Five ways that setting the bar too high can be a bad thing

A district I work with has been focusing on literacy especially reading in the last few years. In multiple ways the district keeps redefining what are can be accepted as grade level achievement. In essence they keep raising the bar. As I was reviewing some of the data fro the district it was clear that teachers across the district are struggling to help their students reach the new criteria bu are slowly making significant strides in their efforts. This is the dream of all those interested in education - successfully raising outcomes by increasing the expectations. It's hard to argue against success but I am going to do it anyway. I am not against raising the bar I just want everyone who goes down that road to be aware of the impact beyond that specific area.

1. Discouraging struggling students. Students who are already behind and struggle with the material as it is are even less likely to meet increased demands. The target seems even farther for them which as they become aware of the demands may actually discourage them from trying harder.

2. No teacher flexible time. If teachers are focusing on new and more challenging goals they will take any available time to make their students are making progress in that area. They will used the most comfortable "surefire" methods. That seems great except that it will prevent teacher from trying new things, whether supported by research or not. Teachers know that when you first try new things you waste time learning new ideas and finding "your groove" often it leads to a temporary drop in results. In a high expectation, high stakes environment they are much less likely to try new things.

3. Other subjects get "cannibalized". If you set a high bar in one area, say reading, teachers and administrators will cannibalize instructional time. They do not do away with other subjects they just give them less favorable times. For example unit studies tend to be pushed to the end of the day when kids are most restless and where the time spillover of the day is most felt. Officially science might have 25 minutes daily but in reality it is 15-18 minutes of actual instructional time. That may not sound like a big difference but over time we are losing a third of the instructional time.

4. New areas get no time whatsoever. You want to add future oriented skills like entrepreneurship? Coding? creativity? Engineering? It will not happen during school!

5. New pressures affect teachers in low performing schools disproportionately. If teachers give up on reaching standards with students at-risk they will move to other schools or leave the profession altogether. This is not because they are giving up on students but instead giving up on pleasing a system that seems hell bent on making sure they will fail even if students reach a grade-level standard.

What Tech Startups can Teach Educational Reform

Photo from: yoursmallbusinessgrowth.com

Let me start by saying that I have never been part of a tech startup so my view may very well be skewed. I recently read that many venture capitalists prefer investing in entrepreneurs that have already failed once. Actually in a phone conversation with my father he quoted the late Uri Menashe who told him once that he likes hiring retired IDF officers after they had failed their first civilian position. The main lesson for me is that to be successful you need to fail a few times, sometimes many times.

The problem is as Sir Ken Robinson likes to point out repeatedly is that we are building educational systems that seem to converge on the exact opposite direction. High stakes tests that constantly push one answer and the notion that failure is not an option.

So what are the lessons of startups?

1. Collaboration: most if not all startups are based on a group of individuals with different capacities and skills working together to accomplish something that hasn't been done yet. Relationships and the ability to work with others are crucial.
2. Failure must be an option: while the long term must be successful the road to success must include many short term failures.
3. High expectations: startups are successful only if they do something new, or something old considerably more efficiently that it essentially becomes something new.
4. Continued innovation: Once you do succeed you must work to improve and work on the next problem.

There might more and different ones for those who are inside startups but these are my takeaways. What does that mean in education? I believe that points to a very different system than the one we have now. Instead of a high stakes low expectation system I advocate a low-stakes high-expectation system. That is true in the classroom and in the school, for students, teachers, and administrators.

The fear of high-stakes is driving administrators, teachers and students to focus on the most direct route to a known answer- the exact opposite of a startup. Low stakes allow honest discussion and the option to fail occasionally so you can succeed in the long run. If every failure has high stakes we who are a risk averse species (see Arieli) shy away and stop innovating and taking risks. For education to match the needs and fast paced changes in modern society we must make room for low stakes so educators can experiment and provide room for short term failures leading to subsequent spectacular successes. We do not need to give up on high expectations instead we need to be patient for long term gains while short term fluctuations occur. In essence its what your investment advisor told you- don't pay attention to short term. In essence it makes all the leaders managing our educational systems akin to day traders instead of high-tech entrepreneurs.