RIVETING RESULTS, LLC...

Getting High School Students To Read  and Enjoy Complex Texts!

From Chuck Cascio: In my ongoing search for unique, ground-floor solutions to the rapidly changing teaching and learning environment, I was fortunate recently to learn about Riveting Results, LLC, and its CEO Arthur Unobskey, a longtime teacher, administrator, superintendent, and education reform leader. Riveting Results (https://www.rr.tools) is a program that deserves significant attention from educators, business leaders, and anyone committed to meaningful education reform. I am pleased to present details about Arthur and Riveting Results’ unique approach to learning.

About Arthur Unobskey: After thirty years as a teacher, principal and superintendent, Arthur Unobskey partnered in Riveting Results. After building systems and structures to support his students’ daily progress, he wanted to provide middle and high school teachers with the specific tools that they needed to teach all of their students to read-and enjoy-grade level text.

Throughout his ten years as a middle and high school teacher, Arthur strove to engage every one of his students in deep and rigorous study. As an administrator in both urban and suburban schools, he built and supported teacher and administrative teams that analyzed formative data to determine which teaching approaches unlocked students’ potential, particularly for reluctant students. As a superintendent in Wayland, Massachusetts, he guided the district to embrace the needs of underperforming students, integrating best practices from Social Emotional Learning and Culturally Responsive Teaching to improve student engagement and performance.

About Riveting Results, LLC: From 1994 to the present, Arthur co-founded, co-directed and served as the Board Chair for The Writers’ Express (now SummerInk), a non-profit summer writing camp for middle and high school students. During this time, The Writers’ Express developed an instructional model that helped campers from a wide variety of backgrounds find their voices as writers.

Arthur notes that at a time when 69% of entering 9th grade students read below grade level, Riveting Results' 9th and 10th grade comprehensive English/Language Arts solution transforms students' classroom experience. It enables teachers to accelerate their skill development so the entire class can read and enjoy the same rigorous, engaging books. Requiring minimal professional development, its software-based curriculum enables a teacher to seamlessly implement four high-leverage literacy activities that provide students with the precise practice and feedback they need for rapid and sustained skill development.

Arthur’s responses to questions delving into details about Riveting Results, LLC:

>>>What do you see as the major challenges in education today?

The hold that divisive local politics has on our public schools limits collaboration between researchers and educators, stymieing innovation. District leaders cannot risk the immediate fallout of giving different services to different children, a necessary feature of the randomized controlled studies that have led, in the medical field, to the rapid spread of effective practices. 

With no widely accepted “gold standard” for efficacy, impressive results from another district are met with skepticism. Curriculum committees often privilege programs and approaches that they already know even if they are not impactful. Those districts that seek to be innovative often turn to their teachers to do the impossible: create an in-house solution that is adaptable for all teachers and students while each of the teacher-curriculum developers simultaneously tend to the needs of 25 to 150 of their own students. In such a scenario, no one has the brainspace to effectively determine the impact of their work on student achievement.

>>>What specific "ground floor" education/learning issues does Riveting Results help address?

Recently, a groundswell of mainstream media attention has spotlighted how districts across the country are changing their instruction to incorporate a more structured approach, summarized as techniques that align with the rigorously researched “Science of Reading”. This change in reading instruction will result in more students learning how to read elementary texts. It is a very exciting shift. The media, however, has paid far less attention to adolescents and what literacy instruction they need. The structured literacy approaches used in elementary schools, no matter how systematically implemented, will not enable most high school students to read grade-level texts, shutting them out of the classes they want to take and that prepare them for college.

Text changes significantly between fifth and sixth grades. Students begin to see complex sentences, and by ninth grade, almost all of the text they see is made up of these types of sentences. They are longer, making use of clauses to link multiple ideas. When students see these new types of sentences, they trip over them. The ability to read fluently (smoothly and with expression), which they developed in elementary school with simple sentences, deserts them. Reading becomes laborious and students don’t have the leftover mental energy necessary to process the meaning of these sentences.

