Corinne A. Gregory's Blog, page 9

Parents have power when it comes to schools

I've been musing over a comment shared with me at my recent presentation at a Parent/Teacher group on bullying (here's more on what this group had to say on the subject of bullying). The parents were apparently not overly enthusiastic of the processes that were in place at the school to address bullying. One of the parents stated that they, the parents were essentially powerless to make or influence any changes in the school.

The parents' perception was that all the decisions were made at the administrative or district level and that they really couldn't have much impact over what occurs.

My comment: "On the contrary. Parents have enormous power. In fact, parents have the ultimate power when it comes to spearheading change in schools."

Another parent chimed in that it didn't seem that was true — recently the district had adopted a new math curriculum and it appeared, from the comments made, that many, many people (both parents and others) weren't in support of the curriculum. Yet, the new math curriculum came in.

That may have happened, but I had to ask parents a very critical question:

"Who, in this room, has the well-being and educational goals of your child most at heart?"

It may seem like a rhetorical question, but it's not. The answer is, we, the parent.  So, it is not only our prerogative but our obligation to do what it takes to ensure that education and well-being.

That is particularly true in the case of bullying (though hardly exclusively so).  If you feel you aren't getting an adequate response from your site principal if bullying has occurred, ask for more information. One parent I know was told by her principal "Oh, we have it handled" but was never provided any details on HOW it was handled.  It may be against school policy to reveal disciplinary details – and that should be ok, — but if incidents continue to occur, it's within a parent's rights to insist on more information.

If you can't get satisfactory resolution from the school, then by all means, you need to escalate. Find out who, at the district level, is responsible for the area of concern and discuss it with them, in person, if possible.  If it doesn't get dealt with at that level, make an appointment with the Superintendent.  If that fails, heck, there's a School Board who is ultimately responsible for what happens at that school district.

No, I'm not a rabble-rouser or trouble-maker, but I AM my child's loyal and steadfast advocate. As I told the parents the other night…sometimes you just have to let "mama lion" or "mama bear" loose if you don't feel things are being handled in a way that keeps your child safe and secure.

But we have to start assuming that our teachers, staff and administrators have the same goals in common — the education and well-being of our child.  Too often we immediately drop into a confrontational mode and become instant adversaries is not the way to pro-actively solve problems.  It puts people on the defensive and creates an "us vs. them" scenario that can only produce winners and losers.  In that situation, the child is most often the biggest loser.

We parents are reluctant to wield our power because we are either unaware that it exists or we are afraid to make waves.  I get that.  I, too, want to be well-liked and respected among the people with whom I have an important relationship with and require regular interaction, which include teachers, staff and administrators. But protecting my child and interceding on their behalf is my "Job 1."  Mess with me…ok. Mess with me and look out!  I will always assume the best of those entrusted with my children's education until proven otherwise, but if I have to raise an issue up the ladder, trust that I will.

My understanding is that is really the goal of a PTA/PTSA anyway.  For parents, teachers and staff to communicate and, theoretically collaborate on issues affecting the kids and the learning environment.  Yes, we are dreadfully busy so that we aren't as connected as we probably want to be, but we HAVE to be. Any one parent can't possibly know all that is going on in the schools, but a group of parents can share information, validate assumptions and cooperate in affecting change if they deem it's necessary.

Ultimately, if all else fails, parents can vote — with their feet if nothing else.  I know for many that isn't an option so to them I'd say, "Do everything you can to make change happen in the schools you are in."  They aren't call "public" schools for nothing. You send your children there, you fund them, you pay the salaries of the people who work there.

You have enormous power — don't be afraid to exercise it.

Filed under: Bullying and School Violence, Education Reform Tagged: bullying, changing education, Education Reform, implementing change in schools, parents' power, PTA, PTSA

To end bullying requires a cultural change

I had an interesting experience last night, one that may serve to partly explain why we're not making much headway on ending bullying in our schools.

I was speaking last night at a local school, for a group of parents and educators. The talk I was giving was advertised as one on "preventing" bullying (actual title is "7 Steps to Eliminating Bullying in Schools: An Inside-Out Approach"). The presentation goes into details about defining what bullying is, explaining the different types of bullying, who does the bullying and why…all as part of the setup to explain how to cure it.

I wasn't more than 7 slides and 15 minutes into what was supposed to be a 1 hour and 15 minute talk when the first questions started. That wasn't a problem; I had encouraged the group to ask questions during the talk. I wanted it to be interactive, to address the concerns and issues they had so I could be sure their issues were heard.

What I wasn't prepared for was where the questions were going to go.

The parents immediately went to "my child has been bullied here at school — what do I do?"  They shared that in spite of the fact that their children had been participating in a "program" at the school for years, bullying was still happening so what was I recommending we do about that?  They also felt that their administration wasn't doing as much as they could to fix the problem because bullies weren't being held accountable. One parent wanted to know why the bully shouldn't be expected to write a note to the victim explaining how sorry he/she was for bullying.

All good data and much of it may be true. But, as I explained they were missing the point — and it was one I was trying to make.

