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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!apr!osu-eddie!karl
From: karl@osu-eddie.UUCP (Karl Kleinpaste)
Newsgroups: net.kids
Subject: Re: school taxes
Message-ID: <127@osu-eddie.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 30-Nov-84 14:22:12 EST
Article-I.D.: osu-eddi.127
Posted: Fri Nov 30 14:22:12 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 1-Dec-84 20:19:55 EST
References: <419@hogpd.UUCP>    <227@oliveb.UUCP> <601@amdahl.UUCP>
Organization: Society for the Advancement of Raw Weirdness
Lines: 124

----------
>>    No!  Make teachers and administrators accountable to the STUDENTS, not
>>to the parents or anyone else.  The students should decide how to run the
>>schools, because they are obviously the ones who can best decide what the
>>quality of education needed to run a democracy is, since they'll be running
>>it.
> 
>I must take issue with the idea of letting students decide how to run
>the schools.  To me this is like letting the cat guard the canary.  This
>philosophy has already been tried in the late 60's and through the early
>70's at the college level, under the guise of ``relevent'' [to what?]
>education.  Students shunned in general those courses that were either
>difficult (ie required much preparation) or uninteresting.  The net
>result:  a generation of college grads who lack certain skills and
>knowledge of their past.
----------
I think a better question which should be raised is, "When should we let the
kids  decide what should be in their education, and how much should  we  let
them decide?" We must concede that, eventually, the students will make their
own decisions on what courses to take, when they reach college age.

I went to a high school which has  what  is known as the Alternative Program
[AP], which is a small subset of the total school population (about 150  out
of about 2000) where the  students  have  a  great deal of control over what
they  are  taught and in what manner, but they are still  constrained  by  a
number of guidelines imposed by a  variety  of sources, from the State Board
of Education on down to the set of teachers who teach at it.

The advantage which the AP gave me  is that it allowed a fantastic amount of
freedom  of  choice  with respect to how much structure  one  got  in  one's
education. The students could elect to do a lot of work on "contract," where
a  student would sit down with a teacher and discuss a  particular  project,
usually for a  9-week period (a quarter of  a  school year). The student and
teacher would come to an agreement which was written up in some detail;  the
two would state that,  with  the  specified  amount  of  work performed at a
certain level of proficiency, the student would get thus-and-so a grade when
complete.  Doing remarkably better would  result in better grades, and doing
poorly results in lower grades. I did a lot of this sort of work, because  I
really like independent  study  (I'm  working  towards  my MS by thesis in a
project which [I hope] will be completely independent from other research in
the Computer Science Dept here).

There were also a large number of  courses designed by students, and some of
these were even run by students. For example, at the time when I was  there,
there was a  surprisingly  large  number of  people  who  were interested in
flying in one way or another. There was one particular individual who was  a
very proficient model  airplane  builder/flyer  (he participated in competi-
tions regularly). This person got permission to teach a couple of courses in
the physics of flying for  a  9-week  period.  The  only major condition for
setting up a course of this type is that such courses must have an  adviser,
which is any of the teachers at the  AP. This kept the students in check: if
too  many weird ideas were coming down from the students, no  teacher  would
sponsor them.  New course  ideas  would have  to  be created which a teacher
would sponsor, and the students ended up with a very well-rounded  education
with these courses.  One minor glitch with the system: due the difficulty of
matching  such  individualized courses with subjects that  the  State  Board
understands, a  course  on  research-paper-writing  might  be generalized in
transcripts as just plain "composition."

And, of course, students at  the  AP  could  always  elect  to take a couple
courses from Main Campus which just weren't available at the AP. I took some
intro computer programming courses at Main Campus while attending the AP.

Probably the single best part (and the single most frustrating part as well)
was the fact that the AP was run almost entirely by the students. Policy was
decided in Town Meeting, a once- (or sometimes twice-) a-week occurrence. It
was frustrating because there were attempts on several occasions to run  the
place by consensus vote,  and  you  could  never  got 150 people to agree on
anything all at once.

What I'm really getting at, other  than  putting in an unabashed plug for my
high school, is that students can in fact get a very good education on their
own, as long as there  are  constraints placed  on them by the adults around
them. Students just don't have the maturity to do it entirely alone. Also, I
would have to say  that  something  like the  AP  would  be unacceptable for
anyone  younger  than high school as well, due to the possibility  of  truly
impressive failures; there were a  number of people at the AP who majored in
sleeping, which resulted in them flunking out or being expelled.

----------
>This has bubbled its way down to the elementary level to a certain
>extent, but enough to alarm people to begin a ``back-to-basics''
>movement [``traditional education''].  Students at the elementary
>level have not accumulated enough information to even begin how to
>decide to run a school.  I believe (and support through my local PTA)
>the notion of teachers accountability to the parents.
----------
Interestingly  enough,  so  did   our AP.  As  far  as  "back-to-basics"  is
concerned,  we  had  our  local Board of Education  just  drooling  when  we
instituted a new course in basic  English, required by all students, because
it  was  realized  that the level of proficiency  was  dropping  noticeably,
particularly at the AP.  We  did  that  entirely  voluntarily,  without  any
outside influence requesting it.  That went over really well with the Board,
for obvious reasons.

As I've already said, I agree as  well that elementary-age children are just
not equipped to deal with this sort of a situation, and I don't recommend it
at all for them.

----------
>Our local community school has a ``basics'' program in which my oldest
>daughter is enrolled.  Essentially, the teacher commits to the parents
>to teach the child a certain set of skills, and the parents commit to
>seeing that the child completes homework assignments, etc.
----------
Sounds a lot like our contracts.  A good idea, I must say.

----------
>This is the third year for the program at our local school, and believe
>me it has made a phenomenal difference!  That elementary school used
>to have a bad reputation; now parents from outside the school district
>are sending their kids there!
----------
{:-)} Well, it's the 11th year for the AP!  So there! {:-)}

Just kidding.  As a result of  our  AP's success, several surrounding school
systems have also instituted similar programs. Good ideas tend to get copied
a lot.
-- 
From the badly beaten keyboards of                       best address---+
him who speaks in _*_T_y_P_e_* _f-_O-_n-_T-_s...                                   |
									V
Karl Kleinpaste @ Bell Labs, Columbus   614/860-5107  {cbosgd,ihnp4}!_c_b_r_m_a_!_k_k
                @ Ohio State University 614/422-0915    cbosgd!osu-eddie!karl