Years ago I was in a brainstorming conversation with a colleague, talking about what we would do to create the ideal school from the ground up. It was an engaging thought experiment, and ultimately not unlike coming up with a wish list of gifts you’d hope to receive.
There has been a lot in the news recently (and for the past several years) about how the public education system in America is broken. It’s hard to argue this is at least partially true, especially speaking as someone who has worked inside the system as long as I have and has a fair understanding of how it all works. Today I’m going to present some ideas about how to fix things. Some of these ideas might be a little outside of the box, and I'll admit many of them are not financially practical, but every idea is meant to ultimately benefit the students.
*Each classroom should be staffed by two licensed teachers, one taking the role of instructional lead while the other offers support. They would rotate those positions throughout the day with each specializing in different content areas. This would cut the planning time for teachers in half, and allow more time for planning and bringing new approaches to their instruction while pursuing the curricular areas they prefer and playing to their strengths. It would give each classroom two consistent adults for the students to bond with. Each pairing of teachers would involve one experienced teacher and one newer to the profession, to help establish a mentor-mentee working relationship.
*Social promotion would end. This helps no one. Addressing the problem through other accommodations as a collaborative team of school staff and the student’s family would hopefully achieve more.
*The curriculum would be based on addressing the same standards for everyone, but would be structured in ways that would address different student ability levels and learning styles. Clustering students by need and establishing magnet schools are positive steps in that direction, but these opportunities should be widely available in each building.
*Schools could promote stronger character education by awarding monthly-themed citizenship awards (something our school has started this year). Once this is in place, the school community should go all in on it, making these goals a constant presence throughout the day and actively promoting them.
*There should be a team of two or three people in the building in charge of everything to do with standardized testing. They’d be tasked with creating workable schedules, analyzing and establishing building goals, presenting relevant student data to the teaching staff, and serving as a resource throughout the year.
*Community involvement would be an active part of the school calendar. People would come in for special events or presentations to help the students see themselves as a part of a wider community, or communities, instead of just being school kids. This would also give them opportunities to be more active in their community, and give community members a greater awareness and appreciation of what things are happening in the schools.
*The arts have been woefully minimized in the overall curriculum. This needs to change.
*Instead of having a school social worker, each building would have a Community Outreach Specialist, since too often that’s what the social worker ends up becoming anyway. This person would be responsible for organizing whatever resources are necessary to meet student needs beyond the academic. They’d have a team of social workers, psychologists, police officers, doctors and nurses, behavioral specialists, and county representatives who might not be permanently staffed in the building but would always be on call and readily available. The ratio of students to available health staff should be close to one adult per grade level.
*Discipline problems for behaviors that endanger students in any way would be dealt with immediately and consistently. The students affected negatively by the behaviors would have their distractions minimized, while the students with the behavior issues would be held accountable for what they had done wrong while being counseled to change whatever they need to about their personal mindset to find ways to improve future decisions.
*Intervention teams — people who collaborate to decide whether or not a student would meet eligibility requirements to receive some kind of special education service — would have the resources necessary to move quickly on their decisions. All of the assessments would take place within a week’s time. Any enabled modifications and progress monitoring would begin right away, with the follow-up happening as soon as the modification cycle had finished. Students would have their needs isolated and addressed in weeks instead of months, or years.
*All school staff members who interact with students would receive regular professional development to address whatever capacity they work with the students.
*Elementary school recess would have a permanent staff, sized to greatly reduce the student-staff ratio. One of these people would be a licensed teacher, in charge of providing loosely-organized options for student participation, keeping them active and prevent the explosive social drama that can damage focus for the remainder of the day. Having recess as a fun time and a more positive part of the day for everyone would make it more worth the time.
*Each grade level or department should have its own secretary. Our building has a group of valued parent volunteers who sort all of the weekly flyers being sent home into “Wednesday folders” for the students, which is an incredible time saver. Having someone to take care of the non-instructional organizational things like this (i.e. collecting money, scheduling field trip buses, completing inventories, making copies) would give teachers more time for planning in-depth lessons and focusing on instruction.
*More should be expected of parents. I expect this will be one of the more controversial points I'm making here, and I swear I’m not passing the buck; most parents are supportive and helpful partners with the schools, and are legitimately concerned that their children are doing the best learning they can. On the opposite end of the spectrum are the outliers; I’ve witnessed parents picking up their children at school without knowing the name of the teacher, or even what grade their own child is in. There needs to be some level of agreement, either a more rigid social contract or a loose version of a written one, that establishes the importance of family support in the success of the child. In just the same way parents can’t solve all of the problems themselves, the schools can’t, either. If this kind of communication became an even better established norm than it is now, it could lead to fewer parents and families having adversarial relationships with the people who teach and work with their children, which I'd like to think is what everyone hopes for.
*It is possible for a class to be either too small or too large to be effective. K-1 classrooms should be capped at 18 students, with 2-5 classrooms capped at 24, and secondary classes limited to 28, with exceptions for larger group activities like band or choir. If classes are too small the dynamics can shift to something unproductively casual. I’ve taught classes of anywhere from 15 to 35 students in my career, and at different age levels. From what I’ve seen and experienced, the numbers I’ve proposed are pretty close to the sweet spots for each grade.
*Each school should have multiple cafeterias instead of one big one. Tables should seat no more than six people. All fruits and vegetables would be fresh. Smaller tables would lead to less shouting and less chaos, and would be easier for cafeteria staff to monitor. Fresh fruits and vegetables are simply more appealing than the stuff that comes in enormous cans, and its availability would encourage healthier eating habits.
*Breakfast has to be a choice at each school, if not a requirement like lunches. There would be unbreakable, strictly defined rules forbidding junk food to be brought for daily snacks. Healthier snack choices would be made available from the cafeteria for students who need them during the day, or will need to have one to bring home if they aren’t sure they’ll be able to eat when they get home that evening.
*There should be one non-student work day for school staff each month. Depending on the needs dictated by the time of year, this day would rotate between preparing for term grades or parent conferences, professional development opportunities, collaboration meetings between departments or teams based on what each team feels they need to meet about.
*Mandatory team building activities should be summarily abolished. So many more productive things could be done with this time that would have greater impact on the children.
*Each physical plant should be organized for maximum efficiency. Every school building that exists right now should double it’s number of bathrooms.
In retrospect, a lot of the things on this list could be boiled down to “Take the knucklehead stuff off the teacher’s plates.” This could understandably be taken as me making suggestions about what should change for my job to become easier, but it’s not about things being easier for me. It’s about making things better for the students, and the overall community. If that means I think it’d be better to have someone else pass out the hockey flyers and put together my spreadsheets for me, and for me to spend less time settling hours-long slow-burn arguments about who said what about which friend in the bathroom, so be it.
I’m a teacher. I just want the chance to do it the best I can.
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