All of these actions are geared toward dealing with the problem after-the-fact.  It's a "now that we have the problem, what do we do about it?" approach. It's the same one we've been doing in schools all across this country, yet in spite of the hundreds of millions of dollars, in spite of all the programs and policies, bullying is an epidemic and children are being hurt, lives are being lost.

And it's this approach that keeps us in the cycle.  As I explained yesterday in my presentation, we tend to think of "bullying" as something that occurs in isolation — what I mean is, it happens between an individual or a group (the "perpetrator(s)") and the victim.  But, while the actual bullying may be between limited players, the reality is that it's the culture that allows it to continue.

Author Barbara Coloroso, in her book "The Bully, the Bullied, and the Bystander," describes the dynamics of bullying this way:

"The bully, the bullied, and the bystander are three characters in a tragic play performed daily in our homes, schools, playgrounds and streets."

And she's right.  We have to consider all the "actors" in the play and examine what role they have in the cycle of bullying if we are ever to have a shot at really solving it.

That's where I talk about changing the culture — of the school, of the community.  That requires focusing on a model of prevention, not just one of mitigation and management, as so many typical anti-bullying approaches do.  Please don't misunderstand; I am not suggesting that we drop our policies that set consequences for negative behavior or establish reasonable and effective punitive measures when the inevitable bullying incident occurs. But that should be the last resort, not the first response.

It's natural for parents, educators, and administrators to want a quick fix — we all want the problem to go away. We want it handled, now.  But it's not that simple. Bullying doesn't just drop from the sky one day, with no warning.  It's something that develops over time. While there are some pathological exceptions, bullies are made not born.  Many of the kids who bully do so because they don't have any better way of dealing with their aggression and their insecurity. By focusing on developing positive cultures in school, where every child gets a chance to gain the social/emotional learning and character development they need to not only function in school, but succeed in life, we are taking steps to build the kind of environment where bullying isn't tolerated and anti-social behavior is not supported.

I could go on — after all, my presentation is over an hour in length and that's without the chance to ask questions.  But the point is that we cannot hope to solve this problem with a quick "one size fits all" snappy answer or a silver bullet.  We have to start looking at things differently because we know that what we have been doing for decades isn't working the way we'd hoped.

To the parents from the group last night, I want to say that we do have a good shot at stopping bullying, but it won't come from any quick fixes or handy "tips" I — or anyone else — have to give you. It's a process and it starts with prevention, and the whole culture has to be in on it.

Filed under: Bullying and School Violence Tagged: anti-bullying, Barbara Coloroso, buillied, bullying, cultural change in school, pro-social skills, social-emotional learning

Guest Blog – "Every day is worth living"

I had the amazing fortune to receive this from Christopher Burgess this morning.  Not only am I very lucky to have this piece from him to share with you, I would also like to make this the "unofficial" announcement that he has joined SocialSmarts' Board of Advisors.  This is compelling and I encourage you to read and share with anyone who is concerned with the lives of our children.

—-

Do you ever delve into a stack of statistics and just find yourself mesmerized by the data, data that shocks your inner core?  I had that happen to me recently as I was doing some fact checking surrounding instances of children committing suicide, specifically children who were bullied into suicide by others (both adults and children).  I concluded, we lose too many precious children to "bullyicide."

According to the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (NSPL) a person dies of suicide about every 15 minutes or approximately 96 people take their own life each day.  Sadly, for every person who succeeds, there have been between 8 and 25 failed attempts.  That math works out to approximately 800 to 2400 attempted suicides in the United States each day. 

Looking solely at the numbers for youth between the ages of 5 and 19 we see that right around age 10, suicide moves up to the third leading cause of death (See table 1).  Sadly, according to the NSPL, the suicide rate amongst young people has more than doubled over the past two decades.

   Rank
      Ages 5-9
    Ages 10-14
      Ages 15-19


1
Unintentional Injury

1,072
Unintentional Injury

1,343
Unintentional Injury

6,616


2
Malignant Neoplasms

485
Malignant Neoplasms

515
Homicide

2,076


3
Congenital Anomalies

196
Suicide

270
Suicide

1,613


4
Homicide

121
Homicide

220
Malignant Neoplasms

731


5
Heart Disease

106
Congenital Anomalies

200
Heart Disease

389

Table 1: Leading Cause of Death of Children

Digging a bit deeper into the available information, I wanted to know where, geographically, suicides were occurring.  I was startled.  No state is exempt.  According to the National Center for Health Statistics, based on 2007 data (the most recent), the top ten states are:   Alaska, Montana, New Mexico, Wyoming, Nevada, Colorado, West Virginia, Arizona, Oregon and Kentucky based on the number of suicides per 100,000 of population.   (See table two)

I then started digging to see if the statistics would tell me how many of these were the result of bullying? My digging found that in 2010, I was able to confirm 30 cases of suicide which the family, friends, or authorities attributed to bullying.  The age of the children ranged from 9-19 years of age (9-1, 10-0, 11-2, 12-2, 13-3, 14-4, 15-6, 16-2, 17-5, 18-2 and 19-3).   I also found that the vast majority of these suicides were at the first and last thirds of the traditional school year (16 suicides Sep-Nov and 10 suicides Mar-May).  Perhaps this is coincidence how the frequency of bullycide coincides with the academic school year.  (For additional reading see: Bullycide, the end result of cyberbullying and Bullycide: My Time Has Come So Now I'm Gone )

I think you would agree that given the alignment between school year and children being bullied into suicide that an individual investment in educating and making all concerned aware of the realities is warranted.  