The literacy research of the past twenty-five years is overwhelmingly clear that middle and high school English teachers need to make fluency practice a consistent part of a larger literacy program. Fluency practice provides a bridge to complex text that enables students to read more automatically, become engaged and then dive deeper with subsequent research-based reading activities. But getting adolescents to read out loud is hard. And, how does a teacher with 30 students in a class give feedback so that each student can improve their fluency? How can teachers integrate fluency practice into a highly engaging reading and writing curriculum so that it does not feel remedial?

Programs that claim to provide fluency practice for adolescents use methods developed for elementary students that adolescents roundly reject. Commonly recommended choral or echo reading doesn’t work in a high school class because adolescents are much less compliant than elementary school students and will often fake participation. Current fluency software solutions that do track individual performance measure words read correctly per minute, marking students down for each mistake. Speed is not a good measure of fluency with complex text because it requires changes in pace and the careful emphasis of certain words. And, adolescents disengage from instruction that focuses attention on their mistakes.

Riveting Results makes practicing reading out loud joyful. Activities guide students to become comfortable with complex sentences and to notice the impact that their reading has on others. Teachers use the software to assign each of their students individualized fluency practice on the same section of highly engaging, complex text. Not only do students receive feedback on their recordings from remote scorers, but they share their readings with their classmates. The classroom community that emerges from this shared fluency practice enables each student to establish what Gholdy Muhammad calls “literary presence,” (Muhammad, Cultivating Genius: An Equity Framework for Culturally and Historically Responsive Literacy, p.28), the sense of agency that supports adolescents from historically marginalized communities as they dig into understanding complex text.

After approximately fifteen minutes of fluency practice, students develop an initial understanding of a particular section of complex text. Riveting Results’ software then guides students through three subsequent high-leverage literacy activities in which they work with a partner and their entire class to deepen their understanding of the text. Because they no longer have to provision activities or spend class time explaining directions to students, teachers can focus on eliciting their students’ best work, giving students’ immediate and actionable feedback, and harvesting student ideas for dynamic classroom discussions.

We are implementing our 9th and 10th grade comprehensive English Language Arts curriculum in schools in New York City, Maine, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Texas and California and are getting extraordinary results.

>>>Recalling your own life as a student, going back as far as you would like, what personal experiences did you draw upon while creating Riveting Results?

I believe that a classroom can be magical! The tension during a debate; the laughter at a peer’s wit; the grunts when a task is difficult; and, ultimately, the momentum when everyone is leaning in: a nurturing classroom is both raw and gentle. As an educator, I gravitated toward adolescents because they not only crave such a setting, but also respond to it by discovering that they have the agency to impact everyone around them.

At the same time, building such a classroom community, particularly a high school classroom whose students have widely divergent reading levels, cannot be done by a teacher acting alone. Teachers need tools to enable all of their students to succeed. Riveting Results seeks to provide teachers with those tools: beautiful, engaging literature and a set of practices, tested and refined for 30 years, embedded in software so that teachers can reach every student.

For more information about Riveting Results, LLC, go to https://www.rr.tools.

To contact Arthur Unobskey directly, email at arthur@rr.tools.

To contact Chuck Cascio directly, email at chuckwrites@yahoo.com

Copyright: Arthur Unobskey and Chuck Cascio, all rights reserved.

Five Takeaways from the TRANSFORMING EDUCATION Series

by

Chuck Cascio

     When I started the “Transforming Education” series on my blog last school year my goal was simple: Cut through the empty political blather and share ideas and experiences from people who have actually devoted their lives to teaching, school administration, and education-reform initiatives. As a former teacher of 27 years at both the secondary school and university levels, and as a former executive at two major education research/reform organizations, I knew this-- 

     The reality that people inside schools experience daily is vastly different from the “experience” of people who push around political and/or personal agendas. 

