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Forward to Different – Part 1 – Rethinking the School Calendar

Editor’s Note: This the first in a series of blog posts reimagining how schools should move going forward. Taking to account the current state of K-12 schools, the increase in teachers and leaders leaving the field, and the tools we have available to us. Check out the overview post here.

There is a long-standing belief that the school calendar was built around the agrarian calendar. Summers are off for kids in farming when in actuality, they would be most needed in the spring (for planting) and in the fall (for harvesting). Like many urban legends, this myth has become somewhat of a talking point narrative as to why a majority of U.S. schools have summer off.

The truth is, our current “traditional” school calendar was set up as a compromise between rural and urban areas. Prior to the invention of air conditioning, keeping kids cooped up in sweltering buildings didn’t make much sense. So, it was agreed at the end of the 19th century that students take time off in the hot months of summer. The belief was that this would allow for kids to do other enriching activities (thus summer camps were born) and teachers could do some professional development.

With this traditional calendar come some other side-effects that are still deep rooted in education today. One side effect is a deadline, based on birth date, to determine which kids are locked into certain grade levels. These grade levels then build basic assessments of knowledge and skills based on an average. Assessments take a pre-determined marker as the average and then say that the average student should be above that preset line.

Entire economies are built around summers off with travel and family vacation. Mom and dad could plan to take a couple of weeks off from work to travel to see Marty Moose. Sure, many students experience the “summer slide”, but this has been the way of doing business in schools for over a century. But it doesn’t have to be. Below are all the different ways we could do school if we move forward to different.

Traditional School Calendar (180 days)

Let’s start with the one we know. 180 days of instruction. 12 weeks off in the summer. Students distributed based on age into grade levels and the year is split up into semesters, quarters, or trimesters. This has been the tried and true model since the late 1880’s. Some of the pros of the traditional calendar include a concentrated time frame for professional development. Another is the financial savings of not operating air conditioning of a school building during the hottest months. And of course, teachers do need time off to recharge their batteries, especially after these past couple of years.

The downside of the traditional calendar can be seen in schools today. At-risk students tend to suffer a bigger “slide” during the summer. Those that need the most academic support often don’t have access to it. Those with a higher socio-economic status can provide tutoring and/or enrichment camps. The gap between the haves and have-nots continues to widen in this model.

Professional development is also a challenge. Teachers are often bribed with extra pay (much deserved) or days off (also much deserved) to attend training in the summer. With those days held so sacred, much of the required training (like blood-born pathogens) occupies a teacher’s calendar. When actual professional learning takes place, it can’t be implemented right away because of the long break.

Year-Round Calendars

In this model, the days are split into either 60/20 (days on/off) or 45/15. Some models still have 180 days, but most countries add in a few more days as the United States has one of the shortest academic calendars in the world.

In this model, there isn’t a long summer break but instead several breaks spread out through the year. Students are still grouped based on age in the traditional Year-Round model and the year is usually split into quarters or trimesters in an 11-month system.

Image Credit: https://www.screenflex.com/reasons-why-year-round-school-is-a-good-idea/

Just a quick visual check of the models above shows the differences when you spread the academic time throughout the year. Cons of this model generally come from those that don’t want to lose their summer or from schools trying to save money in the summer by closing down buildings and saving on electricity. Sports camps (especially football) also feel the squeeze when summer isn’t 60+ days long. Parents would need child care options, but that is also an issue in the summer. If all schools had a similar schedule, pop-up camps and other enrichment type businesses could emerge for those parents that need a place to physically house their children during the work day.

The are many pros to this model, including a smaller summer gap for students to fall behind. With more frequent gaps, teachers and students get time to recharge their batteries and reduce stress levels. Professional learning can be ongoing and throughout the year. Vacations now have more options for travel, including “off-peak” times that don’t include summer.

Students struggling academically don’t have to wait an entire year before summer school arrives to help them recover. There can be opportunities provided by teaching staff during breaks (for an additional stipend) to help support those students that need it. Teachers can assess their students’ needs and spend quality time adjusting lessons as needed, rather than doing it during lengthy after school or weekend times.

More breaks throughout the year could also help teachers when it comes to the daily errands of life. Getting oil changes, doctors appointments, tire replacements, vet visits, etc. get kicked to the summer or take days off in the traditional model. School might lose some savings from having their buildings operating during more summer months, but they also have more breaks to update and fix parts of the school.

This model would be the first step into a different direction. Some private schools, charters and even a few public institutions are using this model now in the U.S. It would take federal and state guidance to make this model the norm and breaking us out of the 1800’s. That said, if we switch to year round calendars, other options, like those below, become more possible.

Multi-track year-round systems.

There will likely always be a marker to denote where a student is on the academic spectrum. But that marker should be based on their learning growth, not their age. The traditional school calendar keeps the age-based grade level system locked in place. It takes a lot to advance a student or retain a student an entire year, often affecting the student socially and emotionally in the process.

In a year round scenario, students could jump up to a different level in between breaks rather than wait for the summer break. Would this be disruptive to some classroom environments with already established norms? Yes. But if enough students earned the move up, a new section could be formed and another dissolved to balance costs.

Staggering and mixing students based on ability can increase diversity and differentiation of learning. In a true multi-track model, certain cohorts of students would be off while other students remain “on”. This means you could have more students enrolled in a school than the traditional capacity as well.

