Equal Educational Opportunity: The Way Forward to a Better Nevada

Fifty years ago on January 8^th, 1964 President Lyndon Johnson announced to the nation, in his first State of the Union Address, that the government was going to wage war on poverty. Johnson noted that "We shall not rest until that war is won… the richest nation on Earth can afford to win it. We cannot afford to lose it." Fifty years later, we are still fighting, and for many Americans it has been a war waged in vain. According to the non-partisan Pew Research Center report “5 Facts About Economic Equality” U.S. income inequality is the highest it’s been since 1928, the eve of the Great Depression. In the post-World War Two years a strong middle class provided the political stability and the purchasing power that enabled this country to become an economic superpower. The polarization of America into the haves and the have-nots will have serious economic consequences into the future, not only for the country but for Nevada as well.  

Minorities suffer disproportionately as the income gap widens. For example, in 1964 there was a $19,000 difference between the two groups, growing to over $27,000 in 2011 adjusted for inflation. The golden ticket to the middle class, economic stability and a better life has historically been a quality education, but for many students of color this is not equitably obtainable. Low educational outcomes for students of color is not only a quality of life issue, but is an economic issue, and in the eyes of many, a civil rights issue.   

In a 2010 study conducted by Cross & Joftus we are failing Nevada’s children. Low-income students account for 41% of kids in Nevada, who are disproportionately Latino and African American. Nevada has the 3^rd lowest graduation rate in the nation at 62.7%  to put it into real numbers, more than 13,000 of  Nevada’s students from the Class of 2013 will fail to graduate.  Minority students drop out disproportionately high compared to whites. The graduation rate for Hispanics is about 55%, while African Americans complete high school at a rate of only 45%! To compare, Nevada graduates 76% of its Asian students and 69% of its white students.

It is well documented that a failure to earn a high school diploma may result in a host of societal ills, consider the following:

CRIME: A one-year increase in average years of schooling reduces murder and assault by almost 30 percent, motor vehicle theft by 20 percent, arson by 13 percent, and burglary and larceny by about 6 percent.

PUBLIC ASSISTANCE: If one third of all Americans without a high school education went on to get more than a high school education, the savings would range from $3.8 billion to $6.7 billion for welfare, $3.7 billion for Food Stamps and $0.4 billion for housing assistance.

TAXES: A high school dropout earns about $260,000 less over a lifetime than a high school graduate and pays about $60,000 less in taxes.

HEALTH CARE: High school dropouts have higher rates of cardiovascular illnesses, diabetes and other ailments, and require an average of $35,000 in annual health-care costs, compared with $15,000 for college graduates. [i][ii]

Our business community understands the importance of having a skilled work force. According to a recent White House report the share of jobs that require postsecondary education has doubled over the last 40 years, as today’s jobs require more technical skills. Of 100 high school freshmen in Nevada, only 10 will earn a college degree within 10 years, this is half the national average! Education is the cornerstone of our economic future, as the world continues to grow smaller and flater due to technological innovation. Colorado high school teacher, Karl Fisch, points out “We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist using technologies that haven’t been invented … in order to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet.” (“Did You Know?/Shift Happens”)

If Nevada is to achieve sustainable economic prosperity, we must adequately educate all of our students. We cannot continue to allow Nevada’s schools to be “drop-out factories” for students of color and the disadvantaged. Educating all of Nevada’s students is an economic and moral imperative. Fifty years ago President Johnson sought to correct another social injustice with the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1864. As a nation, we must reassert our conviction to our shared creed that this is a land of equal opportunity for all Americans. Through education we have the power to determine our future, a future that must include the many and not just the few.        

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[i] http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/docs/white_house_report_on_increasing_college_opportunity_for_low-income_students_1-16-2014_final.pdf

[ii] http://www.washoe.k12.nv.us/docs/Crisis_in_Nevada_Education_and_the_Economy-Presentation.pdf

Nevada Last in Success for Our Kids

A few weeks ago the Las Vegas Review Journal announced that “Nevada still last in success for kids.” This is a headline no one wants to see, especially teachers, parents, our business community and of course the students themselves. If you have lived in the Las Vegas valley as long as I have (20 years) you have most likely heard the quip that Nevada is at the top of every bad list and at the bottom of every good list, but dead last in the nation in terms of chances for student success? The report cited in the article is the Education Week 2014 Quality Counts State Report Cards, and indeed Nevada’s children deserve better, not only for a chance at a better life, but for the overall health and vitality of our communities.   

