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I've observed Bill Gates' philanthropic work for many years. I admire his passion, stewardship, and laser-sharp focus in a variety of efforts to improve human lives. But something is missing from his approach to American education reform that causes me concern. Lost in the milieu of politics, power, and the lure of straightforward answers to complex questions are the research, principles, and practices of how children and adolescents learn and develop.
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has invested $5 billion in school reform in the last decade. In 2004, they initiated a project to open 20 small high schools, testing a theory that smaller schools would result in greater college attendance. When the project failed to produce those cause and effect outcomes, the benefits of smaller learning communities were lessened in the eyes of school reformers. That is too bad. Because if we only use college admissions as a criteria for success, we've missed the other benefits that small schools might produce, including increasing teachers' capacities to develop children's character, initiative, and a belief in self.
Moving from school-level change to national policy, Gates recently invested $335 million to learn what works best inside of classrooms. Specifically, he wants to know what makes a good teacher. A noble effort, his plan involves measuring teacher success, in part, on how well students perform on standardized tests.
While Gates' goals and commitment to education are commendable, the methods used to measure teacher and student success appear flawed. In Uneducated Guesses: Reforming Education by Committee Rather than Evidence, Howard Wainer, a Distinguished Research Scientist and former chief statistician for the Educational Testing Service raised important questions about Gates-funded research methodologies and reform approaches that rely on anecdotes rather than evidence.
It is not difficult to agree with Gates that our schools must be more globally competitive, that we must raise standards, and reward success. But while these goals are good in principle, a large body of interdisciplinary research suggests that the narrow focus on teachers may lead us into a much darker hole. Why?
Education is not a product. Nor should it be about politics. It is about childhood learning and development, interconnected processes that cannot be reduced to test scores, individual teachers, or class size. It is implausible to think we can reduce childhood development and learning into small parts, then measure the success of each part quantitatively. By doing so, we fail to see the more complex, systemic influences on development - influences that include good teachers, dynamic curriculum, family engagement, safe schools and neighborhoods, good nutrition, effective mentoring, and access to transformative out-of-school-time activities.
Fixing education is not like finding and correcting a software problem. Nor is there a vaccine that will enable us to better compete on the global stage. Whether or not children grow up to be innovators and problem-solvers depends on a multitude of internal strengths that cannot be measured in numbers. Yet Gates and others appear convinced that reducing school reform into small parts, speculating on cause and effect relationships, and issuing top-down mandates will help the U.S. compete in the 21st century. This same data-driven thinking was embedded in the failed policies of Bush's No Child Left Behind and continues to drive the practices of Obama's Race to the Top.
It is the positive whole of education, not a box of small parts, which leaves no child behind. The article Fallacy of Good Grades outlines the important aspects of development that cannot be measured by test scores. Children will race to the top when they discover passion and purpose from the inside, not because of extrinsic rewards like test scores, grades, or trophies. Research has demonstrated these principles over and over again.
While Gates and an influential group of leaders and politicians think that answers lie in focusing on a few aspects of the solution, many scientists, educators, and researchers no longer view change in these reductionist terms. In a recent Forbes article The Single Best Idea for Reforming K-12 Education, Steve Denning aptly describes the type of thinking that holds back school reform. A leader in complexity and knowledge management, Denning believes that our goals need "to shift from one of making a system that teaches children a curriculum more efficiently to one of making the system more effective by inspiring lifelong learning in students, so that they are able to have full and productive lives in a rapidly shifting economy." Denning's emphasis is on what inspires learning and development, not on creating a factory model of educational management.
Shifting the Conversation
Denning is not a lone voice in an alternative conversation about school reform. He is joined by thousands of educators, parents, civic leaders, psychologists and others who do not possess the money, power, or political influence of Bill Gates. Distinguished educators like Sir Ken Robinson, whose highly acclaimed TED talk about the history of education and why today's reformers have it wrong has been watched by more than 5 million viewers. If you haven't seen Changing Education Paradigms, I urge you to watch it.
What matters most to families and to our democracy is that children develop into caring, productive young adults who critically think about and actively engage in the world around them. Test scores are useful for measuring progress in specific and limited areas of education. But they are a by-product of many other aspects of positive youth development.
My hope is that those involved in school reform will expand their thinking about education, to see it for what it truly is - a systemic process of development that involves all adults - teachers, families, service organizations, churches, and communities. If we embrace the complexity of learning and development as a nation, we will act to create environments at the grassroots of schools where all adults and students, not just teachers, are expected to step up and do their parts.
©2011 Marilyn Price-Mitchell. All rights reserved. Please contact for permission to reprint.
