Since the launch of BC’s Education Plan, people from all parts of the province and all walks of life have weighed in on how we might make our already great education system even better.
Check out our report: What You’ve Said – which contains a summary of major themes and ideas that have emerged from our conversation.
It is sad that most of what floats around in public spaces and published is just propaganda with little statistical basis or truth. Just read this quote from the new BC Education Plan, “This Plan will make it easier for teachers to use their professional knowledge and discretion to guide students toward the skills and knowledge that will help them thrive in later life.”
Where is it written that teaching in our province is defined as a peer regulated personally accountable profession?
As a BC taxpayer, I would like to see any additional salary or benefits that are being considered for teachers be moved into resources for our children (textbooks, new programs where necessary, additional training for teachers, etc.).
I recently read an article in the Financial Post on how a high income earner, maxing their RRSPs could not compete – in terms of retirements benefits – to a well-paid teacher in Ontario: http://business.financialpost.com/2012/12/12/the-best-rrsp-money-can-buy/ Now I recognize that BC teachers may not receive quite as generous pension/benefits, but I think it bears repeating that improving the quality of our children’s education does not necessarily mean we have to improve teacher salaries or pensions.
I know this is likely an unpopular sentiment with the teaching community – but as a taxpayer, I would be incensed to contribute to raises in their salaries when most of us in the private sector have not received any in a long time.
The caveat is that I do believe in meritocracies. Great teachers should receive great salaries, but in any profession – and especially in one that does not promote merit, but rather seniority – there are a lot of teachers who are just average – and some who are even mediocre. If you ask any BC educated person, you will find that there were teachers who stood out as fantastic, and some or even many who were not good – but maintained their status in the system based on their seniority. While I understand there are inherent difficulties with “qualifying” a good/great teacher, I think there are always ways of measuring or quantifying such teachers (student evaluations, parent evaluations, school participation, etc. – with different weightings given to various measures.) In private sectors, we are “measured” by our supervisors on any number of unquantifiables – justifiable or not.
Great teachers should be rewarded, and not so great teachers should improve, begin caring or taken off the taxpayer’s payroll. If a meritocracy is used, I have no qualms about contributing to high salaries and pensions. Alas, that is not the system used now – and less than average teachers should not be making significantly more than the average Canadian, both during their working careers and into their retirements with healthy, inflation adjusted pensions, in my opinion anyway.
I hope you will take my thoughts into consideration.
I am absolutely livid to read that BC plans to give up altogether on IEPs (is that even legal?) and adopt a one-size-fits-all approach of “self-regulation” based on the findings of one Canadian researcher. Two decades of proven, confirmed, evidence-based research has clearly shown us what supports are needed for children with learning disabilities. I am tired of feeling like my I’m placing my child in a laboratory/school run by second rate pseudo-scientists.
I’m all for self-regulation, and I’m sure it would make a wonderful adjunct to the supports that children with LDs need, but instead of? Just as you wouldn’t expect paraplegics to self-regulate themselves out of a wheelchair, just exactly how is a child with dyslexia supposed to self-regulate himself into reading? It seems the common theme is to spend as little money as humanly possible on children who need extra help. Once again the province proves to be totally indifferent to the needs of struggling students, and to add insult to injury, parades their pseudo-science budget-saving experiments as one giant leap for mankind.
Shame on all of you.
Hi Felicity,
The Ministry of Education has no plans to end the use of IEPs. IEPs are a requirement established by a Ministerial Order which also makes clear what must be included in an IEP for each student identified as a student with special needs.
I think what you may be responding to is a project currently underway in BC, involving Dr. Stuart Shanker, a well-known author, researcher and advisor on early childhood development and self-regulation. Dr. Shanker is working with a number of districts in the province as part of a national research initiative, and at their invitation, to support teachers in understanding the importance of early intervention in addressing the needs of young children. Inherent in that understanding is the need to also support students in learning ways to self-regulate their behaviour, problem solving, communication challenges, etc. Self-regulation, as you have also said, is an important adjunct to the supports that children with special needs need, especially children with learning disabilities.
The Ministry looks forward to learning from the districts involved regarding early intervention and self-regulation and what it can mean for student development and achievement.
Thank you Mike. If this is true that there are no plans to do away with IEPs, then the Minister may want to retract his statement made here:
http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/schools%2Bpromote%2Bstudent%2Bself%2Bdiscipline/7287707/story.html
“He expects it will move schools away from their emphasis on diagnosing a child’s special need, attaching a label — which may or may not bring additional funding — and developing an individual education plan (IEP). The goal, instead, will be for schools to make better use of groundbreaking neuroscience research on self-regulation to benefit all students.
“Let’s not be blowing our resources on trying — at often too early an age — to diagnose precisely what the challenge is,” Abbott told leading school officials at a self-regulation conference earlier this year. Regardless of what the challenge is — whether the child is the next Isaac Newton or has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) — the strategies to help with learning are the same, he said.”
