Do you remember the documentary from a few years ago titled, Two Million Minutes, where the crew followed two American suburban students and compared them to their peers in India and China (two students privileged enough to be in school in those countries, but BoardBuzz won’t get into that topic now)? It got a lot of attention in education circles. To sum up the film in a broad generalization, the American students came off as aloof about their education, and the students in China and India were devoted and serious about being educated.
A sequel has been completed now, and eSchool News covered it here. The second film zooms its lens on a charter school in Arizona that apparently has all of the solutions to education’s problems (are you noticing a trend?). BASIS Charter School starts AP classes in the fifth grade and follows the College Board’s curriculum in all core subjects. It pays teachers to stay and gives them bonuses for students who score well on AP exams.
It’s an interesting concept that has been played out in other parts of the country as well. Charter schools are being given a lot of credit in urban areas for doing good things, but the biggest critique is that all students aren’t served in charter schools, only those selected to be there. The film shows poverty-stricken children performing well on assessments, which everyone wants to see more often. High standards are always a key in urban districts and if you’ve ever attended on of NSBA’s CUBE (Council of Urban Boards of Education) conferences, you’ve heard this over and over again. So it’s no wonder that major business leaders say things like this:
All of the education experts interviewed in Compton’s film agreed that American children have the ability to improve their overall performance in school.“I think that the children in the United States are capable of so much more than we ask of them. They are incredibly smart. They are so smart that they see exactly how high you set the bar, and that’s about all they’re willing to go normally,” said former Intel Chairman Craig Barrett, adding that if the standards are increased, students will meet them:“We’ve just been afraid as a society to raise the level of expectation. These kids could do it. Kids at BASIS [Charter] School are taking on high school [courses]. They’re doing it in middle school. Those are not specially selected kids. It’s the same demographics as the rest of the universe. Why don’t we just accept that they can do it, and accept that as a society we need them to do it if we want to be competitive?”
If it’s that simple, what’s stopping us?
One need only look through NSBA’s own past policy commentary to see “what’s stopping us.”
BoardBuzz,
I must correct a few inaccuracies in your post:
1- about privileged Indian and Chinese students. It is accurate, there are hundreds of millions of students in India and China not able to get into school. Both countries come from enormous poverty India from being pillaged under colonial rule; China from 40 years of Communist insanity.
Neither country is proud of their poverty. What they are justifiably proud of are the 212 MILLION Indian children and the 194 MILLION Chinese children in K-12 today. That contrasts with the 54 million K-12 students in America.
The Chinese and Indians should be given a modicum of credit for educating 4X the number of students as the US, with economic resources much smaller than Americas. For both countries, that level of education has allowed their economies to grow during the deepest global recession since the Great Depression, while Americas economy struggles.
2- As President Obama and Secretary of Education Duncan strongly advocate, charter schools seem to be a viable, valuable option for American children to get a 21st century education. That is the goal, isnt it?
The fact that Newsweek named BASIS the best high school in America in 2008 was their decision, not mine. I simply thought a school that goes from start-up to number one in America in 10 years might offer to useful lessons. So I made the film.
As Secretary Duncan has stated charters are the laboratories of innovation from which the rest of the education system can learn. I believe BASIS offers useful information to all schools.
3- The film shows poverty-stricken children that is simply not accurate. It shows ordinary kids from Tucson getting an extraordinary education. The students at BASIS reflect the local demographics middle to low income, ethnically diverse.
4- The students at BASIS are NOT selected to be there, unless you consider open enrollment, where all are welcome, to be selective. I suppose self-selection would qualify. The students who go to BASIS want a world-class education and they work for it. The parent or parents also must agree that they want their children to be at BASIS.
5- If its that simple, whats stopping us? I ask myself the same question. My conclusion, like that of Reverend Al Sharpton who spoke after the DC screening, is that the US education system is primarily organized for the benefit of the adults and not the education of the students.
Rev. Sharptons comments http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NYftTRhBn8
Bob Compton
Executive Producer
Two Million Minutes
Some charters are truly excellent, but many of even the excellent ones still struggle with issues of selection bias and, more troubling, attrition. KIPP’s Bay-area schools struggle with attrition. More recently, it has been revealed that Boston’s charter high schools lose more than half of their students before graduation. Boston charter leaders did not dispute the numbers, but they attributed attrition to their uncompromising high standards.
Don’t get me wrong–those charters that are performing very well are truly commendable, and the students who remain in them are being well served. But it’s very fair to question those who see charters as THE answer to what ails urban education–rather than one of many answers. Even strong charter proponents have questioned the ability of the KIPP model (for example) to scale up enough to serve all students.
But serve all students we must, so conversations about school reform have to move beyond just charters. (No, Matthew, it’s not just current charter policies that are stopping us from serving ALL kids.)
Very interesting perspective, and one which we should consider in trying to remedy this problem.
Although both sides / factions in this debate are entitled to their positions, I seriously doubt that any one side is fully or primarily responsible for what is occurring here in our society at this point. It’s probably 50/50 or 51/49 at worst. However, I am reasonably sure that continuing to argue and fight about it, without actually addressing the underlying root problems, will not advance anyone’s interests. We all should Try Harder.