Constructing Kasun, Educator

Today I was initiated into the world of the ESOL Central Office Staff Meeting.  Observing an ordinary meeting of the sixty-plus of these staff members would have been enough of a culture shock (first fifteen minutes are mandated for the regular consumption of snacks and coffee and “nice to see you again,” announcements, reminders, talk about business, etc.). 

But what unsettled me wasn’t the subculture (actually, these people like each other, and the leadership in my district is truly talented and kindhearted—not easily replicated).  Instead, it was what was coming after our first break, something called “eCART.”  The preface was, “This is something we can use on Blackboard [that ubiquitous and not always helpful, some argue badly-designed on-line tool for teacher, student, and parent usage—now mandatory in my district].  It’s a tool where teachers can share information with each other and share out to the district.”   

One of my very good-natured and technology-friendly colleagues thought about the possibilities.  She leaned over and said, “Hey, great.  We can probably put up really helpful information for the teachers at the sites where we work.”

Another colleague, skeptical like myself, rolled her eyes. “I don’t think that’s what they have in mind.  It’s probably going to be all about testing and assessment for No Child Left Behind.” I agreed with her, citing some things I had already seen our district do to “support” NCLB, and waited.

Two women who were very enthusiastic about this new product smiled their ways through the introduction.  This is the latest “tool” teachers can use (the kind that slices,  wounds, carves), they assured us.  All those teachers who are basically being forced to use common assessments (some will argue they like them—especially if it cuts down o the amount of time they have to spend preparing other assessments) in our extremely large schools where most kids are anonymous will have to use this on-line equipment, especially those who teach in the four “core” areas (math, science, history and language arts).  We can then track data on schools, teachers, and students (and presumably punish those who don’t meet the standards, and, to be fair, perhaps help some of the kids who really need it most?).

In this software, all the discrete points of the standards in my state are now on-line with their corresponding benchmarks and indicators.  Along with them, however, are minute questions which test for each of those standards.  So much for essential knowledge—we’re drilling deep here for tiny pieces of evidence of information.  People are being paid all summer long to create these questions.  In fact, we (the district) are even purchasing some questions from big publishers like the Princeton Review.  And most of the funding has gone toward the creation of test questions.  And the supplemental materials they showed us as support for these discrete pieces of knowledge (like the algebraic concept of the line of best fit) come with what appeared to be dull, dry worksheets.

Those worksheets were referred to as the “resources” new teachers really need, the kind of resources that are hard for us to sort through in my district, since the district provides an overabundance of them.  Dissonance.  I remember my principal at my last school telling us my district wanted to “get away” from worksheets.  So?

Finally, to set our minds at ease, we were told the software had been created by Northrupp Grumman.  Yes, the major defense contractor.  The same one that builds missiles and aircraft used in war, like the one we’re not managing so well in
Iraq right now.  Of course it’s logical that there’s technological spillover from our generously-funded military research and development into civilian fields, but, do we have to do business as a school district with makers of weapons?  On the devil’s advocate side, the Association of Supervision and Curriculum Development—one of my favorite sources of educational research—has partnered in creating the software.

Our two presenters continued to sell us the benefits of the helpful “Curriculum Repository” button (I don’t know why we have to use big words instead of more clear ones like “bank,” especially when they sound like places where we keep dead bodies in refrigeration… or maybe I’m getting these death images because this whole agenda smacks of the death of education,  forsaking the bringing to life new ideas for students, of opening their eyes to beautiful possibilities in learning, of discovering alongside them).

And then one of my colleagues shot me an email which popped up on my monitor.  “This is really depressing.”  And I bled on the inside for an instant and remembered that despite these initiatives, good teachers weather them and steer their children through these storms because they have to, because despite the pressures, they can.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 18th, 2007 at 7:50 pm and is filed under education. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.