The challenges of this model, besides logistics and traditionalism, are that they school year is constantly resetting every break. All the other traditional benefits of the current calendar are also affected like state-testing, athletics, graduation events, parent conferences, etc. Teachers and support staff would have to be adept and flexible when it comes to instruction, making a traditional “lecture-based” model more difficult. Grading systems would need to pivot to a more standards-based approach as well since learning is rated based on mastery of a topic rather than getting a good grade on a homework assignment or quiz.

This type of model certainly moves a lot of cheese, but it also could be the most beneficial to student learning and true personalization. A project-based school would have much better success attempting a model like this than a traditional school system. Now, if we really wanted to move to something different, this last model could be it.

Year-Round Hybrid Multi-Level

Educators shudder at the word “hybrid” these days as they harken back to the beginning of the pandemic when they had to teach kids online and in-person simultaneously. That is not the version of hybrid I’m referring to here.

In a year-round hybrid model, school would exist in two simultaneous models. Students would follow a multi-track year round in-person schedule supplemented at times with an online experience. Teachers wouldn’t be teaching these online components in real-time. The classes would be project or challenge-based and students would be able to determine their own pathway during off-time.

Vacations could still happen. Students can log in as often as they want or until they mastered their objective. This new version of homework would be less about practice and more about deeper understanding. Worksheets replaced with world-building and connecting.

Students could attend classes outside of their geographic area (hint – future blog post coming on this). During their in-person “off time” they could learn another language, master math objectives, or design an app for their future business. This calendar looks the most messy of all as the online component would happen during various quarters or trimesters potentially. Here’s a look at what that might entail for a student.

In the above model, a student attends year round in-person school, potentially jumping up levels in various subject areas between breaks. Meanwhile, they are working on additional online learning either in an area they are passionate about or in an area where they need extra support.

As with in-person school, there would need to be some built in breaks for online learning. These “Off line” times could coincide with in-person breaks so that students could achieve true “down time”. An online advisor/mentor would help them through this part of their school day and help them connect with the right resources and instructors as needed.

Time is a limited resource

No matter what calendar or ideology a school chooses, balancing academic time and down time is a challenge. There is no, one-size-fits-all scenario in education, but creating calendars and possibly online components that allow for flexibility is a step towards true personalized learning. There are many permutations of the methods I’ve suggested above that exist, but for reasons of traditionalism, they never take hold and achieve wide-spread adoption. It’s going to take leadership at the state or federal level to truly make that happen.

Please share your own thoughts in the comments below. What am I missing? What more could we do as we head Forward to Different?

March 23, 2022
Improving Everyday
Promoting daily, incremental growth to help raise your school to new levels of success.

Photo by Nick Fewings on Unsplash

As we approach the two-year mark since this whole craziness started, I keep asking myself the simple question: Are we doing this right? As a school, are we headed in the right direction and are we leading the children out of this quagmire? How do we get our students learning with the same rate of growth we had prior to all this mess?

March, 2020 the whole message changed. “Together, We can do anything” was the daily mantra to hold onto for me, our staff, our students, and our families. As a neighborhood school, I kept wondering, “Is everyone okay??” “What can we do to help?” “Does anyone need anything our school can provide?” As time progressed, the answer became more clear: School is the sense of normalcy we need. The messaging out of the main office each morning was an attempt to reclaim normalcy and hopefully, a feeling of structure for the children logging in remotely. We wanted students met with a welcoming teacher and staff members as they progressed through a day of learning. What we received back from our school community was a master class in resiliency. Communication from families was incredible. They made sure their child was ready each day, logged in, and a purposeful learner. (Yes, we had to chase some to get them logged in).

We wanted students met with a welcoming teacher and staff members as they progressed through a day of learning. What we received back from our school community was a master class in resiliency.
~Craig Vogt
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Through the hybrid learning experience and now having all the students back since September, I kept going back to the message my mentor kept telling me years ago, “Just focus on improving everyday”. Keep it simple. To me, the concept is easy to wrap your head around and we apply it to all of our messaging. If we get better at something everyday, we are headed in the right direction . Improving behavior, improving focus, improving our work ethic, it is something that applies to everyone. So, “Improving Everyday” replaced “Together, we can do anything” as the message our children see each in the morning announcements that come from my desk via Screencastify.

From a Teacher standpoint, their focus is taking each child on a journey of self-improvement as a person and within our curriculum construct. As professionals, we are well aware that every child improves at differing speeds. The magic lies in continuing to build their confidence, getting them to believe in themselves, and to see true value in their EFFORT each day. Growth mindset at the elementary level is ongoing. The more students see how effort pays off, the more we will reap the rewards as a school through their academic success. As a building leader, among all the worries we have, I keep a close eye on the enthusiasm as we enter the building each day, and the students’ engagement / exploration in their learning. I see a focus from each of us (staff and students) on getting better at something everyday. Here are a few talking points we center our discussions around:
- Small Wins – whether moving up a reading level, consecutive days completing all homework assignments, or for those who are really struggling, showing up each day and trying. Small wins are so important to celebrate and be enthusiastic about and eventually may turn into HUGE wins.
- Mistakes Are Our Friend – we use mistakes as teachable moments to understand the why in our academics. Behavioral mistakes are also teachable moments where we look through our options and understand we need to pause before we react or act out.
- Hard Work Pays Off – effort is everything.
- Be The Reason Someone Smiles Today – enthusiasm is contagious.
Keep a simple message at the core of what you are doing each day and ALWAYS search for the small wins. The small wins will eventually turn into HUGE wins and your children will recognize their efforts matter.