Allow me to call you to action:

Encourage your children to accept who they are, and be all they can be with the capabilities given to them.
Direct our young on appropriate use of the Internet as a tool of collaboration, knowledge sharing and commerce, and not as a tool of hate.
Make it your business to know and understand the many ways in which your child is engaging online and communicating – Smartphone, laptop, Xbox or Wii and where: your house, your neighbors, the library, etc.  Then monitor this activity.  I've often said, it is not espionage to know who and what your child is being exposed to online or via any other communications medium.
Teach your young how to cope when overwhelmed.
Ensure your child understands mistakes are universal, and unless it stops the sun from rising in the morn, you and they can work through the error.
Show your child how to report and confront bullying and call it out as wrong. Show them how to do this in a non-confrontational, but direct manner.  To be a silent witness is to endorse the action.

If we are able to collectively work together, we can save a life, we can save many lives and in doing so we will demonstrate to the children, every day is worth living.

Rank
State (2006 rank)
Number of Suicides
Population
Rate


1
Alaska (3)
149
681,111
21.8


2
Montana (2)
196
956,624
20.5


3
New Mexico (5)
401
1,964,402
20.4


4
Wyoming (1)
101
523,252
19.3


5
Nevada (4)
471
2,554,344
18.4


6
Colorado (9)
811
4,842,770
16.7


7
West Virginia (12)
300
1,809,836
16.6


8
Arizona (6T)
1,016
6,353,421
16.0


9
Oregon (8)
594
3,735,549
15.9


10
Kentucky (13)
649
4,236,308
15.3


11
Idaho (10)
223
1,496,145
14.9


11
North Dakota (15)
95
637,904
14.9


13
Oklahoma (11)
531
3,608,123
14.7


14
Maine (27T)
191
1,315,398
14.5


15
Utah (16)
378
2,668,925
14.3


15
Vermont (21T)
89
620,748
14.3


17
Arkansas (20)
402
2,830,557
14.2


17
Florida (19)
2,587
18,199,526
14.2


19
Kansas (17)
382
2,777,382
13.8


20
Missouri (18)
808
5,878,399
13.7


20
Tennessee (14)
844
6,149,116
13.7


22
Mississippi (36T)
396
2,921,030
13.6


23
Washington (23)
865
6,449,511
13.4


24
Wisconsin (27T)
729
5,598,893
13.0


25
Alabama (24)
592
4,626,595
12.8


25
South Dakota (6T)
102
795,689
12.8


27
Indiana (21T)
790
6,335,862
12.5


28
Louisiana (29T)
522
4,373,310
12.2


29
New Hampshire (31T)
158
1,312,256
12.0


29
South Carolina (26)
530
4,404,914
12.0


31
North Carolina (25)
1,077
9,041,594
11.9


32
Pennsylvania (34T)
1,441
12,419,930
11.6


33
Virginia (31T)
880
7,698,775
11.4


34
Ohio (29T)
1,295
11,477,641
11.3


35
Michigan (34T)
1,131
10,049,790
11.2


36
Delaware (39)
95
861,953
11.0


36
Minnesota (38)
572
5,182,360
11.0


38
Iowa (36T)
322
2,983,360
10.8


39
Georgia (41)
997
9,523,297
10.4


39
Hawaii (42)
133
1,277,356
10.4


41
Nebraska (31T)
181
1,769,473
10.2


41
Texas (40)
2,433
23,843,432
10.2


43
California (43)
3,602
36,377,534
9.9


44
Maryland (44)
518
5,618,899
9.2


45
Rhode Island (45)
96
1,053,136
9.1


46
Illinois (47)
1,108
12,825,809
8.6


47
Massachusetts (48)
516
6,467,915
8.0


48
Connecticut (46)
271
3,489,868
7.7


49
New York (49)
1,396
19,429,316
7.2


50
New Jersey (50)
596
8,653,126
6.9


51
District of Columbia (51)
36
587,868
6.1


Total
 
34,598
301,290,332
11.5

Table 2:  National Center for Health Statistics for the year 2007.

—— 

Christopher Burgess (@burgessct) is a humanitarian focused on hunger, slavery, world health and the online safety of our young and elderly.  He serves as the Senior Security Advisor to a Fortune 100 company and previously served as a senior national security executive for more than 30 years. In addition to the United States, he has lived and worked in South Asia, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Central Europe, and Latin America where he acquired a deep understanding of the people, cultures, and societal issues which we face today. Christopher is also a regular contributor to The Huffington Post  where he writes on online safety issues and his own blogs: BurgessCT.com and Veritate et Virtute . He is the co-author of "Secrets Stolen, Fortune Lost, Preventing Intellectual Property Theft and Economic Espionage in the 21st Century."  Christopher can be contacted at:  Christopher@burgessct.com

Filed under: Bullying and School Violence Tagged: bullycide, bullying, children, Christopher Burgess, cyber bullying, education, family, National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, suicide

It's "No Name Calling Week" again – what do we do the rest of the time?

