Correctable Error
January 17, 2014
I have written at other times and places that if it had been the stated purpose of our state’s and country’s chief executives and legislators for the past 20 years to weaken public education, they would have done exactly what they have done. They have spoken about strengthening schools and improving education, but their actions have done the opposite.
This is precisely the point of the richly researched Reign of Error, The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America’s Public Schools by Diane Rovitch (Alfred A. Knopf, 2013).
Competition, choice and corporate influence are all attacked, as are the misuse and overuse of standardized testing and the excessive reliance on e-education.
The author’s prescription for schools is not everything new and different, but removal of politicians and profiteers. And, catching my attention most, Rovitch writes:
“As students enter the upper elementary grades and middle school and high school, they should have a balanced curriculum . . . Their school should have a rich arts program where students learn to sing, dance, play an instrument, join an orchestra or band, perform in a play, sculpt, or use technology to design structures, conduct research, or create artworks. Every student should have time for physical education every day . . . Every school should have after-school programs where students may explore their interests, whether in athletics, chess, robotics, history club, dramatics, science club, nature study, scouting or other activities.”
The kinds of programs that the MHSAA promotes and protects are the keys to the type of education students want, need and deserve. And I admire every school that provides these programs in spite of all that has conspired against them for two decades.
Prime the Pump
July 24, 2017
Even the awkward or aggravating moments in life – perhaps especially those moments – have the redeeming value of offering metaphors for these messages. Times like this ...
Country dwellers and cottage owners know that the pump which brings water to their residences is a precious apparatus. When it works, it’s taken for granted; when it fails to work, it ruins almost everything planned.
So it’s prudent for those who don’t live on a community water line to know how to prime their own water pump; and some of us have had to learn the hard way to keep jugs of water on hand to prime the pump. As my local well expert told me, “You can’t prime the pump with water that’s already run down creek.”
That’s wisdom on many levels. It reminds us to have emergency plans. But more than that, it suggests we should take advantage of opportunities as they arise, not try to do so after they’ve passed by. It suggests boldness ... a degree of aggressiveness.
In our current situation, it suggests that we assess what is trending, but not take forever to do so; and seize the day in order to shape the future.
This is when I think, for example, of conducting regional junior high/middle school meets and tournaments across Michigan and 7-on-7 football leagues in the summer. When I think of mandating MHSAA camps for officials during their first three to five years of registration. When I think of adding a co-ed Ryder Cup format to the MHSAA Golf Tournament and a co-ed team tennis format to the MHSAA Tennis Tournament. When I think of adding flag football for girls, volleyball for boys and both water polo and weightlifting for both genders. This is when I want to take a chance with the exploding e-sports world, and the emotional tug of Special Olympics unified sports.
I have zero motivation for increasing the number of contests or the distance of travel for high school athletics, but I get very excited when I think of expanding the number of students who might get engaged if we would prime the pump before the water runs away from us.