This year I’ve had the good fortune to also read Malcom Cladwell’s Tipping Point andOutliers as well as a book called Nurture Shock, by Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman.  These authors write wonderful exploratory narratives inspired by playing with data.  Each book has examples of data that has been mininterpreted, under applied, or counter intuitive.  Richard Rothstein’s The Way Were Were? focuses in on the delightful subjectivity of data an gave me both a sense of hope and despair for ever sorting out our education system.

Two quotes particulary stuck with me:

Q:  If Americans believe their schools perform more poorly than they used to, reforms will be designed differently from reforms aimed to improve a satisfactory institution.  It is difficult to make a careful assessmet of schools’ ills and successes, or to develop a plan to improve them, if myth gets in the way….  p. 31

Q:  How can I simmer this down to my own classroom or school?  What myths am I in the midst of that might be misguiding my evaluations?

C:  I could copy the rest of this paragraph as I felt it was the cornerstone of the whole book for me.  In all our efforts to improve it seems we are constantly blinded or distracted by things that turned out to not be the real issue at all.  In my classroom, I seem to go through cycles of thinking my instruction is brilliant or miserable–one week the students are on fire, producing amazing work, focused and collaborative like pros.  The next, they give me the classic blank stare, bicker with each other, and fail half the quiz.  What am I doing wrong?! I wonder.  Or, does it even have to do with me?  And, of course, if my state test scores come back high, did I do a good job?

On the flip side, our school happens to have a uniform policy which convinces many parents that we are practically a private school and obviously do not have behavior issues.  While this isn’t necessarily a harmful perception to have out there, are we really upholding an academic and behavioral environment that matches the perception?

I am beginning to really appreciate the complexities of data.  It is a powerful tool and distractor.

Q:  Certainly, we will never all be above average.  p. 111

C:  HA!  This popped out at me as a hilarious truth and one of the funniest things about data: every time performance changes, what is “average” changes.  Even when we try to have criteria-based tests, we are basing the criteria on what the “average” candidate should be able to do to be “proficient.”  So if educators miraculously helped every student test “proficient” or “advanced,” the average student would be the majority.  Anyway, just a funny play on words and meanings and terminol

Q:  No wonder studies consistently find that there is no connection between student performance and teachers who hold master’s degrees. There are likely to be graduate programs that are exceptions, of course. But which ones? Clearly, there is no substitute for good data to distinguish among them, and yet the vast majority of graduate programs have no data on how well their graduates do in the classroom.

At our university, the University of Washington, in Seattle, we don’t hide from these simple facts. Rather, to the surprise of some of our higher education colleagues, we’ve embraced them.

Here’s our thinking: If teacher-salary scales were to be redesigned so that compensation was structured around increased student outcomes (instead of awarding sums after the attainment of any master’s degree of any quality), we’d certainly expect that teachers (our clients) would change their degree-seeking behaviors. Many universities rightly worry that teachers would be less likely to pursue a master’s degree at all. However, and this is an important point, those who did pursue master’s degrees would become more demanding customers: They would seek out master’s programs oriented toward genuinely improving classroom effectiveness.

C: On the surface, I agree very much with what is being said here–certifications and trainings and degrees do not a good teacher make.  I salute the University of Washington for being bold enough to stand up for a meaningful, if less easily achievable, master’s program.  Having spent 5 years earning my BA, 1 year earning my teaching credential, and now 2 more to earn a masters, I have certainly wondered whether my education is really comparable to some of my peers who achieved their BA, MA and teacher certification in an all-in-one 5 year program (and, due to the “master’s bump,” will have made about $20,000 more than I have by the time they are on their 7th year of teaching.)

However, I am stumped by how to gauge “how well their graduates do in the classroom” or how to design a payscale where “compensation [is] structured around increased student outcomes” because this brings us back to the dilemma of defining student, and thus teacher, success.  It is based on entrance to college?  Graduation from college?  The majority of my close friends work in business and IT and none have college degrees–all of their training has been through their employers or through technical schools.  They make twice what I do and have had far more success with job opportunities, too.  So, are they successful students of the public school system?

