Why???

I moved to Philadelphia in August 2002 with a lot of energy and no idea what I was doing here. Nearly 9 years later I have built a career, bought a house and am proud to call Philadelphia home. I think that there are amazing things happening in this city and it is an exciting place to be. The city is full of creative, inspired and passionate people of all ages. Between The Mural Arts Program, events like Ignite Philly, a movement of food co-ops, farmers markets as well as a number of civic associations that work hard to make their neighborhoods great places to live.

The majority of these groups are community-run and are not funded by the City or the State. Often, the people running them work full time along with the work they do for their neighborhoods and the larger Philadelphia community. There are a lot of hard working individuals trying to make Philadelphia the best city it can be.

So, I ask, why does the state still run our schools?

It is time for these concerned and involved citizens to say "enough is enough." We've seen the enraged parents, the protests and the shady actions by the School District.

Until we have an elected school board that truly represents the parents, families and stakeholders of our city, then we will continue to have change forced on us and we will continue to lose our voices.

I don't pretend to know where to start, but I wonder who is with me?

It was 9pm on Thanksgiving night.  My belly was bursting and my eyelids were heavy.  I was sitting on an Amtrak train back to Philadelphia after a wonderful evening in NYC with my family.  I sat in the window seat, and was joined shortly by a man with a laptop bag.

The train began moving, and he opened up his laptop.  Immediately, I noticed the School District of Philadelphia desktop background and I looked up from my book and said, "School District of Philadelphia?"  He said, "Yes."  I offered, "I teach at Bluford Elementary in West Philadelphia."  He replied, "How's the move going?"  I was immediately taken aback.  I rarely meet someone who has heard of my school, and no one ever knows anything about our temporary relocation.  He followed with, "I helped plan that move."  I was intrigued.

It turned out that the man sitting next to me was none other than the Chief Business Officer for the School District.  We proceeded to spend the next hour and a half discussing the School District's history over the last 8 years, starting with the State takeover, dissolution of the School Board and the leadership of Paul Vallas.  We discussed pay for performance and teacher pay in general. Stemming from my statement that in any other neighborhood with any other parents, our old building would have been a lawsuit waiting to happen, he even showed me a graph on his laptop showing how much the district spent on its facilities up until the last few years (let me tell you, it was pretty measly!).  He explained that the district had decided to pump more money into its buildings in the last few years since the money was there.  (For more on our former building, you can read my posts here and here.)

As the conversation unfolded, I began to realize that this man with an all-important job, who had worked for the Rendell and Street administrations in Philadelphia as well as in Harrisburg was acting with the students and teachers in mind along with protecting the fiscal health of the District.  Why wouldn't he?  Why is it that 'us' teachers in the classroom look to blame the leadership 'downtown' at the School District ('them') for all of our problems?  We teachers always talk about how 'they' forget the children, that decisions are never made with the students and teachers in mind.  We talk about initiatives that are poorly thought out and even more poorly executed by 'them.'  Why should we believe that 'they' don't want teachers to succeed or that they don't want children to learn?  Similarly, why should  the top of the administration chain ('us') look at the teachers ('them') as being incompetent in the classroom or in need of more supervision and mandatory support due to dropping test scores.

Most people don't get into education without good intentions.  What is it about this convoluted, huge and disorganized system that turns us against each other?  Even those who work in the upper echelons understand that disorganization reaches down the rungs and affects the teachers and students in the classrooms.  It's kind of like a hugely expensive and paramount game of telephone.

This brought up more questions.  Why does the state still run our school district?  Why don't the taxpayers and parents seem to have a say?  Why are my union negotiations behind closed doors while issues are negotiated for my best interest without my interests being voiced to anyone?  Are teachers and parents' voices being heard when it comes to budgetary concerns?