This week is the 8th annual 'No Name Calling Week" in schools across the country.  Created by GLSEN (the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network), it is intended to be

 … an annual week of educational activities aimed at ending name-calling of all kinds and providing schools with the tools and inspiration to launch an on-going dialogue about ways to eliminate bullying in their communities.

It's a worthwhile effort that has certainly garnered quite a bit of attention and many high-profile sponsors — Barnes and Noble, Cisco Systems and several others.  It also has the support of leading educational associations like ASCD, the NEA (National Education Association), NAESP (National Association of Elementary School Principals) and more.

While it's a great concept, it suffers from the same pitfalls, I believe, as many other "traditional" anti-bullying efforts. Which means, it's a one-week highlight on the problem — but what do we do the other 51 weeks of the year?

Yes, it's meant to be a high-point or beginning step in continual dialog. But in reality, here's probably what happens:

The schools who participate start planning for the special "week." They may make posters, announce it in the newsletter for parents, promote the coming week to the students.
When the actual "week" happens (it began this past Monday 1/24, this year), there may be special activities planned — perhaps an assembly or rally, maybe daily "moments" in classes to discuss No Name-Calling Week, its implication or how each school or class can "own" the intent.

Now, kids themselves, being kids, are likely to react in one of three ways:

First, some may really get behind it, embrace it and support it. These are generally the kids who have been affected by bullying, either first- or second-hand. They have been teased or know someone who has been picked on.
Next are the kids who will go along with it, but it really doesn't affect them. It's just another "rah-rah" that their school does for other causes and events, but in general, it doesn't change much for them personally.
Then there's the third group. They are jaded, they are frequently the bullies even, but their attitude is "Hey, we're having this 'No Name Calling Week.'  What sort of dork is going to do THAT?  I got your 'no-name calling,' lame-o."  In other words, with these kids — the ones we are most trying to reach, calling attention to an already-negative issue just results in more negative.

 And then, what happens after "No Name Calling Week" is over? Typically what occurs is that life gets back to normal. Just like the holidays, after the wrapping has been put away and the batteries have run out, so does the interest in the gift.  It's like that with any "special" event — as time goes by, unless reinforced and revisited, the feeling and drive behind it fades into the past.

That is typical for most of these types of "anti-bullying" efforts, sadly. We have rallies, we have assemblies, we have policies and programs, but they don't become deeply integrated into the daily fabric of behavior and conduct. As one principal told me not too long ago: "We don't believe in anti-bullying anymore because after the 'rah-rah' is over, nothing has changed."

Don't misunderstand me — I think "No Name Calling Week" is a good effort, but there's so much more that must be done to make it be "No Name Calling Year." We have to consciously make positive behavior and positive social skills just as important as the other things we do in school. And not just in school, but beyond. As I share in some of the presentations I do for K-12 students, we have a mascot we use, too, to talk about creating "No Put Down Zones," but it's not just for today…we ask students, teachers and staff to make a committment to being a "No Put-Down Zone" and they can have our logos, even order products such as TShirts and other things to be used as constant reminders of their promise to practice empathy, compassion, kindness and caring all the time.  Not just this week, but for all the ones after that.

Of course, T-Shirts and logos in the classroom won't be any more effective than a one-week celebration of tolerance.  That, too, has to be followed up with continual dialog, continual education and a continued emphasis on positive social skills and character. We'll never achieve a paradigm shift that really has a positive effect on the bullying epidemic until we stop thinking "anti-bullying" and start thinking "pro-social skills."

Let's see if we can get the sponsors of this week to commit to that kind of lasting and on-going education in our schools — sadly, it may mean that we no longer have an annual "No Name Calling Week," but wouldn't it be incredible if we didn't have to?

Filed under: Bullying and School Violence, Current Events, Social Skills and Character Tagged: anti-bullying, GLSEN,

Rudest city in America: congrats, you won?

Here's a distinction you probably don't highlight on your Visitor's Bureau brochure: you've just been voted "America's Rudest City" by Travel and Leisure Magazine, according to USA Today's Travel section.

According to the article, there are plenty of people who don't love LA.  It was selected as the rudest city in America, not the Big Apple as we might think.

Not surprisingly, a lot of the "top" rudest cities were also the ones that see a lot of traffic congestion.  Face it, people are not civil in bumper-to-bumper traffic. They get irritable, they get grouchy…they get rude.

I'm sorry to say my own Seattle ranked 16 of the top 20 "rudest" cities ranked.  Shoot, guys…can't we take it a little easier on each other?

On the flip side, Charleston, SC is frequently voted as the most polite city in America.  I don't know how that stands recently, but I'm lobbying for Seattle to work a bit harder on its manners so WE can turn that "impolite" ranking around. What do you think? Can we do it?

What if we all took a little mental chill pill before getting in our cars and consider that cutting someone off on the road really doesn't shave ANY measurable time off our commute?  Or, when we get ready to board a plane, remember that we all leave at the same time?  We can even get proactive and remember to grace someone with a smile when we hold open a door — it may be dreary and rainy outside, but how 'bout we spread a little emotional sunshine?