Craig Vogt

Principal – Jefferson Elementary School, Bergenfield, NJ
March 22, 2022
Fish Dinner

“I would like fish for dinner.”

So, you’ll need to get your fishing gear and go to the lake or the ocean and catch some so you can cook it tonight.

Or you can drive to a seafood shop and see what fresh catch they have today.

Or you can walk over to the supermarket and get frozen fish dinner.

Or you can press this button on your phone and dinner will be here in twenty minutes.

There are so many conveniences nowadays, but it really comes down to the money and effort you are willing to put in.

Lesson planning is the same. You can take the time to really think about the main ingredient and how to best prepare it for your students, or just open a textbook and teach from there, or perhaps you can buy a ready-to-use lesson from TPT.

I am willing to bet a fish dinner you caught and prepared yourself would be the most memorable.

Sometimes the effort we put into something is totally worth it.

Image Created by the author via Adobe Creative Express

March 15, 2022
Join K12Leaders!

We know leaders in education meet together in various venues across the internet… Teachers find teachers, admins find admins, human resource experts find other human… you get the picture. We think that’s great!

However , K12Leaders.com is a un樂威壯 ique community where leaders in ALL roles <犀利士 strong> across education come together to collaborate, share, and grow.

If you are a member – we’re so glad you’re here! Invite a friend from across the hall, across the district, or across the country to join our conversations!

March 15, 2022
Modeling Leadership

I was fortunate this week as an education leader: I spent two full days working with students. Our graduating students are working hard on their Senior Projects, all of which are interesting and impactful. I was asked to help with one senior’s project in particular; training a cadre of younger students to take over running the A/V booth in our performance theater.

Let’s get this straight – I know about 10 buttons to work the A/V booth. This was not my training. I was there to assist, supervise and observe. Our senior student (assisted by his good friend and fellow Class of 2022 member) designed a full two-day course to teach mentees all they would need to know as production assistants. He developed a schedule, a syllabus and training materials. He provided information, demonstrations and hands-on opportunities for students to learn. Finally, he stepped back and gave them time to use the equipment in a supportive environment.

Lunch as a group

For hours, I worked on my laptop with an eye and ear tuned into their work. I was impressed by the commitment to excellence, the level of respect and the variety of lessons taught. I learned a WHOLE lot more about our A/V capabilities!

After lunch on Day 2, students started working together to run “productions” on the stage. At times the auditorium was filled with the sounds of music. At other times, the theater was so dark, I could only see my computer screen. As students grew in their knowledge and comfort level, I started to see their skills gel and the theater came to life.

At the same time, I was thoroughly enjoying myself. Singing along from my seat, tapping my feet, smiling as students got up, sang and danced to give those in the booth something to track.

Soon… I was starting to think I wanted to get up and sing. It would not be the first time I’ve wished to do something similar. I love to sing. I LOVE LOVE to sing. However? I am not a singer. Since my strokes? I am REALLY not a singer. I usually chicken out and just enjoy the show, always wishing later that I at least spoke up. Today, I went up to the booth and asked the kids if I could sing. After their surprised reaction, they gave me a mic, helped me find the track I wanted and I headed to the stage.

I’m sharing this video with you… NOT because I’m awaiting a record deal. I am sharing because of how it models vulnerability, community building, risk-taking and having fun with students. In my role, I have limited ways to build relationships with our students. During these two days, I observed them coming out of their shell, creating a small community, taking risks and having lots of fun together while LEARNING. I wanted to be part of the experience!

I’ve decided to share the experience here for many reasons… Leaders need to find ways to spend quality time with those whom they serve. Find ways to have fun. Find ways to model vulnerability and facing fears. Laugh at yourself; don’t just TELL students everyone makes mistakes. SHOW them.

It makes me feel wicked uncomfortable and super proud to watch this video. I sound WAY better inside my head. I keep up with the rhythm singing along from my seat. I remember EVERY single word when singing in my car. I felt as silly and awkward and self-conscious as I look on stage. But listen to and watch the students in this video. Teaching and learning is going on all around me, without my having to teach a thing. In the end, this experience wasn’t about me. It was about building the capacity of students.

I think that’s magical.

What are you teaching your students, or your staff, when you aren’t teaching at all?

Simply,
Suzy

Want to see part of the song we did together after this?

March 10, 2022
Designing Media Literacy Choice Boards for Current Events

At the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in late February 2022, we developed a Ukraine-Russia Conflict 2022 Media Literacy Choice Board to support students and teachers in exploring current events from a critical media literacy perspective. To engage in critical media literacy is to access, analyze, and produce a variety of media, with a particular focus on the ‘behind-the-scenes’ work of ownership, production, and distribution of media. The Ukraine-Russia Conflict 2022 media literacy choice board asks students to critically investigate and construct new ways to interact with the information about the Russian invasion of Ukraine from the news, television, social media, and other media outlets.

After sharing our Choice Board on social media and receiving an enthusiastic response, including more than 9,000 views on Twitter and 250 shares in Facebook groups for educators, we recognized that educators from across all grade levels and subjects are looking for ways to incorporate real world events into their classroom in real time. And critical media literacy is one such way to do this.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine is part of what British investigative journalist Carole Cadwalladr has called the First Great Information War – a war she believes began in 2014 when a democratically elected leader replaced an ally of Valdmir Putin as President of Ukraine. Given the ubiquity of media and the Internet, it can be easy to fall prey to the barrage of misinformation and disinformation that shapes the way in which we understand global events.

