Educ Systems-Structures LO1587

John Gould (John_Gould@Quickmail)
9 Jun 1995 13:09:18 -0500

Mail*Link(r) SMTP Educational Systems-Structures

As an educationalist working with 25 schools systems in PA and teaching
graduate courses, I am finding the measurement and customers in education
strand very interesting. Working with schools, I facilitate a process of
getting people to see the relationships between structure -- behavior --
events -- mental models. The fundamental reason is to get people to see
how the structure influences the interactions among people and results
within the organization. Why do this? We are a knowledge driven society
and our schools are structured for a production-line society.

In Barry Mallis post (LO1430), he paints a good picture of the events
and behaviors that one can find in many K-12 systems, and I might add
universities (competency.incompetency in teaching, poor measure of product
output, no recognizing master teaching, superision that in inured to the
situation).

Reactions to this post have surfaced many samples of behaviors, events,
and assumptions: teachers are so vehemently against outcome-based
education (OBE); anti-intellectual attitudes; much of what students need
to learn isn't "fun" to learn; many students are there for other reasons
instead of learning; students are customers; students buy the opportunity
to learn, rathe than knowledge itself; schools promote getting a degree,
high GPA withiut regards for learning; textbooks, test banks, teacher's
manual run the curriculum; the system does not require or promote
learning; we emphasize teaching to much; students are passive recipients
of knowledge; students buy the opportunity to learn, but are we providing
them with that opportunity; teachers are at fault in many situations where
students fail to learn; schools have so many roles hat they are unable to
do any one of them well; and, the teaching cadre is responsible for
providing continually improving product and aervices. I present this long
list (it could be longer) to see the mix of issues in order to get the
sense of the complexity at play.

Working within and with schools for the past 25 years, I find most of
these situations and attitudes to be part of the daily fabric of schools.
Looking at this list, I ask the question of what variables are at play
within the structure? For example, my experience in PA (OBE State) is that
teachers are not vehemently against OBE. Politically motivated pressure
groups are! The vast majority of teachers are willing to invest in new
learnings for themselves if they can see a sustainable outcome for their
efforts. Looking at the structure which causes this behavior in teachers,
one finds the ever changing of the policy making group at the top --
School Boards -- is the driving force against sustainability. Its actions
are motivated by political structures and assumptions not educational
needs and assumptions. The outcome - a non-sustainable system with a
by-product of failed students.

Linked to this issue is how performance is measured within the system.
As teachers are learning about new knowledge on how learning takes place
-- multiple intelligences, multi-aged grouping, technology enhanced
instruction, intergenerational learning activities, preformance based
assessment-- communities still want to use very narrow measurements
(standardized test, SAT"s, etc.) that don't even come close to assessing
the products of the above! If there is no structural change in policy in
allowing the measurements to be congruent with the new knowledge being
generated for both teachers and students, than most of the negative
behaviors mentioned above will continue.

Personally, I strongly believe that we need to rethink the structures
of those institutions involved in learning (schools, business, community
agencies) if we are to allow future generations to become life-long
learners. At a deeper level, many of the responses to this strand might be
asking "How do we create sustainable learning communities for a Knowledge
Society?"

Maybe the questions we need to generate are those found in Senge's
operating principles of LO: how do our schools embody new capabilities for
all its customers, clients, stakeholders; how do our schools nurture
leadership throughout the system; how do our schools foster learning
through practice "with" and performance "of" knowledge and understanding;
how do our schools design new patterns of knowledge (curriculum) that
blends knowledge (academics) and skills (vocational) as being equal; and,
how do our schools encourage risk taking to expand the learner's learning?
Let's see what we can come up with!

Just some thoughts to add to this strand!

--
John M. Gould
Center for Systemic School Renewal
Norristown, PA 19403
jgould@mciunix.mciu.K12.pa.us