Well... that was a remarkably depressing read, and I'm not even involved in education. So I can't even imagine how frustrating it all must be when actually directly involved in the US educational...
Well... that was a remarkably depressing read, and I'm not even involved in education. So I can't even imagine how frustrating it all must be when actually directly involved in the US educational system, especially as a teacher being forced to navigate that minefield.
I can't really think of much more to say, other than asking, what can be done about all these issues?
I know that's also probably a massive can of worms as well, but your writing didn't leave me with a lot of hope that things will ever get better, so I am kinda grasping at straws here in the hope that there is some solution to these issue somewhere. :P
Like the non-traditional grading approaches mentioned in the article which inspired the blog post (e.g. offering grace periods, opportunities to revise work, and redo tests; or doing like we do in much of Canada by giving separate grades for academic achievement, participation, punctuality, and effort), are any of those actually realistic solutions, in your opinion?
I think changing up grading practices are schools/teachers attempting to correct or ease systemic inequities by controlling what we can rather than what we can't (e.g. racism, poverty, etc.). I...
Exemplary
I think changing up grading practices are schools/teachers attempting to correct or ease systemic inequities by controlling what we can rather than what we can't (e.g. racism, poverty, etc.). I think they can be valuable on an individual level (as applied to a student like Liam), but I don't think they're going to undo the bigger issues in the slightest.
Also, in practice, many of them do introduce some regressions. I mentioned it in my writeup, but getting rid of deadlines enables procrastinators, for example. Some students absolutely need and deserve a flexible deadline, but if it becomes universal policy for all students then it becomes easily exploitable by those who don't need more time but will choose that anyway.
Also, some of the policies sound good on paper but can end up worse in practice. From the article:
Placer Union High School District, where a majority of students are white, has directed teachers to base grades on “valid evidence of a student’s content knowledge and not...on evidence that is likely to be influenced by a teacher’s implicit bias nor reflect a student’s circumstances.”
This sounds great as written, because we definitely should be vigilant to how implicit biases might sway our judgment, but it also sounds an awful lot like standards-based grading which is where you run into Liam's issue, where we cannot take into account his circumstances and he thus has no pathway to academic success.
The solutions, to me, lie in solving the systemic issues that disproportionately disadvantage certain populations. Basically, if we want to solve unfair grading, we don't start with fixing schools -- we start with fixing poverty. Grading is a universal measuring tool, so it makes sense that factors that damage kids will show up in that measurement. I think if we tackle the damage, the measurement will respond in kind.
Also, sorry that my writeup is depressing, but it'd be a bit dishonest if it were anything but. I'm exhausted by my country's failure to address its longstanding and thoroughly documented inequities. I'm exhausted that half my country can't even acknowledge them. Also teaching is just kinda exhausting, you know?
But I feel like I've committed a separate dishonesty by omission, because education itself is driven by an incredible, irrepressible hope, and that is fully absent in what I wrote. While I'm really fucking angry about educational inequity in my country, I'm also really fucking proud of how much effort and care has gone into trying to solve that problem. The United States remains one of the world leaders in how we treat students with disabilities, for example. We guarantee their right to education and support for their individual needs. Guarantee. In no uncertain terms. Many students with disabilities, and this goes beyond just physical disabilities, are fully included in classrooms alongside peers without disabilities. Students today are growing up with the understanding that they are valued members of the community and have the same rights to spaces and access that everyone else does, and it wasn't too long ago that this wasn't the case at all.
Addressing and correcting societal disparities continue to be a driving factor in educational change, as you see in this article with schools and districts trying to re-evaluate past practices to make them more inclusive and fair. This kind of thing is and has been going on in schools across the country. Part of the reason we're seeing such a big conservative backlash to "critical race theory" in schools is that many schools are finally teaching unwhitewashed content for the first time. When my students go to the library at my school, there is an entire LGBTQ section there! When I was a kid, which wasn't that long ago, I wouldn't have been able to find a book with a gay character in my school library if I'd tried!
We have a lot of problems. Tons. American education is crap in so many ways, but it's also not crap in many others. I actually felt bad about writing much of what I did because teachers and education have been subject to decades-long pileons already -- how is it fair for me to come in and throw another log on the fire? A truth that I left out from my article but that is no less true is that education actually does have this incredible, magical root that somehow doesn't die out even when it has every right to. It always keeps trying to grow no matter what.