Information about the Russian invasion is coming in at a furious pace. Critical media literacy asks audiences to slow down and look closely at what is presented, watched, read, and listened to. By slowing down, and carefully analyzing texts through the tenets of critical media literacy, audiences may gather a greater understanding of both their own media use as well as the content of the events. This process is especially valuable for youth audiences for whom this may be the first global conflict with which they are grappling. Furthermore, it may be the first time that such highly contentious information pops into their social media feeds. Critical media literacy aims to support young people in their media use as well as their media understanding and sense making.

Designing Digital Choice Boards

As an interactive online visual display about a topic, digital choice boards are a powerful tool for literacy learning. With multiple entry-points for captivating the attention and interest of learners, choice boards can excite and propel student understanding and learning (Trust & Maloy, 2022).

A digital choice board can be designed using any type of word processing software or design tool – from Microsoft Word and Google Docs to Google Slides and Canva. Like traditional paper-based choice boards, digital choice boards often are set up in a grid or box-like format with each box featuring a learning activity. Digital choice boards have the added benefit of being able to include direct links to online resources and digital tools that can advance and extend student thinking and learning. The “choice” aspect of digital choice boards comes into play when students get to choose which activities they would like to complete and/or which topics they would like to explore. For example, you might ask students to complete any three boxes or have each student in a group complete 2-3 boxes and then share what they uncovered during their activities with their groups (like a Jigsaw activity).

When we design digital choice boards, we make sure each box includes the following elements: 1) interest-engaging topics and titles, 2) higher-order thinking activities, 3) hyperlinks to digital resources and/or tools, and 4) an image.

Interest-engaging topics and titles capture attention and motivate learning. For example, the title and content of the “Evaluate the News from All Sides” box on the Ukraine-Russia Conflict Media Literacy Choice Board draws attention to how news outlets don’t always paint the same picture of an event. Here we build on Maria Montessori’s focus on capturing attention and engaging students with a “point of interest” – in this case, examining how different news outlets present a current event.

Students’ engagement is not complete with just an examination of different news outlets, though. They must then think critically about what they found and consider how to present that information to friends, family, and peers through a website, image, or video. The digital choice board box includes a link to Adobe Creative Cloud Express (formerly Adobe Spark), which supports the design of these types of learning materials. Here we are guided by Bloom’s Taxonomy and how students learn more deeply when they are asked to not only understand and remember information, but to continually create, evaluate, analyze and apply information through hands-on/minds-on activities.

To engage students in higher-order critical media literacy thinking and learning, you might ask students to analyze their online search habits for a topic of interest, produce a news report about a current event, create an interactive digital story that draws connections between the past, present, and future, hand-draw an infographic to influence thinking (like William Edward Burghardt “W. E. B.” Du Bois did), or investigate an issue as a journalist. For more ideas, explore our free open access eBook Critical Media Literacy and Civic Learning.

Finally, each box contains an image as a way to excite interest, convey meaning, and invite analysis. When selecting images, we strive to find #heading=h.4uw6j1z2sc2e” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener noreferrer”>public domain images, such as those from Wikimedia Commons, and include a link to the source site for students to learn more about the image. However, if we cannot find a public domain image that is related to the topic, we will seek out an image with a #heading=h.d5qmfz2k608i” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener noreferrer”>Creative Commons license or one that is permissible within the #h2_IWir” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener noreferrer”>Fair Use doctrine.

For more examples of digital choice boards, take a look at the Black Lives Matter learning pathway and Influential Women learning pathway in our free open access eBook Building Democracy for All: Interactive Explorations of Government and Civic Life.

Critical Media Literacy in a Media-Saturated World

With our media-saturated world filled with vast amounts of disinformation and misinformation, critical media literacy activities presented in digital choice boards can inspire students to choose ways to critically interact with and construct their knowledge about global events in real time as they unfold. By engaging students in asking questions and thinking critically about the information they are getting, who is providing it to them, and why the information is provided to them, you are preparing students to become engaged citizens in a global society.

Authors

This post was written by Robert W. Maloy, Ed.D., Allison Butler, Ph.D., and Torrey Trust, Ph.D.

Robert W. Maloy is a senior lecturer in the College of Education at the University of Massachusetts Amherst where he coordinates the history teacher education program and co-directs the TEAMS Tutoring Project, a community engagement/service learning initiative 犀利士
through which university students provide academic tutoring to culturally and linguistically diverse students in public schools throughout the Connecticut River Valley region of western Massachusetts.

Allison Butler is a Senior Lecturer, Director of Undergraduate Advising, and the Director of the Media Literacy Certificate Program in the Department of Communication at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where she teaches courses on critical media literacy and representations of education in the media. Butler co-directs the grassroots organization, Mass Media Literacy (www.massmedialiteracy.org), where she develops and runs teacher trainings for the inclusion of critical media literacy in K-12 public schools.

Torrey Trust, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor of Learning Technology in the Department of Teacher Education and Curriculum Studies in the College of Education at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Her scholarship and teaching focus on how technology shapes educator and student learning. www.torreytrust.com

March 5, 2022
Keep. Them. Safe.

Talking about SEXTING with teens can make all of us feel uncomfortable.
As #K12Leaders, we must find ways to support staff, parents and caregivers so they can facilitate the conversation with us.
@SimplySuzy
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Safety doesn’t happen by accident. It happens when we are aware and equipped with resources to make Informed decisions.

