Matthew Lynch

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Providing every child with an equal opportunity to learn has been a central challenge in public education. In fact, at its inception, universal public education in the United States was viewed as the “great equalizer.” Education was perceived by some as the vehicle through which individuals could rise above the social and economic circumstances which may have created longstanding barriers to reaching their potential as individuals and contributing citizens.

As the test of time has proven, education alone cannot address entrenched social problems; multiple institutions, policies and support systems are necessary to level the social and economic playing field. However, education is and will continue to be one of the primary means by which inequity can be addressed. Public funds will continue to be allocated in support of educational programs, and the rationale for these investments will likely continue to be that education creates social equity. 

The purposeful and practical allocation of resources to support equitable access to high-quality learning opportunities is a major component of education policy at the federal, state, and local levels. Leaders at all levels of the education are charged with making decisions about how to effectively distribute and leverage resources to support teaching and learning.

Resource allocation consists of more than assigning dollar amounts to particular schools or programs. Equally, if not more important, is the examination of the ways in which those dollars are translated into actions that address expressed educational goals at various educational levels. In this respect, leaders are concerned not only with the level of resources and how they are distributed across districts, schools, and classrooms, but also with how these investments translate into improved learning.

 It is critical for resource allocation practices to reflect an understanding of the imperative to eliminate existing inequities and close the achievement gap. All too often, children who are most in need of support and assistance attend schools that have higher staff turnover, less challenging curricula, less access to appropriate materials and technology, and poorer facilities.

Allocating and developing resources to support improvement in teaching and learning is critical to school reform efforts. Education policymakers must be informed about emerging resource practices and cognizant of the ways incentives can be used to create conditions that support teaching and learning.

Resource allocation in education does not take place in a vacuum. Instead, it often reflects policy conditions that form a context in which opportunities for effective leadership can be created. For example, effective leaders know how to use data strategically to inform resource allocation decisions and to provide insights about how productivity, efficiency, and equity are impacted by allocated resources.

The roles, responsibilities, and authority of leaders at each level of education also impacts whether and how they are able to allocate resources to particular districts, schools, programs, teachers, and students. Further, the type of governance structure that is in place also affects decisions about resources and incentives. Governance issues arise as leaders become involved in raising revenue and distributing educational resources. These activities involve multiple entities, including the voting public, state legislatures, local school boards, superintendents, principals, and teachers’ associations. Each of these connections can provide insights into how best to allocate resources and provide incentives that powerfully and equitably support learning, for both students and education professionals.

Resources necessary to operate a successful school or school district cannot be confined to dollars alone, however. Indeed, the resources needed to actively and fully support education are inherently complex and require an understanding that goes far beyond assessing the level of spending or how the dollars are distributed. Educational leaders must be able to examine the ways in which those dollars are translated into action by allocating time and people, developing human capital, and providing incentives and supports in productive ways.

Principals, district officials who oversee the allocation of resources, and state policymakers whose actions affect the resources the principal has to work with, are all concerned with three basic categories of resources:

1.  Money. Activities at several levels of the system, typically occurring in annual cycles, determine both the amount of money that is available to support education and the purposes to which money can be allocated. No one level of the educational system has complete control over the flow, distribution, and expenditure of funds.

2.  Human capital. People “purchased” with the allocated funds do the work of the educational system and bring differing levels of motivation and expertise developed over time through training and experience.

3.  Time. People’s work happens within an agreed-upon structure of time (and assignment of people to tasks within time blocks) that allocates hours within the day and across the year to different functions, thereby creating more or less opportunity to accomplish goals.

These resources are thus intimately linked to one another. Each affects the other and even depends on the other to achieve its intended purpose. An abundance of money and time, for example, without the knowledge, motivation, and expertise of teachers (human capital) does little to maximize desired learning opportunities created for students.