This has been widely construed as the end of IEPs and a too-broad application of otherwise worthy research.
Further to Felicity’s observations above, consider the following excerpt:
What next for BC?
Far from pausing for breath, the next wave of reform is already taking shape in BC. Three priorities in the next period will be:
Decategorisation of special needs education. In the words of Rod Allen, there will be “no labels and no medical model. In a 21st century personalised world, I’ll tell you what a special education looks like if you can tell me what a ‘normal’ education is.”
That quote from Rod Allen (BC Superintendent of Learning Division responsible for BCEdPlan) is from a March 2012 interview reported by Julie Temperley, of a UK organization called GELP which is funded by the Gates Foundation (See item 1 in this related BCEdPlan comment).
Back then, BCEdPlan comments from citizens had not been summarized yet (The “What You’ve Said” summary doc is dated August 17, 2012). And it is my understanding that public “consultation” is still ongoing for the BCEdPlan.
I thought authentic consultation requires that the decision making doesn’t happen until AFTER all the input has been collected and duly considered, not BEFORE then.
And since the Superintendent has apparently been working with GELP since 2009 (see the links in this related BCEdPlan comment), it looks like GELP has a stronger influence over Ministry of Ed decision-makers than the millions of students, parents and citizens in BC, including the best ~40,000 education professionals hired to serve them.
BC Superintendents can also be seen promoting in this YouTube video from a private sector education corporation (Pearson) and yet I have yet to come across a single Administrator (Superintendent, Secretary-Treasurer or Principal) publicly speaking out against the Orwellian, Charter Rights abusing laws that have been severely damaging our public education system & democracy here in BC (see related commentary here, here and here).
Even Janet Steffenhagen of the Vancouver Sun has noted, in her column here, the selective silence of BC Superintendents and she questioned whether they are “skirting controversy”. In another article here Janet asked, “Why are so many initiatives in public education treated like state secrets?”
It is clear to me that public consultations like BCEdPlan would be best operated at arm’s length from the BC Ministry of Education (perhaps by ElectionsBC).
Furthermore, the chronic and systemic problems in our education system (including the overlooked governance and administration parts) need to be addressed by an independent, modern, 21st Century version of a Royal Commission on Education.
In this election year, now is the time to demand this from EVERY political party so that regardless of who wins the election, our ailing Public Education system will start getting the assessment, diagnosis and treatment it so desperately needs.
Or, contrary to the very purpose of education, we can continue to bury our heads in the sand, accept the status quo and continue to witness the same problems repeated over and over again.
Apparently there is also a link between the above mentioned GELP organization and Pearson Corporation. See here => http://t.co/Jw3K7g2b
Thanks Richard for all of your input. I hope people are aware that Pearson Educational is behind the disastrous No Child Left Behind program in the US, all centred around standardized testing. It is impossible to understand why there is no public consultation around the corporatization of our education system. Indeed, this forum feels mostly like public mollification, while the education ministry and superintendents are doing exactly as they please in the back rooms. I just resent the appropriation and misapplication of so much worthy research. It is clear to me that this gov’t will *never* put the resources into any of these schemes that would make them truly successful.
How about the rights of teachers? George Abbott sent emails to all B.C. Teachers this summer using our home email addresses. Our addresses are registered with BC College of Teachers and that was how the addresses were obtained. I received an unsatisfactory reply to this complaint from our new minister.
As you may know the BC College of Teachers is now part of the Ministry of Education and is known as the Teacher Regulation Branch. The email list is now available to the Minister if he wishes to use it to communicate with teachers on Ministry initiatives.
Is there a way to opt out of said email list?
If you click onto the bottom of the email where it says unsubscribe it should take you off the list.
Why do people seem to believe it is fair to trample on the rights of students with extra support needs to improve the education system? ALL students have a right to an education in British Columbia. Putting students with special needs into segregated classes is like putting all complex medical patients into palliative care instead of spending the money to treat them. We would not entertain this notion for our health care system, so why do people suggest it for our education system? It shows a basic lack of respect for children with extra support needs that none of us should tolerate.
If any of these commentators ever bothered to do any research,they would know that having children with extra support needs in typical classrooms has no negative effect on the learning outcomes for the typical children.
While I am not in favour of segregation, I am not in favour of abandoning special students in classes, leaving a very busy teacher to do even more.
When integration started 10 or so years ago, SN students were getting sufficient help and then THEY started to take away one by one support to some of those borderline kids.
To be honest, immigrant students with no knowledge of English should also have an SEA, but the immigrant community doesn’t have the time or the resource to demand that. Instead, these student vegetate in classrooms. At the very least, initial segregation might be better for them, actually, so that they can eventually be a part of the classroom.
Sure, lets be totally fair and send everyone, regardless of their medical condition to a general practitioner?