I was recently approached to pull together a team of experts in my district on a presentation for some of our students. We are teaching them about the realities and dangers of sexting among pre-teens and teenagers. Talking about SEXTING with teens can make ALL of us feel uncomfortable. As #K12Leaders, we must find ways to support staff, parents and caregivers so they can facilitate the conversation with us. So, as part of our planning, we brainstormed ideas and pulled together resources.

What came out of it (besides the ongoing presentations we are doing) was a website created for adults as the intended audience. While there are plenty of resources here to be viewed alongside children, pre-tees, and teenagers – I recommend parents/caregivers spending time learning, exploring and choosing beforehand .

I am sharing my site with teachers as well. Some teachers have children who did not grow up during times like these, and some have little ones too young to use devices. However, we all know someone with children who are right in the thick of things – or will be soon enough . The Internet is a vast and ever-changing environment. The better informed adults are, the better we can support our students.

Check it out, provide feedback and share additional resources!

This website has become a labor of love…

For you. 💙

Let’s lead K12 Education together!

Click. The. Link.

https://sites.google.com/mpspk12.org/mpsfamilyresources/home

February 18, 2022
Forward to Different – A Blog Series on How School Will Operate After the Big Quit

Teachers and school leaders have been through the wringer during the pandemic. First they were praised for spinning up remote learning in mere days. Then, they were ostracized for not making the remote experience as good as the in-person one. After that, it was COVID protocols, CRT, and fights about what books our kids should read. The cavalcade of over the top school board meetings have become so commonplace, Saturday Night Live did an entire skit about it.

At some point you have to laugh or be forced to cry. On top of all of this mounting pressure is the harsh reality that our teachers are SEVERELY underpaid. This is not anything new, as many states in the union pay less than $60,000 a year which after health care and taxes equates to around $3300 a month to live off of. That’s a little less than $20/hour and that’s just for those that pay $60k a year! There are 34 states that don’t hit that mark in terms of average pay.

We are facing a time famine

Let’s take the money out of the equation for a moment. You can always figure out ways to make more money, but you can’t make more time. We are facing a major TIME FAMINE in our classrooms. More curriculum is packed into our school day as we try and cram instruction in between book battles and school board takeovers. The lack of flexibility and substitute teachers means no extra time for planning engaging lessons or having meaningful professional learning.

In a recent survey published by K12Leaders.com, 67% of respondents said they are “moderately” to “highly” dissatisfied in their current role. Of that group, 88% said they would leave their job with less than 1 month of notice if another job came along. While compensation (74%) and lack of flexibility (70%) came in as high reasoning, the highest was lack of respect (77%). One educator shared the following quote:

“I don’t feel valued in our culture in a general way…. I will always be asked to do more and more and more with less and less. I don’t feel like I have room to advance and I definitely can’t afford to stay in a classroom long term. It gets worse each year. At this rate I will never be able to retire.“
Anonymous educator

“Back to Normal” is not the answer

Schools and communities have been rushing to return things “back to normal” for their students. Removing masks and doing away with social distancing as quickly as possible. Putting technology back in the closet with the belief that was only useful for remote learning and isn’t necessary during the school day. Discarding any flexibility or asynchronous learning options and forcing all students back into synchronous in-person learning. The truth is, this “normal” way of doing school doesn’t serve all children, it only serves a few in the middle.

Students in traditionally underserved communities have struggled with the “Game of School” which is more about making the A and less about actual learning. It’s about getting the best scores on mandated tests and less about longitudinal learning and reflection in a portfolio. We are teaching kids to fill out bubble sheets when we should be filling their minds.

Last year, my oldest child went to middle school completely online. She got most of work done between 10am and noon. Remote learning wasn’t good for many kids, but for some like my daughter, they excelled. Returning to in-person school for this year has led to some struggles that she didn’t encounter before. The school bell schedule is very much gospel in schools. You go to one class for a set amount of time and then onto the next class. The child’s mind and ability to process new information isn’t taken into account when making these schedules.

Time to Eliminate Seat Time Funding

Our school schedule is a symptom of a larger issue in our schools. We are forced by state law to fill out a certain amount of days or minutes with kids physically present in the classroom. This means that it’s more important if your rear end is in a seat than if you are actually learning anything. The devaluing of our learning institutions peaked during the pandemic. Many parent communities were eager to put their students back in school so they could get to work. Schools are large childcare facilities in the minds of these parents, not learning institutions.

To move away from this national belief, school funding shouldn’t be centered around physical presence. Do families still need physical buildings to help with their child’s learning? Absolutely. But do we need to fund schools solely based on seat time and a one-time high stakes test? Absolutely NOT.

Eliminating seat-time funding could open up schools to some creative scheduling and cross-curricular and dare I say, cross-grade level learning. Why do we need to consider this? Our current school system model relies most heavily on ONE major item, we need personnel to make it run.

The Big Quit in Education

The Great Resignation, or “Big Quit”, is happening across multiple industries. Education has been in the cross-hairs of this movement for the past several years, but now the pandemic has amplified it. At recent professional learning conferences I attended numbers were down due to Covid concerns but also a “lack of subs” to cover classrooms. This affected teacher attendance but also administrators who are now covering classrooms on a regular basis. And it’s not just classrooms that are feeling the pinch.