Furthermore, an abundance of human capital without money or time to distribute it does little to alter practice in classrooms or to share expertise with others. From their position of influence over the acquisition, flow, and (intended) use of resources, educational leaders thereby undertake a massive attempt to coordinate and render coherent the relationships of the various resources to the goals they set out to achieve.

When initiating reform, an action plan must be developed before the school can determine how the reform will be carried out and how it will be measured. Too often, administrators become anxious and feel the need to change the reform before any data has been collected. More patience is warranted because if a plan is not working, it can be amended. The school team, which consists of educators, administrators, and other stakeholders, must make the necessary amendments without hindering reform efforts. Creating too many changes within one reform plan would be counterproductive and frustrating for all parties involved.

Many new administrators enter the field hell-bent on making a name for themselves and refusing to live in the shadows of their predecessor. Often, they feel as though their only choice is to go in a totally different direction, making the previous reform null and void. This situation creates frustration among the surviving faculty and staff. New administrators often make changes before they fully think about the consequences or repercussions of their actions. Perfectly competent adults massage their egos instead of thinking about what is in the best interests of the school and the children.

It is counterproductive to start one reform and then decide to start another several months later. Once a reform has been implemented, all parties involved must show fidelity to it until there is concrete data or evidence that indicates that it is ineffective. Reform is about creating an environment in which students are the priority and we as their teachers assist them in starting and finishing their journey to becoming educated citizens.

It is hard for many administrators and educators to grasp the fact that frustrations may worsen as the reform is being implemented. Often, issues arise because people do not welcome change. Some educators need to see that change is for the better before they completely support the reform. Once the rebellion to change has subsided and the reform has been implemented correctly, the waiting game begins. During this time, educators and administrators must go about the business of collecting data for analysis. The findings will give them a clear indication of whether or not the reform has served its intended purpose. If students are not progressing under the implemented reform, then it may not be fulfilling the needs of the students or faculty.

Strategic planning and the implementation of school reform sometimes require schools to absorb temporary setbacks in order to reap the benefits of long-term gains. Student progress might dip for a month or two before teachers and administrators see a significant gain in student learning and performance. Teachers and administrators need to allow change to take place and not panic when instant changes are not apparent. In many school reform efforts, educators and administrators must understand that policies and practices that met the needs of the past, do not necessarily address current needs or the needs of the future. They must realize that in order to obtain a great future you must let go of a great past.

Some administrators fall into the trap of emulating model schools. Model schools can be found in every major city, but when trying to recreate their success, many schools fail to achieve the same results. Trying to recreate another school’s success is potentially dangerous, even when schools share similar characteristics. This is because, regardless of the similarities, every district is unique. Often, after a large amount of time, energy, and money has been spent, the school declares the plan a failure and has nothing to show for the efforts.

Strategic planning, which is widely used in the educational arena, can assist districts in setting goals and implementing school reform. You would be hard pressed to find a school district that does not have one or more strategic plans awaiting execution. Strategic plans are a district’s consistent road map, even in the face of adversity. In the end, a strategic plan that reflects the culture and needs of each individual school is a better route than attempts to replicate the success another school.

In part I, we discussed and analyzed four inspirational movies about transcendent educators. In part II, we will discuss three additional movies and end with a brief summary and discussion. Without further ado, let’s begin.

Lean on Me is not really about a teacher per se, but about a principal, Joe Clark (Morgan Freeman), who comes to save a school about to be taken over by the state. It is run down and full of rebellious and even criminal-minded young people. Joe Clark, the principal with the baseball bat, quickly tries to run the school like some angry but well-meaning despot. At first his teachers are against his methods (and critics of the movie made the same mistake), but as both students and teachers warm up to him, it’s clear that what he is doing is really working.

He does, however, have his enemies; particularly one member of the School Board, who is trying to get him fired. When he is caught chaining the school doors against the fire department’s regulation, he is put in jail, and the School Board convenes a special session to decide if he should be fired. But the students show up in front of the jail en masse and demand his release, which is eventually granted. Immediately after his release, he receives good news; the entire student body has passed the test administered by the state. Here too, we are dealing with a dedicated educator who breaks the rules and succeeds precisely for that reason.

