Edu Change & Student Advocacy

     With expressions like School to Work, Career Ready and others, it seems like Education is focused more than ever on getting students ready for the world of work. However, hasn’t this always been one of the foundational goals? Yes, there were others such as citizenship, democratic participation, character and more. But working or employment was always part of the goal right? Well, this is both a good and bad thing. How could that be bad? Well, the problem is that many of the Myths of Learning, as I like to call them, come from our historical world of work. And they now seem archaic, outdated and ineffective.      Here are a couple of those myths: LEARNING MYTH #1 – LEARNING IS QUIET. For most adults, and even current students, learning is often associated with being quiet. Our libraries and classrooms are founded on this to some degree. And indeed, there was a time when “quiet” was a foundation at work. When work was being part of t...

     One of my many mantras is about trying to make education as real world or relevant as possible. This can apply to all areas of education including teacher hiring, retention, promotion, compensation, etc. Although I’d like to see tenure, unions and a host of other things reformed, I’d rather start with something that I think is more agreeable, possible, tenable and reachable.          Essentially, I would like to see California adopt a statewide standard and process for teacher mobility and salary compensation. As you know, we already have a statewide credentialing process, a statewide teacher retirement system, a statewide recognition of sick leave accumulation, state department of education and many more examples of our education has a state standard of what teaching is in CA.      However, in terms of teachers being able to move from one district to another, there is not a standard or anything that equates to m...