Statistics and School Climate: Why 97% is Not Good Enough

--This is a Guest Post written by Lon Weaver, Marshall School Chaplain and Religion and Ethics Teacher--

In discussions with colleagues about the centrality of a safe cultural environment in educational and religious institutions, there can be a temptation to rest satisfied when a high percentage (perhaps even 97%) of students or adherents express the belief that they are safe. 

When that occurs, a great little article my father passed along to me decades ago comes to mind. Dad worked in quality control/quality assurance for 25 years. Thus, it was logical that this article would catch his eye:

Let's get real here. Is it truly necessary to go for "zero defects"? Why isn't 99.9% defect-free good enough? Those are questions often posed to quality consultant Jeff Dewar, of Red Bluff, Calif.-based QCI International, when he argues for eliminating defects altogether. To make his point, Dewar has come up with some examples of what life would be like if things were done right 99.9% of the time. We'd have to accept:   

• 1 hour of unsafe drinking water every month;

• 2 unsafe plane landings per day at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago;

• 16,000 pieces of mail lost by the U.S. Postal Service every hour;

• 20,000 incorrect drug prescriptions per year;

• 500 incorrect surgical operations each week;

• 50 newborn babies dropped at birth by doctors every day;

• 22,000 checks deducted from the wrong bank accounts each hour; and 

• 32,000 missed heartbeats per person per year. 

Suddenly, the quest for zero defects makes a lot of sense…

Of course, all of those are 1989 numbers.

Martin Luther King, Jr.
Photo credit: Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com
via Foter.com / CC BY

In his “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Some years after that, the Latin American liberation movement declared that a fundamental tenet of a sound spirituality must be a "preferential option for the poor," the most visibly vulnerable in Latin American context (Gustavo Gutierrez, The Power of the Poor in History [Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1983], pp. ix, x, 126, 37, 149). 

If we apply these thoughts to academic and faith communities, it becomes obvious that when even .1% of the members these communities feel unsafe because of cultural values that tolerate exclusion or discrimination, this is .1% too many. Injustice to the vulnerable is a threat to justice for all, be they students or adherents, educators or religious leaders.

Queer Youth: Lost in a Time-Warp

9/1/16: It was really windy, and, yes, they
spelled my name wrong. Photo by Mary Engels. 

I was given an award last week for service to the GLBTAQI* community because of my work as a Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA) advisor. Many of you came to the award ceremony to celebrate with me, and I want to thank you for that. (I also know many of you wanted to be there but couldn't.) I am by no means a social butterfly, so seeing such a large number of friendly faces at the event was a great comfort to me. Thank you! 

I didn't know if I would be expected (or given the chance) to give a speech or not, so I came prepared, having hastily composed one that afternoon. As it turned out, there wasn't time for all award recipients to speak, so my speech went unspoken (despite some cries of "speech! speech!" from my Marshall friends). I promised those who were there with me, however, that I would share my speech via blog post, so here it is. (Publishing it online allowed me to add some important links--I hope you'll take the time to click through and read them.)

Thank you. This means the world to me. I’m very proud of Marshall School’s GSA, which has run continuously since the 2001-2002 school year when it was founded by two students, Patrick Colvin ('03) and Suzanne Jokela ('04).

Strong women like Tina Alcala, Laura Jensen, and Kathy Hermes did as much as I did, if not much more, to carry the group through times of great conflict and controversy.

Social & political advances in the adult world do not automatically translate into similar advances for queer** kids. Progress does not naturally or consistently trickle down to their world. 

What practical, immediate good does the Supreme court decision about gay marriage do for queer youth, for instance? (Yes, it gives them hope for their future, but it doesn't stop the bully in 4th period from harassing them yet again.) 

Often, our schools lag behind the “real world,” leaving queer kids in a nightmarish time-warp that we adults can (if we're lucky) dismiss as history. 

I’m not saying the adult world is perfect yet (Orlando proves that), but all too often, queer youth still live in the “bad old days” of neglect, ignorance, and violence, even while their attitudes toward gender and sexuality are light-years ahead of ours. We can’t leave our kids there and simply tell them “It Gets Better.” 

Some of you may be familiar with the CDC’s recent study of youth belonging to sexual minorities; it shows that queer kids are significantly more vulnerable to violence and sexual violence, to being beaten up and raped, than straight kids are. We can’t accept that. 

Until all schools, public and private, are places where queer folks of all ages are safe and comfortable being out of the closet, our kids will be left behind, deprived of the role models they need and deserve.

Until our schools stop perpetuating the completely unnecessary tyranny of conventional gender roles and gender expression, our kids will be left in the dark ages to deal on their own with the very sources of our oppression. We must help them. 

If every parent of every child demanded that every school be safe, in the broadest sense, for every child, then queer kids could live in a world that more closely resembles ours.

So that's what I would have said, time and courage both permitting. And here's what I'd add to that:  We take a lot of pride in our 21stC teaching methods these days, but we need to apply more of this forward-thinking to the climate and culture of the school, which has not kept pace with our pedagogy. We need to get all aspects of our school up to speed. The well-being of our queer kids depends on it.

