Principal Bennett Lieberman, Central Park East High School in Harlem, wrote a memo to his teachers and this little tidbit has knotted all kinds of panties in the city as reported by
WCBStv.com. The big whop-tee-do? His memo stated, among other things:
“If you are not passing more than 65 percent of your students in class, then you are not designing your expectations to meet their abilities, and you are setting your students up for failure, which, in turn, limits your success as a professional.” (emphasis mine)
Folks have taken that statement to mean that teachers should lower their expectations of students and pass them along. That’s a fine sack of apples, isn’t it? I’ll let all this sink in for a second.
[pause]
I don’t think that is what the principal said at all. This is a case of teachers getting mad at being asked to do their jobs and the media jumping on without asking questions. The good principal goes on to say something else, which is what makes me wonder if his statement above is simply crafted poorly and misrepresenting his views.
“Most of our students come from the lowest third percentile in academic achievement, have difficult home lives, and struggle with life in general. They DO NOT (emphasis theirs) have a similar upbringing or a similar school experience to our experiences growing up.” (emphasis mine)
I do not think Lieberman is telling his teachers to just dumb things down and pass uneducated students along. He is telling his teachers that their classroom culture is based on white, middle class culture, which is alien to Black and Hispanic students of low socio-economic status. He is telling his teachers to rethink their approach to teaching and do something else to connect with students.
It all comes down to a definition of terms. In this case the problem comes down to the word “expectation”. What does the principal mean by “expectations”? Does he mean being able to add 2+2 or does he mean making inner city Black youth conform to a white, female, middle class, culture? Those are two different things. I seriously doubt this principal wants teachers to just dumb things down. I suspect he wants teachers to change the way they teach in order to connect with students. [gasp]. How dare he ask teachers to change how they teach to meet the needs of their students! The classroom is there for students, not for teachers.
Much has been said about students who are of color – of minority status – and how culture affects academics. We have talked about this issue in my educational philosophy class this semester. In short, the criticism comes from the fact that the bulk of teachers are white, middle class females, thus the “school experience” is based on white, middle class, female standards. In turn, the argument is that school is not designed for people of other races and cultures therefore it feels less relevant to them.
If you are a Black or Hispanic boy living in poverty in Harlem and your only exposure to academics and school culture happens to be mostly white, middle class females, then you may have a hard time connecting with school and seeing the purpose of it all. To succeed is to become white, middle class and possible female, metaphorically. It is to embrace the white experience.
The issue is much larger than that. My presentation is very simplistic, but that is the idea and I think people have missed Lieberman’s point. Every Tom, Dick and Harry thinks he knows how to teach, and new techniques are always coming around, many of which are actually just old techniques with new names. So teachers get tired of always changing. The revolving philosophical door is problematic and I can understand why teachers buck. Just because something is new does not make it better. But … we need to re-examine how we approach students.
Simply lowering standards because students are persons of lower economic status is not the answer (and I do not think anyone is suggesting we should despite the news article’s slant), but if our classroom culture, our teaching methodology, is not somehow constructed with the students’ home culture in mind, then we are failing to adequately reach and educate them.
The idea here should be to bring education to the children, not to force children to education. So many teachers, poor teachers, believe teaching is about opening up a student’s head and dumping in information. So many think they are to stand in front of the class and lecture. It is up to the students to get what they get. That is an old approach that is not relevant or successful in today’s classroom.
So what do we do? We do not grade easier, or simply pass kids along. We may, however, have to [gasp] change the way we teach in order to help students get the education they need to be successful. That requires work on the part of the teacher and some do not want to do it. So they just make class easier, lower expectations and pass the kids along.
Good teachers teach. If kids do not get it with one approach, then you change approaches and see if they get it this way. The one-size-fits-all approach to teaching is a failure and I suspect that is what this principal is actually talking about. If I am right, then his first paragraph was poorly crafted. If I am not, then he needs to be fired.
We need more male teachers, Black teachers, Hispanic and Asian teachers in the classroom, especially on an elementary level. One of my professors said that males make up about 10 percent of pre-service elementary teachers on our campus. Children need to have role models on which to base their worldviews. Check this. According to the article “Why Kids Hate School What Kids Say” by Emmett Sawyer and Judith Gregg, they interview many inner city students and discovered “in some instances, students perceived it was not a black cultural thing to do to complete high school.” Like it or not, culture plays a huge role in how students perceive education. They need to see more men and minorities teaching school.
Notice, will you, that the story mentions that the teachers could get bonuses of $3,000 if improvement is made. How is that improvement measured? Who decides if improvement was made? Should be base teacher pay on student achievement? Oh there is so much in this entire news article, beyond the typical media response. So very much, indeed. This issue of teacher bonuses for student achievement is a whole other discussion.
Cookies and milk to
Chatterman for posting the WCBStv.com article on his blog.
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