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DEL.ICIO.USWhat is the role of the State Board of Education?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I’m in Albany for the second day of a working retreat for State Board of Education members.
During their first day, board members discussed how they operate and whether they’re meeting their goals.
The board members are appointed to their positions. They set policy and establish rules over what students should learn and what teachers must teach.
Most of us know that. But what else should they do?
We expect them to increase student achievement and help more children graduate from high school on time with skills to succeed in college or in jobs.
Are there other goals this board must achieve? Should they work directly with Gov. Perdue or can they set their own legislative agenda and advocate for that?
Comments
By Tony
November 6, 2008 9:10 AM | Link to this
The State Board of Education must have some independence from other politicians in order to be the advocate for children. There have been many laws, rules and regulations that have come from the political world that are harmful and detrimental to children’s learning. NCLB and A+ Reform Act being the most onerous. The state BOE has mostly just played along with these laws instead really pushing for substantive changes that would actually benefit children.
The role of the state BOE should be to set policy and goals for the state in a way that allows local boards to move forward. We are an extremely diverse state and it is impossible for the state BOE to micromanage each local boards’ plans for improvement. Unfortunately, the “one size fits all” mentality is prevailing in some aspects of the state BOE’s role in supporting schools throughout the state.
Providing support for struggling school systems should be one of the major roles of the state body. Organizing resources to support these systems throughout our state is a huge task, but it is desparately needed. In some ways, the state office has gotten better at this role under the current leadership than the previous.
By jim d
November 6, 2008 11:14 AM | Link to this
Here’s what the GADOE states it goals as
By jim d
November 6, 2008 11:22 AM | Link to this
amazingly, these 15 goals fail to once mention improving learning. Perhaps these goals should be reconsidered.
By TheBlogger
November 6, 2008 11:43 AM | Link to this
jim d-
Your confusion clearly shows exactly why everyone needs to understand how education (think of it is a company) works.
The State BOE doesn’t “improve learning”. They do and should, however, define what should be learned….. in other words, the content or standards for learning.
How this is accomplished is not part of the State’s responsibilities, nor should it be. The how is the responsibility of the individual teacher, school, and/or school system. They consider the how based on the mix of students, the amount of money available, etc. Not every classroom, school, or school system has exactly the same number of students, same type of student, nor the same amount of money to spend. Therefore, the State cannot dictate this - nor should they.
Everyone needs to understand how education (as a company) works.
An analogy…. the Board of Directors of GE do not decide on what detergent to use to clean the bathrooms in their plants - nor should they. They may have a broad statement about cleanliness but in no way do they say that (for example) Lysol must be used and a 10 inch brush must be used to scrub up and down only to clean the bathroom sink.
By jim d your trailer is on fire
November 6, 2008 12:06 PM | Link to this
jim d isn’t confused; he is just spewing his typical nonsense that he always does. Do not bother trying to correct him. Remember the old adage about arguing with fools?
By jim d
November 6, 2008 12:56 PM | Link to this
Blogger,
I’ll give you that.
The point I was attempting to make is that setting any type of goals in education the primary focus should be upon increased opportunity to learn.
IMHO, Teaching should be about learning and any board of directors controling education, should have first and foremost a goal of improving that process and improving the process for each and every student.
Please note, the only mention of improvement in their goals comes in testing and graduation rates. Where I’d suggest these improvements would automatically be realized if the primary focus was on student learning instead of some other bogus measure of success.
Quality—not quantity!
By jim d
November 6, 2008 1:00 PM | Link to this
Blogger,
For your entertainment—here’s another anology.
GE or any other widget manufacturer produces widgets that are all the same.
God help us when our schools are content producing widgets.
By TheBlogger
November 6, 2008 3:33 PM | Link to this
jim d
One more try for me and then I am done….
GE doesn’t tell how to clean the bathrooms. But, they can have a scale set up to measure how clean the bathrooms really are.
This is similar to the State BOE. They don’t tell how to teach but they have set up a scale (EOCT, GHSGT, etc) to meausre how well the students are learning. Notice that this measures the students and not teachers.
The GE BOD doesn’t measure the workers performance, just the results.
Now, I am done. Have a great day.
By high school teacher
November 6, 2008 3:36 PM | Link to this
jimd, I’m not sure what a widget is, but I think I’m teaching them. :)
Just kidding. Seriously, the primary goal of BOE should be to serve as a support system to teachers so that THEY can improve learning. Take a look at the DOE website; it’s one of the most user-unfriendly sites I have encountered. It’s is difficult to find what you’re looking for.
DOE wants to improve test scores. However, since the shift from QCC EOCT’s to GPS EOCT’s, they have yet to release a copy of a GPS based EOCT for 9th grade English. The released test is from 2004, and some of the questions on that released test are over content that we no longer cover in the 9th grade! Not very effective, IMO.
By State BOE = Political Hacks
November 6, 2008 8:23 PM | Link to this
Here’s what the state BOE’s role shouldn’t be. To suggest law that would abolish a teacher’s BASIC CITIZENSHIP RIGHT to participate fully in the political process, not where they work, but where they LIVE, PAY TAXES, and VOTE.
We need to tread VERY lightly, when we start talking about abolishing rights of citizens, but obviously the state BOE feels empowered to do so, since they obviously consider teachers second class citizens at best.
By State BOE = Political Hacks
November 6, 2008 8:33 PM | Link to this
Not one word on supporting classroom teachers when it comes to discipline. (And no, Goal 15 on “Persistently Dangerous Schools” doesn’t could when the standard for such a school is so weak that Columbine High wouldn’t qualify.)
No effort at all to address the literally one million discipline referrals teachers have had to write state wide. And no “classroom management training” absent support does not count as addressing discipline. It counts as losing ALL backbone, so you can easily stick your head up your a$$ and say “Problem? I don’t see any problem.”
And we wonder why we are bottom feeders.