M.I.T. Game-Changer: Free Online Education For All – Forbes.
How awesome is this?
via M.I.T. Game-Changer: Free Online Education For All – Forbes.
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Book club at TCS?
The other day my wife, Lindsay, told me about a book that she thought that I would like. The author was interviewed on Talk of the Nation and she was excited about his ideas. The book is called ‘The Other Wes Moore’. Basically the author read a story about a guy with the same name who was arrested for murder. The author, a highly successful soldier and young man, wondered , “What happened?”. This simple question lead him to write a letter to the other Wes to inquire. The book contains the answer to that simple question. While I haven’t yet cracked the book, I have purchased it and am toying with the idea of hosting an all-male student book club using this book. I don’t know if it’ll seem too up front to some of my students, but the notions of choice and decisions is compelling. This’ll be a blog series that I’ll be writing a lot about. More to come…
Reflection on August staff meetings
Each year we spend a week and a half preparing with the full staff. This often entails reviewing policies and procedures (boring but necessary), discussing our goals and objectives, hosting an orientation for students and families, and spending time preparing for our classes. This year we did this plus initiated committees that will help us move our ideas further, rolled out the goals and objectives to our reading and writing initiatives, and ate lots of donuts! Coming out of our time together I felt that we were very well prepared and hit a good stride as a staff.
I was pleased with how well the committees worked especially. Each committee brought useful and innovative ideas out to staff. The stand outs to me were the diagnostic testing planning and preparation and the work on a ‘helpful tips’ sheet for teachers when they’re reaching out to parents.
The other notable event that happened at the school was related to enrollment. Going into August we were disappointed that our admission of new students slowed down coming into the month. Then the floodgates opened up! There were multiple days when we admitted 5+ students! It was very encouraging to also see that the students who were coming in were eager to go to an academically focused school. With that rate we formed a wait list in a short period of time. It was gratifying to see our student body form over the last few days before school started.
The final comment that I want to make is that I’m in my last six months of my administrative licensure program. This section focuses on instructional observation. I have lots of homework to complete (mainly reading and writing but I have some activities to compete as well) by the 15th of this month. Once I finish in January, I take an exam and then will have an administrative license. It’ll be gratifying to complete this work and earn another credential.
All in all this is going to be an exciting year!!
Reflection on week one
This was the longest 4-day week I’ve worked in recent memory. I’m guessing I was close to 60 hours. Thanks to the help of Erin and Allie we were able to get 304 schedules done before classes started. The only way I could be happier is with slightly smaller class sizes.
The school had a great start to the year this year! The ‘Writing and thinking workshop’ seemed to have engaged all students in meaningful learning and set the academic culture that we were looking for. All in all this was an amazing week at work. I’ve been recouping all day with OSU football and now the ND/Michigan game.
College Board president tests well on income | The Columbus Dispatch
College Board president tests well on income | The Columbus Dispatch.
This should be the first and most important indicator that our obsession with testing has gone too far.
Continuing the Debate on Early College High Schools
Continuing the Debate on Early College High Schools.
This is a fantastic article on the importance of early college high schools. TCS is an early college high school and we pride ourselves on the opportunities that being a ECHS provides for our students and families. Certainly there are things that we do well and room for improvement. This article contains a few ideas that I had never considered (e.g., summer school as a support mechanism, branching into middle schools to support student learning and growth, etc.). I guess I should clarify, these ideas I have considered, just not all of the data behind them and the potential impact that they might have. At any rate, if you are unfamiliar with ECHS, this article is a pretty good place to start your thinking and learning.
Here’s whose ideas I’m thinking about: Sir Ken Robinson
Sir Ken Robinson: Bring on the learning revolution! | Video on TED.com.
I find his ideas to be incredibly interesting and convicting. Not sure what to do with them all, but I’ll be thinking them through for some time, I’m sure.
@GOOD Asks: What Makes a Great Teacher? The Community Answers – Education – GOOD
@GOOD Asks: What Makes a Great Teacher? The Community Answers – Education – GOOD.
These are some good answers to a great question. I think that everyone I work with is a person who embodies these characteristics!
Beating the Odds: First-Generation College Students Prepare for Freshman Year – Education – GOOD
Beating the Odds: First-Generation College Students Prepare for Freshman Year – Education – GOOD.
First generation college-going students have a very difficult time due to the lack of modeling and support. Families can be an endless source of energy and information for college students, but if they do not understand the system in place at colleges or they do not value education as highly as the child, they will not be able to guide the student to make the best educational decisions for themselves. As much as we want college to be open and available to all, this is a huge hurdle for students to go through and many don’t make it.
First Graduate provides mentors which will help students by establishing strong mentor relationships for these students. Our school begins students in college courses while they are still high school students. Both approaches will help increase the child’s odds of completing their sought after degree. One thing is clear, however, doing nothing sets these children up for failure, educational and personal disillusionment, and will not end cycles of poverty and ignorance.
Here’s what I’m working on…
1. Presenting with a colleague on why we should consider the words of Scott Belsky in his book, Making Ideas Matter and investing in his project management program to help us stay on task, organized, and productive.
2. Thinking about project-based learning in the physics classroom.
3. Reading ‘Balanced Leadership:What 30 years of research tells us about the effect of leadership on student achievement’ (what a sub-title!). Part of my work to pursue my administrator’s licensure.
4. We’ve scheduled 52% of the students and the other 48% are just 1 course away from being completed (students need to choose a course but they don’t do that for another week and a half). This time last year, 19% of students were scheduled.
5. Going to review the Common Core standards in English. It’s a barn-burner, let me tell ya!
6. Working on house projects this weekend with my in-laws and wife. Can’t wait to knock a few more items off of my to do list. I can’t go wrong with Ken’s help (the man’s a Mr. Fix-it!!)