      Inside any school building, where youths move through various levels of maturation daily, there are multiple tensions, challenges, and, yes, rewards. Every teacher who is doing their job thoroughly is basically putting on approximately five hours of “shows” daily for youths whose brains and emotions are often pulled in many different directions. Administrators, counselors, and support staff are submerged in analyzing challenges and experiences that can help each individual child. And leaders in education reform organizations like the Urban Schools Human Capital Academy, the National Board for Professional Teaching standards, and many others put their experiences on the ground-floor as they search for innovative ways to help the daily challenges that their colleagues inside schools face.   

     These ground-floor experiences and the challenges that emerge from them are at the heart of education reform. That is not to say that political interest is not important—it is, for all the obvious reasons in American society today. But far too often, the political proposals and decisions are made without any realistic understanding of what goes into the exhausting day-to-day operations of educators. So I invited educators and education-reformers with that ground-level reality to contribute to my ongoing series “Transforming Education” and they responded with truly enlightening experiences, comments, and proposals that have the capability of making real change. 

Here are five key takeaways summarized from their collective comments, but I urge all readers to review my blog site to read their comments in depth…and to follow the series, which will continue during the 2022-2023 school year:

     >>>TAKEAWAY #1: Grass-Roots Reform—The need for transformation is immediate and it must start at the grass-roots level, which means getting the input of teachers, administrators, and educational organizations. The conversation in the field has been overtaken by politicians and others who have little or no experience actually engaging in day-to-day learning activities. Nor have they spent significant time inside school buildings actually experiencing and analyzing the fundamentals of educational operations. 

     Every person contributing to the Transforming Educations series has had--and is having--those experiences. 

     Every person in the series knows what it is like to try to engage students in activities designed to help strengthen their self-image, to increase students’ understanding that the world extends far beyond their own daily lives, and to help students commit to increasing their knowledge—all part of a process that is constantly evolving. The experiences discussed in the series are filled with levels of engagement that show the respondents’ awareness of how true education develops. From the heartbreaking racism some experienced to the realization that someone in a position of educational development actually believed in them, these educators show how their lives were changed. 

     Those lives were changed not through narrow-minded, empty rhetoric but through daily, minute-by-minute decisions made with the knowledge that the world is bigger than any one person. Through the comments of these committed educators, we see realistic actions that can be taken—actions dedicated to making students aware that their lives are more than a simple ideology.

     >>>TAKEAWAY #2: Students First--When a teacher or coach or counselor or administrator makes it a point to let students know that their lives and their intellect are meaningful and can be used for a greater good, those educators have a positive influence on countless lives. Sadly, respondents in the “Transforming Education” series also shared some examples of the opposite experience--the unnecessary criticism leveled by an education professional on students in ways that made those students feel inferior and reduced their sense of purpose. 

     Educators are not perfect…they make mistakes like lawyers, doctors, athletes, mechanics, politicians and other professionals do. They may not even be aware of their negativity in the moment and the lasting impact it can have on individual lives. But they must be made aware! There are ways to do that, to assist educators who need to have their purpose adjusted, and those methods must be implemented in order to bring teaching to a new level of professionalism--a level that is essential and is already being implemented by many in the field. 

     I believe that educators want to reach their students in a positive manner. They recognize their opportunity to change lives in a moment and to guide students as they consider their future. We see from the responses in the series that everyone, when reflecting on their own experiences as students, had both positive and negative experiences. But let’s focus on the positive, the responses that show how teachers can shape lives through simple, consistent, personalized interactions.  Transformation occurs primarily by keeping students in mind as the priority rather than the goals of politicians.

>>>TAKEAWAY #3: The Times Are (Always) Changing--Old methods of instruction are being outmoded. Relax!That does not mean that every teacher needs to become a technology expert. However, it does mean that the reality needs to be faced--kids today are tech-driven, and in the “Transforming Education” series various statements show ways in which new, more engaging methods of learning can be implemented. 