This may begin to sound like a litany, but Dangerous Minds is yet another story (based on a true story) involving the dedication of a teacher. Here Michelle Pfeiffer plays the real-life LouAnne Johnson, whose story the movie is based on. LouAnne Johnson, an ex-Marine, is hired on the spot without really being informed of the kind of class she is to teach. At first she almost gives up in frustration, but then she decides not to. Once she has made up in her mind that she is going to win over the students, the “battle” begins. Needless to say, once more, we have a movie about a teacher who breaks as many rules as it takes. In the end, the class is completely won over. In fact, they not only start learning and enjoying it, but they have also come to love and respect their teacher along the way.

Freedom Writers is based on another true story. Here Hilary Swank the real-life Erin Gruwell. Her dedication also leads to a compassionate understanding of her underprivileged students, and she achieves the ultimate breakthrough when she informs them that they aren’t the first young people besieged by problems. Although she is not permitted to use The Diary of Ann Frank, she does precisely that, at her own expense. She also buys notebooks for her students and encourages them to keep diaries that she would only read if they permitted her to do so. Needless to say, breaking all the rules once more allows a teacher to become an exceptional teacher whom her students come to love.

So you won’t think that I am advocating anarchy and chaos in the classroom, allow me to point out that this is far from being the case. The point all these movies make is that you can’t have a great school by making everything and everyone concerned wear the same straitjacket. Rules and regulations are fine, provided that they don’t interfere with the real business of teaching. These fictional and real-life educators got through to their students by leveling with them, by understanding where they come from, and by empathizing with their struggles. 

The factor that ultimately determines how successful a student will become academically is the teacher(s) that they are assigned to. In this piece, I will discuss several movies that have explored what great teaching is all about, including great teaching in underprivileged schools. As I begin this piece, I ponder an interesting idea: what if all teachers in the America were “required” to watch and thoroughly discuss the following movies? I will list them in chronological order: To Sir, with Love (1967); Up the Down Staircase (1967); Teachers (1984); Dead Poets Society (1989); Lean on Me (1989); Dangerous Minds (1995); Freedom Writers (2007). With one exception, all these movies deal with rebellious and underprivileged youth in urban schools and economically depressed family backgrounds.

What they all have in common are teachers who rise to the occasion and whose methods are unorthodox. They are all unconventional in their methods, but they are all – or become – dedicated and compassionate and completely concerned with the welfare their students – as opposed to principals or fellow teachers or even school boards.

In To Sir, with Love, Mark Thackeray (Sidney Poitier), an engineer by trade, comes to teach a class in the East End of London, full of obnoxious and unruly and underprivileged white students. He wins them over once he abandons the posture of the “typical” teacher and begins to level with them. He teaches them that to have respect for others; they first have to learn to respect themselves. In the end, what was to be a temporary job, becomes his vocation. Everything we see in this movie is worthy of emulation by all teachers everywhere.

In Up the Down Staircase,a young idealistic woman, Sylvia Barrett (Sandy Dennis) starts teaching in another “problem” school in an urban setting, a rough neighborhood. At first she is naïve and her students laugh at her. But slowly she begins to think about what kind of “kids” her students are, and begins to see them not as enemies, but as young people who need her help to get out of the cycle they are in. Eventually she breaks through to them, not so much by breaking the rules, but by compassion and understanding. Once again, it’s the quality of the teacher that makes the difference and her dedication to her profession (which, once more, becomes more like a vocation).