…segregation makes sense when it means the cancer patients may be treated by cancer specialists, and the heart patients treated by heart specialists.
What research have you done to support the notion that having children with extra support needs in typical classrooms has no negative effect? Most teachers that I know will disagree. You’ve limited it to learning outcomes…which is questionable in itself. How does one measure the connection there when so many factors are involved? The teachers have to work 10 times harder to maintain the status quo of learning outcomes, but so long as the learning outcomes are relatively stable, that doesn’t get taken into consideration…the expectations on teachers go up, and the teachers rise to the occasion. The system becomes more and more inefficient in its structure, placing more and more responsibility on teachers while at the same time undermining their ability to be successful.
…kids that need that extra help currently get put into typical classrooms, and the teachers and parents both feel as though the teacher is unable to give that child the extra attention that they need…so the child gets a separate curriculum(IEP), and a separate teaching assistant, etc. etc. So there is still the same segregation–it is a separate class, only it is happening in the same room.
The segregation is based on needs(we don’t put all the grade 7s in the same classroom as the grade 2s, because they have different needs and maturity levels…but since that sort of segregation isn’t taboo, it is accepted as the norm).
Lack of respect insists on playing pretend, so that those with differences can be viewed as though they do not have said differences.
The issue of respect has to do with basic social values, and not with whether or not someone gets taught in this room or that room. I never treated the kids that went to the special ed. teacher’s room with any less dignity and respect than the students that were in my own classroom. The fact that it works better to separate students with different needs has nothing to do with our capacity for respect and dignity; it has everything to do with educating children effectively and efficiently.
Differences can be celebrated and accepted just as well in either case, and those sorts of values need to be taught.
To look at the issue pragmatically is important.
Personally, I wouldn’t say that putting students with special needs into my classroom has negatively affected the rest of the class. However, I don’t understand what it does for that student with special needs. Why sit through my class that is not designed for them, of which they understand very little, of which little is expected of them, and for which they are not held particularly accountable, and for which they receive very little help/interpretation?
To be more specific, I have had students put in my Math 11 class who have been given a package of Grade 2 level math to work on and no EA support. Even if I can ‘help’ them on their math for a few minutes every class, how can this possibly be more beneficial to them than being in a separate classroom designed for them? with other students that are in a similar place? somewhere where their curriculum can be given some dignity and where it is not a constant reminder of their difficulties every time I open my mouth to teach the class?
If my classroom was a social club, I could see value in friendships and learning from others, etc.. but hopefully my class is 90+% focused on learning curriculum and socializing happens elsewhere.
Here is some local research. Teachers are not the only ones who should be listened to as they are confusing their working conditions with student support.
http://www.sfu.ca/content/dam/sfu/cerp/Briefs/inclusionBrief.pdf
I would also suggest people read the Victoria DPAC proposal on this site under user submissions to find a fairer way to work with children with exceptional learning needs.
I believe this study confirms my point as stated. I agree that is doesn’t affect the rest of my class but how does it benefit the special needs student? What are they learning by sitting in on my class when they are not working on the same curriculum?
Let’s not be fooled. All of this is about pretending to engage with the public, teachers, kids,… I say we judge people by how they act, not what they say or write.
Have you noticed the self-congratulatory statements made at every turn on every initiative (see students edchat and background info … infomercial)!
“B.C. has a strong education system [...]”
“British Columbia’s education system is among the world’s best.”
Is it? PISA scores are high thanks to the work of teachers to compensate for lower and lower budgets in the last 7 to 5 years. I wonder what the new tests will show?
To me it seems pretty obvious what the two main problems are in the current public school system. First, is the integration of special needs students into the classrooms. This idea only works if there is enough money to provide the support required in the classrooms. For the first couple of years the support was there and it seemed to be working as the classroom teachers were able to continue providing proper instruction to all the students in the class. Gradually though as financial pressures for the government increased, this support has been eroded to the point that the teacher is being called on to not only teach their regular lessons but deal with the multiple students with behavioral and/or physical problems. There is no way a teacher can provide the attention to all students in the class when they’re being pulled in so many directions. If there is no money in the system to provide the needed support then things have to change when it comes to special needs integration, and if that means discontinuing the program then someone needs to have the guts to say so and not cave to every special interest group out there.
Second, is the issue of ESL students being put into regular classrooms. Again it all comes down to money and the fact is there is not enough money for the public education system to be carrying the cost of teaching new immigrants how to speak English. How can you expect a teacher to teach a child who cannot speak a word of English? Having them pulled out for one class each day to spend time with an ESL teacher is a waste of time. What about the rest of the day when they’re in the regular class, not understanding what the teacher is saying and not able to communicate this fact. If a child is going to put into the public school system they need to be at a certain level of English language proficiency before they start. This would mean the family, not the government pays for the English lessons needed to get them to this level. The money saved would be enormous (probably enough to provide support for special needs integration) and the teachers would be able teach students that they can actually communicate with.