According to the report, the areas that have significantly handicapped our student’s chances for success include linguistic integration, or the number of children whose parents are fluent Spanish speakers, preschool opportunities, low high school graduation rates, and low post-secondary participation for both young adults and adults alike. These are complex issues that speak to larger systemic problems, but  Nevadans have to ask themselves, what kind of community do we want to build? I believe Nevada’s future success economically and in terms of quality of life is predicated on correcting these deficits. Easier said than done I know, but I believe that as a community we can solve these problems together. There is good news in the Silver State however, according to the same study there have been small but steady gains in achievement. The Education Week report puts Nevada 36^th overall. Admittedly not where we want to be, but we are going in the right direction making gains in reading and math.

In addition, Nevada’s students need to learn the skills and acquire the knowledge that will help them become college and career ready. Proficiency in reading and mathematics and effective oral and written communication are vitally important but according to our business leaders so are the “soft-skills" like reasoning, logic, collaboration, communication, problem solving and thinking skills. The 21^st century work force requires employees who take the initiative and have an entrepreneurial spirit, curiosity and imagination. Character is important for success too, attributes like honesty, persistence, determination and empathy have to be developed in students who don’t already have them. Admittedly, this is a tall order in a time of growing class sizes, diminished funding, and increased public skepticism of our public school’s ability to properly educate our children.  If Nevada is to become a leader in education we will need to take bold initiatives and think outside of the box to solve complex problems, it will be difficult work, but work worth doing.   

Teacher Leadership: The New Way Forward

                 

Nevada has a lot of work to do if it wants to have a first class public education system. For most of us, this is not news, and anyone who has been paying attention long enough knows that the state has been struggling for years to find its way to educational achievement. The Clark County School District, the fifth largest in the nation, with over 311,000 students, makes up approximately ¾ of all of Nevada’s students. Reforming education in Nevada means improving education in the CCSD, easier said than done. The CCSD has one of the lowest graduation rates in the nation at 62.7% beating only South Carolina, New Mexico and Washington D.C.. The district’s educational challenges are far too numerous to enumerate them all, but at the top of the short list are educating English Language Learners (ELL), poverty and all of the social consequences that go with it, low per pupil funding and large class sizes. If Nevada wants to be economically competitive going into the future, we need to take bold measures and rethink how we educate Nevada’s students.    

   

Fortunately, we are in the process of transforming our education system. The state, along with forty-four others, has adopted the more rigorous Common Core State Standards, it is in the process of overhauling its teacher evaluation process, implementing a merit pay based system and has embraced educational competition by supporting the proliferation of charter schools to name a few. Nonetheless, despite these measures, our schools still reflect the 19^th century factories from which they were originally conceived. While many of the stated reforms are steps forward, we have failed to tap into the most important and underutilized resource we already have, teacher leaders.

Historically teachers have had limited options in terms of promotion and advancement. The only real path to greater responsibility and influence is to become an administrator, but that takes great teachers out of the classroom instead of where we need them most. By thinking outside of the box and creating career paths that enable master teachers to exert greater influence and positively affect student achievement, we can significantly improve educational outcomes. Teacher leadership is inchoate, but much work is being done to expand the role of the classroom teacher. Several organizations are leading the way to re-imagine teacher roles and responsibilities they include the National Education Association’s Teacher Leadership Initiate, Public Impact’s “opportunity culture,” and Educators 4 Excellence  “STEP: Supporting Teachers as Empowered Professionals” initiative.