It wouldn't be hard. It'd just take a little more "outside thinking" as we say in SocialSmarts and consider others' needs, too, not just ours.  If every city on the "Top 20″ list took just a little time and made an effort, I'm sure we could all turn it around.

How's this:  friendly competition for that "Politest City" award. We could arm-wrestle for it!

Filed under: Current Events, Social Skills and Character Tagged: rudest city in America, Travel and Leisure, USA Today

What happened to "good citizenship?"

Today's topic came to me as a convergence of a number of thoughts and observations over the period of a few weeks.  I'd like to examine the idea of "citizenship" — no, not as in the "citizenship" or nationality of a country, but the ordinary, everyday sort of citizenship.

Citizenship is about belonging to a group and "good citizenship," then, it follows is about being a good, positive member of that group. What I think is interesting is that this trait is something that our young children used to be routinely graded on in school. Today…well, not so much.

This concept was brought home to me several weeks ago when I was browsing through, of all things, Tony Little's latest book "There's Always a Way."  In the center of the book, among other pictures and illustrations is a copy of Tony's report card from Kindergarten. If you look at the boxes for which he was graded, you'll notice something very interesting: you will find virtually nothing that assesses and reports on his academic progress or achievement.  Instead, you'll find assessment points like "I listen when others are speaking," "I keep my hands to myself," "I take responsibility," I keep my hands to myself." (I'm not going to discuss Tony's actual grades here; for that, you'll have to buy a copy of his book!)

But, recently, when I was interviewed on Q13 Fox, in the wake of the AZ Shooting incident in which six people were killed and many wounded, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, I posted a link to the video on the SocialSmarts Facebook  Fan page. The topic of the interview was "uncivil discourse," in which I discussed the types of words and phrases we use these days and how it can instantly lapse from disagreeing with someone's viewpoint to vicious character assassination. In response to that posting, one of our supporters, Louise Hart mentioned, too, how we used to be graded on citizenship in primary school, but how that seems to have morphed to where we are merely "consumers" — great at shopping, but lousy at our social skills.

Heck, I, too, remember those days (they weren't THAT long ago, people!), where I had a line in my report card for "Plays Well with Others."  It clearly used to be important — what happened?

I think there was a subtle, but vitally important, shift from "getting along" to "achieving."  It was more about what you accomplished, and less about how. Further, with schools across the country dealing increasingly with the problem of academic under-achievement in their students, the emphasis in the classroom is pushed more and more on academic learning, and less on "the other stuff."

I hear this often when we talk with schools about integrating social skills education into their curriculum.  While there ARE many enlightened school and district administrators who recognize the value of social skills education, more often I get the argument that "we don't have time — we have to focus on academics."  Yet, repeated studies show that time spend on social/emotional learning and social skills results in more productive time in the classroom. More productive time in the classroom results in better academic test scores — exactly the objective schools are trying to achieve. Yet, social skills education continues to be viewed as "non-essential." The push to introduce academics at earlier and earlier ages isn't helping, either, because our youngest kids are losing out on the ability to gain vital skills that will enable them to learn better as they grow older.

Face it, if the data that shows too much time in the classroom is being lost to disruptive, unruly students, then reducing that disruption to allow more time for effective learning is a worthwhile objective. And, the burden can't be exclusively on the teacher.  In other words, just bringing in better "classroom management" programs won't do much if the students, themselves, lack the abilities and skills that allow them to be managed.

So back to the report card: if you have a room full of students, — or, frankly, even just two or three — who don't "Listen when others speak," how do you expect the teacher to teach?  If you aren't able to "Follows directions accurately" or "finish work [my] work promptly" then how will you do well on your assignment, assuming you "take responsibility" to do it in the first place?

It goes deeper than that. "Good citizens" aren't the ones getting in trouble for bullying.  "Good citizens" aren't taunting fellow students on Facebook or harassing them to the point of suicide. The "good citizens" aren't bringing guns to school — they know it's against school rules. "Good citizens" are taking care of their own business, are being respectful to others, are behaving appropriately because it's the right thing to do, not because they're getting paid to do it, and they are doing better overall — socially, emotionally, and academically. Repeated studies have proven this to be the case.

I guess my point is this: yes, we do want to raise young people who do well academically, who can achieve great things and get good test scores.  But, we also need to consider that the goal of education should be to raise not just good students, but good people. While you may believe that the latter is the responsibility of the parents — and I do agree — it is not only the job of the parents. Just like schools expect parents and caregivers to work on students' academic skills at home, so should parents expect support from schools in teaching and practicing good social skills. That way the expectation to be a "good citizen" is consistent, no matter where you are and what you're doing. Which is who we should try to be and what we should be, at all times in all circumstances.

Filed under: Current Events, Early Childhood Education, Education Policy, Social Skills and Character Tagged: good citizenship, improving test scores, social/emotional learning, soft skills, unproductive classrooms

Rhee and StudentsFirst recognizes need for social skills

Wow, I never thought I'd see the day.  This morning, former DC Public Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee appeared on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" program to talk about her plans to help reform education through her new not-for-profit, "Students First."

There was a lot of discussion about the things we have been known to hear from Ms. Rhee — about the problems with teacher tenure, of the values of merit pay, of the importance of keeping good teachers, not just ones who have attained the highest seniority.