Hi,
it’s time to leave my 5 cents.
1. I think the consultation process is inadequate. Every single parent must be contacted via school to fill out some sort of survey including current concerns, future hopes and ideas for perfect public education for their children. Also, the teachers must have the same survey filled out.
2.I am a proponent of a more prescribed approach to education. Predefined curricula, set outcomes, solid definitions of how each outcome is measured, emphasis on math, physics, chemistry, earth sciences. Avoidance of meaningless competencies: innovation, creative thinking etc… Why? because there is no methodology in assessing whether children are “creative” Innovative or good at teamwork or not. This approach is going to lead to frustration by students, teachers and parents. I , for instance, have my own understanding of creativity, I have other standards for critical-thinking, what is excellent on someone else’s scale is average on mine or vice versa. Outcome measures must be precise :Knowledge of Newton’s 3 laws of motion – you either know what they are or you don’t. Only after establishing the precise measures , the teachers have a right to attempt at grading a kid’s work. A teacher’s personal judgement in grading the outcomes are not acceptable. This could lead to favoritism.
3. Students should be given an option to have specialization subjects in the last three years of schooling. Students should not be given any flexibility as to choosing electives earlier. Neither should they be given time to sleep-in. Discipline is the key. Teachers should have more authority in terms of disciplining the students, provide them with more homework and fairly assess their results.
4. Students’ agendas should clearly state what subjects they are going to learn and in what order. Homework assignments should be written in the agenda for the date of the next lesson on that subject. Students must bring home the textbooks or other assignment books for the semester, in order to familiarize with the content of the course and if interested learn the course ahead of time.
5. Parents must be able to familiarize themselves with all the materials distributed to their kids ahead of time.Textbooks, lesson plans etc.
6. Parents must be informed if the students are going to learn about sensitive subjects beforehand.
7. Summer vacations are important. the two months of summer vacations should stay.
8. It’s important that the core content for math outcomes is revised. Take a look at what kids of other countries learn in math in grade 4 and you’d realize that BC children is nowhere near to their level. I know that from first-hand experience – I am an immigrant, as you may have guessed.
9. I think the BCEDplan is not really a plan. Just an outline of the directions we “should” take in 21st century…who said we should be taking this approach. Can someone give an evidence behind the assertion that increased flexibility in learning means increased knowledge, better learning outcomes, or may be better chances to enter good universities? can someone point to a study that supports this?
10. I am noticing there is a lot of issues high on the political agenda involved in the children learning themes. My daughter has spent three consecutive years ! of elementary school studying lifecycle of salmon from different viewpoints, mostly because it’s the food of the indigenous population, it’s local food etc… But compared to kids her age from other countries she has not even started to learn geography, history, physics etc.
11. In the conclusion, I would like to say, that my major issue with BC education has been: “not enough learning” – our kids are becoming lazy, undisciplined, sluggish. Also, there is no reward for being a good student, no competition, no excellence, no passion for great accomplishments…just plain mediocrity.
I think kids need to be rewarded for being good students. Scholarships and bursaries based on grades is a good start.
12. a rhetorical question: who benefits from making the majority of our low to medium income population dumber and is this a price for not being able to afford private education?
BC’s Education Plan is a vision for the types of changes that we believe need to be made to our K-12 education system. It is not a prescriptive document. If you’re interested in knowing about the research behind the Plan, please check out our interactive flipbook at http://www.personalizedlearningbc.ca/#/32-33. The Supplemental Readings (starting on page 32) list the main references that have helped shape our thinking on personalized learning and education transformation.
You say that it is a vision for *needed* changes, and then that it is not a prescriptive document.
In an earlier post you spoke of efforts here being *unbiased*…and then you write this comment about changes that you *believe* need to be made…
I’m terribly confused. Predetermined beliefs = bias.
Efforts to fix things are prescriptive.
Can you clarify these seeming contradictions, Mike?
-Rob
Sure. The Plan lays out the broad strokes of what we think needs to change while the subsequent conversations we’ve been having with folks both on this website and face to face are geared towards finding out if we’re on the right track and if we are how we can go about making the Plan a reality. The details of the Plan are being worked out by all of us. The What You’ve Said report is part of that process.
Well a good future question might be “Are we on track?” That is, if you really want to know whether you’re on the right track.
Spell it out: “This is the track that we’re on; this is how it currently is; are we on the right track? how can we get on the right track with this issue?”
If you want, put forward your vision, in detail, in the description that goes with the question.
So far, the questions have been affirming of the vision…all framed and presented in such a way as to shape the context of responses favourably to this proposed vision.
