The Needed National Education Umbrella

                                                              

 As you know, I believe that we need a units of learning, or what is commonly known as a ‘standards based’ education system (SBS) in our public schools nation-wide, or in a parallel nation-wide public charter school system. We are a large and mobile nation. It is projected that each individual will have at least three separate jobs in his or her working life. Irrespective of that, employees are often moved from city to city by their companies. With the grade level system in place today, new students usually arrive to find themselves either way ahead or way behind the class they enter This system would guarantee parents that their children, in any move, would go into each subject at their new school, at exactly the same level they were at in their old school. Fortunately the system already exists, in microcosm, in the Adams 50 school district in Westminster, Colorado.

The standards based system is not new, but its use has been very limited. In the 1990s it was tried in Alaska, where the widespread Chugach district went from the lowest performing district in the state, to the highest performing quartile in five years. In 2009, the Adams 50 school district gave it a try. Before implementing the system, a team of teachers and administrators traveled to Alaska to see the system in action. The district is happy to report that while the road has not been easy, students involved in it, are thriving. The results have been so good that Kansas City, Missouri and the State of New Hampshire are adopting similar programs. The state of Colorado is following District 50’s progress, and next month school administrators are scheduled to speak before the Joint Education Committee. Colorado is now creating state-wide academic   standards so that there is more consistency from school to school.

With state funds shrinking, and with them state controls, across the country there are school districts exercising local control to bring innovation into their schools. While these local districts do their job, the country as a whole needs a nationwide umbrella to unify them. The ‘standards based’ education system would do that job without affecting content, and that could turn the present Federal Department of Education into a small Department of Educational Correlation. A result many of us would welcome.

      To understand the system, I ask that you go to their website at http://www.sbsadams50.org/. Visit the home page and you will find a detailed explanation of how the system works. You will be fascinated!  It is complex enough to convince me not to try to explain it. The Westminster, Colorado system will eventually provide the opportunity for advanced students to move on to college classes in the subjects they complete, while finishing their remaining high school level work .This is, for me, an essential ingredient.

 Please, do visit the website. We need to get behind a unifying system for this country while the districts do their innovative things. It would be wonderful, and maybe even possible, to have this system ready to put into place by the time our next President takes his place.