One thing I didn't expect to hear her talk about was the value of social skills.  Commenting on the question about violence in public schools, linking it to the events this past weekend in AZ with Rep. Giffords' shooting, the conversation went:

(view video portion of her statement here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32545640)

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Here's the transcript of that portion of her interview:

Morning Joe: …the larger question of violence in public schools off of what happened in Arizona. Being a public schoolteacher can quite often be dangerous. What do we do about this?

Rhee: One of the things that we realized when I was in DC is that we were putting the majority of our resource into reactive resources so we'd have police officers and safety and security and that sort of — those sorts of people in the schools so that when a fight broke out or when something negative happeneed, they came and reacted. So what we've decided to do is deploy some of the resources to thing proactively. How can we train and teach kids, on the front end, conflict resolution so that thaey don't get into those positions to begin with and I think that's the way that we have to be thinking more.  Back in the day, school was ust about teaching writing, reading and arithmetic. Now we have to teach kids a lot of the social skills they're not getting at home.

This is a belief I've held and advocated for for a long time, but it surprised me coming from Ms. Rhee.  You may recall that as Chancellor of DC Public Schools, she launched the ill-fated "Capital Gains" program in several middle schools in the district.  Capital Gains' mission was to pay students each month, in cash, for getting good grades, showing up to school and behaving properly. You could almost say that Capital Gains is the polar opposite of "teaching social skills" because, instead of teaching students to do the right thing because it's to their advantage and it's the right thing to do, you taught them to do it because they saw immediate financial gain.

But, I agree with Ms. Rhee in that putting the bulk of your resources on management and mitigation policies and procedures that is reactive once something occurs isn't nearly as effective — and cost-efficient — and building in prevention models.  Students who are taught the social skills that allow them to recognize and use appropriate and effective behaviors are less likely to get into trouble.  We've seen that in our SocialSmarts schools where principals have reported that they no longer have a bullying problem because the kids won't stand for it.

Schools can be a dangerous place to be, for students and for teachers. I've written in the past about everything from the teacher meltdown in Tennessee because of disruptive students, to the Maryland teacher who was beaten in class by her students, to a teacher caught on camera violently beating HER students.  Violence in schools is everywhere, everyday, whether it's beatings, bullying, shootings and death.

The violence in school is only the extremen outward symptom of the problem. If we truly focus on social skills education we'll not only take care of lot of the extreme stuff, but we'll also see more productive classrooms, more productive teachers that accomplish more (leading to achieving merit pay), students who are respectful and courteous, and test scores that go up.  Ms. Rhee didn't mention that in her interview, but I hope she sees that improving students' social skills will have not only short-term but also longer-term benefits for everyone involved.

And, as her organization's name proclaims, that strategy is putting students first. Because students that are not equipped to learn suffer in the classroom now, in the workplace later, and leave a legacy of rudeness, insensitivy and possibly even more violence in their communities.

Will it prevent another AZ shooting like we saw in Tucson?  There's no simple direct cause/effect relationship here. There are unbalanced people on this earth everywhere.  But, research does show that young people with better social skills have better mental health, better academic achievement and higher economic development. Also, interesting enough, many individuals with mental illness are known to have poor social skills.  I'm not saying that teaching social skills to someone with a mental disorder will miraculously make them "normal;" it doesn't work that way. But, we do know that positive social skills contribute to better individual well-being as well as make things like learning, building relationships and other things so much easier.

I hope this is the beginning of a real look at the importance of social skills education in our schools. I guess only time will tell, but I will remain optimistic that the energy toward this kind of learning is picking up.

Filed under: Education Reform, Social Skills and Character Tagged: AZ shooting, Gabrielle Gifford, Michelle Rhee, Morning Joe, MSNBC, school violence, social skills education

New "gadgets" to control bullying

Now I've heard it all — now we're looking for nifty little gadgets to help with the continuing problem of bullying.

Yesterday, King5 News repeatedly ran a story highlighting new high-tech tools intended to curb bullying among kids.  Among the "solutions" offered:

A cell phone app that monitors conversations between kids. When there are certain patterns or phrases detected in email or text messages, it alerts parents of possible problems.  For the low-low price of $10/month.
The new "iSAFE" backpack which comes with a special cord a child can pull if they feel they are being harassed or intimidated (hopefully they have the backpack handy when this occurs!) The cord causes an alarm to sound and lights to flash on the backpack.
Then there's a new website: bullystoppers.org which allows kids to log in and post reports of bullying anonymously. According to the King5 story, "school officials can then view the postings."

All well and good, but how will this decrease or stop the bullying problem? It's all about building a better mousetrap, but it does NOTHING to curb the underlying "infestation" (to extend the metaphor) that causes bullying to begin with.  Which is typical of the types of "solutions" we generally seek out when there's a problem.

Apparently these tools were studied over a three-month period by a University of Washington professor at Seattle Public Schools and in her assessment she found the cell phone app quite interesting.  But, if you're going to spend $120 "monitoring" your child's email and text messages, how will this help when the bullying is in-person or on social network sites? Will the cell-phone app be extended to all your child's communication methods? 