-Rob
In that case, I think that the areas of change have not been identified correctly. In the link (thank you) you have provided case studies in China, Singapore, Finland and some others are showing examples “21st century education”. The reforms aiming at increasing creativity and innovative thinking in those countries have a strong academic knowledge of the students as a foundation on which to build and almost zero “creativity” and “communication” content in the current curriculum.In that case it is timely and adequate to start enriching students’ curricula with subjects or approaches in the areas of need. BC, on the other hand, is nowhere close to China and Singapore in terms of academic performance,workload, diligence and discipline of students, yet does dedicate a lot of time to Arts and crafts, show and tells etc, drawing etc already…It is all about the starting point, the baseline from which the reforms begin.
I have made several pointed and referenced comments about the Finnish, Chinese, Korean,… stories in the past, but I don’t think they passed the censured test! I repeat, thus, that there is ample evidence (for those who know anything about linguistics) that the Finnish success is due to the ease by which learners can learn an easy language (MOSTLY)! I would like you to google reforming-english to read my blog for research, proof, stats, comments by imminent professors and academics and, pleae, if you can help spreading the word, that would be great! The question is why are they ignored? No one wants to have those 4 fingers pointing back at them, do they? Furthermore, Asian students reach the top of PISA tests by spending 3 to 4 hours more time in class than BC students (because they also must learn a complicated language, although with PINYIN, a phonetic method, Chinese is easier to learn than in the past)! That’s right, folks, the Chinese improved their system by adopting a phonetic system. I need to know how phonetic Chinese is compare to English, but my bet is that English is still the winner of the worst language when it comes to decoding it.
1, 老师必教内容还会减少,课时也会减少.让老师更加轻松,是该计划的目的.昨天的报纸说,该计划实施后,学生早上上课的时间会推迟.
2, 每次改大纲,都是减内容,从来没增加过.他们想把学生都教成半科盲.
3, 以前的大纲是经多少前辈多年实践后形成的,基本上是很科学的.现在的这些二把刀,按自己脑子里的意识形态为标准,以教师少干活为目的,任意删减大纲,是相当不负责的.这和中国文革时的作法一模一样,连喊的口号都差不多.这种偷懒堕落的意识形态在西方越来越占上风.
4, 该计划只是一些漂亮的,永远正确的口号.教育厅让大家讨论一个没有具体内容的计划,是明目张胆的欺骗.用一些漂亮的口号来骗取大众的支持和通过,然后他们就可以为所欲为地砍掉大纲内容了.这样的教育厅是在犯罪,早该寿终正寝了.
5, 删减大纲就能把学生培养成他们所说的现代人才了吗? 不是! 正确的作法是在应用题上下点功夫,把新科学,新技术编在应用题里边.这些实实在在的事情,该计划只字未提,恐怕他们连想都没这样想过.
注: 我之前发过该帖,但被删了.既然是讨论,为何要删掉反对意见的帖子.
Thank you for the comment. One of my colleagues was kind enough to translate it for those of us who don’t speak Mandarin:
1.老师必教内容还会减少,课时也会减少.让老师更加轻松,是该计划的目的.昨天的报纸说,该计划实施后,学生早上上课的时间会推迟.
The prescribed learning outcomes that teachers need to teach will be reduced. The class time will be reduced. Teachers will be more relaxed. That’s the aim of the plan. The news from yesterday’s paper said that students will have a later start time once the new Ed Plan has been implemented.
2, 每次改大纲,都是减内容,从来没增加过.他们想把学生都教成半科盲.
Contents are reduced whenever the curriculum changed. They’ve never increased. Students will become half-educated.
3,以前的大纲是经多少前辈多年实践后形成的,基本上是很科学的.现在的这些二把刀,按自己脑子里的意识形态为标准,以教师少干活为目的,任意删减大纲,是相当不负责的.这和中国文革时的作法一模一样,连喊的口号都差不多.这种偷懒堕落的意识形态在西方越来越占上风.
The previous curricular are designed by generations of professionals after years of practice. They are basically very scientific. Nowadays, the “inexpert” are creating the curriculum based on their own ideology and viewpoint. Teachers are trying to do less and eliminating some of the curriculum. It’s very irresponsible. This is the same practice during the Chinese Cultural Revolution, even the slogans are the same. This kind of laziness and unethical thinking is getting an upper hand in the western society.
4,该计划只是一些漂亮的,永远正确的口号.教育厅让大家讨论一个没有具体内容的计划,是明目张胆的欺骗.用一些漂亮的口号来骗取大众的支持和通过,然后他们就可以为所欲为地砍掉大纲内容了. 这样的教育厅,是在犯罪.
The plan is just some beautiful, motherhood slogans. The Ministry of Education is discussing a plan without specific content which is blatant deception. It is defrauding the public for their support through some nice slogans. After that, they can do whatever they want to cut down the curriculum. The Ministry of Education is committing a crime.