Bus drivers, cafeteria workers, and custodians are in high demand and short supply as well. Schools are so short on bus drivers that the U.S. Department of Education and Department of Transportation essentially waived the need to have a Commercial Driver’s License (CDL) to drive a bus. In addition to these necessary positions to help make the school day run, leadership is also in short supply.

Political pressures and debates on critical race and mask mandates has encouraged many superintendents to seek an early exit from the role. In my home state of Texas alone, there with 60 resignations in the last couple of months. That number is typical of an entire school year and not anywhere near what you would typically see between December and January. On a recent podcast, Doug Roberts, who runs the Superintendent think tank known as the Institute for Education Innovation (IEI), said the numbers were alarming. Not only are we seeing a mass exodus from educational leadership, but in the past “we would see 100-200 applicants for a Superintendent position, now we are seeing 1-3 applicants.”

More people leaving the education profession than those that are joining it means that we will be at a critical breaking point in the next few years. Districts and state governments need to start thinking of creative ways to transform schools in the future. Increasing teaching salaries is a start, like this district in Fayetteville, Arkansas did. But as we discovered on the K12Leaders.com survey, money isn’t the only driving factor.

Forward to Different

There is no magic bullet to fix the disaster that lies ahead for our schools. Some schools in affluent areas may find work arounds with stipends or extra off days, but for the majority of districts, it’s time to think differently. This means we need to stop saying “Back to normal” and starting thinking “Forward to different.” I started to develop a strategy called “Learning Realignment” some months ago, but our educational future may need to be even more extreme.

Over the next few weeks, I will publish a series of different approaches that schools across the country are considering. None of the ideas are 100% fail safe but I applaud districts for taking risks and making some drastic changes to keep their school up and running. Before we tackle these approaches, we must first consider changing some of the things we hold sacred in education.

1. Grade level bands eliminated

One such thing is the “grade level band by age” approach. This video illustrates a point that Sir Ken Robinson famously made in one of his talks. We still educate kids in age batches rather than competency. If we are facing a teacher shortage, this could be on of the first things to go.

2. School schedule less rigid

Another change I’ve already mentioned is the school bell schedule. It perpetuates the factory model of the 1950’s and restricts deeper learning and experiential teaching to some degree. It also requires us to have a certain amount of personnel on hand to teach certain classes. Which leads me to another change that needs to happen.

3. Learning options NOT limited by where you live

Learning is limited by geography. My daughter wants to learn Italian, but her school only offers Spanish. This is for a variety of reasons but the primary two are that there isn’t a teacher qualified to teacher it AND there aren’t enough students interested to justify the expense. She could hop on a bus and head to another middle school that offers it, but why? Did we not just go through almost two years of remote learning? Couldn’t she take a class online with a teacher on the other side of the city? Heck, why couldn’t that teacher even live in a different state or country? We limit learning when we restrict it to only the physical resources available in a geographical area.

4. Curriculum needs an overhaul

The thought of changing WHAT we teach while changing HOW we teach can be terrifying. The truth is, our curriculum is also based on mid-20th century education. Does it make sense to teach kids how to write checks when we live in a world of cryptocurrency and NFTs? The silo-model of curriculum limits our flexibility when it comes to cross-curricular projects and experiences. I wrote about this change in core curriculum in 2017 and think of any time to change our beliefs on curriculum, now is that time.

5. Four-day work week comes to education

Teacher pay is a problem in education, but so is the lack of flexibility. When I taught first grade, bladder control was one of my super powers. Being in charge of young humans for a full day can be taxing physically, mentally and emotionally. Teachers got to experience some rare job flexibility when the pandemic first hit. Being forced to teach online presented many challenges but it also allowed educators to see what a “work from home” environment would be like. With students completing asynchronous tasks, they were able to experience what a lot of the modern working world does. Being able to run errands, go to doctor visits and car appoints without spending time on sub plans has its perks.

Companies across the globe are also starting to see the value in productivity that could be gained from both working from home and a 4-day work week. More and more major companies are starting to make the shift which will have a trickle down effect in education. But rather than wait for the entire world to shift to this model, schools could start now.

A “4/5” schedule (4-day work week for teachers, 5-day learn week for students) could be the answer to our impending educator shortage. I’m working with a school in Florida that is trying to make this happen. Alternating “enrichment days” or creating a space for online learning within the school can help create a level of flexibility and give teachers a true day off (not a planning day or one filled with ‘necessary’ meetings).

We are at the precipice of change

Education has been needing an overhaul for decades. State policies and political pressures have created an environment where those of us in K-12 feel like we can’t innovate and modernize student learning. These four areas of change mentioned above are not the only things we can and should change in education. Assessments, grades, and seat-time all play a large role in everything we do in education and they too will have to be transformed if we are to truly head “forward to different” in our schools.

February 16, 2022
Talking to Students About Masks

This week our Governor and Commissioner of Education had a press conference about ending the mask mandate in schools. It was all anyone could talk about. However, what was not being discussed was how educators would talk to their students about what happens IF schools have the option for mask wearing. How will we approach the idea that some people will be wearing masks for various reasons and others will not be wearing a mask?

The conference was scheduled for 10:30 AM, and I decided to watch it with my 5th grade students. Before the conference began, we had a class conversation around masks. I explained masks were the new accessory that became a big trend in 2020! Some people started making them. Others made sure they had ones that matched outfits, while some wore medical masks. We all had them and wore them regardless of our personal feelings about them. We talked about the pandemic becoming an endemic, which were two big concepts for these 5th graders! They recognized we will need to learn to live with Covid in our new normal, which was later confirmed by the Governor during the press conference.