When Ackerman came in as Superintendent, she started an initiative called "Imagine 2014." I attended one of the community meetings to discuss and give input into the new initiative.  We were shown a PowerPoint explaining the initiative and then broke out into discussion rooms based around parts of the initiative.  When the final initiative came out, it was as if they used the fact that these 'listening sessions' occurred as a reason that the initiative was supported and created by Philadelphia constituents.  The intentions were good, but the result lackluster.  This feeds into the "Us v. Them" mentality, which I have been guilty of harboring for years.  I felt that my input into the meeting was wasted breath.

In addition, as an 'Empowerment School' (aka failing school) my school has completely lost control over all of its academic functions.  We teach scripted programs over 45 minutes to an hour a day, 5 days a week and we are told what we are to teach, when we are to teach it, and how to teach it.  We are told what needs to be hanging on our walls, outside our classroom as well as what page we're supposed to be on in our Teachers' Guides.  Talk about feeding the 'Us v. Them' mentality.  However, when looked at through the eyes of the implementers, they are helping us meet our students' needs since we have been failing to do so for so many years (disclaimer: we have made AYP once, so at some point we were heading down the right road without all of these 'supports').  No one has bad intentions, but initiatives that come down from above get caught in that game of telephone and end up a garbled mess.

All of this has made me rethink the 'Us v. Them' mentality.  It gets us nowhere.  The problem is not in the intentions, but rather in how people (don't) work together to achieve a common goal.  And yes, in the end, it is the people we serve (the children of Philadelphia and their families) who lose out.  I can no longer blame only the individuals, but I must blame the system in which we are all caught.

The first step in fixing this systemic problem is making the system smaller.  In Philadelphia, we used to have SLCs (Small Learning Communities) made up of regional schools to put more power back in the hands of schools, who know best what their students and communities need.  Of course, these were part of the previous initiative, Children Achieving (see Part III), which went out when Paul Vallas came in.  While new initiatives are hard to avoid, the idea of a smaller system in place to handle such initiatives can help appease the 'Us vs. Them' mentality.

What are your experiences and thoughts?

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This post is part of the MAT@USC Hope for the holidays event. Did you have an experience or witness something in 2009 which gave you hope for the future of American education? If so, please see this post for more information on how to share it.

Today we had district-wide Professional Development.  On Wednesday of last week the "Activity Catalog" in our web-based 'PD Planner' updated to show the options for the full-day sessions.  Immediately emails began popping up on the PTRN listserv.  There was NOTHING being offered for TTLs (Technology Teacher Leaders) or lab teachers.  As such, we were all forced to pick a session that may have had little or nothing to do with what we do on an everyday basis.

As a joke, I sent out an email saying "Hey, I'll hold a workshop!"  Surprisingly, many people responded to me asking if I was doing a workshop, and that if I was that they would sign up.

This spawned the idea of proposing such a crazy idea to someone higher up, which I did.

A few hours and emails later, at the end of my PD session, through a beautiful act of serendipity, I was sitting in the same room as the head of Educational Technology who had received my proposal and was enthusiastic about the idea.

What followed was one of the most exciting and refreshing conversations I've had here at SDP in a while.  Especially with someone way up on the ladder! It turns out that we have a subscription to Elluminate and that there is a possibility that I could run an Elluminate session.  WOW!  (I hope I don't get in trouble for broadcasting that here on this blog.)

On the walk back to the parking lot I ran into a former colleague of mine who is a lab teacher.  He said, "Thank you for putting that idea up there on the listserv. I'm behind you all the way."

When I got home and had a moment to breathe, I created a Google Form to collect information on what kinds of PD people would be interested in.  Some topics included:

• using Google Docs in the classroom
• creating a class wiki
• creating a PortaPortal or Del.icio.us page
• using iMovie, Garageband, Audacity or Windows MovieMaker in the classroom
• tips for managing the role of TTL (Technology Teacher Leader)
  
• running a server-based environment (Workgroup Manager, Apple Remote Desktop)
• podcasting

Here is a screenshot of the survey:


I created a discussion on our Ning (Philly Teacher Techs) and included a link to the Google form.  I then sent out a message to all of the members asking them to fill out the survey to help me know what kinds of PD people want.  I also added questions asking whether people would be willing to help present or present their own workshop, whether people would prefer a webinar or a face to face workshop and whether people would be willing attend knowing that they may not get Act 48 hours for it.

