President's Perspective

Tales from Lake Wobegon

by Michael Mulgrew

Oct 15, 2009 1:21 PM

Once upon a time, before the time of the Enlightenment, the schools wherein the children of Lake Wobegon were educated were failing in every way. The children could neither read nor calculate. The school buildings were crowded and unsafe. Management wasted millions of dollars. Parents’ voices were unheard and their complaints unheeded. And the teachers were driven to distraction by mindless paperwork requirements.

But that was then. Today, the sun shines in Lake Wobegon every day. The children learn at astonishing rates, 97 percent of schools are above average, new buildings gleam, new laws empower parents, money is used wisely on behalf of the students, and the only thing preventing the teaching force from being perfect is the union.

How do we know all this? The data tell us so. Let us praise the data.

Call it Tweed’s Tales. It is how the administration tells its story. And it doesn’t end there. Here’s how it continues:

But wait! There are those who doubt. They say the data are fallible. They say that reliance on numbers alone can sometimes lead to faulty conclusions. These skeptics are no more than obstructionists. As educators, they stubbornly continue to put their efforts into giving children real skills and knowledge instead of concentrating on improving the data. And Wobegon ’s visionary leaders can do nothing about such opponents of reform because they are protected for life by the defenders of the status quo, the union.

Hardly the Greatest Story Ever Told, but it has a growing following. And those believers now want to remake all of public education in the image of the New York miracle.

Should we accept these “miracles” on faith? Or do they warrant closer scrutiny? Reason alone tells us that when 1,031 out of 1,058 schools get an A or B, there is something wrong with the metric. Or when 82 percent of students in grades 3 to 8 meet standards in math, the bar is too low. Especially when other tests show no such gains.

Remember the “Texas Miracle,” the remarkable turnaround that U.S. Education Secretary Rod Paige touted and President Bush made the rationale for No Child Left Behind? Rising test scores and plummeting dropout rates turned out to be more illusion than reality — and most of the illusion was created by manipulating, maybe even falsifying, data.

Let me be clear. My questions are not meant to diminish the achievements of our students or their teachers. In fact, teachers don’t get nearly enough credit for the real improvements in our schools. And no one who has been in the school system for more than 10 or 12 years can deny that there are improvements.

But let’s be real. Overstating those improvements only eases the pressure to continue to invest real resources in public education. Who can blame people for simply shrugging when they read about the budget cuts, the overcrowding and the large classes? After all, they say, the kids are learning anyway. Isn’t that the bottom line?

But are they really learning? Many experts say that what our kids are learning is how to take tests. And for their teachers, the pressure to raise scores (and neglect real teaching and learning) can only intensify as school budgets shrink and principals still must produce results. One Queens principal is under investigation for pressuring teachers to pass students. She is also accused of promoting failing 7th-graders because the school could not afford summer school for them. Is that how decisions about what students need should be made?

Similarly, stories circulate throughout the system of school leaders telling parents that their children’s school will close if they say negative things about it in the Learning Environment Survey. Teachers in the Schoolwide Bonus Program report being told they won’t get a bonus unless their responses on the Learning Environment Survey help boost the school’s score.

The combination of phony claims, greater principal accountability and tighter budgets is a potentially explosive mix. The administration has created a Potemkin Village of false facades and fake accomplishments while driving the workers behind the scenes harder and harder to maintain the illusion. It is a dangerous game to play. The truth would serve our kids far better.

When my daughter was very young, I read her fairy tales, as I’m sure most of you did with your kids. I wanted to foster creativity and imagination in her. At the same time, however, I always made it clear that wicked witches and talking pigs are not real.

Similarly, as a teacher I frequently had to remind my at-risk students not to count on magic to make their dreams come true, that it took hard work and perseverance to graduate and go to college and become an architect or a nurse or whatever they wanted to be.

I myself believe in miracles. I’ve seen kids turn their lives around; I’ve seen teachers save youngsters from futures that looked pretty dim. But I know that wishing doesn’t make it so.

Our kids deserve more than wishes. Of course we should applaud the good, but we also need to deal with the not-so-good. And we can’t do that if we deny it exists, whether we live in Lake Wobegon or here in New York.