5, 删减大纲就能把学生培养成他们所说的现代人才了吗? 不是! 正确的作法是在应用题上下点功夫,把新科学,新技术编在应用题里边.这些实实在在的事情,该计划只字未提,恐怕他们连想都没想过.
Can we develop students into modern talents by reducing the curriculum? No, we Can’t!
The correct practice is to spend more time in developing questions/tasks for students to apply their knowledge and skills. Try to bring new science and new technology in the “Applied Problems”, The Ed Plan failed to address that real situation. I am afraid they never thought about it.
Bill Wu brings up a key point. I want to build on his main point a little bit.
The criteria for sound assessment has two test questions: is it valid, and is it authentic.
The curriculum is the rubric against which we measure the performance of all aspects of our education system. The curriculum is an objective document and can be used by parents, teachers, students and administrators to assess the current state of affairs.
As a rubric, the curriculum must always stand up to the two test questions of assessment. If it fails, it can be changed by parents, students, teachers or administrators.
When we reduce curriculum, we eliminate the acid test for the soundness and integrity of our system.
A critical question can be asked in regard to the curriculum: with fewer curriculum points, what is the rubric against which students, teachers, administrators and ministers can be assessed and constructively criticised? The answer is simple: with fewer curriculum points, that rubric literally disappears. And after that?
Again, the answer is as simple as intuition suggests it might be: The system itself erodes into a mess of incomprehensible subjectivity.
Like many members of the public, Bill uses “Teachers” and “The Ministry” interchangeably. That is an understandable mistake in this case: teachers in China, Korea and Japan have a different role as government officers than they do here in BC.
The reduction of curriculum in BC actually makes for exponentially more work- literally, exponentially – for teachers as the Ministry reduces its own involvement in the process of running public education. Running a healthy public education system is a very complicated process, and so is running an effective, dynamic and nuturing classroom. Teachers won’t be able to do both.
The curriculum desperately needs change. When that change is supplemental, the curriculum grows. We need growth now more than ever, but what I see across the web (particularly in tweets coming out of the BC School Superintendants summer retreat) is talk of exactly the opposite.
A curriculum in decline is a system in decline – the physics of the thing are that simple.
Thanks for your comment, Eli. My understanding is that our new Curriculum and Assessment framework will be released today. Hopefully this will address some of your concerns.
The curriculum and assessment documents I referred to above are now available on the Ministry of Education website. These have been developed after extensive public consultation:
http://www.bced.gov.bc.ca/irp/transforming_curriculum.php
Bill,
I suggest you google reforming-english and read my blog. Translating in Chinese would help a greta deal in spreading the word that it is the English language that is MOSTLY to blame for an inadequate system. The kids are nto at fault. The teachers are not at fault. Even the curriculum is not at fault! It is the way the spelling system makes reading extremely hard that is the real problem. My blog has all the research by imminent professors.
The BCEdPlan presented the public with pre-established forum questions and themes. Citizen submissions regarding education improvements that were deemed outside the scope of those pre-established forum questions & themes were rejected by the BCEdPlan Moderation Team. So BCEdPlan submissions were already biased toward what BCEdPlan was looking for.
Regardless of those constraints, citizen submissions to BCEdPlan included BOTH comments AND specific suggestions. However, specific suggestions didn’t seem to survive the summarization process very well. Citizen comments may have been accumulated in themes and topics in the summary, but many specific suggestions from citizens are not listed at all.
In my opinion, the “What You’ve Said” summary of citizen submissions would more accurately be titled “What We Planned From The Start“. Compare those two documents and I think you’ll see what I mean. In my opinion, it looks like the BCEdPlan got exactly what they were looking for, by design.
In authentic consultation the consultation part should come BEFORE the decision-making part. Otherwise it’s just PR & spin.
Having said that, I think that there have been a lot of constructive citizen submissions to BCEdPlan so far, and those original submissions from a large number and variety of citizens are far more valuable than any subjective summary created by a few public servant(s) acting as middle-man between the voice of citizens and the ear of decision-makers.
Specific suggestions submitted by citizens should be collected and prioritized. And the prioritization process should allow for citizens to participate. As in everyday life, the lowest priority items might never get addressed, but the highest priority items would.
It would be useful to make a numbered list of all the specific suggestions that were submitted to BCEdPlan, preferably using the actual text from each citizen’s original submission. Grouping related suggestions near to each other in the numbered list might be useful for some purposes, and the entire list should allow for assigning priorities as well as re-ordering the list according to priority.
Perhaps an Excel sheet might be a useful format for that numbered list of suggestions so that citizens could download it, prioritize/sort the items in the list, post their prioritized list for consideration and comment by others, and ultimately submit their final prioritized list for consideration by decision-makers.