How about that backpack?  Is this going to turn out like the legacy of car alarms where most of us just ignore when a car alarm goes off because so many "alarms" are false-positives?  Wouldn't it be just as effective for a child to yell, "Help I'm being harassed or hurt!!" than it would to have some techno-squeal go off in the middle of a crowded playground? Which one is more likely to cause a human to respond?

And, do you really think that school officials have nothing better to do than scan websites or get online reports from a site looking for problems? What's going to stop BULLIES from using this site to now turn around an accuse other students of being the troublemakers? Sounds like a great new potential platform for cyberbullying.

I think much more effective use of time and money would be to invest in solutions focused on prevention — not, once again, management and mitigation like we always do?  Just like authorities' response to the Foss High School shootings was to call for better gun control policies and metal detectors.  I asked, "What about the Shooters?"

Backpacks, cell phone apps and "reporting" websites are not going to solve the underlying problem that leads to bullying.  It may benefit the companies coming up with these newfangled ways to trap the perpetrators of the bullying, but there'll be a new crop of them coming up to take their place unless we stop applying superficial bandaids and start dealing with the disease.

Filed under: Bullying and School Violence Tagged: bullying gadgets, bullystoppers.org, cyberbullying, Foss High School shooting, iSAFE backpack, King5

How to hurdle the Achievement Gap

One of the persistent problems in education over the past 40 years has been the Achievement Gap between low-income, minority, and non-native students as compared to their mainstream counterparts. One of the objectives on NCLB was to narrow this gap, but repeated research shows that we haven't made the strides in this area that we had all hoped.

Image by Brian Carr, courtesy of Excellent Education for Everyone (E3) at www.nje3.org

A February, 2010 report by Indiana University's Center for Evaluation and Education Policy (CEEP) entitled Mind the (Other) Gap: The Growing Excellence Gap in K-12 Education (Jonathan A. Plucker, PhD; Nathan Burroughs, PhD; Ruiting Song) shares a great deal of information on the student achievement gap, slicing and dicing the data into varying segments and analyzing the results. I won't bore you with all the details, but I found their overall findings as summarized in the conclusion telling, and consistent with the other research and publications frequently cited:

"The economically disadvantaged, English Language Learners, and historically underprivileged minorities represent a smaller proportion of students scoring at the highest levels of achievement."

With few exceptions, research generally agrees that we haven't made real, significant progress in closing the gap. However, the question remains, why? The typical answer is "funding." While it is true that students in the "gap" populations often attend schools that aren't as well-funded as the mainstream majority, merelyassuming funding is the problem is not sufficient to explain why minority/disadvantaged students lag behind.  And, with supplementary funding sources such as Title I, many impoverished schools are actually able to receive more assistance funding than more "well-to-do" peer schools. So, if not funding, then what?

One of the strongest contributors, I believe, in why the Achievement Gap remains a chasm has very little to do with academics itself.  Yet, at the same time, it happens to be the biggest factor in an individual's personal and professional success — in the classroom and beyond.  It has to do with children's social skills and social-emotional learning.

Readers who are familiar with my writing also are well-aware of the research I often cite about multiple studies from Stanford, Carnegie-Mellon and Harvard which show "85% of your personal and professional success depends on your social skills."  That's more than your academic achievement, more than your socio-economic situation, more than your connections — more important than all of those other factors combined. Further, effective social skills and character development can compensate for a lack in those other areas, they also make acquisition of those other success factors easier.

What does this mean and how does it relate to the classroom environment. Well, it's simple really.  Positive social skills and social-emotional development translates directly into "classroom readiness." Students who don't understand that a classroom environment requires a certain level of discpline, that their job as students means they need to be respectful, paying attention, doing their best work are simply not going to get as much out of the learning environment as students who do have an appropriate level of social skills development.  It is, quite frankly, the most important thing needed for "learning:" the abilityto participate effectively in a learning environment.

And we know already that too many of all children lack appropriate social skills to be successful in the classroom. NCLB actually even talked about this when it stated that "all children will be adequately prepared to participate in the classroom environment." When I train teachers across the country, one of the questions I ask is "how many of you have the majority of your students 'adequately prepared for the classroom environment'?"  General response I get is laughter.  When we see that 20/30/40% or more of productive learning time is lost in the classroom on managing discipline and behavior, we KNOW that too many of our kids aren't "adequately prepared." And you only have to look at the staggering statistics about school bullying, bullying suicides, or classroom violence — even inflicted on teachers — to know that our kids aren't anywhere close to "adequately prepared."

Where does this involve the Achievement Gap?  Simple.  Our low-income, minority, and non-native learners are particularly vulnerable to the problem of inadequate social skills.  Before you interpret this to mean that I blame the parents, let's be realistic.  If you are a single parent, with multiple children, trying to hold down multiple jobs just to keep a roof over your kids' heads and food in their mouths, when, oh when, do you have time to be the "discipline and behavior police?" Or, should you have come to this country from somewhere else in the world where your language, customs and behavior expectations differ from what our norm of behavior is in the US, how are you able to teach your children what's appropriate in this culture?  Without external support, they have to learn by trial and error. 

