Yes, the bubble tests must go on.

Today’s post references a story that almost makes me want to shower. Though I can’t really say that it is anyone’s fault. A culture of TEST, TEST, WE MUST TEST has insidiously woven its way into the soul of American teaching and when people react as they do in the story I link below, well… to me, it’s just a by-product of misplaced values.

In a nutshell, a teacher died, the school (quite naturally) was shocked and saddened but, inconvenient as this may sound, the educator passed away on state testing day. So the school bravely did the right thing… and postponed the test one hole day from Thursday to Friday.

This link explains it better than I ever could.

But how has it all come to this? Well, Kelly Gallagher just linked this story via twitter which, I think, says a ton.

Two “ya really oughtta read this” pieces today… the operative word being pieces because our inane focus on bubble testing is tearing our school system to pieces.

So today is a just a little “state of what’s going on” type of post. A good friend of mine, a great teacher, just informed of this, but be warned… you really don’t want to read it.

My friend in Michigan just had a 10% pay cut – RETROACTIVE TO DECEMBER – imposed by the school board (they have been working without a negotiated agreement all year). That means her checks will be 20% less for the rest of the year. AND she has additional health insurance costs now also being imposed! Teachers were told if they don’t show up to work tomorrow they can be fired!

I mean is this really what our nation wants?

I am struggling to even write commentary in a way that I feel good about posting because all of my commentary feels just so dark. And that’s not who I am nor who I want to be.
But how long can this educational levee hold in the face of this current onslaught from all sides

Today’s blog post is a throw over to a must read article. Here is the link.

I must say, I have had my issues with Diane Ravitch before (not personally; I do not know her) but this piece is entirely exceptional. Perhaps because it is so accessible. Truly, the lay person in the general public can read it and “get it”.

People in schools, parents of kids in schools, Joe and Jane on the street, this is a must read link if you want to know about our schools. We are just crushing our nation’s schools – and what’s worse is that it’s only getting worse.

*head on desk, banging*

I’ve gotten a bit of blowback from my previous post on bringing cell phones into the class in a way that somewhat caught me off guard. And when I reflect on why, I think there’s a part of me that may not have tipped my hat enough to the idea that there are going to be inevitable “issues” with the incorporation of more technology into our classrooms – but I also thought that this notion was somewhat a given, that all of us knew precisely this going into any discussion of this type of stuff.

Teachers are going to have to develop new skill sets to keep pace with the new skill sets that students are going to be developing – and needing – as literacy tools evolve, morph and grow. Will there be “rule violators” with some of this stuff? Of course. Will there be challenges? Of course? Will it be, as the techies like to say, “discomforting” for the entire institution of public education? Of course.

But a new era is upon us. Hand held technology has evolved so rapidly – and is so remarkable – and provides so many expanded tools for learning that we are going to need to start to figure out a way to start incorporating it. You can poo-poo it all you want in 2011 – and even in 2012 – and even in 2013… but today’s high school freshman will graduate from an institution that will have seen a ton of growth by 2014/2015 in this area. And by their 10th high school reunion, parts of their old school will seem unrecognizable. It’s literally an explosion ready to to happen under our classroom feet… and like it or not, it’s coming.

And why? Because there is merit to these tools being used. Yes, there will be some sorting of the wheat from the chaff but we’re still sorting that in the non-tech world of schools even after decades and decades of public debate about it. Looking to have all the answers before we start swimming in these waters is tantamount to saying we’re never going to make the leap and jump in the pool.

As every teacher who uses this stuff knows, at some point, you just have to jump in. That causes fear. That becomes personally confrontational. That taps into our shadows.

But schools – and the tools we use to teach inside of them – are changing. No one can hold back the water about to burst from this dam.

In my last blog post I said that printed books seem to have a legitimacy that eBooks do not. Now, will that change?

Of course. But when?

I know not.

However, lots of folks who sit on book award committees (the ultimate sanctioning body of a book’s merit, in many, many ways – not that I agree, but society certainly seems to buy into it, so I’ll play along for the moment) are already swamped enough with titles to read that have “been published in print form” by a credible institution. The publishing houses – like agencies – serve to vet content in order to arrive at some level of answering the question, “Is this material “worthy”?”.