Can we base student outcomes on test scores?  Progress made?  Is the school in a wealthy, well-educated neighborhood more or less successful than the school in a high-poverty, immigrant neighborhood?  Perhaps the wealthy school has high test scores but have their kids made progress?  Have the teachers there really done a better job teaching or have they just been handed students that are nearly complete to begin with?  Can I, at my small suburban charter school, say I am a better teacher than my sister-in-law, who teaches migrant students in a gang-ridden, high drop out, high teen pregnancy school?  I mean, my test scores are higher so I must be better, right?

Q:  So, my question becomes, Whether we are a preschool, high school, or college, how to we gauge the success of our students, and thus, teachers, in a meaningful way?

Wow!  This book got me thinking!  

I have to say, I actually like data, even though I’m not always sure how to interpret it or what to do with the information.  This book, however, brought data to life from the perspective of school leadership: How can I put data to work in my school?  How can I use this as a tool to enhance teaching and learning?

Although my school site has a long way to go, I was grateful to Data Wise for giving a path to follow and sane advice and strategies along the way.  Starting in January, I will be leading monthly staff meetings regarding data and instruction so I am eager (and a bit apprehensive) to see where the conversations lead us…

Q: “Attitudes towards data vary widely in schools.  There are plenty of “data skeptics” who believe either taht student assessment data cannot tell them anything they do not already know or insist that such data can be manipulated to support whatever story the teller wishes.  Typically, there are also some “data advocates” who believe that student assessment results contain the answers to solving student learning problems and that finding these answers in just a matter of becoming better at data analysis.  In reality, student assessment data is neither this weak nor this powerful.  The real value in looking a this kind of data is not that it provides answers, but that it inspires questions.”  p. 77

C:  This is a rather long quote but it hits on two things that stood out to me about Data Wise in general:

1.  People’s attitudes about data must be acknowledged and probably will be one of the most challenging aspects of working with data.  

2.  Data is neither a blessing or a curse, but is ONE improvement tool that can be used in beneficial or shallow ways.

Q:  My school site is more linear and traditional than HTH.  I’ve been asked to lead a monthly professional development meeting (30 minutes!) to help staff help students improve test scores.  I know that the heart of our staff is actually interested in helping students be successful learners but I feel like we don’t have a culture to talk about student success unless we are talking test scores.  How do I get my staff to embrace the prospect of discussing data while simultaneously trying to create an environment about genuine improvement and not scores or teacher “worth”?

Wow!  This book got me thinking!  

I have to say, I actually like data, even though I’m not always sure how to interpret it or what to do with the information.  This book, however, brought data to life from the perspective of school leadership: How can I put data to work in my school?  How can I use this as a tool to enhance teaching and learning?

Although my school site has a long way to go, I was grateful to Data Wise for giving a path to follow and sane advice and strategies along the way.  Starting in January, I will be leading monthly staff meetings regarding data and instruction so I am eager (and a bit apprehensive) to see where the conversations lead us…

Q: “Attitudes towards data vary widely in schools.  There are plenty of “data skeptics” who believe either taht student assessment data cannot tell them anything they do not already know or insist that such data can be manipulated to support whatever story the teller wishes.  Typically, there are also some “data advocates” who believe that student assessment results contain the answers to solving student learning problems and that finding these answers in just a matter of becoming better at data analysis.  In reality, student assessment data is neither this weak nor this powerful.  The real value in looking a this kind of data is not that it provides answers, but that it inspires questions.”  p. 77

C:  This is a rather long quote but it hits on two things that stood out to me about Data Wise in general:

1.  People’s attitudes about data must be acknowledged and probably will be one of the most challenging aspects of working with data.  

2.  Data is neither a blessing or a curse, but is ONE improvement tool that can be used in beneficial or shallow ways.

Q:  My school site is more linear and traditional than HTH.  I’ve been asked to lead a monthly professional development meeting (30 minutes!) to help staff help students improve test scores.  I know that the heart of our staff is actually interested in helping students be successful learners but I feel like we don’t have a culture to talk about student success unless we are talking test scores.  How do I get my staff to embrace the prospect of discussing data while simultaneously trying to create an environment about genuine improvement and not scores or teacher “worth”?