Tuesday, November 29, 2011

How South Korea gets it Right

Education in America has changed.  I say this like I'm some kind of wizened old spinster teacher who has seen fifty school years come and go.  I'm not THAT old, but my initial statement still stands.  Even since my days in elementary school (which started in 1986), I have seen a drastic shift in instructional methods, curriculum, and disciplinary policies within our schools.  Students today face a much more challenging educational environment than I did.

Once upon a time, the United States was one of the top nations in the world in mathematics and science, putting us in the driver's seat when it came to space exploration.  But as the years have past, the memories of our competition with the Commies have faded, and our students are becoming less and less able to compete internationally with the new rising stars.

One of those rising stars is South Korea.  I ran across an article last week on CNN by Fareed Zakaria entitled "Why all of South Korea went silent".  It's a short article, maybe running 500 words, quickly discussing the South Korean equivalent of the SAT.  Students study for years for this exam which lasts a grueling nine hours.  For such a short article, I was surprised to see that it illicited 264 responses.  The average Korean school day lasts from around 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.--approximately an hour longer than most American public schools, and the average Korean school calendar has 25 more school days than the average American public school calendar.  After school, many students attend a hagwon--a private, after-hours tutoring academy--until 10 p.m. or later.  That's a 14 hour school day.  Average tuition for a hagwon?  $2,600 per student per year.

Since shortly after World War II, South Korea has placed a strong emphasis on educating its children, improving its literacy rate from 22% in 1945 to just shy of 98% (97.9%) in 2002 according to the CIA World Factbook.  In 2009, South Korea placed 4th in mathematics according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.  Additionally, they ranked 6th in science proficiency and 2nd in overall reading proficiency.  The United States, by comparison, ranked 31st, 23rd, and 17th respectively.  That was in 2009 and South Korea has only done better since then.

Success, though, usually comes at a price.  As of 2010, South Korea also holds the highest suicide rate of any OECD nation at a shocking 22 deaths per 100,000 individuals.  The current population of South Korea is approximately 48.8 million people, so you can do the math.  To put that in perspective, countries with the lowest suicide rates (such as Italy and Spain) tend to hover in the 3 per 100,000 range.

Critics of South Korea's educational system point out that there is a heavy emphasis placed on rote memorization to allow students to do well on their exams, and that critical thinking goes largely untaught.  Students routinely sleep in class because they are up late studying, and because they realize that anything they miss can be learned at their hagwon later in the day.  Parents have chosen to have fewer children, unable to reconcile the costs of education with their pocketbooks (in 2009, South Korea had the world's lowest birthrate with the average South Korean woman giving birth to 1.2 children in her lifetime).

Despite some of the ugliness that has been caused by South Korea's education system, one thing that simply can't be denied is that South Koreans care about the education of their youth.  Perhaps they are a little overly zealous in some respects, but South Korean parents, teachers, and politicians all emphasize education, and, clearly, their approach is working.

That's not to say that Americans don't care about their children's education, but the days of education being a privilege rather than a right are well behind us.  Even the Supreme Court says so.  Every person in the United States is entitled to a free public education up through high school.  This is both a blessing and a curse.  We are fortunate to live in a country that views education as so important that it commands all individuals to be educated up through age 18.  Traditionally, denying education to a population has been used as a means of control.  A means of keeping the population ignorant and illiterate.  Unfortunately, by commanding that all individuals be educated, we have to accept that not everyone wants to be educated.

If we want to see a shift in education, we need to understand that it starts with us--the parents--and the expectations that we have for our children.  We don't have to go as far as the South Korean parents, but we could take some tips from them.  Be involved with your child's school beyond elementary school.  Help your child with their homework.  Be willing to hire a good tutor if your child is struggling even if they're only in elementary school.  Early intervention is the key to helping your child be successful.  Be an advocate for your child and education in your community.  The squeaky wheel gets the grease, and this holds true in education, too.

Parents can't change everything, but we can change how we approach education.  If we make education a priority, then so will our children.

http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2011/11/21/zakaria-why-all-of-south-korea-went-silent/?iref=allsearch
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2094427,00.html

Thursday, November 17, 2011

The Final Countdown

Getting the Most Out of Your High School Education or How to Best Prepare Yourself for College


Several of my former students are receiving their college acceptance letters in the mail.  I've seen the Facebook posts:  "Accepted to UT!"  or "Just got my acceptance letter from ETSU!".  Well, it is, after all, that time of year.
This time next year, my charming little freshmen will once again be freshmen, but the stakes and the cost this time will be much higher.  So, how do I, as a teacher, ensure that these students begin their college careers with the best possible start?
The College Board (henceforth called The Board) recently released the results of an interesting survey.  The Board, if you aren't aware (as I wasn't), is the creator of several large, well-known exams (the SAT being the most prominent) and the curriculum and tests for AP classes amongst other things.  Blood-sucker status aside, the results of this survey shed some very interesting light on what we can do to better prepare our students to be successful in their post-secondary lives.
Here's a break-down of some of the numbers:

  • The Board surveyed 1500 students who graduated with the class of 2010.
  • 74% of those 1500 students immediately enrolled in some form of post-secondary education upon graduating from high school.
  • 47% of the respondents said they wished that they had worked harder in high school, and many of those said they wished they had taken different classes.
  • Only 49% said they felt like high school adequately prepared them for both college and work.
  • 58% of students say that they rely upon their family to help them in setting goals after high school.
  • 86% said they believed that a college degree was worthwhile, and 76% of them were not enrolled in any type of degree program at the time of the survey.
  • 54% said that their college classes were more difficult than they expected them to be.
  • And, sadly, of the 74% who had enrolled in some form of post-secondary education immediately out of high school, 81% did not complete their first year.
Let's take a look at that 81% who didn't complete their first year of PSE (post-secondary education).  There are many reasons why a student may not complete his/her first year:  not enough money to complete the year, an unexpected accident or death, but I suspect that for many students it comes down to a lack of preparation.
There are many ways a student can be unprepared for college.  Certainly a lack of academic preparation is the first thing that jumps to my mind, but some students simply choose the wrong college or the wrong career path.  Did you catch the statistic above that said that 58% of students rely on their family for advice?  I know that's probably a shock to some parents whose teenagers have essentially ignored them for the past four years, but they don't necessarily seek out the opinions of guidance counselors, teachers, or friends.
Knowing this, the next question is:  What can parents do to help ensure that they guide their teenagers in the right direction?

  • Encourage your child to take harder classes.  I say this with a caveat.  There is a fine-line between encouraging/insisting that your child take harder classes and being pushy.  Only do this if you are certain that you child has both the work ethic and the skills to be able to handle the class.  Otherwise, you could do more harm than good.  One of the best things my mom ever did for me was insist that I take a fourth math my senior year of high school.  Math was never my strong point, and I had completed the state graduation requirements (Algebra 1, Geometry, Algebra 2).  In my mind, I was done with math.  However, my mom insisted that I take the extra math class, and in the spring of my senior year I found myself sitting in a statistics class.  I didn't appreciate at that time, but when I found out that the ONLY math class I had to have to graduate college was statistics, I was grateful when I could stop doing the homework for that class in October because I knew everything we were covering all ready.  I guess my mom decided (correctly) that if I could handle Algebra 2, then I could handle statistics.
  • If you are not familiar with the college application process, take the time to learn.  I have never met a guidance counselor who couldn't find time to talk to a parent.  Attend informational meetings that your school or community is offering.  
  • Know what schools your child is considering, and what career path he/she has in mind.  There is no law that your child has to stick with the major that he/she enters college with.  My college didn't require you to declare a major until the end of your sophomore year, but if your child is considering a highly specialized career, this information should color his or her choices pretty heavily.  If your child has trouble with large classes, perhaps sending him/her to the largest university in the state is not the best idea.  
  • Go with your child to tour some of the schools on the short list.  Get a feel for the campus and the people. 
  • Encourage your child to apply to multiple schools.  We all had our first choice schools, but there is always the possibility that your child might not get in to that first choice.  Like most things in life, he/she needs to have a back-up plan.
  • Take the SAT and/or the ACT more than once.  As of a couple of years ago, ACT allowed students to take the ACT exam for free once.  Use this to your advantage as a test-run.  Once the scores have returned, you will know what areas you REALLY need to focus on the next time you take it.
What can teachers and schools do to prepare our students?

  • Teachers, if you're ever given the opportunity to be trained to teach an AP class, take it even if you don't think you'll use it right away.  I know that in the case of biology, the teachers must first be trained to teach AP Biology and these training classes are expensive.  You would be amazed at the number of schools that don't have AP classes because their faculty lacks the proper training.
  • Encourage your students to consider some form of post-secondary education.  No, not every student needs to attend a four-year university, but many students are oblivious to the fact that there are other options out there.  
  • Don't be afraid of making your class challenging.  Your students will thank you for it later.
  • Contact professors at area colleges and find out where they feel their in-coming freshman are lacking.  This type of collaboration will allow you to see where to focus your efforts.
If you want to read the College Board survey results, you can view their pdf document here:

Monday, November 14, 2011

How do we stop a bully?

I recently had a lengthy Facebook discussion with a friend of mine from middle and high school regarding bullying.  Her son was being bullied on the bus, and the situation had reached the point  where he no longer wanted to go to school.
This scenario seems to be replaying itself across the nation as the school year progresses and our students begin to crack under the burden.  We’ve all seen the stories of students, tormented so extremely by their peers  that they feel they have no other choice but to take their own lives, and parents and schools are left asking the same question:  “What can we do?”.
A study released this month by the American Association of University Women (AAUW) attempts to address some of these issues.  Though the study, Crossing the Line:  Sexual Harassment at School, admittedly focuses primarily on sexual harassment in grades 7-12, it highlights some valid points that apply to bullying in general.
  • Forty-four percent of students said the reason why they had harassed another student was because they didn’t think it was a big deal.  Bullying and harassment of any kind should be a big deal. 
  • Fifty percent of all students didn’t do anything about being harassed.  They didn’t speak to a parent, a teacher, a friend, or the police.  Most bullying occurs in the seedy underground of the American public school—in the hallways during class changes, in the gym locker room, in the bathrooms, on the bus, or at the bus stop.  The places out of reach of or only loosely monitored by teachers and administrators.
  • Thirty-six percent of girls and 24% of boys reported some form of cyber-harassment via text message, e-mail, Facebook, or other electronic means.
  Ladies and gentlemen, we have to do better.  All of us.  Parents, teachers, and administrators.  This is affecting our children’s education.  After being sexually harassed, students reported that they didn’t want to go to school, they had difficulty sleeping, they had actually stayed home from school, and, in some cases, been forced to change schools.
                Many students throughout the study reported that they felt their teachers didn’t care or wouldn’t do anything if they brought up the issue.  We need to know the school’s and school district’s policies on bullying/harassment and be able to speak to a student intelligently about what he/she needs to do if a student does report bullying to us.  Giving a student who has been harassed or bullied a step-by-step approach to taking control of the situation is a way to empower your student. 
           All complaints of sexual harassment/bullying need to be taken seriously by the administration.  There have been too many instances lately where a student has committed suicide, only for us to later discover that the school was perfectly aware of the bullying and not enough was done to stop it.  If a student is involved in a bullying or sexual harassment complaint, parents need to know immediately.
Finally, parents have the unique difficulty of striking the delicate balance between privacy and a lack thereof.  While middle and high-schoolers expect a certain degree of privacy, there is nothing wrong with a parent checking their child’s cell phone, Facebook account, or email occasionally.  Maybe that doesn’t make me popular, but, in this day, it could mean the difference between your child living and dying.  Experts have told parents for years that we should keep our family computers out of the kid’s bedrooms and in the living rooms.  There’s a good reason for that. 
If you want to read the full study Crossing the Line:  Sexual Harassment at School by Catherine Hill and Holly Kearl, you can read it here:  http://www.aauw.org/learn/research/crossingtheline.cfm