Like I said in my writeup, education a belief in a type of alchemy: that past performance can be transmuted into future opportunity. I fully acknowledge that our alchemical processes are definitely far from perfect and could absolutely use a lot of tweaking, but even in spite of all of those, teachers and schools still believe, fundamentally, that we can build future opportunity.
And that is magic to me -- incredible, irrepressible magic.
Well... that was a remarkably depressing read, and I'm not even involved in education. So I can't even imagine how frustrating it all must be when actually directly involved in the US educational system, especially as a teacher being forced to navigate that minefield.
I can't really think of much more to say, other than asking, what can be done about all these issues?
I know that's also probably a massive can of worms as well, but your writing didn't leave me with a lot of hope that things will ever get better, so I am kinda grasping at straws here in the hope that there is some solution to these issue somewhere. :P
Like the non-traditional grading approaches mentioned in the article which inspired the blog post (e.g. offering grace periods, opportunities to revise work, and redo tests; or doing like we do in much of Canada by giving separate grades for academic achievement, participation, punctuality, and effort), are any of those actually realistic solutions, in your opinion?
I think changing up grading practices are schools/teachers attempting to correct or ease systemic inequities by controlling what we can rather than what we can't (e.g. racism, poverty, etc.). I think they can be valuable on an individual level (as applied to a student like Liam), but I don't think they're going to undo the bigger issues in the slightest.
Also, in practice, many of them do introduce some regressions. I mentioned it in my writeup, but getting rid of deadlines enables procrastinators, for example. Some students absolutely need and deserve a flexible deadline, but if it becomes universal policy for all students then it becomes easily exploitable by those who don't need more time but will choose that anyway.
Also, some of the policies sound good on paper but can end up worse in practice. From the article:
This sounds great as written, because we definitely should be vigilant to how implicit biases might sway our judgment, but it also sounds an awful lot like standards-based grading which is where you run into Liam's issue, where we cannot take into account his circumstances and he thus has no pathway to academic success.
The solutions, to me, lie in solving the systemic issues that disproportionately disadvantage certain populations. Basically, if we want to solve unfair grading, we don't start with fixing schools -- we start with fixing poverty. Grading is a universal measuring tool, so it makes sense that factors that damage kids will show up in that measurement. I think if we tackle the damage, the measurement will respond in kind.
Also, sorry that my writeup is depressing, but it'd be a bit dishonest if it were anything but. I'm exhausted by my country's failure to address its longstanding and thoroughly documented inequities. I'm exhausted that half my country can't even acknowledge them. Also teaching is just kinda exhausting, you know?
But I feel like I've committed a separate dishonesty by omission, because education itself is driven by an incredible, irrepressible hope, and that is fully absent in what I wrote. While I'm really fucking angry about educational inequity in my country, I'm also really fucking proud of how much effort and care has gone into trying to solve that problem. The United States remains one of the world leaders in how we treat students with disabilities, for example. We guarantee their right to education and support for their individual needs. Guarantee. In no uncertain terms. Many students with disabilities, and this goes beyond just physical disabilities, are fully included in classrooms alongside peers without disabilities. Students today are growing up with the understanding that they are valued members of the community and have the same rights to spaces and access that everyone else does, and it wasn't too long ago that this wasn't the case at all.
Addressing and correcting societal disparities continue to be a driving factor in educational change, as you see in this article with schools and districts trying to re-evaluate past practices to make them more inclusive and fair. This kind of thing is and has been going on in schools across the country. Part of the reason we're seeing such a big conservative backlash to "critical race theory" in schools is that many schools are finally teaching unwhitewashed content for the first time. When my students go to the library at my school, there is an entire LGBTQ section there! When I was a kid, which wasn't that long ago, I wouldn't have been able to find a book with a gay character in my school library if I'd tried!
We have a lot of problems. Tons. American education is crap in so many ways, but it's also not crap in many others. I actually felt bad about writing much of what I did because teachers and education have been subject to decades-long pileons already -- how is it fair for me to come in and throw another log on the fire? A truth that I left out from my article but that is no less true is that education actually does have this incredible, magical root that somehow doesn't die out even when it has every right to. It always keeps trying to grow no matter what.
Like I said in my writeup, education a belief in a type of alchemy: that past performance can be transmuted into future opportunity. I fully acknowledge that our alchemical processes are definitely far from perfect and could absolutely use a lot of tweaking, but even in spite of all of those, teachers and schools still believe, fundamentally, that we can build future opportunity.
And that is magic to me -- incredible, irrepressible magic.