You may be aware of America’s recent dismal performances on the
Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). PISA was created to compare educational
systems across the world. According to PISA (2009), students tested in the
United States were average in Math, Science, and Reading. In Surpassing
Shanghai (2011), Mark Tucker defines what makes countries like Finland and
Shanghai successful on the PISA. It is
clear that our current reform efforts in America seem to be going the opposite
direction of other high performing education systems. Current US reform efforts include: teacher
evaluation tied test scores, merit pay to reward high-performing individuals,
and sanctions on schools that do not perform well on state assessments. According to Fullan (2014) these are the wrong
drivers and will not improve our schools.
These efforts instead create fear and further reduce the number of
people interested in the field of education.
The list below tends to focus on building capacity rather than the use
of sanctions due to low test scores. The
right drivers should include: capacity building, developing social capital (the
quality of the group), improving instruction, and systemness. I think you will find elements of the right
drivers found throughout the list below.
Ten things we can learn from high performing educational
systems:
(1) High performing systems pay their first year teacher the
equivalent of a beginning engineering salary.
(2) High performing systems have rigorous teacher
preparatory programs. Finland requires master’s degrees for all teachers and
also includes 2-3 years of practical training in schools.
(3) High performing systems view teachers with great
respect, and the top quarter of students become teachers. Finland's most
popular profession is teaching.
(4) High performing systems view classrooms as
learner-centered.
(5) High performing systems focus on educating the whole child.
(6) High performing systems have moved away from rote
learning. Shanghai focuses on 21st
century skills like, communication, teamwork, problem solving and includes many
real life experiences.
(7) High performing countries have a national curriculum,
but are given autonomy over how they teach the material. Finland's curriculum is seen more as a
framework.
(8) High performing systems seldom use standardized
testing. Finland tests only in grades
six and nine, and all other assessments are established by the master teacher.
(9) In high performing systems education is the corner stone
of their culture.
(10) High performing systems work closely with teachers in
developing policy and the education system is run by the educators themselves.
We are going the wrong direction in terms of
accountability. Merit pay and punishment
will not change and motivate people. We
need the best of the best to go into teaching.
Teacher pay needs to increase substantially and teacher prep programs
need to include more training in schools.
Teachers are not done learning after they graduate from college and it’s
important that school districts continue to build the capacity of their
teachers. We can learn from these
countries, but we have to be open to new ideas that challenge the status
quo.
