Improving Teaching Through a Grassroots Reformation: 
Disclaimer: This blog appearrantly struck a chord in me because its a behemoth of ideas all piled together  (feel free to comment on my logic or content- thanks)

An area that I feel compelled to work towards change, as a high school teacher, is the way that our school system deals with English Language Learners (ELLs). To give some concrete understanding to this issue let me reference how my district's has failed in their attempt to reach these students:

1. Lack of a system to address the need - Throw them all at the new inexperienced teachers- I received on my 1st year of teaching, 4 periods of students who, despite progressing through grades k-8, had failed just about every class and still remained functionally illiterate. The only advice I received was to: a. not assign homework (they won't do it) b.  kick out the misbehaving students quickly c. teach them academic vocabulary, with no emphasis on how or what, or mention of the fact that they could barely even read - - Needless to say my first year was rather trying. In fact, throughout the past couple years I've been teaching  these students the majority of teachers teaching this population have given up and moved on to "regular" classes, and, sadly, about half have given up on teaching altogether. At the same time the district and other teachers bemoan falling test scores and a high drop out rate.  
2. Lack of leadership- Though I am often frustrated with my colleagues, I believe the problem does not entirely lie in their hands. No one knows how to deal with these students. Though I do believe that the responsibility should fall on those who are getting paid to figure it out, the district or site level leadership. Our English learner contact person has offered real concrete help in the form of worksheets and get to know you activities (which more often then not came straight out of a book or off the internet- like I can't fucking google shit) For help on my campus I have to seek it out on my own. I have to meet with credible teachers during lunch or pass notes during the useless training sessions. 
   
3. Lack of respect- Teachers who have stepped up to the plate with at desire to make a change (teachers who have been recognized by experts in their fields and have published articles in peer reviewed journals) are often brushed aside by those in power because their ideas may take too much initiative or time to implement. 

Sure, this is just my personal experience, but I hear it echoed by teachers all over the county. I haven't quite worked out the solution, but I know that teachers must  have a larger role in the leadership of any system that will succeed, and I cringe at systems that  place technocratic superintendents in power and allow them to mandate the direction that their districts are heading. In most cases these top down mandates include heavy scrutiny on test scores as a means to gauge the quality of education that students receive. Though these are the most easily  quantifiable measures of teacher performance they do not do a good job of truly grasping how well our students really comprehend material. A student's limited vocabulary or unfamiliarity with certain cultural interactions may make them unable to understand a reading passage or the questions being asked. Also, these types of high stakes tests are one of the worst ways of testing English language learners, impoverished, and special education students due to the fact that they have different methods of organizing information (they often do not arrange things in hierarchical logical patterns- like this blog post for example). A perfect example of this is the fact that the only students who do not pass high school exit exams are ELLs and Sp Ed students. Don't get me wrong, it is undoubtedly the purpose of the school system to introduce students to this type of formalized, logical way of thinking. It's just that I don't see that tests are helping do that, they instead show students that our education system values arbitrariness. The biggest flaw of standardized testing is in the message it sends to our kids. If we value critical inquiry and in depth reading & writing  then why give students tests that have them filling in bubbles. The most formal piece of most students k-12 educations often just become guesswork (a striking percent of students score less than 25% -that means they didn't even guess well), that has little bearing on their lives at all. No wonder students don't buy into the education system, they see no value in it. I believe our efforts to educate must include efforts to help students see the relevance of their education and its implication in the world they live in - Perhaps a school where students confront real life problems and atttempt to make a difference, like the school  Adam Doster suggests in his article "The Conscious Classroom." These kind of ideas could confront the youth culture's uninterest in the education system (a huge factor in student failure that is rarely talked about)

 Another thing that worries me about the education reform movements is the frequency that  finger is pointed at teachers who are substandard and need to be removed them from their positions. Of course these these crappy teachers exist. We all had them in high school and there are many  on my campus that are way overdue for retirement, but these crochety x-mas sweater wearing curmudgeons are only part of the problem. Rarely is there discussion about how to procure money needed to fund programs like NCLB, or create students that are critical thinkers v. those that can take tests. Even if there is discussion of failing teachers there is little discussion seeking to find the reason that teachers do get burnt out: they can no longer see hope in their jobs. The students are less interested, and there are more of them. Their jobs are more focused on stagnating in meetings (which more often then not do little to inform or educate teachers), and there is little chance to make their teaching better (unless teachers are motivated to do it themselves on their own time). So many trudge back to their dilapidated caves armed with a red pen and coffee mug (or if you were my HS math teacher- a flask of tequila) and await retirement.

That said, there are many teachers who, given the chance to have their voices heard and the responsibility to make their ideas reality, might actually make change. Like the most effective and healthy revolutions, the  change in education structure begins at the grassroots level, not at the top. Instead of being marketed by ACSD or any other education publisher, ideas need to come from teachers that are using them in the classroom. Take for example the National Writing Project a teacher lead professional devolpment group that is revolutionizing the way teachers approach academic writing in their classrooms.

There is a lot of experience and knowledge in our schools waiting for an outlet.  But this power can't be fully tapped until it can find an outlet in the school system itself. A reformation or revolution of the education system can't really take shape until those at the top acknowledge where the power lies.