Franklin Schargel’s Blog

Students are using the Internet to complain about teachers, principals and the schools they attend.  The vastness of the Internet and MySpace, Facebook and personal blogs permit students to vent about real or perceived complaints.

Some schools have taken have taken disciplinary steps against students posting critical content such as suspending students from the National Honor Society or banning the students from clubs or teams. There’s no question that attacks on principals and teachers are abrasive, degrading, racist, sexist, sophomoric and insulting, we tend to forget that students also have rights. Too often, adults seem to believe that you get handed the Bill of Rights along with your high school diploma; that’s not the case.

The issue of free speech in the schools seemed to be settled. In a landmark case in 1969, the Supreme Court upheld the First Amendment rights of public school students to wear black armbands to protest the war in Vietnam. The high court asserted that young people have First Amendment rights, noting, “It can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.” Short of a substantial disruption of school operations, the kids could have their say, the Supreme Court concluded.  The black armband has been supplanted by the Internet, a potent tool for information, education and character assassination.

The current law is murky, and might not be clear until the United States Supreme Court steps in.

The best legal path in these cases is to treat young people posting ugly and potentially defamatory content the way we would adults. If the content is illegal or threatening, charge them. If the content is libelous, sue them, as some teachers and principals have done. And if the content is neither criminal nor libelous, contact their parents.  While the Supreme Court has said that schools cannot suppress free speech, the Court has said nothing about parents metering out punishment.

USAToday reported (8/21/) that the kindergarten class of 2010-11 is less white, less black, more Asian and much more Hispanic than in 2000. For example, about one out of four 5-year-olds will be Hispanic. More Hispanic children are likely in the next generation because the number of Hispanic girls entering childbearing years is up more than 30% this decade.

The profile of the 4 million children starting kindergarten reveals the startling changes the USA has undergone the past decade and offers a glimpse
of its future. In this year’s class, for example, about one out of four 5-year-olds will be Hispanic.

A USA TODAY analysis of the most recent government surveys shows:

“¢About 25% of 5-year-olds are Hispanic, a big jump from 19% in 2000. Hispanics of that age outnumber blacks almost 2 to 1.

“¢The percentage of white 5-year-olds fell from 59% in 2000 to about 53% today and the share of blacks from 15% to 13%.

“¢Kindergarten enrollment is up, from 3.8 million in 2000 to about 4 million.

This is not just a big-city phenomenon. The percentage of minority children is growing faster in the suburbs and in rural areas.

In Lake County, Ind., a Chicago suburb, the under-20 population went from 51.8% white in 2000 to 47.1% in 2008. In rural Nebraska’s Colfax and Dakota counties, the share of Hispanic youths is rising while young whites are down from 60% to about 45% in the same period.

“¢Schools face linguistic challenges. The share of 5-year-olds who speak English at home slipped from 81% in 2000 to about 78%. The share of Spanish
speakers grew from 14% to 16%.

The article fails to point out another challenge facing educators.  Hispanics represent the largest group of school dropouts.  So in addition to having to address the language issue, schools need to address the steps needed to stop these youngsters from dropping out.

School friends may play a major role in teen’s academic success.

In a new study conducted in Los Angeles 629 12th-graders kept a record of
activities such as time spent studying and time spent with school friends and out-of-school friends. Students with higher grade-point averages (GPAs) had more school friends than out-of-school friends. The more school friends, the higher the
GPA.

It appeared that in-school friends are more likely to be achievement-oriented and share and support school-related activities, including studying, because they are all in the same
environment.

The study was recently published online in the Journal of Research on Adolescence.

The findings don’t mean that friends from outside of school aren’t beneficial.  It simply means that the friendships formed in school are more beneficial for academic success.

Data clearly indicate that students who spend more time in school are more academically successful.  It may indicate that schools should encourage more time in school through the use of clubs and sports activities.

Each August since 1998, Beloit College has released the Beloit College Mindset List. It provides a look at the cultural touchstones that shape the lives of students entering college this fall. The purpose of this list was originally created as a reminder to faculty to be aware of dated references, and quickly became a catalog of the rapidly changing worldview of each new generation. The Mindset List website at www.beloit.edu/mindset.