For many citizens, perhaps an online tool might be easier to use than Excel. It would need the ability to display the numbered list of specific suggestions that were submitted to BCEdPlan, the ability to assign a priority to each specific suggestion, the ability to sort the list by item and by priority, the ability to share the prioritized list with others for commenting, and the ability to submit the final prioritized list for consideration by decision-makers.
Summary reports showing average citizen priorities could automatically be created by BCEdPlan from all the final prioritized lists submitted by citizens (using All Submissions, Student Submissions only, Parent Submissions only, Teacher Submissions only, etc).
It would be encouraging to see all specific suggestions submitted by citizens included on a list for consideration and prioritization. It would be encouraging to see prioritized lists openly shared and constructively criticized.
Modern online communication, collaboration and decision-making tools can enable us to better leverage available human resources in order to produce better ideas and priorities. BCEdPlan is a start, but let’s make it better.
Thank you for your comment, Richard. Our recent “What You Said” report is an unbiased summary of the key themes and topics that have emerged on the BC Education Plan Get Engaged page to date. Had we pre-planned this report to say only what was complimentary of us, a number of the things (such as class size) wouldn’t have been mentioned. Our team takes great pride in being a neutral arbiter of your ideas, and the majority of the feedback we’ve received so far has been quite positive and suggests to us that we mostly have it right. The onus is now on us to connect what people have said to actions. Lots is taking place. Look for more explicit connections on that in the very near future. You can also visit our Actions page (http://www.bcedplan.ca/actions/welcome.php) at any time to see where we’re currently at with the implementation of parts of the BC Education Plan.
Ministry staff is working very hard to capture your ideas and to flesh out the details of the Plan. This report is part of that process. We invite you to continue to comment and to be part of the positive changes that are happening with this project.
The report is biased in favour of folks that write a greater number of comments as opposed to those who write long comments covering a range of subjects. It says: “Approved comments are categorized under specific topics related to the themes. Many comments fit in more than one topic but we’ve categorized them under the topic where they fit best.”
I know Richard has written some lengthy posts…as have I…and they covered more than one of the themes. The method of categorizing posts is biased…and biased toward less complex thought actually.
Also, it has been mentioned that there were several ideas that were presented which were not included at all. Peter Mare posted some ideas on numerous occasions(ideas that I personally find to be ridiculous) about problems with the English language and how they relate to curriculum. They were not represented at all. There was a viewpoint represented in comments by several posters that computers and technology are distracting, and that they would prefer them not to be used as learning tools at all…and again, that was not represented at all in the report.
The report is a really watered down summary of some of the most prevalent ideas…and it has all sorts of biases.
Self-congratulatory bias is not the only way to have a distorted view of things. The report doesn’t address anything that would compliment or criticize the government…what it does do is report on points that are a decided focus of the government’s flexibility agenda. That agenda is wherein you may find the bias. Thus, the positions in support of traditionally inflexible, structured, strict learning is totally under-represented, because all of the questions fished for ideas regarding the push away from that.
There were no questions such as “What traditional aspects of education do you feel are most critical to sustain?”…nearly all the questions were about changes, rather than conserving what is already effective.
Now, with all of that said, I think it is silly if anyone expected this report to be free of bias…to be free of bias is quite a tall order.
However, it is even more silly if the creators of the report can say it with a straight face that the report is entirely unbiased. Such a claim indicates a low degree of self-awareness.
-Rob
Many great ideas have been selectively edited –dare I say censured– from the report!
What I would like to know is the real name, relevant experience, and credentials of the team of mod.? I would like this to be posted!
This report was written over a two-month period after a thorough analysis by our data collection team and our lead moderator. Every possible effort was made to capture and accurately represent the key themes and suggestions on the site. We cannot possibly include every idea in the report, especially those that were presented repeatedly by single individuals. Our data team is well trained in both quantitative and qualitative analytics, and our lead moderator, who wrote the report, is a certified and experienced teacher with a strong background in web writing and data analysis. He is intimately familiar with the discussion forum, having read every comment on it and responding to many of them.
I read through the plan.
I am wondering about accountability for students with medical needs with or without designation. I learned that schools do not have to follow a medical doctors instructions. For example a child with bladder issues due to nerve damage had some leakage problems. The medical doctor wrote to the school asking that the primary school child be reminded to go to the bathroom twice in the school day. The school was able to refuse to follow the doctors request. The teacher indicated that it was beyond her comfort zone to tell a child to go to the bathroom. (child was not permitted to use a watch alarm as a reminder because teacher said it interrupted the class. Child was not permitted to use an alarm that vibrated because teacher had issues with it.)
A primary school child was prescribed medication (not for behaviour issues) long term for health issues, the school required the primary student to remember to go ask for the medication each day and the child got in trouble for forgetting to ask for the medication. I wonder how many adult women forget to take birth control pills – I think it is too much to ask an 8 -9 year old child to remember to take medication.
Teachers were not notified and informed about the health needs of students – eg teacher and aid not told of new autism diagnosis for an elementary student.