In other words, prior to quite recently, not just any Joe or Jane could publish a book. (Except through a “vanity press” of course, and those have carried the stigma of “it’s merely a self-published book” for years and years.)

And to paraphrase a friend of mine’s ideas (Clix) any idiot can write an eBook – and many do. (BTW, I think this sentiment alone conveys why Clix and I are friends.) Where are the gatekeepers who protect us from having to read loads and loads of crap?

Well, the entire publishing industry has been fashioned around a system of just such gatekeepers and without jumping through their hoops, one mostly does not get Simon and Schuster, DoubleDay, Random House, Workman, or so on to put out your material.

The editors rely on the agents to be the first round of vetting, sifting the slush pile from the gems. Then the editors-in-chief rely on their own in-house editors/sales team to be the next layer of vetting, via the process of acquisitions. Then the bookstores rely on the publishing houses to determine those books worthy of shelf space (and, in case you didn’t know, end-caps and the such on bookstore aisles are actually paid for by pub houses these days; premium bookstore real estate costs pub houses money… it’s not simply cause someone “likes the book” that it ends up on an end cap in so many stores… it’s because a publisher paid for that end-cap as part of the marketing budget, which is why the rich often get richer and The Sentimentalists (see my blog post from a few days ago about this book) is a bit like a needle in the haystack/lottery ticket of a book. But then again, I believe in meritocracy and if a book is ROCKIN’, the audience will find it.)

All in all, this “new” system of eBook publishing allows a writer to by-pass all the gatekeepers… but that calls into question the idea of, “Is the reason they by-passed the gatekeepers because the material is inferior and it would not have passed the gatekeeping mustard in the first place?”

To wit, a lot of people will publish YA novels in 2011. However, when Disney releases my next new YA novel in July, it will come with the full weight of institutionalized credibility behind it. That doesn’t necessarily mean my new book is actually better than anyone else’s new book – especially the ones written by folks who only publish through digital text and eReading modules – but then again, now that I think about it, I do believe it could be argued that indeed, hey, it really might be.

Having Disney publish my YA book in print form (i.e. hardcover, available in bookstores across the nation, and so on) implies a credibility to my authorship that self-publishing a digital eBook simply does not have.

See, we count on gatekeepers in so, so, so many forms of media. With so much out there, who is going to curate the white noise? Publishing houses have served that role for quite a long time… and brought us a heck of a lot of GREAT books through this process. Without skilled agents and editors and other publishing industry professionals, it’s somewhat like the difference between a New York Times Reporter and Joe on the Street reporting on a story, no?

And so, the publication of Cinder-Smella in digital format calls into questions all sorts of societal presumptions about books, reading, credibility and the nature of “what is worthy of being considered as an award winning text?” I like that.

At some point, years from now, this debate will almost seem superfluous. You’ll know when the Newbery Committee picks something that never saw the light of day in printed form.

I like to read stuff from all sorts of perspectives written by all kinds of people. If they are “thinkers in their field” in any way, shape, or form, I will often cut them a wee bit of slack and try to hear what they have to say.

Not that I always agree, but listening to others weigh in helps me in many ways”think about what I really think” in my own life.

And often I see connections to school from what people “think” about life from outside the world of education.

To wit, Seth Godin just wrote a blog post which illustrates this point exceptionally well. (Here’s the link.) Essentially, his basic point is, when someone asks you what you are working on, you ought to be enthusiastic about your reply… or else you are, as he says, “wasting away”.

I am not sure I agree with the “wasting away” part because I truly LOVE what I do for a living but still, there are times where it’s a heck of a lot of blue-collar, roll up your shirt sleeves and execute, execute, execute type of work. (Nothing is ever all glamour and people who try to sell that idea to other people annoy me because persevering through the mundane – after all, God is in the details, right? – is a very under-appreciated quality of success, in my opinion) However, I do agree with the idea that the over-arching energy behind what “you are working on” ought to be fueled by enthusiasm, inspiration and passion.

