Educate For A Change

All education seeks to develop knowledge, skills, and understanding. We believe that proficiency in rigorous, sequential standards should be the foundation for learning in all disciplines.

The purpose of setting standards is to answer the question: "What knowledge, skills, and understandings do we want all individuals to have in a given subject?" and "What knowledge, skills, and understandings do we want all graduates of advanced studies to possess?"

Generally, there are essential proficiencies that must be attained for an individual to realize success in life. Every individual should be well-rounded: having been equipped through learning experiences that provide these essentials, and also through learning experiences that provide enrichment.

Enrichment education should begin at the earliest of ages. Learning for enrichment is vitally important, but that learning will be all the more enriching as the student becomes well-equipped in essential proficiencies. Generally, a strong foundation in essential academic standards makes enrichment experiences more meaningful and longer lasting in their effects.

Additionally, extra-curricular activities are also an important part of the school experience, and there is much learning in these. There are many social skills that can only be developed through purposeful interaction in extra-curricular activities. Our schools should be communities that provide rich extra-curricular socialization experiences.

Even the core-curriculum should extend beyond the scope of the standards. The interest and enthusiasm of both students and the instructor are a necessary element in the learning environment that carry inquiry beyond the fundamental requirements of a discipline.

Schools should provide some learning experiences that require no pre-requisites, and in some cases, standards might be relaxed if the student is in a class that is not part of the student's emphasis in study.

Proficiency strands might be developed that are differentiated between those that are needed generally, those that are life and career path specific, and those that are purely for enrichment.

Although we support the concept of all instruction being informed and guided by clearly delineated standards, we strenuously object to creating required timelines for achievement and advancement. Each individual deserves the amount of instruction and time that they require to gain essential knowledge, skills and understanding.

At all times, each student's unique talent's, interests and capacities, must be recognized, knowing that these will change over time if the individual is respected and nurtured in the learning process. Students should never be labeled as failures in any discipline simply because they demonstrate greater needs than most.

Measurable objectives for essential standards coupled with well-conceived assessment strategies and a "proficiencies profile" record for each student, will allow students and all other stakeholders to clearly see what has been accomplished and what needs to be done.

Periodic review of the "proficiencies profile" by school counseling staff, may be very helpful for students and their families as they make choices for instructional and career paths. We believe that institutions of higher education and employers in business and industry would very much like to know that proficiencies their applicants possess.

That being said: What are the "essential standards" to be in every discipline? It is not the mission of Educate For A Change to develop curriculum. It is the processes of placement for instruction and advancement, and the educational pathways provided to students that must be changed in order to make new interventions and methodologies effective.

We suggest that those who develop curriculum and standards ask some simple questions as guides for their work:

Does learning this standard serve a short or long-term purpose, or is it just learning for learning's sake?
Is this a standard that all students need proficiency in, or is it only essential for a segment of students?
Is this a standard that is a necessary pre-requisite for subsequent standards?
Is this a standard presenting something that a student must master, or simply be familiar with?

Developers of educational standards must exercise discernment and restraint, as they help to answer the questions, "What are the essential things that we want all students to learn in a given discipline?" and "What are the essential things that we want all members of our society to know?"