     Sure, educators should try to do things that take kids away from their technology—to engage them in conversation, to stimulate their on-the-spot thinking, to help them realize that they are MORE than their technology. But that can be done while also engaging them to use technology in creative ways--perhaps to develop videos that correlate to a piece of literature or to elaborate on a historical event or to encourage them to explore cutting-edge areas of science. The educators in this series, and the others out there like them, have those creative ideas but they MUST be given the opportunity to explore and implement them without fear of political reprisal.

     Society moves on as time moves on. New experiences impact and shape daily lives. Our cars are different. Our methods of payment for daily needs are different. Our social interactions are different. Yesterday’s science fiction is today’s reality. The respondents in the series make us realize that things also change in education and, therefore, educators and education itself must change in order to match the times and the experiences of the youths we serve.      

>>>TAKEAWAY #4: Teachers Deserve Respect…and Higher Pay--Various responses in the series also touch upon the ongoing lack of respect for teachers in particular and educators in general. This has to change. Anyone who actually believes that teaching--real teaching--is easy has never actually done it!!! Teachers are pretty much on stage for several hours per day in front of the toughest "audience" imaginable--young people whose active minds are ready to be engaged and are easily distracted. 

    As is noted in some responses, too often teachers are viewed as having an "easy" schedule--"only" working nine months of the year, summers "off," etc. That is nonsense!!!  Teachers who are deeply engaged in their work put in countless hours during the school year and during summer month studying, preparing, creating, learning. It is a nonstop process, and it is a process that requires the highest levels of professionalism. 

     Yet the average public school teacher salary in the United States is approximately $64,000, a figure that varies significantly by state and locale.  (Members of Congress and the Supreme Court receive well into three-times that amount, along with staff, retirement, and various other benefits.) Teacher benefits such as health care, retirement, IRA contributions also vary widely with some states and localities not providing pensions at all. 

     The knee-jerk reaction to improving teacher pay and related issues is that there are not enough measures in place to determine how effective teacher performance is, so providing increased benefits and pay across the board would reward even those who are not reaching high levels of professionalism. Perhaps to the surprise of many, I agree that there should be measures in place to ensure that teachers are performing at the most effective levels possible, and an answer is in front of us: 

     Series respondent Peggy Brookins heads the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, an organization that has established the highest levels of teaching performance as developed by educators and researchers in their respective fields for more than 30 years! Implementing those standards nationally would provide goals for teachers to reach, the possibility for incentivized compensation for teachers who reach those goals, and the requirement that every few years teachers must show that they are continuing to perform at the highest levels of those evolving standards. 

     Teachers deserve to be treated, evaluated, and compensated as professionals, but the standards that they are to reach cannot be established by politicians operating in isolation of the profession. The members of the profession themselves can--and have--established those standards. All that is required now is implementing a process for transformation. 

>>>TAKEAWAY #5: CHANGE IS POSSIBLE!!! This series will continue indefinitely because too many people seem to believe that meaningful change in education is either unattainable or can only come from outside sources. Every person has some experience, at the very least, as a student. But those singular experiences do not comprise the total reality! Read the insights in “Transforming Education” in order to get at least a taste of the complexity that goes into teaching, school administration, and education reform. There is no singular experience, no personal solution—education is so much bigger than the singular. It is about many; it is about thousands of individual decisions made by educators and students daily; it is about understanding that the real world is larger than any one person’s reality.

     Certainly, given the system in which we live where political realities tend to drive other realities, we should not ignore the potential impact of politicians on the decisions that need to be made to help transform education. However, those politicians should not venture into the unknown. They should make a commitment to spend significant time inside school buildings, talking to teachers and administrators, observing the incredible diversity in the student body, and meeting with education-reform organizations to gain a personal, detailed insight into what those organizations do and how they might help in the transformation.

     Change is essential. Change is overdue. Change requires thoughtful, insightful, experiential action.  With that, then yes: Change IS possible!

Your Thoughts/Comments? Write to chuckwrites@yahoo.com

Copyright: Chuck Cascio; all rights reserved.

