how do you get away with telling the state education superintendent to go stuff it?

markmaynard |  On Thursday, February 20, at 10:00 AM, members of the Eastern Michigan University (EMU) community opposed to the ongoing association between their university and the Snyder administration’s troubled Educational Achievement Authority (EAA), will be gathering in Welch Hall to “demand” that all connections be immediately severed. Following is my discussion with EMU College of Education Associate Professor Steven Camron, one of the event’s organizers… Those who cannot attend, by the way, are encouraged to sign the online petition.

MARK: My knowledge of the Educational Achievement Authority (EAA) is somewhat limited. Perhaps a good way for us to start would be for me to tell you what little I know, and you can jump in and correct me where necessary… As I understand it, the EAA was conceived of as a statewide school district, into which Michigan’s least well performing schools could be placed. This, we were told by the Governor, when he announced the existence of the EAA in 2011, would make it easier for the State to ensure that “more and better resources” could be delivered to the students in these schools. The long term goal, we were told, was to put the bottom 5% of all Michigan schools into the EAA, but they started with a subset of 15 Detroit schools. And the results at these schools, from what I’ve been able to ascertain, have been mixed at best. Since the roll-out of the EAA, during the 2012-2013 school year, we’ve seen enrollment in these schools drop by 24%, insufficient funding, and evidence of unsafe conditions, among other things. In other words, it doesn’t look as though “more and better resources” actually materialized… Am I close?

STEVEN: Yes, you’re spot-on! Former teachers I’ve talked to (three to be precise) have confirmed the anonymous reports we’ve been hearing out of EAA schools, about the poor teaching and learning environments. For instance, even experienced teachers are finding the exclusive teaching methodology – the computer-centric BUZZ system – wildly insufficient and under-resourced. And that’s even more true for the untrained Teach for America recruits who have been drafted to work in these schools.

MARK: Snyder, when announcing the launch of this initiative, in addition to promising “more and better resources” for kids in EAA schools, also said that there would be “more autonomy in these schools.” Given your reference to an “exclusive teaching methodology,” would I be right to assume that he also never made good on the promise of autonomy?

STEVEN: When the corporate reformers talk about “more autonomy for the schools” they don’t mean autonomy for teachers in the classroom. They mean principals getting to make hiring and firing decisions. They mean autonomy from “central office” on curriculum decisions, working conditions, staffing, etc.

MARK: What can you tell me about the BUZZ system?

STEVEN: I do not have first-hand knowledge of BUZZ. I’d suggest that you talk to former teachers, Delbery Glaze or Brooke Harris, who have very strong feelings and experience with it, and have described it as a joke.

MARK: Based on what we’re seeing unfold, it’s difficult not to get the impression that our legislators want to see a system in which those with resources purchase private education, while those without are warehoused in situations where inexperienced facilitators essentially read scripts… Which leads me to my next question. Are any of these initiatives being put forward by the EAA scientifically vetted? Are they employing best practices sanctioned by the educational community?

STEVEN: I think EAA officials have described their instructional approaches as “Student-Centered-Learning,” “cutting-edge” and the wave of the future. If that were true then why did the Kansas City Public Schools dump that experimental approach immediately after Covington left them to come to the EAA. Former teachers, and some anonymous current EAA teachers have unanimously described the instructional regimen at the EAA as anything but student-centered. My colleagues in the College of Education at Eastern, and Dr. Tom Pedroni from Wayne State, know better than I about evidence-based, research-supported pedagogy, and they describe this approach as defective from the beginning.