I led an open discussion about how people can sometimes get made fun of for the clothes they wear, the earrings or shoes they have on, or their hair style. When asked if anyone had been made fun of for these things every hand went up. This was a natural opening to talking about mask wearing and normalizing it. Wearing a mask is going to be part of someone’s identity moving forward, should they choose to do so. It is a human choice and should be valued. Just the same as the person who chooses not to wear a mask. There are also people who have to wear the mask because they are immunocompromised or cannot get vaccinated, so this is something else they need to be aware of.

In the spirit of Kindness Week, students talked about being nice and having empathy towards everyone regardless of their individual choice. Students also mentioned how they are young, and it might be their parent’s prerogative for them to wear a mask or not.

In the spirit of Kindness Week, students talked about being nice and having empathy towards everyone regardless of their individual choice. Students also mentioned how they are young, and it might be their parent’s prerogative for them to wear a mask or not. Having an open dialogue with students where we normalize mask wearing before a decision is even made helped students see the bigger picture of how we are transitioning into an endemic.

As we watched the press conference, students learned there are decisions about mask wearing made at the federal level. The decision to wear a mask on a bus is decided by the federal government, and students heard they will still have to wear one on a bus. Then they listened to state government officials discuss how they are lifting the mask mandate in schools on February 28th. This was followed by an announcement that it was now up to the local government to decide if they would lift the mandate. Our class talked about the different levels of government and decision making. We then dove into a talk about policy. A child curiously asked if our school committee would decide to keep the mask policy even though the state said the mandate would not be in effect at the end of the month. I told him we would have to wait and see what happens.

I gave the students a few days to reflect on our discussion and press conference. Then I revisited the conversation, reminding them about everyone’s personal choice to wear a mask or to not wear a mask. We talked about ways to approach our classmates. One student said, “It does not matter whether someone is wearing a mask or not. It is their decision and their choice.” Another child said, “Do not treat someone differently because they are wearing a mask.” A student said, “It is their decision to wear a mask just like it is your decision to get your ears pierced or wear something.” A student mentioned, “They might feel safer with a mask. It is their decision. Some parents might want their child to still wear a mask.” “Just because someone does something different than you, they should still be treated with respect,” said another child. “People will have different beliefs, but you have to respect their opinion,” was something shared by a student. “A mask is just an accessory,” said someone else. A student ended the conversation with a person has “their reasons to wear a mask.”

Students then had an opportunity to email our school committee should they choose to and share either what they learned, what they wanted to see change, or their concerns about what could change. Empowering students to share their voices with local elected officials is a dynamic learning experience that promotes student agency.

So as everyone begins to make decisions that impact our children, make sure conversations are happening about how to talk to children about these changes.

February 16, 2022
Real-time Data about the Real Quit in K12: Winter 2022
One of the problems with data, and K12’s reliance on it, is that data ages. And ages quickly. But public education, especially, in its quest for accountability has established itself around officially reported data that states require from school districts periodically through the year. The complexities of collecting, auditing, reporting, and responding to district-reported data are significant, but perhaps not as significant as the consequences of the delayed reporting cycles that have been established over the years.

K12 education in the US is in the valley of those reports right now, and our ability to respond collectively to the stresses our students, teachers, and schools are under is hampered by the fact that many important attendance, discipline, and staffing reports won’t be due until after school is out in June.  This has led to a significant gap in our understanding of how our schools are actually doing in 2021-22 and how we might be able to respond to potentially critical and time-sensitive issues in the school building.

K12Leaders touched on the significance of these gaps in a recent article (The Big Quit and the Problem with Big (and Old) Data in Education) which cites the radical differences between a Forbes and The 74 articles which paint both dire and simplistic pictures of where we are in regards to how our teachers are actually doing, and whether teaching, as a profession, is in crisis.

This has been a largely anecdotal conversation, at least as perceived by some… the “data simply isn’t in.” Though The 74 article does highlight the problem with data… it gets old fast.  The data cited in that article, some from 2015, and some from as recent as 2019-2020, is profoundly out-of-date for our purposes of understanding what’s happening <right now> in our classrooms and school buildings.

Data collected from January 23^rd through February 6^th 2022 by K12Leaders describes the more immediate situation. Based on over 375 responses from across the country, here is the picture we see.

Who responded?

K12Leaders collected 364 responses between January 23^rd and February 6^th 2022.  87% of responses were from K12 staff, teachers, or administrators. Respondents spanned 38 US states.

Respondents were experienced, with 95% reporting more than 3 years of experience in K12. Another question and response were somewhat redundant but supported these numbers… 75% of respondents are more than 10 years from retirement.

How seriously should we take recent stories of teacher dissatisfaction?

Over 67% of respondents report that they are “moderately” or “highly” dissatisfied in their current role.

How should we read the 67% degree of dissatisfaction?  88% of respondents report that they would give less than 1 month notice if they found another job.

Some good news is that over 60% of respondents indicate they would consider staying in education in a different role or district.

While 4 weeks notice may seem more than reasonable outside of education, educators are in the habit of announcing career moves well ahead of time. Retirements are deliberate and well-planned, and both teachers and administrators generally announce intentions to move-on in the spring before summer break. That over 10% of respondents say that they would “leave immediately” is unheard of.