Within 5 minutes of sending out the link I had no less than 7 replies in my spreadsheet!

This is proof enough that there is a high level of interest in professional development geared around what teachers want and that it is not being offered.  I know this is based on the topics I chose. I have seen one or two of them listed perhaps once or twice during the school year as an after school workshop with a limited number of openings that usually close up, but most have never been offered.  However, the topics that I'd never seen offered were the topics that most people chose!


What makes the job of a lab teacher so hard is that we often work in isolation.  While grade teachers have their 'grade groups' or 'grade partners' with whom to bounce ideas off of, we do not.  There is (usually) only one of us in the building.  We also often wear many hats which are not technically in our job description.  As a result, the job can get pretty darn overwhelming.


My goal for starting these workshops is to build a learning community for us so that we have someone to reach out to in times of need and so we have others to share our own ideas with for feedback.


The most amazing thing?  Out of 8 total responses so far, 100% said they'd be interested in helping present and that they would participate knowing that they wouldn't be compensated.


Already it is obvious that these workshops will be effective because teachers WANT the information and are willing to SHARE information and it is RELEVANT to what they do in their classrooms.


I see a small ray of light shining at the end of the tunnel and the best part is: I don't have to make the journey alone!


lab photo courtesy of Extra Ketchup on Flickr

What ensued was an overview of resources and procedures that we, as TTLs, should know.  Links to directions on how to access public folders, links to how to order new hardware, dispose of old hardware, etc....  All stuff I've known about for years now.  Siiighhh...I patiently sat through the overview while I set up my email on the new iPod Touch we had all received at the beginning of the meeting (more on that later).

At the part of the agenda when we were talking about filtering, I heard my name float across the room from the main speaker, who happened to be standing in the doorway.  I looked up in surprise.  I had no idea who he was, but he addressed me by my first name....hmm....  He was discussing the district's new system for attending to requests to unblock sites.  I've been, well to put in nicely, hounding the filtering team about unblocking GlogsterEDU and VoiceThread since August to no avail.   Apparently I am (in)famous 'downtown' for my persistence and big mouth.  He said something to the effect of, "We were hoping to bribe you, Mary Beth, with the iPod to appease your filtering requests." I smiled.  I liked the guy already.

What the gentleman (who, it turned out is head of Technology Services for the district) began to explain made my heart go 'pitter-patter.'  He understood.  He explained how they are changing the system by which sites get reviewed.  "We need to have more input on the instructional side.  Right now we have IT guys reviewing sites, and they don't always get the educational value of a site."  He explained that the new committee would be made up of members of the Educational Technology Group (ETG), Information Technology and the highest-ups in the district when it comes to technology.

Starting in a few weeks, rather than sending an email to 'filtering,' we will fill out an online form stating what the site is and why we want it blocked or unblocked and then the form must be approved by our principal.  That form is then sent out to all 7 members of the committee for review.  He also explained that they are working closely with the company the district hired to do the filtering to get some sites reclassified.  As of now, sites are blocked by software that classifies websites and blocks them according to classification.  By changing the classification, they will be able to unblock those sites.

After the meeting I discovered that filtering is something that even the heads of departments 'downtown' have limited control over.  For all of the complaining we do, it is not the people in IT or the people at ETG's fault.  It is (surprise, surprise) the lawyers who scare the district into such strict filtering that has little human input.  Hopefully, with this committee reviewing sites monthly, there will be more rhyme and reason into what we see filtered in our network.  I also found that I had friends down at 440 (the main district offices) who knew of my efforts and had my back.

The battle is far from over, and who knows if we will ever win, but I feel that this news today was a tiny victory along the way.  I still can't help but think of that old saying about the squeaky wheel.  Apparently my voice hasn't gone unheard (for better or for worse).

Battle photo courtesy of eisenbahner on Flickr
Filter photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons