Category Archives: Education / Youth

Lots of Questions Worth Pondering

This weekend, our new Center for Civic Literacy hosted the first annual meeting of its National Advisory Committee–scholars and educators from around the country who are focused upon civic education. Our goal  was to emerge from the meeting with a more focused research agenda: a better grasp of what we do and don’t know and a clearer idea of the most urgent unanswered questions about America’s “civic deficit.”

It will take me several weeks to absorb everything I heard, but here–in no particular order–are some of the questions and observations that struck me as particularly weighty during our various sessions.

  • Can we say with any assurance that more and better information changes attitudes and behaviors? Educators certainly hope so, and marketing professionals who research advertising tell us that the more informed a consumer is, the more resistant she is to misleading framing in sales pitches, but we don’t know the extent to which information has this effect in more value-laden venues.
  • How do we inculcate what used to be (quaintly) called civic virtue? If–as one participant observed–American citizens have largely been transformed into consumers, where does that leave old-fashioned notions of civic duty?
  • How do we explain to the general public that civic literacy and civic skills are not simply concerned with affairs of government? Indeed, how do we achieve some measure of consensus about what such literacy and skills include? What is the content–the basic, minimal information– a citizen of 21st Century America needs in order to understand and navigate his environment?
  • How is the teaching of civic information and skills informed by the concept of civic identity?
  • Should teaching students how to evaluate the mountains of information and misinformation supplied by the Internet be considered a civic skill?

Perhaps the most penetrating question came from an eminent professor of Social Work, who asked “To what end are we engaging in civic education? What is the desired outcome? If we were wildly, improbably successful, how would the world change?”

How, indeed?

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Mitch and Purdue: More Evidence of a Bad Fit

One of the most troubling aspects of the current wave of anti-intellectualism we are experiencing is Congress’ declining support for basic research. No matter that we have ample evidence that such research pays massive dividends down the road– the focus on austerity has provided a convenient excuse for cutting the grant opportunities that have led to breakthroughs in science and medicine and have provided the foundation on which technological advances have been based.

In the face of this disinvestment, university presidents and chancellors representing 165 institutions signed a letter in July calling on President Barack Obama and Congress to close what they called the nation’s widening “innovation deficit.”

As JC Online reported,

The letter — signed by presidents of Yale, MIT, most Big Ten universities and all of Purdue’s self-designated peer universities — says declining federal investments in research and cuts as a result of sequestration could lead to fewer U.S.-based innovation and scientific breakthroughs in the future.

Purdue’s President, Mitch Daniels, refused to add Purdue to that list of signatories, citing the deficit. ” I abstained from signing it, in my case, because of its complete omission of any recognition of the severe fiscal condition in which the nation finds itself.”

Where to start?

First, despite Republicans’ adamant refusal to notice,  the U.S. deficit has declined steadily   during the Obama administration.  It will decline 155 billion just in 2013, according to the Congressional Budget Office. In fact, we are experiencing the most rapid deficit reduction since WWII.  The reasons for that decline can be debated–as ill-considered as the sequester was, it may well have contributed–but the fact that the deficit has been significantly reduced cannot be denied. Citing the nation’s “severe fiscal condition”  as a reason for Purdue’s non-signatory status simply reinforces a growing public conviction that Mitch Daniels is a partisan politician who does not understand the mission of the university he leads.

The problem is not a prior career in political life. Others have made the transition from politician to academic, and done so successfully. The problem is that Daniels seems utterly unaware of the difference between partisanship and scholarship, between ideology and philosophy, and–as the Zinn controversy so clearly illustrated–between indoctrination and education.

As we know, Daniels orchestrated his move to Purdue, appointing the Trustees who would–surprise!–choose him to lead the University. He evidently viewed the job as simply another platform for partisan persuasion– with the added benefit of seeming disinterestedness. But he clearly didn’t understand what universities are about. Failure to recognize the importance of funded academic research–failure to appreciate the centrality of that research to classroom performance, among other things–is refusal to understand the interests of the institution he leads.

With his refusal to sign the letter, and his purported reason for that refusal, Daniels has chosen Republican talking points over the needs of his University.

It’s really a shame. Had he chosen to use his formidable political skills and partisan connections on behalf of Purdue’s scholarly mission, Daniels could have been a great asset as President, despite the clouded process that delivered him to the office.

That he did not make that choice is becoming clearer by the day.