The class of 2014 has never found Korean-made cars unusual on the Interstate and five hundred cable channels, of which they will watch a handful, have always been the norm. Since “digital” has always been in the cultural DNA, they’ve never written in cursive and with cell phones to tell them the time, there is no need for a wrist watch. Dirty Harry (who’s that?) is to them a great Hollywood director. The America they have inherited is one of soaring American trade and budget deficits; Russia has presumably never aimed nukes at the United States and China has always posed an economic threat.

Nonetheless, they plan to enjoy college. The males among them are likely to be a minority. They will be armed with iPhones and BlackBerries, on which making a phone call will be only one of many, many functions they will perform. They will now be awash with a computerized technology that will not distinguish information and knowledge. So it will be up to their professors to help them.  A generation accustomed to instant access will need to acquire the patience of scholarship. They will discover how to research information in books and journals and not just on-line. Their professors, who might be tempted to think that they are hip enough and therefore ready and relevant to teach the new generation, might remember that Kurt Cobain is now on the classic oldies station. The college class of 2014 reminds us, once again, that a generation comes and goes in the blink of our eyes, which are, like the rest of us, getting older and older.

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A Portion of Beloit College Mindset List for the Class of 2014

Most students entering college for the first time this fall””the Class of 2014″”were born in 1992.

Few in the class know how to write in cursive.

Email is just too slow, and they seldom if ever use snail mail.

Buffy has always been meeting her obligations to hunt down Lothos and the other blood-suckers at Hemery High.

“Caramel macchiato” and “venti half-caf vanilla latte” have always been street corner lingo.

With increasing numbers of ramps, Braille signs, and handicapped parking spaces, the world has always been trying harder to accommodate people with disabilities.

A quarter of the class has at least one immigrant parent, and the immigration debate is not a big priority”¦unless it involves “real” aliens from another planet.

Colorful lapel ribbons have always been worn to indicate support for a cause.

Korean cars have always been a staple on American highways.

DNA fingerprinting and maps of the human genome have always existed.

Leno and Letterman have always been trading insults on opposing networks.

They have never seen a carousel of Kodachrome slides.

Computers have never lacked a CD-ROM disk drive.

Czechoslovakia has never existed.

Second-hand smoke has always been an official carcinogen.

Adhesive strips have always been available in varying skin tones.

American companies have always done business in Vietnam.

Having hundreds of cable channels but nothing to watch has always been routine.

They first met Michelangelo when he was just a computer virus.

Galileo is forgiven and welcome back into the Roman Catholic Church.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg has always sat on the Supreme Court.

They have never worried about a Russian missile strike on the U.S.

The Post Office has always been going broke.

The nation has never approved of the job Congress is doing.

One way or another, “It’s the economy, stupid” and always has been.

Silicone-gel breast implants have always been regulated.

The rest of the list is available at www.beloit.edu/mindset

Welcome back! Hopefully you have had a chance to relax, do some reading, swimming and just mellowing out.

As the new school year begins, I’d like you to take a look at the past year and what you have accomplished.  I have had the privilege of talking to educators at conferences during the summer and have been impressed with their stories.  I have spoken to teachers, educational assistants, secretaries, counselors, administrators, school security officers – people who work passionately at schools day after day. These are the folks who teach children, engage them in learning and keep them safe.  They do the real work and are rarely thanked for doing jobs that come with so many challenges.

During the past school year, I have visited classrooms and I’m impressed with what I have seen.  Children are learning in classrooms.  Most students left school at the end of the year better readers than they were at the beginning.  Their math knowledge and their awareness of the world have improved.

So before you walk into the school, take a bow.  You deserve it.

Hope you have a productive and successful year.  I will be talking to you.

Franklin

Welcome back.  For many of you it seems that the summer went too quickly.  I understand that having been in the classroom.  Hopefully,  you had a chance to rest and recharge your batteries.

