A World-Class Education by Vivien Stewart

Author:Vivien Stewart [Stewart, Vivien]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: EDUCATION
Publisher: ASCD
Published: 2012-01-17T16:00:00+00:00

Reflection Questions

As you consider the ways in which Singapore, the Canadian provinces of Alberta and Ontario, Shanghai, Australia, and Finland have each raised their student achievement to the top of the world and the key elements they all share, here are some questions to stimulate a discussion of how your state or district could meet world-class standards. How does your state or district stack up on these elements of high-performing systems?

Vision and leadership: What is your state's or district's vision for what an educated American should look like in 2030? Can you engage your students, parents, teachers, and business leaders and community organizations in reaching consensus on what knowledge and skills will be essential and form an ongoing leadership coalition to take and monitor strategic steps toward that new vision?

Ambitious standards: High-performing countries have ambitious standards across the curriculum that are understood by students, parents, and teachers alike. To start, can you construct an implementation plan for the curriculum, instructional, and professional development supports that would be needed to get all students to achieve the Common Core standards in reading and math? (See Chapter 5.)

Commitment to equity: How well would your lowest-performing students do on the PISA science assessment? (Sample questions are available from the OECD PISA website at www.oecd.org/dataoecd/47/23/41943106.pdf.) What would it take in terms of classroom interventions, changes in school structure, multiple pathways, out-of-school supports, professional development, and targeted resources for low-performing schools to set a high floor of achievement in your state or district?

High-quality teachers and leaders: What steps can your state or district take to raise the quality of teaching and leadership to match the new challenges? (See Chapter 4 for a detailed discussion of how high-performing countries recruit, prepare, support, reward, and retain high-quality teachers and leaders.)

Alignment and coherence: High-performing countries perform well because all parts of the system work together toward achieving their standards. In the United States, there is typically an "implementation gap" between a state's or district's goals and what happens in classrooms. What are the causes of the implementation gap and the barriers to change in your jurisdiction? What bold action could you take to eliminate those causes?

Management and accountability: Taking the vision and standards you have laid out as your school system's five-year goals, what kinds of teachers and knowledge sharing will your system need in order to develop the professional capacity necessary to meet those goals? What should be the goal for Year 1? Year 2? How would you measure progress toward those goals in a fair and transparent way?

Student engagement and motivation: How motivated are your students to study and learn? Can you identify those students who are bored or disengaged, whether because the work is not challenging enough or because they are falling behind and, as in Ontario, create a student success plan for each of them?

Global and future orientation: The world is changing fast, and schools cannot stand still. Review what other countries do to keep abreast of the world's evolving educational standards and best practices, and discuss ideas of how to impart a more global perspective in your school.

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