*GLBTAQI stands for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Allied, Questioning, and Intersex. There are other variations of this "alphabet soup" initialism, my favorite being QUILTBAG.

**I use the term "queer" as an umbrella term because that's how most of our young folks use it. Some older folks are uncomfortable with this reclamation of what was once a vicious slur. 

The Nurse Log

I started thinking about (and thus also photographing) nurse logs last spring, but I never found the time to write this post. Now, as the new school year is about to start, and as I contemplate revising my syllabi, it seems like the right time share my thoughts.  

Nurse log, May, 2016, Jay Cooke State Park

Fungi and lichen on stump, Meadowlands, June, 2016

A nurse log is a fallen tree that provides a birthplace for young trees, often--but not always--of the same species. As the old tree decays, it provides a rich source of nutrients for the young seedlings and for a wealth of other plants, including moss and fungi. There are lots of potential metaphors here for an educator, but what got me thinking about nurse logs last spring was the issue of curricular change. 

I was realizing that I couldn't teach my favorite WWI Poetry unit in the same old way yet again. Not only was there not enough time left in the year for me to teach it in my usual way, but I'd known for years that the old way wasn't working very well. I was going to have to change it up quite a bit or let it go.

Fungi on fallen log, Jay Cooke State Park, March, 2016

I got hooked on the poetry of WWI as an undergrad, continued to study it as a grad student, and have been teaching it for almost 30 years now, not just at Marshall. Some of that poetry is so intertwined with my personal identity that a frightened student once said he thought I was channeling Wilfred Owen during a discussion and asked me to stop.  

All this is just another way of saying I didn't want to cut the unit entirely from my classes. But I did let the old tree fall. 

Black spruce enveloped by sphagnum moss, Meadowlands, June, 2016

I let a new project grow out of the old reading list, the familiar resources, the fossilized exercises. The new project was very student-centered and project-based, so we didn't have much in the way of whole-class discussions of the poetry. We lost that experience of struggling through each poem together. 

I also never had the chance to show the kids just how much I love this poetry. Maybe that doesn't matter. Maybe I'll find a new way to share my passion for it as I tweak and revise this new project in the coming years. 

Club moss and cup lichen on decaying log, Meadowlands, June 2016

In the current project, the WWI Poetry is subsumed into a newer, stronger focus on Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried, which I had long taught as a kind of adjunct to the WWI texts; now, it's the anchor text. 

When I disengage my heart and use only my brain, I know the new project is better than the old unit. The students did great work. They did much more critical thinking, and I did less to shape their responses to the texts. I let go of the old cherished outcomes, and while relinquishing the past is still painful, I know it was necessary and inevitable. 

Fallen tree, Leif Erikson Park, July, 2016

Our region weathered some extremely rough storms this summer: we experienced widespread and lengthy power outages, and we lost a lot of trees. Some were probably ready to fall; others, not so much. Either way, their loss is hard to take.

But every fallen tree lets new light into our familiar surroundings, and if we let them, the dead logs can spawn new life, new ideas. 

Not a nurse log, but a cool tree in Jay Cooke State Park,
July, 2016, and, yes, it reminds me of the Leonard
Cohen song...

What decaying, hollow lesson plans are still standing in the forest of your curriculum? 

What will you let fall this year to make room for new plans? 

What old giant in your repertoire needs to be pushed over? 

Sharing Some Big Projects

I haven't posted in some time, but my students have all been working on some big projects. 

Based on their reading of Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried, my seniors have created websites in response to some rather extensive guidelines I gave them. Both the guidelines and their websites can be found on my website. If you have time and would like to navigate your way through some of the students' work, that would be great. 

Screenshot of the class website with menu/navigation path.

Obviously, some students did better work than others, and there were a lot of guidelines to keep track of! I haven't attempted such a large project before, and it went fairly well...

I'm having my juniors do an even larger project based on Stephen King's Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption. It's evolved into an alternative exam, and I hope to invite you all to our showcase sessions soon. (If you click that link, you should navigate around the class website a bit--much of the students' work is already completed at this point). 

Screenshot of the English 11 project website.

Why Are You (Still) Afraid of Twitter? (Another Rant & Another Challenge)

So, this morning, Lori sent out a link to an article from A. J. Juliani's blog, and it got some conversation going on email about social media and education. 

I really, really wish all educators could get over their fear of social media, fear that keeps them from learning about social media and thus also teaching students about social media. We've got to use it to know it, and then teach its wise use to our students. 

