Common Knowledge

Welcome Back

“You don't need fancy highbrow traditions or money to really learn. You just need people with the desire to better themselves.”

--Adam Cooper and Bill Collage--

“It is possible to store the mind with a million facts and still be entirely uneducated.”

--Alec Bourne--

“The strength of the United States is not the gold at Fort Knox or the weapons of mass destruction that we have, but the sum total of the education and the character of our people.”

--Claiborne Pell--

Yesterday was the first day of school for students in the Chicago Public School System. Thousands of children and their parents went up to school with great expectations for this school year. Some students and parents this year are expecting high marks and others are just looking to make it to the next grade. However, I must take this opportunity to drum a familiar beat. Education is a tool to where a person wants to go in life. It is not an entitlement or a warranty and it is not just a feeder ramp to a job.

When most people talk about getting an education they are really referring to a diploma, degree, or certificate. They are not really referring to the process of learning, which should be a life long process. There is nothing wrong with wanting a diploma, degree, or certificate. There is nothing wrong with wanting a good paying job that can come from having a diploma, degree, or certificate. But, there is something wrong with brainwashing ourselves and our children into believing that getting a diploma, degree, or certificate some how guaranties a person a “good” paying job and/or a lucrative career. The truth is that it does not.

There are dozens of “well educated” unemployed or under employed people in this world. That is a reality that will never disappear but can be reduced. One way of doing that is by challenging ourselves and our children to get away from tailoring our and their education to chase a job. We must instead tailor our and their education to provide critical thinking and problem solving skills so we can meet the ever changing challenges that life provides.

The first step our children must take in tailoring their education is to determine what they want from their education. No goals. No future. No dreams. No greatness. No desires. No chance to shape their lives into what they want it to be because they do not know what they want. That is where “us” grown folks come in. We must be ready to challenge our children, our nieces, our nephews, our little cousins, our god children, and our grand children. We must challenge them to dream. We must challenge them to want more out of life than we did. We must challenge them to think about who they are, what they want out of life, and then how they can make it happen. Then we can begin to should them how an education can be the bridge to their dreams. They will start to understand what tool they will need because they will start to look beyond just going to school to get a job as opposed to going to school to prepare themselves to be in a position to provide to the world their own unique gift that no one else can give.

The truth is as long as we and our children know how to be creative, critical, problem solving thinkers we will always be valuable to employers, ourselves, our community, our nation, and the world.

A Step Toward An Education Rebirth

“They always say time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.”

--Andy Warhol--

“The strength of the United States is not the gold at Fort Knox or the weapons of mass destruction that we have, but the sum total of the education and the character of our people.”

--Claiborne Pell--

Last Friday about a thousand people marched from Walter Payton College Preparatory High School on the near Northside of Chicago to the Federal Plaza in the Southside of downtown Chicago to begin an organized effort to get the mayor of Chicago to improve public education in Chicago, particularly in the underserved parts of the city. This effort was spearheaded by State Senator James Meeks. During the rally at the Federal Plaza volunteers gathered index cards with rally attendees’ contact information in order to build a data base to continue with the organized effort to put pressure on the mayor. It seems that this effort may be in part the product of a report that was released by a Washington, D.C. based think tank that essentially asserted that the schools with the most needs tended to receive the least qualified teachers. Although some of the speakers during the rally demanded that the mayor “fix” the public schools in Chicago, one of the specific requests made prior to the rally was that Chicago Public School teachers receive better training. I think this organized effort is a great idea, however I hope this organized effort will not end once a few issues are addressed. The issues that were raised in the report by the think tank and the issue of equitable funding are all connected to the root of the problem in creating and maintaining a public education system that provides a globally competitive education. That root issue is that the Chicago Public School System as well as any other large city public school system must throw out the old book of operating a public school system and start writing a new one.

What am I talking about? Well, think about it. People always talk about improving public education by getting more money for the system or by getting more qualified teachers or by raising educational standards or by getting better books or by fixing old buildings or by erecting new buildings or something else. The truth is maybe it is time to start with the premise of what is desired, i.e. an educational system that provides a learning environment that is reasonably calculated to get every student a globally competitive education, then figure out what is needed to get there. There are basically two root problems that must be addressed in order to provide a globally competitive education to every child in the system: (1) first the issue of resources must be addressed and (2) how those resources are used must be addressed.

The issue of resources pretty much boils down to money. Now most people believe that it is easy to address that issue. They think that all that is needed is for the federal and state governments to increase their share of the funding. Right? Well not so fast. The money must come from some where and higher taxes are not high on anyone’s list. Because of this politicians are not in a hurry to advocate for higher taxes regardless of how important education is to the health of our communities. Plus any increase in education one year can be cut the next. There are a number of educational reform advocates that champion changing the funding formula for education from a property tax formula to a statewide equitably crafted formula. What is the big deal? The big deal is that as long as Illinois has a property tax based education funding formula the rich will get richer education and the poor will get poorer education. What does that mean? That means that schools that experience the greatest need will tend to receive fewer funds because those schools tend to be in the poorer neighborhoods. This effectively reinforces the cycle of poverty and continues to trap people in economic prisons by virtue of being born into a poor family that lives in a poor neighborhood. In order to eliminate the disparities in educational opportunity a new funding formula must be enacted.

The second issue is a little trickier. Determining how much money a school system needs is easier than determining how best to spend it. I am not big on micro managing so I will not attempt to tell Arnie Duncan exactly how to do his job, however I do have a general suggestion: treat the students differently! Yes. I said it. Treat them differently!!! What do I mean by that? What I mean is that too many schools and school districts ignore the fact that each school, each classroom, each student have different needs and maybe it is time that each school should be required to come up with a game plan to address those needs in order to provide a learning environment that will yield the greatest chance of success. Most people understand that it takes two different game plans to try to get a classroom full of children that think that education is of no value to absorb necessary information than it does a classroom of highly motivated students so why pretend that you can educate them the exact same way. Maybe you should use the same books, teachers, and definitely give them the same amount of respect, but doesn't it make sense to use a game plan that is tailored for the student's needs? I want to be very clear about what I am trying to articulate. If the amount of school material to be absorbed during the school is to be compared to a race then each student, classroom, and school may start at different points but they are all required to finish at the same place. It will be up to them the paths that they take to get to the finish line. It should be up to each principal and teacher to figure out how best to get all of their children to the finishing line. When I was in high school one of my coaches told me something I never forgot. He said the best way to insure success is by eliminating the possibility of failure as an acceptable outcome in your mind. Maybe it is time to eliminate the possibility of failure from the discussion in Chicago of how to provide a globally competitive education to our children.