In Teachers we have yet another underprivileged school in a tough neighborhood. Here the hero (Alex Jurel) is played by Nick Nolte, but the most interesting and memorable feature of this movie involves another character (Herbert Gower) played by Richard Mulligan. When the mental institution tours the school, he detaches himself from the inmates and takes over a history class. His first act as authority figure in the classroom is to pick up the textbook, look at it, frown, and walk to the window and toss it out, to the surprise and delight of the entire class. By the time he is found out and taken back to the mental institution, he has managed to transform the whole idea of teaching history. As he is led by attendants from the mental institution through the crowded corridor of the school, the teacher played by Nick Nolte salutes him in an obvious sign of respect. Perhaps all good teachers should be a little crazy? Not a bad idea.

Dead Poets Society is the exception to the rule, but only in that here we are not in an inner-city school, but in a privileged private school for boys. John Keating (Robin Williams), an alumnus of Welton Academy in Vermont, comes back to his alma mater as an English teacher. His first act of business is to invoke the carpe diem theme and thereby to encourage his students to live in the present and to love poetry. His asking them to tear out the introductory pages from the textbook is another brilliant move. He calls that kind of “literary” claptrap “excrement.”

Here is another brilliant teacher who breaks the rules, and that’s really the secret of his success. In the end, he is betrayed – both by the administration and one of his own students. He is made the scapegoat for the suicide of a student whose egomaniacal and rigid father drove him to it, but Keating’s teaching ends up being blamed for it. The real tragedy of this story is that a clearly brilliant and unconventional teacher is booted out for all the wrong reasons. When after his departure things get back to “normal,” things also get back to what is hollow and insipid.

Well, that’s the end of part I. In part II, we will end the series by discussing and analyzing three additional movies. Feel free to comment and offer movie suggestions for part II.

In advanced liberal democracies, interest groups are a standard feature. As the term suggests, interest groups organize themselves in order to attract attention to their interests and influence political institutions accordingly. At any given point of time, there are numerous interests groups, with membership ranging from a handful to many millions. Interest groups in a liberal democracy are very important and are probably one of the most effective ways of influencing political institutions.

Representative governments are built on the notion that a significant amount of voters will not be concerned with policymaking, and their only real involvement in the political process is via elections. Hence, interest groups organize research and create position statements and present their case to politicians. Politicians in turn would be inclined to listen to interests groups for the sake of the votes at stake.

Interest groups have been known to thrust wide-ranging and important legislation into the spotlight, and influence government policies both internally and externally. However, interest groups can also be used to influence political institutions to enact legislation that could be mostly unpopular. Therefore, well-financed interest groups with strong political connections can significantly distort the democratic process.

There is a sharp inequality with regards to access to interest groups. As a result of this, governments prioritize their activities and pay attention to politically active interest groups. This in turn gives interest groups an unfair advantage with regards to political influence.

Another problem closely associated with unequal access to interest groups is the unequal power certain interest groups have over governments. The combination of liberal democracy and free market capitalism is an important source of such inequality. Businesses have a strong influence over governments because they are necessary for promoting growth and investment and provide significant tax revenues. Thus, interest groups headed by businesses and other commercial entities gain more attention from the government and the electorate alike.

This in turn, forces governments to extensively consult various economic indicators before enacting virtually any kind of legislation and usually means that they will not be able to pass legislation that would hurt business interests in a variety of areas. The dangers of this unequal power over the government is significant both in regards to internal and external policies. This allows the financial elite to dictate policies that will have a significant impact on or even go against the interests of the majority. Interest groups in general are a vital component of any vibrant democracy but unless they are properly regulated, in certain circumstances interests groups can do more harm than good.

_In most liberal democracies, political parties often adopt different positions on many issues and thereby provide voters with a choice on a variety of matters. However, in standard voting models, it is assumed that political parties strive to converge on the median position. Therefore, one could argue that the existence of different political parties makes little difference. This is because regardless of the initial political stance of the winning candidate or party, in most cases they will identify the same electoral issues and often adopt similar measures in response. 