Anyway, the email conversation got Lori and me thinking about a challenge for the faculty, so here goes:

• Sign up for a Twitter.com account. I'm not sure it matters what email account you use--I know some folks are paranoid about blurring the lines between public and private worlds online, but I think that ship has sailed, folks, right off the edge of the world!* You just need to be a professional human on social media. It's possible to be simultaneously 
• A professional who is visible to the world, and 
• A human being with a real life beyond work. 
• Follow Lori, or Whittaker, or me, to see who we're following, and follow any of those folks who seem interesting to you. Don't go crazy, though--don't follow too many folks at first...
• Follow some of the blogs/organizations from the list below or from any number of lists online like this one (again, start by following just a few accounts, perhaps no more than 10-15 total):

1. @TeachThought
2. @MindShiftKQED
3. @edudemic
4. @TheAtlEducation
5. @FreeTech4Teache (that's not a typo)

• Then, post on the Schoology "Faculty Twitter Challenge" Discussion at least 
• One good classroom idea you find in your Twitter feed, or 
• One article you think all educators should read. 
• No duplicate postings!!
• Extra Credit if you 
• Retweet that great article you find! Remember to include the Twitter Challenge hashtag:  #TrendingToppers in your retweet. (Post a screenshot of your re-tweet on Schoology.)
• Double Extra Credit if you 
• Tweet about using that great idea in class! Remember, again, to include the Twitter Challenge hashtag:  #TrendingToppers in your tweet. (Post a screenshot of your tweet on Schoology.)

Check out Twitter's guide for new users, if you need help, or seek out any of your colleagues who use Twitter.

Please note that this doesn't mean you have to keep up with your Twitter feed. You don't have to check it constantly. It's a tool that you can use when you need it and totally ignore when you don't. 

Also, check out these links on the importance of Twitter in the education world, on how educators can use Twitter, and this, which might be the best of the three. 

*Thanks to Andy George ('02) who found the gif for me. Thanks also to Lori for the hashtag and for getting the conversation going this morning! (My idea was #TopperTwits, but that didn't fly...)

Sharing: A Follow-Up

This post is meant as yet another thank-you message to all of you who responded to my sharing challenge. In the lengthy and energetic email thread that developed, we shared about 10 substantial lessons in two weeks. (And then the iTerm email thread generated over 50 shared course-ideas in an even shorter period of time!)

I hope the sharing continues. I do realize that posting something on the padlet link in Schoology or in a discussion thread in the Marshall Faculty Group 2.0  Schoology Course requires a few more clicks than just sending out an email repsonse, but you've got Schoology open all day long anyway, right?! So, whenever you think of it, please share something. 

All this sharing is healthy, and it also stimulates creativity--we want to inspire our students to be more creative, and that means we have to inspire each other to be more creative, as well. Sharing our ideas on a regular basis is one way for folks to get some positive feedback, the lack of which is, according to one source, a creativity killer. 

A sign of spring! Taken in Jay Cooke State Park last weekend.

So let's all keep on sharing!

How to Get Your Stick Out of the Mud

Are you having trouble dealing with pedagogical change? 
Are you still teaching the way you taught 10 years ago?
Is the educational world moving too fast for you? 
Are you stuck in a methodological rut? 
Is your technological stick in the mud? 
Is your teaching style fossilized? 

Perhaps I can help... Here's some of what has worked for me.

• Do something on the fly--don't overthink it. Every now & then, you gotta throw your lesson-plan out the window and be spontaneous. 
• Whatever you're planning to do in class, make the kids do it--don't do it for them! See what happens. 
• Go visit someone else's classroom, even if you haven't arranged a visit. One day, I just popped in, unannounced, to Schonfeld's class because I realized I hadn't yet seen his new room. It was great! I had fun, I got to see what his kids were working on, and one of the students we have in common offered to try to build an app for me!
• Go to a conference--get out into the real world of education and bring an idea back from it and make yourself use it. I'm still learning from presentations I heard at Lausanne a few years ago.
• If you're still using a PC, switch tech platforms, seriously. I know those are fighting words, but doing so gave me tons of confidence. I learned so much, in such a short time, that it made me fearless about edtech. Don't you want to be fearless?! 
• Open up a Twitter account & follow 5 good educators or education blogs (Edudemic, MindShift, TeachThought). Twitter is really big in education, and if you didn't realize that, you're missing out! Just go through the list of folks Lori and Matt are following and pick 5. You'll get more good ideas, and faster, that way than any other. When I need ideas, I scroll through my Twitter feed, click on a few interesting-looking links and before I know it, I have more ideas than I can deal with, at which point, I stop. Find a beginner's guide here.
• Speaking of Matt, go talk to him or invite him into your class! I've said this before, but people aren't making enough use of him--it's his job to help you: why won't you let him?!
• Set up a Feedly or Flipboard account, or use some other feed-reader, and start collecting articles about education. Feed-readers make it easy--you don't have to search--they bring the info to you! 
• Just subscribing to The Atlantic's education feed will bring you tons of great articles to get you thinking. 
• Ask Kevin to put you on the list for the Marshall Memo--you'll get lots of info that way, too.
• You can also use Pinterest as an education feed-reader of sorts. Just ask Johnathan!
• Actually read those articles your colleagues are sharing.

Well, those are my suggestions for now. Please add your own to the comments. What's worked for you?