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Agents of Change

One of my Facebook friends had a perceptive post the other day about the Tony Bennett  debacle: she noted that, whatever the merits or deficiencies of his “reforms,” he’d broken every rule she’d ever learned about fostering organizational change.

Coincidentally, last night I ran into a friend I hadn’t seen in several months. She is retired now, but taught high school for over 40 years and worked with several education reform groups as well. She had a number of Tony Bennett stories–none flattering– but the one that struck me was this: she’d been at a teachers conference when Bennett was introduced to the assembly by a just-re-elected Mitch Daniels. Taking the stage, Bennett wasted no time on frivolous introductions–instead, he immediately launched  into a recitation of all the things the people in that room were doing wrong, and all the changes they were going to have to make.

Shades of Steve Goldsmith!

Changing the way any organization works requires changing its culture, revising behaviors that have become habitual and comfortable. Most people fear change–they find it disorienting, and they understandably resent the implication that the reason changes are needed is because their performance has been inadequate. Good managers understand both the dimensions of the task and the need to connect with and reassure people who are being asked to do things differently.

If change is to occur, and persist (which is the meaningful measure), there absolutely has to be buy-in from the troops–from the people who need to make the changes happen. No lasting change has ever been made by an arrogant superior intent upon imposing his “expertise” on the rank and file.

Strange as it may seem, “Help me figure out how we can achieve our common goal” goes a lot farther than “Listen to me, you idiot, and I’ll explain what you’ve been doing wrong.”

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A Welcome Statement

A couple of weeks ago, I criticized Ball State University for hiring a prominent creationist to teach science courses. Coming after complaints alleging that another science faculty member had taught a course from an “intelligent design” perspective, the hire raised troubling questions about the quality of scholarship at the University.

Yesterday, a friend on the BSU faculty shared with me a strong statement on the controversy just issued by President JoAnn Gora.

The money quote:

As this coverage has unfolded, some have asked if teaching intelligent design in a science course is a matter of academic freedom. On this point, I want to be very clear. Teaching intelligent design as a scientific theory is not a matter of academic freedom – it is an issue of academic integrity. As I noted, the scientific community has overwhelmingly rejected intelligent design as a scientific theory. Therefore, it does not represent the best standards of the discipline as determined by the scholars of those disciplines. Said simply, to allow intelligent design to be presented to science students as a valid scientific theory would violate the academic integrity of the course as it would fail to accurately represent the consensus of science scholars.

Precisely.

The statement made no reference to the prominent creationist who was hired, but it was unambiguous in recognizing that “intelligent design” is neither academically appropriate nor scientifically accepted, and assuring the faculty and alumni that religious doctrine will not be taught in science classes at Ball State.

A failure to clarify its continued commitment to intellectual integrity would have significantly diminished BSU’s academic reputation, so the issuance of this statement was a welcome relief (if unaccountably tardy).

But better late than never.

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Drip, drip……

The Daniels Administration may now be in the rear-view mirror, but sometimes, a rear-view image allows us to see things we missed when the view was head-on.

Yesterday, more embarrassing emails emerged--this time, from the Superintendent of Public Education’s office. It seems that Mr. Bennett was perfectly willing to play games with his beloved “A-F” grading system for schools when a GOP donor’s charter school failed to make the grade. The emails disclose that the system was manipulated so that Christel Academy–a charter established by major donor Christel DeHaan–would not get the “C” grade it deserved, but would instead be awarded an A.

Bennett is frantically trying to spin the emails, but–like those issued by Daniels in the Zinn controversy–they are hard to re-interpret.  Superintendent Bennett blew plenty of smoke during his tenure in office, but these messages are anything but ambiguous.

There are a number of observations one might make over these latest disclosures. At the very least, the emails indicate a willingness to overlook deficiencies of favored charter operators that the administration was unwilling to extend to public schools. They confirm a widespread belief that Bennett was a political operative charged with furthering Daniels’ ideological agenda, not an educator. (Sue Ellen Reed, Bennett’s Republican predecessor, was an educator, and Daniels forced her out of that office.)

It’s also hard to understand why either Daniels or Bennett felt they could express themselves so clearly when using official email. Did they not realize that these messages would be maintained and discoverable?

Of course, the sixty-four thousand dollar question, as we used to say, is: who is leaking these delectable morsels? How has the AP known to ask for them?

And what other disclosures await?

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