However, in reality certain factors prevent parties from fully converging on the median voter position. While, candidates themselves might be unable to appeal to the median voter position due to strong personal beliefs or principles, the internal structure of parties also may play a part.

Most often, political parties with internal democratic mechanisms will elect party leaders who can appeal to most median voters but whose ideology and policy principles are closer to the party's position than the rest of the electorate. For example, a left-wing party will be keen to elect candidate who can appeal to median voters but would be more left wing than the rest of the electorate. In this case, the candidate might occupy the median position within the party, which would still be more left wing than the rest of the electorate.

In response to recurring problems and issues, modern political parties embarked on wide reforms aimed at creating more transparent and democratic mechanisms. In the US, many states feature primary elections and party caucuses that are better regulated. Therefore, most often, the winning candidate of the democratic or republican nomination emerges quite clearly and early in the process.

As a result, party conventions ceased to be events in which parties choose candidates and became more of a formality in which the nomination of a candidate was officially announced and celebrated. In the UK, the Labour party began to choose its party leader through an electoral college, which was composed of a third of each of the votes of party legislators, members associated with the trade unions and individual party members.

These changes were certainly welcomed, as they seemed to address many of the flaws of the existing systems through more democratic and transparent mechanisms. The new election processes not only opened up the leadership process of political parties but also made it more accountable.  However, critics argue that these reforms have exposed modern political parties to a new set of problems.

One of the major criticisms is that modern political parties no longer fulfill the role of being independent organizations that feature their own unique character and the ability to bring together contrasting social interests to the political process. Furthermore, the reforms have transformed the election of party leadership into a spectacle that is comparable to a general election. This has allowed other forces such as the media, interest groups and business co-operations to play a more significant role in the internal election process of a political party. The expanding influence of these forces has come at the cost of the influence held by traditional party groupings.  Thus, the ability of political parties to develop policy ideas and allow leadership candidates to emerge has declined significantly.

In the early 20th century, it was vital for political parties to develop a network that could rapidly recruit members, supporters and election workers from amongst the voters. Thus, parties were massive organizations that could mobilize thousands of election workers during the election cycle. Failure to organize on a large-scale often meant losing the election.  However, by the 1970's parties began to evolve into a 'catch all' model. This required party leaders to run a more direct campaign and winning candidates had to successfully appeal to the electorate and the media.

As a result, political finance became extremely valuable in order to finance media coverage, opinion polls, focus groups and other elements of a political campaign. This change transformed political parties into more flexible organizations that could quickly evolve around a new leadership and the significance of the party bureaucracy declined. More importantly, these transformations also coincided with the dwindling levels of party membership.

Just as campaign financing became the most important resource in any election, major political parties began losing their key sources of revenue such as party subscription fees and individual donations. Thus, party leaders had to depend on large donors in order to gain the necessary funds for election campaigns that have become increasingly more expensive.  This dependence has exposed political parties to significant amount of influence from wealthy individuals and corporate donors.

Therefore, powerful donors can set the agenda of an entire political campaign or fund candidates who champion policies that are favorable to their interests. This has even caused some critics to argue that party leaders are now becoming more focused on designing policies in order to attract wealthy entities.

 As a result, voters are tasked with electing representatives who are more inclined to serve the interests of their major donors rather than their constituents. This has arguably set about a vicious cycle in which the influence of powerful donors discourages ordinary voters from taking part in political parties or making significant donations because they feel that their influence will always be very little in comparison, which in turn forces party leaders to depend on such donors even more. The wide range of campaign-finance related scandals that have plagued elections in liberal democracies in the past few decades have not helped to improve things either

In simple voting models, parties and voters act according to a single dimension (conservative or liberal, left or right, etc.). However, in reality, there can be sometimes two or more dimensions. Hence, while voters may vote primarily along conservative or liberal dimensions, they may also vote based on ethnic, religious, economic and social values. This would make it impossible if not very difficult for a particular party or candidate to accurately represent all the interests of voters at any given point in time. This dilemma is further aggravated by forces such as globalization, which continue to add to the variety of political dimensions that could influence a voter.