While you were gone, lots of things have happened in the field of education.  One of the most productive is that the Congress passed and  President Obama signed legislation which would stop 300,000 educators from being laid off.

As for me, my latest book, 162 Keys to School Success, was published.  One book dealing with high performing classrooms is at the publisher and I am working on two new books which, hopefully will be published at the end of this year or early 2011.  You will find excerpts from 162 Keys at the Resources Section of my copyright-free website.

Again, my best wishes for a smooth and productive school year.

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The Status and Trends in the Education of Racial and Ethnic Groups report examines educational progress and challenges in the United States by race and ethnicity. This report shows that over time, the numbers in each race/ethnicity who have completed high school and continued their education in college have increased. Despite these gains, the rate of progress has varied. Differences on key indicators of educational background, performance, and attainment persist among the various races and ethnicities studied.

·        In 2008, a higher percentage of children who identified as Asian (51 percent) had a mother with at least a bachelor’s degree than did children who identified as White (36 percent), as two or more races (31 percent), as Black (17 percent), as American Indian/Alaska Native (16 percent), and as Hispanic (11 percent).
·        Forty-eight percent of public school 4th-graders were eligible for free or reduced-price lunches in 2009, including 77 percent of Hispanics, 74 percent of Blacks, 68 percent of American Indian/Alaska Natives, 34 percent of Asian/Pacific Islanders, and 29 percent of White 4th-graders.
·        From 1999 to 2008, the total number of Black and Hispanic students taking an Advanced Placement (AP) exam more than tripled, from 94,000 to 318,000 students. In 2008, Asians had the highest mean AP exam score (3.08) across all exams, while Blacks had the lowest (1.91).
·        Among 8th-graders in 2009, 63 percent of Asians/Pacific Islanders had no absences in the past month, compared to 35 percent of American Indians/Alaska Natives.
·        In 2008, 44 percent of White 18- to 24-year-olds were enrolled in colleges and universities (a 16 percentage point increase from 1980); approximately 32 percent of Black 18- to 24-year-olds were enrolled in colleges or universities (an increase of 12 percentage points from 1980); and 26 percent of Hispanic 18- to 24-year-olds were enrolled (an increase of 10 percentage points from 1980).

The report additionally notes that more than 11 million elementary and secondary school students speak a language other than English at home.

To view the full report please visit https://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2010015

President Obama has requested an additional $989 million in funding for
Head Start in the next fiscal year, which would ratchet up Head Start’s budget to about $8.2 billion. (Head Start also got an extra $2.1 billion as part of
last year’s economic stimulus.)

The latest indication: a study of 5,000 students earlier this year by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which found virtually no difference in academic achievement by the end of first grade between those
who attended Head Start and those who were eligible to attend but didn’t. The HHS study followed the students from 2002 through 2006, showed that before entering kindergarten, the children in the Head Start group did score higher academically in some areas than the non-Head Start group. But that gap virtually disappeared in less than two years.

Yasmina Vinci, Executive Director of the National Head Start Association offers a counter argument.

“Right now, because of tight budgets, Head Start serves only 41% of at-risk
preschool students, and Head Start for infants and toddlers serves a minuscule 3.5%.

People who experience the outcomes have affirmed Head Start’s value. Just ask police chiefs who know that people who began in Head Start commit
fewer crimes and go to jail less often. Just ask school administrators. For example, Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland recently found
that kindergarteners with special needs who had been in Head Start needed 3.7 hours of special education per week on average, versus 9.8 hours for non-Head Start children “” a huge financial saving.”

The problems seem to be more with Head Start than with the concept of early education generally. Low-income children often begin school academically
behind their more affluent peers, and early education offers these children a chance to start at less of a disadvantage.

What can states do instead?  One option is state-funded preschool programs. Three states “” Oklahoma, Georgia and Florida “” have universal preschool for 4-year-olds, while 35 other states help fund preschool programs. A 2009 Georgetown University study of free-lunch eligible students in Tulsa-area Head Start and Oklahoma Pre-K programs found that students in the state program showed more progress, in both cognitive development and social-emotional skills, than their Head Start peers.