And when I think about how so many kids go through school these days, I can’t help but be shocked by how absent these feelings are from their educational experience.

Top students, well, we often see how fervent they get when it comes to things like math-a-thon or science fair or moot court or debate club and so on. But if you slice away the top 10% of the highest achievers in any school and you took a measurement of “the enthusiasm for learning barometer”, I fear the ratings would be in the tank.

And who does well in anything that they do not find meaningful, personally relevant or authentically exciting.

Seth Godin is preaching to the business world in his blog post but I think the same thing can be said in education. The kids need to care (internal motivation; Daniel Pink has spoken to this a great deal) and the teachers need to feel enthusiastic and driven about their profession duties as well. (Which of course, can’t ever be legislated, much less measured… another post entirely.)

If you don’t care on the inside, eventually, it’s going to show in the work on the outside.

When I think about one of the most important ingredients a professional must bring to the table, I inevitably come back to passion.

To caring.

To giving a damn.

For me it is the epoxy that holds work which is of true, genuine value together.

I think about this often when I make my way through this world. When I shop in markets. When I go to the post office. When I call a mega-conglom about my various household services.

Sad to say it, but mediocrity reigns in this day and age and the truth is, I think we have all become so beaten down by crud-o-la performance that we are willing to settle for mediocrity because it at least lets us get in and out of the encounters without too much duress. After all, who hasn’t experienced the 45 minute phone call to nowhere-ville with any one of a dozen banks, cable companies, phone service carriers and so on?

It sucks the downright life out of you!

Heck, when I fly on airplanes the lack of passion for the work being done by almost all airline employees in terms of making my travel experience feel pleasant is glaring. Sheesh, it’s almost laughable to even expect anything more than mediocrity from the airlines nowadays. (Yet, having said that VIRGIN AMERICA and, to an extent SOUTHWEST, do show a verve you just don’t see in most other domestic carriers.)

But what makes the difference in a school? In many ways, it’s just this. Passion. Caring. Dedication. Commitment. Dynamic vitality! When I see a staff of teachers who are fired up about the kids, about the work, about meeting the challenges of the job, I can’t help but feel a sense of pride that, “This is what education is all about.”

And when I see a student that show a steely resolve to meet a challenge, give a better effort, step up their performance, and actually try to “learn” something I become energized and excited and even that much more willing to give even more of myself.

Vigor is contagious. Those who tap that well in their classrooms this year will almost certainly reach and teach more young people than those who do not.

Spend yourself this year. Spend yourself heartily!

Ellen Hopkins has written some ferocious books. Brave, gritty, hard-hitting and read by lots and lots and LOTS of teens. I am a big fan of her work.

Interestingly, a brouhaha has recently surfaced about Ellen’s “dis-invitation” to speak at a Teen Lit Fest in Texas.

I use quotes around the words “dis-invitation” because I really have no idea what actually went down. Where it stands now is that Ellen wrote a blog post called CENSORSHIP BITES that has raged through cyber-space… and now the Teen Lit Fest is being accused of all sorts of things and a bunch of celebrated YA authors have backed out of appearing (after previously accepting an invite) to take a stance against censorship.

The mainstream news has even caught up with the story and now things are really starting to hit the fan. And the people in Texas are looking as if they have big egg on their face. (FYI, Ellen has written some edgy books and is no stranger to having her work censored, I am sure, due to the graphic nature of the content.)

However, some event organizers claim that Ellen was never officially invited – a non-formal inquiry was supposedly floated to her, but not an official invitation – and people are jumping the gun by saying she was dis-invited when in fact, she was never even invited in the first place. (Ellen addresses this quite passionately in her blog post linked above. She clearly states she was indeed invited and then dis-invited.)

So perhaps this is a case of miscommunication combining with the forces of the world wide web to create a kerfuffle where there never really was one? Or perhaps it’s not and people are trying to censor Ellen Hopkins. I don’t know.

But no matter what happened, a big boo-boo was made somewhere and a Teen Reading Festival could be forced to go try and be festive without any authors to add some festivity.

Texas at the center of another storm. Sheesh, they keep this up and New York is gonna be getting jealous pretty soon.