The 4 most critical concerns…

We collected responses on 10 main concerns: Respect, compensation, benefits, flexibility, growth opportunities, community support, remote learning, pending retirements, personal concerns, and 4 sub questions about levels of response to Covid-19.

We have tallied all responses citing concerns of “moderate and above,” and labeled that percentage as a “risk factor.” Any “risk” over 60% is considered significant.

At the top of the list of concerns, is “Level of Respect” with over 77% of respondents stating that this was a moderate concern or higher.

Every year there is more expected of teachers and less respect for their expertise or opinion. The amount of data expected from teachers as proof they are doing their job is staggering and cannot be accomplished. Teachers are the only professionals expected to work for free, constantly pursue higher education for little monetary gain, and pay for materials out of their own pocket. All of these things used to be difficult to accept, but these, coupled with the attitude of most of society since Covid, that teachers are somehow the enemy, has made it an impossible occupation to want to be a part of.

Compensation was also at the top of the list of concerns, with over 74% or responses citing pay as a moderate or greater concern.

In a telephone follow-up with one educator, we uncovered some interesting details. It’s no surprise that teaching has a reputation as an underpaid profession, but what was surprising to this respondent was that many of the corporate jobs they’ve interviewed for pay significantly less than what they are currently making. With just over 15 years of experience, the customer support jobs they are interviewing for are paying between 30-50% less than they are currently making as a teacher.

With almost 70% of respondents citing “schedule and flexibility” as a risk, additional questions come up. When, for instance, did educators start thinking about this question? Was this on educators’ minds before the pandemic?

Because of the lack of substitutes, required trainings that used to be a day with a sub to meet and train are now on-line trainings we must do on our own time and even though we are compensated for the time, it is hours and hours we have to do these on-line trainings outside of the work day.

65% of respondents cite a lack of professional growth opportunities, despite the frequent comments about the ongoing professional development demands put on them, as cited above.

I don’t feel valued in our culture in a general way…. I will always be asked to do more and more and more with less and less. I don’t feel like I have room to advance and I definitely can’t afford to stay in a classroom long term. It gets worse each year. At this rate I will never be able to retire.

The number of detailed comments citing student behavior as a major concern makes this 62% seem like it under-represents the stress that extreme student behavior puts on educators.

The lack of support from administration regarding extreme student behaviors wears me thin. I am tired of being accused of not doing my job correctly when a student curses at me or throws things at me when all I did was ask the students to get a pencil, get to work, stop bothering someone, etc. I had a student cause a lockdown in my pod while he ranted and raved for 30 minutes, and the student wasn’t expelled…. I’m exhausted being expected to offer mental health services to students who need a trained professional’s help…. Above all, I am sick that I am not able to do what I love and what I trained to do- teach.

Another educator shares the following:

When I first started teaching 30 years ago, I had autonomy, support, and respect – and my students achieved. Now I have no autonomy, little support, and a complete lack of respect – coupled with the worst behavior, apathy and lack of work ethic in my students no matter how hard I try to make fun, rigorous, or meaningful lessons. I have 7 years to retirement and I’m not sure I’m going to make it…

Based on many comments, we see “parent/community attitudes” overlapping with the question about the”Level of Respect” educators are feeling. Certainly, anecdotally, we are hearing many concerns about parents and communities aggressively engaging with teachers and administrators in ways we’ve never expected. Just over 61% of respondents cited Parent and Community Attitudes as a moderate or greater factor in their stress.

I have been teaching for 13 years and have a master’s degree in my field. I have never felt the hostility and disrespect that I have felt since the pandemic started. I would love to stay in education but move to an edtech position where I can still develop and plan engaging lessons, but be out of the physical classroom.

Tired of being the fall guy. Communities and local governments blame schools for trying to keep everyone safe. Common sense safety precautions are ignored in order to keep the doors open. Having everyone catch Covid is not the best way forward.

Other factors…

There were additional factors as well, but their risk decreases fairly rapidly.
- Benefits- 57% cite as “moderate or greater.
- Personal concerns- 44%
- Concerns about remote learning- 22%
- Planned retirement- 21%
And speaking of Covid…

We posed 3 questions regarding concerns around the response to Covid-19 in three different scenarios. Local communities’ response, a school’s or district’s response, and the response to covid from the state.

While we were accounting for the possibility of some significant variance, we see that all responses rank Covid-19 as a moderate concern.

From comments, it’s apparent that Covid is seen as an aggravating factor that is contributing to educator’s stress, but is not universally seen as the driver for educators’ dissatisfaction.

Observations

We received a very high percentage of responses from K12 Teachers (75%) but only 6.5% of responses were from school or district administrators.

Reviewing free-form comments (some of which are quoted above) we recognize increasing frustration with the number of requirements put on teachers to meet state-level requirements. However, we also see significant and peaked frustration with direct supervision and the culture within schools and districts. Many responses call out their principals and superintendents directly for poor communication, micro-management, lack of support, and lack of respect.

Considering the highest risk factors captured by this survey, there are certainly a number of concerns that are outside administrators’ direct control. Pay-scales are policy and community driven. District leaders may be able to advocate for higher compensation, but to a larger degree their hands are tied.

Other factors, however, are directly within leadership’s control. School culture, respect, and student behavior all present opportunities for leadership. With more respondents from the administrator level, we hope we could provide better insight into these areas. As it stands, more research would be worthwhile to help districts prioritize their interventions to address what is clearly a crisis in the making.
February 7, 2022