TRANSFORMING EDUCATION TODAY
(Seventh in a Series of Interviews with Education Leaders)
Featuring Wendell Byrd

 

Note from Chuck Cascio: Given the difficult issues facing educators today in the USA, I have been running a series in which I contact established educators and request their insights, in their own words, on a number of vitally important education issues. Readers who would like to comment on the views expressed may email me at chuckwrites@yahoo.com. My Twitter handle is @ChuckCascio. Not all comments will be responded to by me and/or the individuals interviewed, but all will be read and, if appropriate, forwarded to others engaged in meaningful education reform. I am pleased to present as the seventh interview in this series the views of Wendell Byrd, former elementary school teacher, coach, and education entrepreneur who has dedicated his career to all aspects of education. Wendell's profile appears below:

Wendell Byrd, a renowned teacher for 31 years at Hutchison Elementary School in Herndon, VA, in 2003 founded the non-profit Readers Are Leaders, a program that trains high school athletes to tutor elementary school students in reading. The program's goal is to "promote growth for both our student-athletes and our young readers" and the statistics it has achieved in improving student reading skills are truly impressive. As head basketball coach at South Lakes High School in Reston, VA, Wendell amassed more than 450 victories, nine district championships, and six regional championships. Wendell continues to apply his coaching and teaching skills to his Readers Are Leaders program. For more information about Reader Are Leaders, and to make a donation, go to https://www.readersareleadersnonprofit.org.

Help spread the word: #TransformEducation

>>>Recalling your own life as a student, going back as far as you would like, what do you remember as the most positive and most negative educational influences for you personally?

My most positive influences as a student would be two people, one in elementary school and one in high school: 

In 1964, schools in the City of Falls Church, VA, became integrated.  I attended Madison Elementary for fifth and sixth grades (one of five Black students in the school).  At the end of fifth grade I was named co-captain of the patrols. During those times each school would send their captain(s) to a patrol camp for developing young leaders. Mr. Chuck Koryda, our principal, provided all of the paperwork to share and to be signed by our parents (the camp was held in southern Maryland). After returning the paperwork a few weeks later, Mr. Koryda called me down to his office and said, “There is a problem with camp--I was told that they will not allow Black students to attend.”  He followed up with, “So I will find a camp were you and Larry (the other co-captain) can attend together.”  

We sat there a while talking about how important it is to see people for who they are, not by what they look like. I learned a lot from Chuck Kordya in my two years at Madison, encouraging me to be the best. And, believe it or not, Chuck Koryda became my principal at Hutchison Elementary in Herndon, VA, for a few years where I taught for 31 years!

Second of the positive influences would be Bernie Bronstein, a teacher in 1966 at George Mason High School, also in Falls Church, VA.  Bernie and I made a connection the first day we met.  He was the true definition of a mentor – a person that teaches or gives help and advice to a less experienced younger person. I was lucky to have Bernie in my life to share so many life lessons with me.  Our relationship continued to grow throughout high school and college, and he remains a life-long friend.

When I became a teacher/coach I was determined to always be the best example and provide the needed support to all of the students that I came into contact with.

>>>Can you identify an educator (or educators) who provided you with uniquely positive insights into subject matter as well as teaching style? If so, please explain what made them unique.

I was very fortunate to work with many outstanding educators.  In 1975, I started my career in teaching at Hutchison Elementary in Herndon, VA.  It was a brand new school and the principal was unique in staffing—half the staff were women and half were men.  I was teamed with a veteran teacher, Kay Bean, and she became a mentor and friend.  In education, teaching styles and strategies come and go (the vicious circle).  Good educators like Kay, would take the good out of all of the styles and strategies and provide their classrooms with the best learning situation. 

>>>What inspired your career as a leader in education?

Being surrounded by strong educators who were in the profession with the main goal of supporting all students.

>>>Who should have the final say in what is taught in schools?

Final say has to come from elected leaders who should have a heartbeat of what is going on in their district.  That is why voting for representatives who meet your needs is essential.  Your School Board should be listening to administration, teachers, parents and, really, their community as a whole.  They are elected to make the best overall decisions for everyone. 

