Betsy DeVos is popular among some because of her support of the Charter School System. Those that support her believe that her real opposition is the teacher’s union. Charter Schools have become a popular, and at some times very successful, alternative to failing public schools. I want to propose that schools are failing not because they are public or private, but because they have fallen into the Spiral of Powerlessness.
The Spiral of Powerlessness
Let me explain. Teachers feel powerless because they can not discipline their students. Students feel powerless because teachers sometimes don’t know how to manage the classroom under the current conditions, or have given up. Parents feel powerless because new security protocols will often keep them out of schools, and when they try to reach out to teachers, the teachers are too busy, or tired, to call them back. Principles feel powerless because they have to answer to a school board that has its own agenda. They are also fighting a union that will not let them fire teachers that really are incompetent, and a state that is demanding that they meet expectations that don’t work for the student population. Teachers again feel powerless because their bosses won’t defend them against rouge board members who care more about their child’s on-paper success than their actual success.
Teachers feel Powerless
Teachers are finding themselves in larger and larger classrooms with colleagues who are more and more burnt out. Common Core has taken a toll in demanding that teachers create new lesson plans, and even when the teachers understand the strange math that has encompassed Common Core often parents do not. This contributes to creating a cycle where parents are angry at the teacher for something she has no control over.
Superintendents feel Powerless
Superintendents are battling unions that have gotten out of control. They are battling school boards that have their own interests, whether religious, personal, or just plain corrupt. They have the state telling them that their school will be monitored, or even disciplined, if more than a certain number of kids of a certain race are punished each month.
A note on this policy: while excessive punishment of one specific race is a very good indicator of racism – the ‘punishment’ to the school does not resolve the crime of racism. It actually exacerbates it. Instead of working to create a less-racist system, these race quota punishment policies have increased racism at mixed-race schools because Superintendents tell teachers that they can’t punish that group of kids no matter how much they misbehave. This creates more misbehavior, and therefore re-enforces any stereotypes about a certain group.
Superintendents are also working with shrinking budgets and expectations from the states for higher and higher numbers. Even though social factors are the greatest predictor of test results, schools with varying social factors are expected to perform all the same. While no child left behind is a great idea – again the execution has created another cycle of powerlessness. Students must take the test at the beginning of the year that they are going to take at the end of the year (somehow ‘science’ has superseded common sense). Students start the year feeling frustrated and helpless taking a test that is not appropriate for their needs at all. Testing people on what they don’t know is not a good way to mark a ‘starting point’. A better way would be to test what their base knowledge is, what they know from the previous year.
Superintendents can not fire teachers who are incompetent where there are unions to block them, and where there are no unions, they do not have the budget to pay great teachers. In both cases this works to the detriment of the school system and to the students. While unions get support because they are supposed to protect teachers against the petty politics of an angry parent, the unions are also supporting teachers who for whatever reason don’t have the basic knowledge and skills to be qualified to be in the classroom.
Students feel Powerless
Students are then left with less-then-excellent teachers, in classrooms that are out of control, with little help outside to get the help they need to understand their homework. They sometimes do not feel safe in their schools, they sometimes do not have time to eat lunch, and they may also be in classrooms that are in less than good condition.
Charter Schools are not the only solution
Charter Schools can kick out students that are not living by the community standards. They can fire teachers in the same vein. They don’t have to answer to angry parents that have an illogical need to unnecessarily inflate the GPA of their child.
This is all possible because charter schools are in demand. There are always more kids waiting in line if others are expelled. They don’t have to answer to parents because they don’t work under government election systems.
Charter Schools are not a panacea
If Charter Schools were the norm, they would be riddled with the same problems as the public schools. You can see this in the University systems. Universities and community colleges are so pressured to recruit and keep students that they let the students have the run of the place. They lower their standards and end up in the same predicament as current public schools.
I really don’t know what the answer is. The cycle of powerlessness is seen in a few industries, not just education. Getting out of it requires different thinking, and also requires thinking outside of our current economic game-theory models.
Laura Danforth 