📉 Teacher Supply, Parenting in the Age of 💻, and Disrupting Education Accreditation
Issue 5 of 7Plus, an education news and critical theory bulletin
This week’s issue covers the plummeting teacher supply and education funding changes and issues in Pennsylvania, ways to address summer slide, how schools have adapted to shifts in recruitment practices, and parenting strategies in the age of screens.
Local Education News
The Teacher Supply is Plummeting. PA. Will Spend $2M to Stem the Tide
July 12, 2018 | Kristen A. Graham | The Inquirer
SUMMARY The number of teaching licenses that Pennsylvania issues annually has dropped from 14,000 to 5,000 since 2009, despite its educator preparation system being one of the largest in the country. The number of education majors in Pennsylvania colleges and universities has also dropped by 55% since 1996. Teacher turnover is a problem as well, with up to half the new teachers leaving the profession in the first 5 years.
SIGNIFICANCE The decrease in the number of educators is alarming, and makes the work that educational non-profits do even more essential. However, more will have to be done institutionally to ensure that the problem does not spiral out of control in the coming years. Both the economic and political issues as well as the perception of teaching as a profession will have to be addressed.
Gov. Wolf Calls for Drastic School Funding Shake-Up in Surprise Announcement
June 29, 2018 | Avi Wolfman-Arent | WHYY
SUMMARY Governor Tom Wolf publicly stated that the state should apply the formula it adopted two years ago for increases in state education funds since 2015 to all basic education money. If Wolf follows through with his statement, Philadelphia and districts in growing areas of the state would benefit while many other shrinking districts would see schools close. Philadelphia would receive an extra $339 million while Pittsburgh would stand to lose $73 million annually. Wolf’s idea would also end the legacy of hold harmless, a provision ensuring districts received as much money as they did the years prior.
SIGNIFICANCE The ideal solution is as detailed by House Democratic spokesman Bill Patton: “Fighting over how to cut up the existing pie of state funding for basic education is not the solution; making the pie bigger while reducing the reliance on local property taxes is the solution.” However, given the improbability of more money flowing into public education and of wealthier parents allowing their taxes to be distributed at a larger level, it is difficult to see how this vision will be realized. Schools in Philadelphia would benefit from Wolf’s proposed application of the formula, but at the expense of many others.
Spending Gaps are Wider, School Conditions Worse, Petitioners in School Funding Lawsuit Say
July 6, 2018 | Dale Mezzacappa | The Notebook
SUMMARY Exposing the $155.3 million decline in state subsidies for classroom expenses in Pennsylvania since 2013 is just a part of the problem petitioners of the ‘William Penn School District et al. v. Pennsylvania Department of Education et al’ lawsuit seek to redress. While a funding formula was legislated in 2016, it only applies to 1.4% of total state education funding. Additionally, most of the funding has been used to pay for state mandated retirement benefits, which have grown by $2.043 billion since 2013. The state share of retirement contributions has however only increased by $1.176 billion, meaning districts have had to cover the gap of $867.6 million. This has led to widening gaps among the districts, with the 100 richest spending $3778 more on average than the 100 poorest.
SIGNIFICANCE The unmasking of growing inequality under the veneer of the funding formula legislators used as an indication for reform will hopefully be sufficient evidence for actual change. Funding policies that serve to alleviate the increased demand on local finances as well as locking funds to be specifically used for classroom expenses and student resources would be what educators, parents, and students expect.
Regional Education News
What Summer Slide Actually Means — And 5 Ways to Fight it
July 12, 2018 | Ariel Goldberg | EdSurge
SUMMARY Summer slide refers to the academic regression that students experience over the summer. Studies show that:
- the average student loses a month of academic-calendar learning each summer;
- summer slide increases the achievement gap;
- there is a link between socioeconomic status and the loss of reading skills over summer;
- older students lose more than younger ones;
- students see greater academic dips in math than in reading.
