachers and learners and
the growing chasm that started some time ago. Richardson asserts that
traditional classroom's will essentially enter entropy unless teachers
increase their comfort and proficiency with technology.
Administrators are not exempt from the technological disconnect.
They must recognize the existence of a younger generation of teachers
who were born during the Digital Age and are very comfortable with
technology. However, when old meets new, especially in a mentoring
situation, conflict seems inevitable. Ironically, the answer to the
outdated mentor may be digital collaboration with worldwide mentor webs;
composed of individuals with creative ideas for the classroom.
Another viable addition to digital education has been blended
learning. In 2009, over 3 million K-12 students took an online course,
compared to 2000 when 45,000 took an online course. Blended learning
examples include pure online, blended, and traditional education.
Research results show that the most effective learning takes place in a
blended format.
This allows children to view the lecture ahead of time and then spend
class time practicing, refining, and applying what they have previously
learned.