An elementary student with a head injury whom the doctor requested not participate in recess or gym class was required by the school to participate anyway.
I wonder if there is some type of legislation change that could require school to follow medical related instructions from doctors. I understand that there could be an issue of outrageous instructions but that is not what I am speaking about. I am referring to medical instructions that are basic and if not followed could pose a health risk.
I’ve read through your report a couple of times now. I think you’ve done a good job summarizing much of what has been said over the past few months. In this report you show both sides of issues – i.e. that some people want more “21st Centry skills” and that others value the 3 R’s; that some people like and want to continue the traditional school year and that other people like and want year round school; that some people want more choice for students and others may think that there’s too much choice, etc.
For myself, I am interested to see where this will go from here. Are you going to continue to ask people’s opinions about relatively open ended questions or are you going to try to get people’s opinions of specific policy? If hearing from the people is important, how are you going to expand the base? After all, with all the people involved in education in this province in one form or another, 5,000 comments is quite a small sample.
One thing I know for certain, I am glad to have been able to participage and to read the posts that have been written here. I’ve enjoyed reading the other points of view and learning what ideas other people have.
Hi Bev. While we will continue to ask open ended questions, we will try to balance that with policy specific enquries as they surface. Given we were in the early stages of bringing the public into the conversation this past year, staying broader with the dialogue was the warm up – stay tuned! And thanks for the encouraging comment.
Eve Gaudet
Director, Open Government
“…Giving politicians a bunch of watered down summaries…is like showing them a Rorschach inkblot drawing… politicians will see what they want to see, spin what they want to spin, then do what they want to do…”
More here(1) and here(2).
I hope that districts move the start time of high school to later in the morning. Adolescents have a difficult time with sleep times and are not at their best in the early morning.
When I attended highschool in the 1980′s, I usually awoke at 5:00 am in order to dive into a frigid swimming pool at 6:00 am (only to be hollered at, and repeatedly kicked in the _ _ _ by my 6-ft tall Czechoslovakian swim coach) as I swam lap after lap until 7:00 am; and, all this before going to school at 9:00 am. But now, I am hearing that the delicate kids of today need a later school start time in order to get more beauty rest – give me a break!
At my children’s high school this year, there wasn’t a single coach for any of the basketball teams who was a teacher at the school. I, like many other parents, stepped up when no other qualified coaches were available. Still, it led me to wonder why teachers should be expected to volunteer over and above their renumerated workload any more than any of the rest of us? Why don’t schools give credit to teachers who coach sports teams, such as the equivalent of teaching a class (or however the equivalent hours might work out), let alone pay them to do it? When I was in high school all the teams were coached by the physical education teachers, who were at the school because they had expertise in sports – they taught phys.ed class, and coached numerous teams, which I assume was part of their expected load, but those teachers don’t seem to exist any more. It’s a shame that so many of our children who are terrific athletes or just enjoy the spirit and good health benefits of sports don’t get the kind of serious attention and support from the school system for sports – there isn’t even a question about it on this whole website – even as such experience could include not just playing and practicing skills but learning how to take care of your health, recovery, good nutrition, sports psychology, and so much more that could have so many benefits for our children and society generally, not to mention providing a better basis for students to excel as terrific athletes.
I sincerely hope that updates to this site include the capacity for posts to get ‘tagged’.
In the report it says: “Approved comments are categorized under specific topics related to the themes. Many comments fit in more than one topic but we’ve categorized them under the topic where they fit best.”
I find the above to be unfortunate due to the fact that longer, more well thought out posts that consider a number of themes don’t seem to have an influence worthy of the effort that their author put into them.
For instance, if Bob wrote a post that addressed technology, flexibility and administration, it doesn’t seem right to assign just one category to it…because Sally, who doesn’t have the same depth of thought as Bob, might write 3 separate *short* posts covering different ideas, and they each get categorized separately.
In the future I would like for posts to be considered with respect to ALL the themes that they address, rather than just the *one* that fits them best according to some subjective assessment. A post tagging option seems like a good step towards making this possible…so a post could be tagged with the theme of flexibility, and with the theme of administration, and with the theme of class size…etc.
Also, the effort to express views in a neutral way is fine…I appreciate the inclusion of both sides of the school calendar change to year-round classes. I find that there are several areas where such contrasting views could have been added as well. For example, there were definitely some more pro and anti positions with regard to technology that were discussed…also with flexibility.
I think it might be clearer to frame some of the themes with for and against views…because many expressed the view that ‘flexibility’ was not something that they believe kids needed more of…and that is not represented in this report.
In any case, it is good to get a re-cap of the messages that have been received by gov’t thus far. What we don’t see on the report that we feel is important, now we can more effectively speak up about those things….don’t present things subtly…say it so that it can be reported statistically! lol
Thanks for your efforts, folks.
-Rob