Eradicate Illiteracy

Eradicate illiteracy?

It will take between 36 to 48 months to eliminate illiteracy in America’s schools!

Believe it?

Well ... probably not!

Excuses abound as to why we cannot achieve this. We have all the skills, knowledge, and experience to send “a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth” – oh that was a different vision. 

My conclusion is as a nation we really don't want to each child fully and functionally literate.  

Did I just say that? 

If we were serious about universal literacy, we would get it done.  No excuses!

We already know what is necessary to successfully teach each learner.  We can effectively teach each child to learn to read as well as how to read to learn.

The excuses, explanations, objections, rebuttals, and the like are underpinned by opinion not empirical research.  Our challenges to eradicating illiteracy are more associated with the adults not the learners.  In part, motivated by the incredible amount money spent on interventions and remediation and in part by the lack of understanding effective pedagogy, literacy is not universal nor will it be any time in the near future. 

Don’t get me wrong.  Teachers every day provide incredible learning for learners despite the system constraints they face.  Incredible as it may seem, the very system they find themselves working within is working against them and us for that matter. 

The narrowly defined accountability system, the inability to understand standards, and the inability to design, deliver as well as assess instruction to inform instructional decisions combine to create a culture of failure – though we expect differently.

Often falling on deaf ears, those most adversely impacted by the system are those most dependent upon our schools for their learning, their success, and their future.

Their future however is our future. 

The cost of failure to learn as well as failed learning is extremely costly fiscally and culturally not to mention the devastation to the human spirit.

The most egregious result of illiteracy is poverty.  Poverty is too expensive.  We cannot afford it.   Rather than throw money away at programs to remediate, reform or recover failed learning why don’t we make the investment to prevent the failure to learn – eradicate illiteracy!

A fully literate society will not necessarily eradicate poverty.  It will, however, purposefully begin to reverse societal erosion caused by generational poverty.  Breaking the cycle of poverty cannot and will not authentically begin until we achieve universal literacy.

The first step to eradicate illiteracy is the most challenging – change the way we think before we change the way we behave.  Prevention to intervention requires a commitment to the mission that marshals not only fiscal resources but also human capital to aggressively address the skill, knowledge, and experience deficit children have as they enter the system.

The advent of effective and efficient digital tools, robust technology solutions that address learner inexperience with oral and written language are literally at our fingertips.  What we must do is first utilize these tools now, consistently and constantly to address literacy.  Without this action learners with the aforementioned deficits will never access or engage the full curriculum let alone meet or exceed local, state, national, or international standards. 

This is where insanity manifests itself.  Without disrupting our thinking or our behavior we commit the same crime as those before us – what isn’t learned now will be remediated later!

Seriously?

Our educators need permission to ensure literacy first before “tilting at windmills”. 

Policy makers listen up - If literacy is the focus of our intentions, convictions, commitments, and decisions first and foremost, accountability will take care of itself.

Not sure why we don’t get this?

Unless of course there is different agenda -

"I was moved with my heart to engage my mind to overcome the constraints" Biji Thampy

In a recent presentation to school superintendents and business executives I shared several constraints that often prevent leaders from leading effectively.  Constraints as we have come to understand are neither good nor bad – they just are!  Constraints out of balance become a liability, however.

The Flippen Group (http://www.flippengroup.com) have mastered the understanding as well as the coaching necessary for leaders to be aware, understand, and address their constraints to ensure leaders reduce or minimize the adverse impact of their constraints.  Though I know this reads like a commercial at worse and an endorsement at best, I know that many of well intended leaders have been unsuccessful because they either didn’t know their constraints or didn’t know how to address them and therefore those they led never realized the full effect or impact of their leadership.

The first step is becoming aware of your constraints.  Once in focus, there are intentional steps to implement to assist with creating and sustaining constraint “balance”.  

A powerful strategy and one that certainly is not new is the need to have colleagues that serve in the role of critical friends.  Call them mentor, call them coach or simply call them friend but each of us need them for balance especially with our constraints. 

Akin to Stu Weber’s Four Pillars of a Man’s Heart, constraints like pillars when out of balance are unstable, vulnerable, and threaten the collapse of all they support – our vision, mission, and core values – our work - those we lead and most importantly those we love – our families.

Constraint “balancing” is challenging.  We each have personalities, behaviors, experiences, likes and dislikes.  We have mannerisms, quirks, gestures, sayings, facial expressions, and the like that are all “tells” of our constraints. There is context, situations, circumstances and relational capacity that influence what we say, how we say it, and how it is heard or perceived.  Each of these has an effect.  Each can be positive as well as negative.