>>>Should high school and college students be encouraged to participate in internships to help enrich their learning? If so, what can be done to stimulate this participation?  

Yes, I agree that high school and college students should be encouraged to participate in internships to help open their eyes to a great profession. High schools should promote “Teaching Clubs” and provide opportunities for those students to intern under strong professionals who will endorse the educational field (and not just have them grade papers!).  

 Copyright: Chuck Cascio and Wendell Byrd, all rights reserved.

TRANSFORMING EDUCATION TODAY
(Sixth in a Series of Interviews with Education Leaders)

Featuring Lindsay Trout

 Note from Chuck Cascio: Given the difficult issues facing educators today in the USA, I have been running a series in which I contact established educators and request their insights, in their own words, on a number of vitally important education issues. Readers who would like to comment on the views expressed may email me at chuckwrites@yahoo.com. My Twitter handle is @ChuckCascio. Not all comments will be responded to by me and/or the individuals interviewed, but all will be read and, if appropriate, forwarded to others engaged in meaningful education reform. I am pleased to present as the sixth interview in this series of the views of elementary school principal Lindsay Trout, recipient of the 2021 Fairfax County (VA) Public Schools Principal of the Year Award as well as a Best of Reston (VA) honor. Lindsay’s profile appears below:

For the past 10 years, Lindsay Trout has served as the principal of Terraset Elementary School in Reston, VA, the school she attended as a child. Her passion as an educator started as an elementary school special education teacher in Fairfax County (VA) Public Schools. Lindsay coached high school basketball and soccer at South Lakes High School in Reston before becoming a special education and leadership teacher there, which is also her high school alma mater. After earning a Masters in Educational Leadership from George Mason University in Fairfax, VA, Lindsay became an assistant principal at South Lakes. When Lindsay became eligible to seek a principal position, she was selected to fill that opening at Terraset. Lindsay prides herself in a lifelong mission of giving back to the children and families of Reston, because she says the lessons she was “showered with there hugely impacted the servant leader” she strives to be every day. 

Help spread the word with:#Transform Education

>>>Can you identify an educator (or educators) who provided you with uniquely positive insights into subject matter as well as teaching style? If so, please explain what made them unique.

When I think of “those” two teachers whose way of teaching profoundly impacted me as a human being and future educator, I discover a common theme: authenticity. I was lucky enough to have the same teacher, Ms. Anne O’Hara, in third grade and part of fourth at Spring Hill Elementary in McLean, VA. She was a mom first and a teacher a close second. What made me want to be my best self was how she emulated being “real.” She often shared how her high school-aged daughter did in her track meets, and occasionally her son would run by the classroom window during the school day. She laughed at herself; she laughed with us; she cried and showed us how to always have space for emotions while we learned about the State of Virginia, played (competitive) kickball, or stuck up for each other in the cafeteria. Because of these lessons, we wanted to do our best and be our best…and for me, that meant wanting to be a teacher—just like her. 

Similarly, when I was a junior at South Lakes High School in Reston, VA, I had the great fortune of being chosen for the newly formed Leadership Class. The class was unique to South Lakes with no established countywide curriculum; therefore, the curriculum and focus was left to the teacher, Mrs. Faye Cascio. Our first assignment of the year set the tone that this was going to be a space of vulnerability as a way of learning authenticity. Like all exemplary educators, Mrs. Cascio modeled the “work” for this assignment. We were to bring in a song that revealed something about us/our lives/our paths as a way of introducing ourselves to each other…a way of creating a powerful classroom community. Mrs. Cascio was not above this work; rather, she courageously shared a song (a Kathy Mattea song, I still remember it!) that expressed the difficult, yet hopeful, time that was her current reality. We walked into that special classroom as strangers, and through her raw vulnerability we were instantly committed to each other, ourselves, and the work of servant leadership. (And that’s not easy to do with 22 self-absorbed teenagers!)

>>>What inspired your career as a leader in education?

