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Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth
Back in the nineties when Ontario introduced legislation mandating school councils, there was huge interest all over the province. The vast majority of schools had dozens of capable, committed candidates for their school council that first year, and the elections had a robust turnout. The next year was a different story. Few schools had enough candidates to force an election, and the school councils were mostly acclaimed. What happened, you ask? Well, the capable, committed candidates on the first-year school councils quickly discovered that the principal had no intention of allowing them to have any meaningful input or carry out any meaningful function other than raise money, and so they got tired of wasting their valuable time and moved on. The second year, for the most part, it was only candidates who were content with going through the motions, and so there were so few candidates that they automatically were appointed to the council. And so it has continued to this day.
This is confirmed by a recent Parents for Education survey, as noted in Educhatter’s latest blog, where 90% of school councils spend on average less than 10% of their time working on the school improvement program - even though that is what the Ontario legislation created them to do.
So we are left with the question of why principals and other education leaders don’t want capable parents as part of their team to raise education standards. Essentially, it boils down to two possibilities: either the education leaders don’t think capable parents would be helpful in a drive to raise education standards or else the education leaders don’t want to/don’t think they can raise education standards.
The former possibility (namely that education leaders don’t think capable parents have anything to offer) is not at all plausible, as it is well accepted that parental involvement - of any kind - leads to enhanced student learning. Furthermore, school improvement schemes are far more likely to be successful if they have input/buy-in from all of the stakeholders.
Which leaves us with the explanation that education leaders don’t want to/don’t think they can raise education standards. Is this possible?
I am incline to say it is a combination of the two - in ratios of 70 to 30, of where 70 percent could be either depending on the school.
Based on my experience, the elementary school that my youngest child attended, the education leaders and their belief systems, indicated to me that education standards and achievement of students could not be raise. Ergo, when I questioned the grade one reading and math curriculum and instruction practices, the principal, along with the staff member from the board, were very quick to give her the label of slow learner, and at the same time, she is in no danger of failing. My child will always be a C student.
For the next 8 years of school, not only did I need to prove to the school that she was in need of intensive reading remediation, I also had to constantly prove that my child was just as bright as the other children. I was not the only parent to do so, but I did not learned this information until 2009, that other parents were in the same position. Their children were labeled as ‘C’ students, and if the parents follow closely the parenting tips and advice found on any school board site, the C student would become a B student. The first school board site that came to my mind was the Peel board, which is just as good as any other school board site, of what parental involvement consists of, and what is missing in action on the tips for parents.
http://www.peelschools.org/parents/helpyourchild/Pages/default.aspx
By 2009, parents were approaching me, asking me what is my secret, since it was known that she had learning difficulties. Following the tips and advice for any parent, is a recipe to keeping students C students and keeping struggling learners struggling in high school. As I reviewed the Peel site, not a word on practice, drills, the benefit of automatic recall, mastery to build knowledge, and when I hit the math help - the infamous words of guess and check as the number one tip. Last week, my child’s online calculus teacher wanted students to guess and check. My child’s reaction was priceless, and I do wish I was present to hear her response, instead of hearing of it at home.
But I digress, what the parents and I learned in 2009, the knowledge gaps that their children have. What was always discouraged by the local elementary school, as in other typical schools was the skills to build up their knowledge base, that has a whiff of mastery, lots of practice on the foundation skills, so their kids would no longer struggled in advance algebra.
I still hear the stories of parents in the primary grades, being told their children in some variation of the ‘C’ student, in the year 2012.
It is why I am incline that most schools, and school leaders have belief systems along with the ideologies that they do not think education standards can be raise, much beyond a C average. What lies behind their beliefs systems on learning, is rather scary, especially for children who are struggling in learning early on.
As for capable parents, I am inclined that school leaders are looking only for parents that have brought into the school improvement schemes. Parental involvement at home, was welcome by most teachers, especially when it showed up in the classroom, as steady improvement in quality of work and achievement. In my case, it was the education leaders who made it very clear, that they disapprove of what I was doing at home. Most thought it was a waste of time, and my child’s steady improvement was a fluke, and the moment I stopped doing what I was doing at home, my child would go back to her ‘C’ average. That never happen, and I stopped my activities at home way back in 2008. Even today, a few times during the school year, my 17 year old, will be accused that I did her work for her. Her usual response, phone my mother up, I dare you to phone her…...” Even in 2012, there is a disbelief on the educator leaders and beyond the school, that my child is not capable of stellar work beyond a ‘C’ average, without requiring a lot of help. And at the same time, the steady refusal and denial of providing accommodations for her low reading ability due to poor word decoding, because her grades do not indicate a reading problem, and yet the 2012 assessments confirms once again - poor decoding skills, that keeps her below average in reading skills. It goes to show, how mastery, practice and more practice can help all children to succeed, and the last thing that education leaders want, are parents at a school council meeting, being the special event describing their experiences, and what works for their child, and very well could work for other children.
It is almost as if, they don’t want to raise the education standards, for reasons that it would not be the best interests of any public education system to do so. The only way to do it, is to keep out all parents except for the ones that have brought into their policies and higher achievement schemes.