The National Education Association (NEA) in conjunction with the National Board of Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) and the Center for Teaching Quality (CTQ) have introduced the Teacher Leadership Initiative (TLI). TLI is a product of the organizations’ shared vision of teacher-leadership advancing the profession by giving great teachers the ability to lead. According to NEA president Dennis Van Roekel “This initiative will ultimately develop expertise and engage thousands of teacher-leaders in leadership work in schools, with NEA affiliates, and in state houses throughout the country—because every student should have the best possible educators in their schools.” TLI’s stated goals are: Define the foundational competencies of teacher leadership; Develop relevant experiences and supports to help teachers cultivate those competencies; and to activate teachers to be leaders for their profession as a result of their participation in this process. One hundred and fifty educators representing Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Massachusetts, Michigan and Mississippi were chosen for the 2014 pilot year.

Public Impact is a national education policy and management consulting organization, which strives to improve educational success for at risk students. One of the stated objectives of Public Impact is to create an “opportunity culture,” and develop teacher leaders who will have influence over a greater number of students. Public Impact promotes job redesign and technology to extend the reach of excellent teachers and the teams they lead, for more pay, within budget, without forcing class-size increases. Recently, Charlotte-Mecklenburg School District in North Carolina has expanded the opportunity culture model to 17 additional schools within the district and by 2017-2018 half of the district’s schools will have opportunity cultures.

Educators 4 Excellence’s stated mission is to “to ensure that the voices of classroom teachers are included in the decisions that affect our profession and our students.” In June of 2013 E4E’sTeacher Policy Team on Career Pathways published a report titled “STEP: Supporting Teachers as Empowered Professionals.” The report outlines a career trajectory for educators that empowers teachers to move up through a series of pathway steps: emerging teacher, professional teacher, lead teacher, and finally innovative teacher. As the teacher climbs up the steps she is rewarded with greater responsibility, accountability and influence.

Providing teachers with opportunities for advancement without taking them out of the classroom is a good way to tap into the expertise and experience of our great teachers that we already have. Policy makers and thought leaders will need to determine what form of teacher leadership is best for Nevada’s students. This is a bold initiative, and will require a shift in the way that we think about teachers and their roles in schools, top-down mandates that bypass teacher input and expertise is doomed to failure. Rather, a more sensible solution is to utilize teacher’s talents and allow them to be the change agents that we need to propel Nevada’s students to educational achievement.     

      

KNPR State of Nevada Radio Interview

I have been Nevada's 2014 Teacher of the Year officially for less than a week, but I have already been inundated with emails, solicitations, radio and T.V. spots. I am not complaining, as a matter of fact I have enjoyed the opportunity to speak with various persons and organizations regarding teacher professionalization and leadership. Today was a special day however, I got to hear myself on the radio being interviewed on one of my favorite Nevada Public Radio programs, State of Nevada. I think  the interview went well, once you get me talking about teaching it's hard to get me to stop, as a matter of fact I didn't want the interview to end. I look forward to other opportunities to speak with the media regarding educational issues. Here is a link to my interview in case you missed it. State of Nevada Interview            

2014 Michael Landsberry Nevada Teacher of the Year

On December 19th 2013 I was awarded the 2014 Michael Lansberry Nevada Teacher of the Year. I can not begin to describe the honor, pride and sense of accomplishment this award brings me, not only in a professional sense but on a much deeper personal level. This year State Superintendent of public schools, Dale Erquiaga, honored former Marine and Sparks middle school teacher Michael Landsberry by dedicating the award to his memory. On October 21st 2013 a twelve year old student shot Mr. Landsberry in the chest in a school-yard shooting. The gunman wounded two others, and would have perpetrated even more carnage if it wasn't for Mr. Lanndsberry's brave action in confronting the boy, giving others time to escape. I did not know Mr. Landsberry, but I do know Marines. Almost 20 years ago I was a young jar head and I know from experience that they put others before themselves, they confront rather than retreat from danger. They are leaders who live their lives according to values like honor, courage and commitment.

This year I have committed myself to honoring  Michael Landsberry's memory by working hard  on behalf of all of Nevada's teachers to elevate the profession to the status and level of respect it deserves. When I received the award I was asked to say a few words. The ceremony was a complete surprise so I did not have a prepared speech, looking into the faces of my students, colleagues, family, and other esteemed guests I started to panic, then I remembered the words of Ronald Reagan, “Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they made a difference in the world. But, the Marines don't have that problem.” I will also add either do teachers.