When I was 13 my mom went back to school at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA to get her teaching degree in physical education. As a student in that program, she had the opportunity to volunteer at a huge Special Olympics Track and Field meet. I asked if I could go with her to volunteer. When we arrived and checked in, we were told that we were designated “huggers” and that I was assigned to any and all athletes in Lane 4 on the track. A few races in, an eight-year old named Chuckie came through the finish line in his wheelchair powered by a lever on the right side of his cheek because he was born without arms or legs. Chuckie’s affect was flat—no smile, no glimmer in his eyes and the second I lifted away from the hug I gave him, I decided I was going to stay with him through his events until he smiled. I abandoned Lane 4, checked Chuckie’s schedule of events and together we went from one event to the next. Finally we were at the softball throw station where he took his spot next to a catapult device that he could operate with his head and neck. He hoisted back the catapult, released it and that softball launched, and so did his smile for the first time all day.

After the event, Mom and I got back into her Oldsmobile Omega and I said, “Mom, I want to be a special education teacher.”

>>>Identify a couple of accomplishments that you and/or members of your school and/or organization achieved that you feel have had a lasting impact on education.

When I taught leadership in Mrs. Cascio’s footsteps at South Lakes High School, some of my students with special needs were part of the class. It was an ‘integration’ that most students had not been privy to before. Students with significant intellectual disabilities and students with severe physical impairments were integral members of our classroom community rooted in servant leadership. I created safe spaces and opportunities for students to tell their own stories about what it is like to have severe cerebral palsy or to have learning difficulties. We learned profound lessons like how to be comfortable in really long wait times so that students could attempt (and often fail) intelligible speech only to be relegated to an assistive communication device in order to participate in a classroom discussion. 

Students learned that sometimes it is blatantly obvious what someone has to offer to a situation or a cause and sometimes it takes locking arms, opening ears and being patient to learn what special contribution a person can make. As a result of living (not just learning) servant leadership, students learned to act when there was a need—a lesson I believe many of them took with them into their post-high school lives. They raised thousands of dollars for victims of Hurricane Katrina, as well as for a classmate going through cancer treatment, and also hosted a bone marrow drive (the biggest the area had ever seen) for someone they didn’t even know. These opportunities obviously impacted those in need at the time and put the students on a path of making a difference.

As principal at Terraset Elementary, through the course of the pandemic, we developed a mission called “Terraset Together.” The idea came during the aftermath of the George Floyd murder as the pandemic forced us all to be isolated in our homes. We badly needed connector pieces in a time where we felt unreachable to one another. These connector pieces especially had to reach those who felt disconnected BEFORE Covid and the George Floyd killing. We created forums where voices were not just heard but were invited to share. We didn’t just invite families who did not feel part of the conversation, we truly listened to and embraced what they had to say. We summarized our mission as a need to “do better and be better for all of our children and families” and to feel like we are making progress…in an area where there is lots of work to be done.

>>>What do you see as the major challenges in education today?

Public school systems’ way of educating children is antiquated and horrifically slow to change. Simply put, we still teach too much to one type of child/learner. We, as public school educators, do not have enough options/pathways/entry-points for students to learn their strengths in order to have something strong to build upon. Instead, we ask all students to enter a narrow pathway and hope that they have some success along the way. When they don’t (because of different learning styles and abilities, vastly different interests and needs), in essence they “fail” right to a dead end. The reality is that we, as educators, have failed to find them their path—the one that goes and goes and goes.

>>>Who should have the final say in what is taught in schools? 

In essence, students should have the final say about what is taught in schools. There is grave disproportionality between how times have changed and how public schools have not evolved since the creation of public schools in the early 1800’s. At that time, schools had a singular purpose of preparing people for democratic citizenship; we now need schools to have a space for every single child to discover their path to a productive, kind, contributing citizen. We, as a public school system, need to create more and different entry points that meet children and families where they are. We need to help children create their own paths instead of having all paths converge into one common walkway.

Copyright, Chuck Cascio and Lindsay Trout; all rights reserved.

Send comments tochuckwrites@yahoo.com