Some scholars have explained it through what they term the ‘faucet theory’. There is a ‘resource faucet’ that is on for all students during the semester allowing students to make gains, but this flow slows more significantly for disadvantaged kids as they have less access to financial and human capital resources. Some solutions the author proposes are:
- getting students to public and digital libraries;
- communicating with parents to elucidate learning strategies and opportunities
- remotely engage students through livestream
- assign summer homework
- using home extensions of digital teaching tools
SIGNIFICANCE As a phenomenon that affects disenfranchised students disproportionately, summer slide should be further imperative for funding summer enrichment programs. It is unclear however, if the suggested solutions would be effective as these students likely first need help in managing other social and fiscal issues before they are in a position to focus on enrichment.
Other Relevant News
How to Remain Employable in The 21st Century
July 9, 2018 | Dr Paul Redmond | The Guardian
SUMMARY Due to automation, online appraisal practices, and shift in focus to contacts and capital, recruitment has changed drastically. The University of Liverpool has developed the concept of ‘ICE — Innovation, Creativity and Enterprise’, areas that graduates should focus on to remain employable in the face of these changes. They also advise setting up a good LinkedIn profile with a broad and diverse set of professional contacts.
SIGNIFICANCE Making sure that students can obtain jobs is no longer solely a matter of academic success anymore. While it remains necessary to equip disfranchised students with the resources to improve their grades and test scores, there must also be an increased emphasis on these other channels the hiring engine sifts applications through. Students might be encouraged to engage in meaningful personal projects and apply knowledge in domains outside the classroom. Organizations in educational equity might want to hold more networking sessions, and training on to complete online interviews and gamified tests.
Parenting in the Age of Screens: Here’s What the Experts Do
July 12, 2018 | Anya Kamenetz | nprEd
SUMMARY Experts on kids and media share their personal experiences in setting screen time guidelines at home as parents. These practices include:
- unplugging at family dinners
- having joint media engagement — screen time shared between the family,
- helping their kids to be aware of the way they react to video games or how to interpret information online,
- removing screens from the hour before bed and from the bedroom as it reduces sleep time and quality,
- limiting screen time to 2 hours a day as part of 5–2–1–0 (5 servings of fruits and vegetables a day, <2 hours of screens, 1 hour of physical activity, and 0 sugary beverages),
- screening content for violence before watching together with kids, skipping scary parts.
SIGNIFICANCE The advent and ubiquity of screens have no doubt allowed for increased connectivity, more equitable accessibility to resources and information, and aided in learning outside the classroom. That said, they have also heralded in an age of screenslaving, and alongside it, various adverse social and health conditions. While the onus is largely on parents and caretakers to ensure healthy and effective use of technology, educators can also have a part to play in communicating with and teaching students and parents the ills of improper screen usage and strategies for regulating it. At another level, educators themselves should be cognizant of their own screen usage and its dangers, to ensure that they can serve students at their best. An approach that overly shields the child should be cautioned against, however.
Examining Education Critically
Stealing a Page from Disruption to Transform Accreditation
June 15, 2018 | Morgan S. Polikoff | Brookings
SUMMARY Effective accreditation in higher education matters as it effects the amount of federal financial aid that colleges and universities receive. However, accreditors do not seem to be holding institutions responsible for student outcomes. Former Education Secretary Arne Duncan characterized them as the “watchdogs that don’t bark”. Judith Eaton, the president of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation, suggests that while reformers want accreditation to be focused on accountability, accreditation was not for built for that, but instead for peer review and to support colleges and university — a ‘helping’ versus a ‘punishing’ role. Eaton thinks that disruption in accreditation would require a fundamental redesign of proposition, resources, processes, and priorities, perhaps through creating a separate autonomous organization.
SIGNIFICANCE If accreditation can successfully reestablish itself as an independent body with the ability to enact consequences for higher education bodies that go beyond hand-slapping, the quality of education in these institutions would improve, and policymakers and governments can also be more confident in providing financial aid to them, benefiting students who require them the most.
Please share this with education equity actors you know that would find it useful; as always, feedback and comments on how I can make this more useful are much appreciated!
