Cycle 5: What Makes a Good School?

As I sat, pen in hand, making my notes in the margins of this cycle’s readings my mind was going in a million different directions.  How would I go about the task of defining a good school? I began by thinking about the aims of a good school.  Did I agree with Noddings’ thoughts about aims that should promote happiness? I contemplated how such aims would impact and guide curriculum and instruction.  I pondered how assessment of student learning would be conducted in a “good” school and how data resulting from those assessments would be used.  Certainly a “good” school would support not just student learning but also the professional development of its staff.  What would that look like?  What would it entail?  As my mind became flooded with ideas, I soon realized that I was no longer trying to simply define a “good” school; I was really attempting to design my dream school.  I was allowing myself to envision a school that would reignite a passion for teaching many teachers, one that would allow teachers to do what they know to be in the best interest of their students and incorporate the instruction that they believe to be best practice.  I was imagining a school where teachers wouldn’t have to compromise either of those in order to meet the ever-growing demands of standards and standardized testing. 

It was at this point in my imagining when I began read The School at Work from Meier’s The Power of Their Ideas.  In short, I was stunned.  As I read each page it was as though someone was reading my mind.  There it was.  Someone had already done what I was attempting to do in my mind.  Meier’s educational model in Central Park East Secondary School (CEPSS) was everything I would want in a “good” school.  It resonated with me on so many levels; however, due to the length of this assignment and nature of a blog post, I will only discuss a few.

The first component of a “good” school that I feel is demonstrated by the CEPSS model is the value placed on depth and not breadth.  Depth of study is viewed as essential for real learning.  Due to this, their model promotes the use of performance-based tasks that have meaning for students and build their “habits of mind”.  These performance tasks emphasize collaboration, inquiry, and problem solving.  They also allow for students to have more choice in how they will pursue their studies which leads to greater motivation.

Meier’s states, “As we rush through a hundred years of history in less than a week, or cover complex new scientific ideas one after another, there’s no time to study conflicting evidence, read multiple viewpoints, detect the difference between false analogies and real ones, not to mention imagine how else it might have happened.”  Hear! Hear!  It’s not that the study of multiple viewpoints, conflicting evidence, and the like are not valued in my teaching environment. To the contrary, there is an expectation that students will be engaged in this type of thinking and learning.  However, though depth is expected, the extent of the material to be covered is not always limited as is suggested and encouraged by Meier.  For example, I am responsible for social studies instruction. In addition to geography, civics and economics, my third graders are also responsible for learning the history of Michigan from it's prehistoric native people to present day.  Attempting to cover this span of history along with the other branches of social studies in the course of the year while at the same time providing for depth is quite the challenge.  I believe as Meier does, that a good school can scale down the scope of the content without sacrificing rigor.  It is a belief that covering less material gives students more opportunities for deeper understanding and provides for the development of inquiry and learning skills.

In connection to limiting the amount of content covered in each subject area, I feel that a good school would follow the lead of Meier and her colleagues and integrate learning in the different subject areas whenever possible.  This would again promote a greater depth of understanding in students and help students to see their learning is not in isolation but is applicable in many areas.

Meier also discusses the benefits of a smaller school another aspect I see as important to developing a “good” school.  Maintaining a smaller school means a smaller student body and also a smaller staff which, ultimately, benefits both parties.  Obviously, a smaller amount of students lends itself to more individual attention and a stronger connection between student and teacher.  A smaller staff allows for a greater professional bond between staff members.  Which leads me to the next ideal of CEPSS that I feel is an essential component of a “good” school, staff collaboration and professional development.

In the CEPSS model, teachers are given significant amounts of time to meet and make pedagogical and curricular decisions that help to promote the vision established by the school. Beyond that, they are encouraged to have discussions of theory and reflect on practice.  It is a “staff-run” school.  The teachers in this type of environment are going to be more vested in their jobs and happier to be at work because they know their opinions actually matter.  They are more likely to maintain their passion for being an educator.  The smaller staff also means that the voices of all are being heard and acknowledged.  Discourse is expected.  It is not just the opinions of a few that matter, but every teacher’s voice has merit.  The professional growth that results from granting teachers this level of professional respect benefits the both students and staff.

Ultimately, I believe CEPSS is a model of a “good” school because it functions like a caring, working community.  Building a “good” school means building a strong community.  What makes community strong is common vision.  All members of the community must support and believe in this vision.  All members have to have a voice in the decisions and all members have to feel their voice is heard.  Perhaps not followed, but at least heard.  The staff, students, and administrators of CEPSS share a common vision of education and make decisions together that they feel will promote this vision. However, even the noblest vision will fade if it is not passed along.  It is then the obligation of the standing community members to pass it along and foster it in new members as they join. 

Sadly, this did not occur at CEPSS.  As I was so invigorated by what I read about this amazing school, I was motivated to find out more about their model.  Upon my investigation, I came across an article from the Coalition of Essential Schools. I was heartbroken by what I read.  The article (Sustaining Change: The Struggle to Maintain Identity at Central Park East Secondary School) was written by Diane Suiter and Deborah Meier herself and describes major changes at CEPSS and how the vision they had when the school first opened its doors is a memory to some and others have never experienced it at all.  The authors site several possible reasons for the change which can be summed up by the following quote, “Examining the layers of this complex metamorphosis, I began to understand the ways that additional students, a substantial number of new teachers followed by steadily increasing teacher turnover, difficult budget cuts, and soon after, an enormous external pressure to move toward competitive, standardized testing finally took their toll.”  It seems even convictions as strong as those held by the visionaries who began the school were thwarted by the same demands and “evils” of today’s education system that we in the rest of the world have also been experiencing.  Though the article is a disheartening cautionary tale, it is also a worthy read for those who were as moved by the original intent of CEPSS as I was.

My hope is that the proverbial pendulum of education will once again swing the other direction and more schools will be able to step back into the path first illuminated by those at CEPSS.

Additional readings and resources:

Sustaining Change: The Struggle to Maintain Identity at Central Park East Secondary School (The full follow-up article about CEPSS)

Grading Schools: How to Determine the “Good” from the “Bad”-PBS NewsHour (Video Link-Explores whether or not test scores are the true measure of a “good” or “bad” school

What Makes a Good School: Students Speak Up at Leadership Forum (Hear from students themselves about what makes a “good” school.