New Vision:
THE NEW VISION OF PUBLIC EDUCATION
The effort to transform public education is driven by fundamental beliefs that all children deserve adequate public funding equitably distributed to learning environments that parents and young people have chosen and that are accountable for results. School districts do not exclusively provide “public education” any more, and the end of this monopoly is progressive - good news for parents and children. We must celebrate this new situation by breaking down barriers between and, in some cases, doing away with obsolete, “over-schooled” organizational systems, labor/management relationships, and public/private distinctions, if we are to realize a new vision of public education.
Building Social Capital For Your Students and Your School
By Daniel Grego
As educators, we are all trying to enhance and increase the “human capital” of our students – what they know and what they are able to do. However, as I’m sure you’ve noticed in your own life, who you know is often as important as what you know. Political scientists and sociologists call the network of people you know your “social capital.” Schools can increase the social capital of their students, and when they do, it can make a huge difference in their students’ lives.
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Milwaukee’s New Vision of Public Education
By Daniel Grego
For the last twenty-five years, a small coalition in Milwaukee has been questioning and posing alternatives to two of the unexamined assumptions underlying schooling in the United States.
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By Daniel Grego
We need a new vision of public education in the United States. Both words in the phrase “public education” must be understood in new ways if we hope all of our children will enter adulthood ready for college, ready for work, and prepared to be contributing citizens.
[click here to read the rest of the polemic]
Download: The schematic of the New Vision of Public Education in Milwaukee PDF (679 Kb)
By Daniel Grego, Crossroads column, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Feb. 1, 2004
Visit an eighth-grade classroom in the city of Milwaukee and ask 10 students to stand. Look them in the eyes.
Now guess which five or six will graduate from high school. If the 10 on their feet are African-American males, try to predict which three will earn diplomas. Instead of the usual economic calculation of the annual “cost per student,” consider the “cost per graduate.”
Can we afford to continue an approach to secondary education producing these results?
[click here to read the rest of why “Smaller High Schools Work Better”]
Are small schools the answer to educational reform?
By Daniel Grego, Outpost Exchange, August 2004
Several years ago, a prominent politician, concerned about the large number of adolescents failing in Milwaukee’s high schools, asked a group of at-risk students, the ones most likely to quit school, why so many of their peers dropped out. There was a brief silence.
Finally, one young man responded: “I think you’re asking the wrong question. Given what high school is, the question you should ask is: why anyone bothers to stay?” After further reflection, he added: “I guess some people just tolerate high school better than others.”
Are the students who remain in our large, comprehensive high schools just tolerating them? Ask them. A small percentage thrives in them: the academic and sports superstars, the extroverts, the ones disposed to please adults. The vast majority, mostly anonymous, either hangs on until graduation or finds the environment intolerable and leaves.
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The Case for Small High Schools by Tom Vander Ark
With permission of the ASCD
Large, comprehensive high schools shortchange too many students. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation believes that, with the right elements in place, small schools offer a promising alternative.
[click here for link to complete document]
Smaller, Safer, Saner Successful Schools by Joe Nathan and Karen Febey
With permission from the National Clearinghouse for Education Facilities
Families want safe, nurturing, challenging, and effective schools for their children. At a time when record sums are being spent on school buildings, it is vital to talk about how that money is being used. We can make significant progress toward what parents, legislators, and other concerned citizens want by using ideas from small schools and schools that share facilities. This is perhaps the first report to combine case studies from all over the United States with a research summary, showing how educators and community members have created these schools.
[click here for link to complete document]
The Case for Creating an Open Sector in American Public Education
Why America needs the policy and support environment to create many more new schools
With permission from Education/Evolving
In this new century, we’re demanding much more from the institution we call “public education.” In fact, we’re demanding that public education do something that’s never been done before, anywhere—bring every child up to ambitious levels of achivement…. After two decades of effort that has produced inadequate progress, many thoughtful people—both inside and outside “the system”--are beginning to doubt whether we can get the schools we need solely by fixing the schools we now have. “Why,” they are starting to ask, “would policy makers and educators put all of our proverbial eggs in the single basket of turning around existing schools? Even as we strive to make our existing schools better, shouldn’t we hedge our bets by also trying to get the results we need by creating different and better schools new?”
Download: “The Case for Creating an Open Sector in American Public Education” PDF (149 Kb)