Now, here are a couple of others consequences of the social skills issue:

Research frequently cites lack of excellent teachers for urban/high-minority/poor schools as a potential factor for the lack of student achievement in these schools.  Good teachers are harder to find for urban schools and even harder to keep once they're there. Stands to reason.  If, on average, the lack of discipline and student behavior issues is consistently within the top-three reasons for why teachers leave the teaching profession, imagine what impact this has in an urban, improverished educational envrionment?
Students that start behind in the area of "learning preparedness" and inadequate social skills are likely to only see further declines as they progress through the school system. Their capabilty to learn declines, they achieve less over time, leading to less motivation to try.  We have a 30%+ dropout rate nationally, and in some urban areas it's as bad as 50% or more. There's no point for these kids to stay in school; they're not getting anything out of it, and it's easier to drop out, hang on the street and continue the cycle of poverty for this and the next generation.
Employers' #1 complaint of the young people entering the job market is that they lack the social skills they need to be successful in the workplace.  And when it takes 27 seconds to make a first impression, having a good handshake and making eye contact and speaking to your interviewer can be the difference between getting that job vs. losing it to someone who knows what it expected in the mainstream business market.

We can go on, but I think you see the point.  Studies have shown that social skills education makes both short- and long-term sense. One notable study came out two years ago, by the University of Washington where elementary students in the Seattle Public School District were given "early childhood intervention" in social skills. The UW followed these students for 15 years and at the end of that period found that these students had better mental health, better educational development and were doing better economically than the control group that did not have social skills education. And the evidence mounts that social skills education is a major factor in students' success in the classroom and later success in the job market.

As the saying goes, "If you give a man to fish, you feed him for a day, but teach him to fish and you feed him for a lifetime."  When we add social skills education into the mix of what we are offering our students — all of them, yes, but particularly those who are vulnurable to missing out on this education  — we are teaching them to fish socially/emotionally.  Not only will we see an improvement in their interpersonal skills, behavior and discipline, but we'll also see improvements in their academic success as a by-product.  They will be on a more level playing field academically as well as economically and perhaps, in a generation, we won't have an Achievement Gap anymore. "When will we close it?" the graphic asks. Then.  Not until then.

 
 
 

 

 
 
 
 

 

Filed under: Education Policy, Education Reform, Social Skills and Character Tagged: achievement gap, bullying, impoverished schools, NCLB, school violence, social skills, social-emtional learning, teacher burnout

2011- What will the current year bring?

I'm not much of a soothsayer, myself.  It seems many people, however, like the idea of making predictions for the future when it's time to turn the page on the new calendar.  I'm not sure we ever really look back much, though, to see what came to pass or how accurate the forward-looking statements were.

I thought I'd try to take a whack on offering a few random thoughts on what we might see in the world of education in year 2011.  Let me know what you think — or better yet, feel free to make a few of your own.

By the end of 2011, 49 states will have some form of anti-bullying laws on the books.  As of today, there are 45 states in the country that have these laws already.
However, in spite of the increase emphasis on legislation, bullying will continue to be rampant. I expect a significant upswing of anti-social behavior and school-based violence in late-April to early-May.
The toll of bullying-related suicides will be higher in 2011 than in 2010.  It's hard to tell, however, whether it's actually because there are more bullycides themselves, or because it's more widely recognized and reported as such.
There will be an increase in attention to prevention of bullying and other anti-social behavior. One significant area of prevention is in the area of pro-social/emotional skills learning, such as our own SocialSmarts program.  In Washington State, for example, State Representative Mary Lou Dickerson (D) is renewing her efforts to raise awareness of the need for this type of education.  The problem I see, however, is that while the need is becoming more obvious and legislators are trying to call attention to these programs, funding will continue to be the biggest limiting factor in adoption.
Because of the financial constraints, more programs will need to be donated to schools, if we're to see any improvement at all.  SocialSmarts, for example, has pledged to donate our program to up to 1,000 schools across the country — other companies are going to need to make similar offers.  The problem with this approach, however, is that frequently schools value their curricula and programs at exactly what they pay for them. If they don't see this type of education as "worth" paying for, why will it become more important if it's free?
We'll see more divisiveness between school districts and teachers/unions as working conditions for them continue to worsen. Talk of longer school days or school years, along with an increasing push to raise test scores, coupled with dwindling budgets doesn't bode well for teachers. So, we'll see more battle lines drawn, at the expense of the kids. This is unfortunate when there are solutions in place that help all stakeholders including district administrations, teachers/staff, and students.
I think the Federal Government will make another push to dedicate more funds to schools like through the recent Race to the Top initiative.  I'd be very interested to see how these initiatives actually perform, but the likelihood is that the current Administration will be out of office before we see any results — positive or negative — against which to measure "success."

I could go on, but I think keeping it to a few choice "predictions" is plenty.

We always talk about how the New Year gives us a chance for a fresh start, to do things better and more successfully. I'm not sure I see that in the cards for Education in 2011 — I'd like to be proven wrong, particularly when lives and well-being of children are concerned.

Now it's your turn — what do you think about what I've offered and what predictions can you make for the coming year?

Filed under: Current Events, Education Reform, Social Skills and Character Tagged: "Race to the Top", bullying in schools, New Year's predictions, Rep. Mary Lou Dickerson, social-emotional learning