Jim,
I really appreciate and value your answers. You seem very committed to
educational excellence.
== Jim said ==
1. Paradox: Unfortunately, there *is* a paradox in many educational
institutions: saying one celebrates the creativity of the individual,
then forcing students into the same old cookie cutter mold. I am sure we
all have war stories showing this paradox.
Why? Saying "we" celebrate the individual is like mom and apple pie - it
is an expected tradition -- but it requires no work. Sincerely
recognizing individual differences in interest, ability, and creativity is
somewhat more difficult. Truly teaching to a diverse population is very
difficult - *especially* in today's educational system. (Most of which
have little understanding of Deming or Senge).
== end quote ==
Right, which I suspected to be the case. I often ask what people mean by
'celebrate the individual' and most often I do not get an answer. Which
of course, means there is no REAL paradox, because by and large,
'celebrating the individual' does not drive specific behaviors or specific
outcomes. Your own example, which I run across from time to time is a
welcome case of actually celebrating the individual by recognizing
explicitly their differences in learning rate and style.
== back to Jim ==
3. Measuring which standards? There is an educational futurist named
Bill Daggett who challenges the traditional roles, standards, and
measurements of the educational system. Similar to the Quality Function
Deployment process, he contends that educators need to be driven by the
needs, skills, and competencies of the "community" receiving the student.
In my case as a community college employee - that community is most often
business and industry. To me this is a simple adaptation of Deming's
"production cycle" It is this community (I am trying to avoid the baggage
that comes with the customer/supplier model by using community as a
collective term) that must set the competencies and the standards - and
not us (or ACT, or NET, or SAT, or EIEIO)
== end quote ==
I would love to get more information on Daggett. Where I can I find
literature? I have pressed this issue myself, and met with big resistance.
On the other hand, I also work in business, and while businesses can
define what they don't like about the educational system, they are
frequently speechless when it comes to defining what they would like.
Other members of the community have not fared too well, either.
== Jim ==
Using the competency matrix as an example, each student is required to
reach a certain level of learning on a certain number of competencies to
make it -vs- do well -vs- excel. Each level has specific and stringent
standards... specific outcomes determined by the Voice of the Customer.
== end quote ==
Where can I see eamples of the compatency matrix?
== Jim ==
6. Goals - education -vs- factory Rol also asks if education *can* or
*should* have specific goals and outcomes like a factory. Yes and no.
Imagine a education system that has a quantitative goal for headcount and
retention. Can I suboptimize the system to meet those goals - but provide
terrible learning? Yup - just like a quota system in a factory - you tell
me how many units and I'll find a way to meet the goal, irregardless..
That is why Deming was against quotas. Among other things, they breed
competition and suboptimization.
OTOH - I can have specific and measureable goals based on student
learning, on competency based outcomes, etc. *IF* the system supports
such a measurement system.
== end quote ==
Yes, I heartily agree with this. Substantive goals that can delineate how
much a person knows, how effectively a person thinks about challenging
things, and how effectively a person communicates -- articulates their
ideas, and listens to and processes effectively the ideas of others --
would provide a great deal of value to the educational system.
Thank you for a thought-provoking and constructive response.
--Rol Fessenden LL Bean, Inc. 76234.3636@compuserve.com
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>