Simply put; working with people is not easy! 

Those of you in leadership positions were not called to just simply “work” with others.  You were called to lead.  The modern day definition of leadership is “you don’t know it all” and “you can’t do it alone”.  Leadership must be intentional!  The intentional leader is aware, knows, understands, and consistently and constantly strives to “balance their constraints”.  Anything less will impair obstruct, reduce, or prevent effective and efficient leadership.

We live in a time desperately in need of effective leadership; Leadership worthy of followership.  I believe those in leadership roles as well as those aspiring to be leaders must know and understand their constraints.  Moreover, we must be diligent and intentional about “balancing” our constraints to provide the leadership necessary to move others to do their best work.

I can think of no better way to balance constraints them to have individuals in your life that have no agenda other than assisting you to be your very best – I have been and continued to be blessed to have such individuals in my life – thanks to each of you for your investment in me, truth telling, and sharing what I haven’t always wanted to hear –

Why Wouldn't We?

I know to some the move to partner with Charter Schools, Private, Parochial, or other education management organizations (EMOs) seems to be a form of betrayal to public education.  Simply not true!  The notion that "getting into bed with the enemy" has merit creating the potential to make good on the promise that each child has not only opportunity but access to the highest quality teaching and learning experience, is not warmly viewed as a strategy to improve or reform education.  Rather, partnering is deemed more as surrendering to the inevitable – the demise of public education as we know it.

Arguably, not all alternatives to public education have been successful.  In fact, some have actually done more harm than good.  Equally true are the numbers of unsuccessful public schools that also do harm.  They exist!  Irrespective of attempts to mandate legislative improvement, failing schools persist.

Several reasons present themselves as explanations or excuses as to why schools fall short in meeting the most basic of performance expectations – hence failing.  Socio economic status, lack of parental involvement, under motivated students, and the like abound as excuses.  Yet, excuses like policy tend to focus on the symptoms of failure not root cause.  We actually do know what works. 

  For each failing school there are countless successful schools that out perform similar circumstances, demographics, or conditions cited as reasons schools fail.  Most of these successful schools did not become successful by means of legislative fiats.  Rather, they became successful due to several factors – intentional not random!

This set of defining factors that differentiate successful from failing schools are not new.  In fact, these factors or correlates of effective schools were first identified over forty years ago.  The difference has been the commitment to constancy and consistency of the presence and practice of behaviors and actions of adults.  

The correlates of effective schools are agnostic – they don’t discriminate between models of education.   As such they have tremendous import to schools and school systems.  Yet, if asked, most educators are limited in their awareness and understanding of the correlates.  Some have even dismissed them as a past “fad”.  The correlates are not a “what”.  Rather, they are a “how” – they are “how” the work is or should be done or what it looks like during and after the work is completed.

To be clear, Correlates of Effective Schools (Lawrence W. Lezotte) are:

• Instructional Leadership
• Clear and Focused Mission
• Safe and Orderly Environment
• Climate of High Expectations
• Frequent Monitoring of Student Progress  
• Positive Home-School Relations
• Opportunity to Learn and Student Time on Task   

       Take a moment and pursue https://www.lakeforest.edu/library/archives/effective-schools/HistoryofEffectiveSchools.php to learn more about the correlates and how they came about.

We presently live in a time of polarizing extremes that define positions especially when it comes to education.  We perpetually listen less and argue more.  We don’t allow others to complete their sentence or thought before interrupting.  We seldom are aware or understand differing positions or opinions let alone articulate what we are “for” versus what we’re “against”.

Lost in all the debate and discourse is the purpose of education.  A rising tide raises all boats just as an educated citizenry raises all manner of discussion as well as decisions of, for, and by citizens - all citizens.

Further still, the economics of an uneducated society or at best a society limited by a small class of educated citizens creates and sustains the very circumstances we presently face – a preponderance of an uneducated, unskilled, unemployed, underemployed, and unqualified workforce incapable of stimulating economic growth, new industries, new businesses, new opportunities, new possibilities, and dare I say, new jobs.

A different calculus therefore is timely. Forging partnerships committed to the aims, purposes, and best hopes of education are exactly what we should be doing - now!  There is much to be learned when the focus is on educating all rather than who gets the credit.

What matters is educating each student. What matters is education benefits all.

So, why wouldn’t we…!