In this case, it will be difficult for political parties to converge on the median voter position (assuming that there are voters in-between these dimensions), which in turn makes competition between the parties more difficult to predict. Supporters of the current system argue that relatively predictable voting patterns will eventually emerge in the long-run and help parties to once again converge on the median position. However, the fact remains that it is becoming increasingly difficult for representatives to represent a majority of the values or principles individual voters have, which arguably does significant damage to the concept of representative democracy but is essentially unavoidable.

For example, assume a voter is socially liberal (pro-abortion, pro-gun laws, pro gay-marriage, etc.) and economically conservative (against large-scale government spending, privatization, minimum state influence, etc.). Furthermore, the only parties the voter can choose to vote for are either socially and economically liberal or socially and economically conservative. In this case, during each election cycle, a voter will have to decide which of these values mean more to him/her at that given point of time and vote accordingly, thereby foregoing other interests. Not only does this mean that voters will not be represented properly but they would also be forced to vote against some of their own interests.

Thus, during the election cycle, if a voter were to vote for the conservative party based on economic factors, he/she will also be voting against their social interests (assuming that the conservative party will put forward a conservative social agenda). Moreover, globalization is ushering in new dimensions such as global warming, nuclear proliferation, arms control, etc., that will continue to add political dimensions and thereby add to the complication.

In the case of countries that feature more than two political parties (a feature that is common except in the US), each individual party will be less inclined to attract median voters. On the contrary, they could remain effective by focusing on a particular dimension. Thus, many liberal democracies are experiencing the influx of smaller parties dedicated to a specific cause such as global warming or extreme nationalism.

The aforementioned problems with the election process in a representative democracy are not new but they have become more visible in recent history. While it may be easy to fix some of the institutional or practical problems regarding the voting system, it would be a lot harder to fix problems associated with the growing amount of political dimensions.

An independent media is a vital feature of any liberal democracy. If the government was able to control all the information regarding its own actions then it could most certainly escape all accountability and even have an unacceptable level of influence over its citizen's actions. This is why the importance of a free press cannot be under-estimated. In a liberal democracy, the aim of a free press is to continually scrutinize the government and provide people with accurate and impartial information so that they can act on it accordingly.

Thus, the media acts as an effective check on government power and influence over its citizens. In the last few decades, there has been an unprecedented growth in mass media accompanied by the falling costs of radio, TV, satellite and Internet services. This phenomenon has helped bring political information to a much wider audience. On the other hand, the boom in media services has also allowed various organizations from all over the political spectrum to quickly and effectively reach their target audiences.

A common charge against the media is that it increasingly seems to lack the principles of objective and impartial reporting. Instead, many major organizations seem to be taking one side of the political spectrum and at best provide relatively bias coverage or at worse act like virtual propaganda machines for a particular political party. Certainly, some issues are subjective and hence there can be no universal line of thought and requiring all news organizations to passively report only what they see and not include an analytical perspective, would to a certain degree, defeat the purpose of having a free press.

While some of the general problems regarding the media and liberal democracies today can be easily identified, it is much harder to come up with an effective remedy. It is very difficult to completely remove political influence and enforce a perfectly neutral position. Indeed, this would be counterproductive. The media today does not just report the news but also represents the views of certain segments of society. As such, many news organizations cater to liberal or conservative lines when it comes to political information.

In theory, this could provide healthy debate because at any given point of time some news organizations will be supporting or opposing government policies. However, sometimes there is a thin line between healthy debate and active intervention and it is common for media organizations to often cross this line. In the process, a negative consequence would be the degradation of accurate political information. Therefore, some issues that can be objectively reported are often distorted to a point that it causes more confusion than clarity to the general audience.

A major concern in many liberal democracies is the emergence of media empires, where a few individuals have managed to concentrate vast amounts of media assets and use them to actively influence political opinion. Thus, these individuals, from whichever point of the political spectrum can deliver a powerful political message on behalf or against a political establishment through their respective media empires. This is especially damaging if parts of the general public are more exposed to one particular media empire either due to its high popularity or the lack of alternative media sources.

Furthermore, these individuals possess the ability to provoke people or interest groups into mobilizing, simply by highlighting a particular issue. For example, horrific images from the battlefield or a controversial medical study can invoke a massive response. Therefore, even if it could be argued that the media cannot exactly influence people directly, they can most certainly have a strong influence on what issues people are made aware of or exposed to.

The danger in all of this is that it could distort the quality of information that people receive and that in turn could distort their decisions.  If positive issues are reported in a negative manner then at-least some voters will vote against them even if it is contrary to their own interests, and vice versa. This is made worse when there is a high level of voter apathy, which means people will be less interested in taking part or learning about particular issues that could affect them. However, these concerns are nothing new. In fact, with the emergence of the first TV and Radio networks, governments in the Europe and America put forward legislation that forced broadcast media to adopt a neutral position. In Europe, in particular, the state often intervened to nationalize major broadcasting networks.

Furthermore, the rise of media corporations, whose owners were enthusiastic to express their political opinions, seemed to herald the end of the media empires of yesteryear. Yet, nationalizing major broadcast networks or heavy-handed regulation can open up the media to government intervention or censorship, which is highly damaging as well. Even with such efforts, owners of media empires have adapted by swiftly embracing new technology and expanding to different broadcast media such as private terrestrial and satellite TV. Today media empires continue to dominate much of the mainstream broadcast networks in many liberal democracies.

A person’s culture and upbringing has a profound effect on how they see the world and how they process information.  This fact was discussed by Richard Nisbett in his work, The Geography of Thought: How Asians and Westerners think differently…and why Nisbett worked with psychologists in Japan and China and determined that the holistic way of viewing the world typical of many students from those countries differed from that of their American counterparts, who tended to view the world in parts or distinct classes of objects that could each be defined by a set of rules. 

In other words, the Asian children see the world in terms of the relationship between things, whereas the American children see the world in terms of the objects as distinct entities. This information is helpful when we consider how cultural background might influence approach to learning and school performance.  There are a number of theories that seek to explain differences in school performance among different racial and ethnic groups.  Three theories stand out: the cultural deficit theory, the expectation theory, and the cultural difference theory.

The cultural deficit theory states that some students do poorly in school because the linguistic, social, and cultural nature of the home environment does not prepare them for the work they will be required to do in school. As an example, some students may not have as many books read to them as are read to children in other homes. Not being able to read has a negative influence on their vocabulary development. Vocabulary development may also be stifled by the amount and nature of verbal interaction in the home. As a result, some children arrive at school lacking the level of vocabulary development expected. The cultural deficit theory proposes that deficiencies in the home environment result in shortcomings in skills, knowledge, and behaviors that contribute to poor school performance.

Expectation theory focuses on how teachers treat students. Teachers often expect less from students of certain racial, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds.  When teachers expect students to perform poorly, they approach teaching in ways that align with their low levels of expectations.  In these instances, students tend to perform at the low levels expected of them by teachers.

Rosenthal and Jacobson tested this theory in their Pygmalion Effect study. A group of teachers were told that their students were due for an intellectual growth spurt during the school year.  Even though the students were average in terms of academic performance, the teachers interacted with them based on this expectation. All students in the experimental group improved both academically and socially by the end of the year. Based on the notion of a self-fulfilling prophecy, students who experience high expectations seek to reach the level of expected behaviors. Correspondingly, students who experience low expectations act to meet the level of behavior expected of them.

The cultural difference theory is based on the idea that students who are raised in different cultural settings may approach education and learn in different ways.  It is important for teachers to be aware of the difference between the school atmosphere and the home environment.  People from different cultural traditions may have an approach to education that differs from the mainstream approach used in American schools. For instance, differences can be noted in the Polynesian concept of learning, whereby younger children are generally taught by older children rather than by adults.  This is a very different approach to learning and one that may need to be considered in an American school that is attended by Polynesian students.

Teachers need to ensure that they incorporate methods of teaching in their classrooms that accommodate various beliefs and cultural notions students bring to school. This requires each teacher to develop an understanding of their student’s culture, but also to know who their students are as individuals. It is also important for teachers to ensure that they treat all students the same and to have high expectations for each one, so that they will all strive to reach their full potential.

Desire and knowledge of how to effect change should be the cornerstones of school reform. Administrators who possess both qualities are more likely to succeed when implementing change. They also possess the ability to focus on aspects of education they can change, and disregard insignificant issues. At the same time, they should also be keenly aware of barriers that impede progress toward change in the teaching and learning environment. The lack of sustainability in educational change, influences outside of the school environment, and personnel who are resistant to change are among the obstacles that interfere with continued implementation of school reform.

Positive change can be achieved in any school district. Building capacity to sustain educational change however is difficult. Effective assessment is a catalyst for continued improvement. The ability of schools to maintain changes brought about through reform rely on ongoing analysis of data collected from agreed-upon evaluations. When administrators analyze data and formulate decisions as to whether or not school reform was successful and ongoing, they must take into account all evidence that can be analyzed. Not all evidence can be collected from standardized tests however. Data pertinent to reform efforts can also be collected from classroom observations, authentic evaluations/learning, and student surveys. In this sense, the role of teachers in data collection efforts can never be minimized. Teachers need effective professional development focused on innovative modes of assessments used as essential components of reform efforts.

As administrators analyze obstacles to school reform, they should consider influences outside of school. Situations in children’s homes and communities sometimes create distractions in the classroom. When teachers have to address non-school issues, they lose valuable teaching time, which in turn negatively impacts the learning process. Although schools work with children for a considerable portion of the day, children return to their families and communities when the school day ends. Children today face a multitude of issues once they leave the school building. Even children from middle-class and upper-middle-class homes may not always have ideal family situations. In order for any child to learn, their basic needs must be met. It is difficult for students to concentrate on schoolwork when they are dealing with the effects of physical or verbal abuse, tension in the home, homelessness, or poor nutrition. While outside factors such as these are not directly captured by assessments, the existence of these problematic issues should be considered when analyzing standardized test data.

Communication with and the support of faculty and staff are essential before any school district embarks upon the long process of school reform. Disagreement is fine, and can be constructive, but in order to continuously improve, the majority of a district’s faculty and staff have to support reform. The process of consensus building is difficult, and district leaders have to work hard to build the level of consensus necessary to move forward with reform. Many employees will naturally feel stressed about upcoming changes, and will need to trust and respect the administrators leading the reform efforts.  

Change is difficult. Administrators should anticipate that there will staff who are resistant to change. While a dissenting minority staff cannot be allowed to impede the improvement processes, administrators cannot simply deal with discontent by ignoring it and/or by asserting their authority. They must make a conscientious effort to clearly articulate their vision of successful school reform. Malcontents should be given the opportunity to express their fears and frustrations to the administration. At the same time, administrators should use caution to ensure that all complaints are stated in a professional manner so as not to discourage others. There may be times when a teacher feels upset over a diminutive detail that can easily be cleared up. When taking criticism from concerned educators, administrators must recognize genuine concerns and fear, and consider all suggestions.

School reform is as much about ensuring that a forward thinking and motivated teaching force is in place, as it is about making procedural changes that foster continuous improvement. Administrators who put data driven and innovative practices in place, attend to outside of school influences on school change, and engage in the work to include teachers in the process of change increases the possibility that a boost in the academic performance of American youth will occur.