I just finished a book about the Cholera epidemic of London in the 1850’s – timely, right? Aside from providing a little perspective about current events, it was an interesting read because it looked at the way different groups and people addressed the epidemic. More specifically, it highlighted two approaches to addressing a problem – do we attribute the problem to that ‘s the way things are or do we practice due diligence and look for a specific cause of the problem? It didn’t take long for me to connect this much larger idea to what we do in education. There was a huge majority of Londoners at the time who attributed the disease to the miasma, the overall air quality of the generally filthy conditions of some parts of the city. They figured it’s dirty and doesn’t smell good a lot of the time so that must be the reason that illness takes place. That’s malpractice, right? In fact, that isn’t even practice at all. It’s basing a life and death decision on bias and offers zero scientific evidence. To me, it just lacks effort.
I started wondering, do educators fall prey to the easy off ramp that is blaming results on the educational miasma? Hey, this is just the way things are, right? Too many kids in my class. Too many social problems outside of school. Not enough time in the day. Kids these days. To be honest, I’ve heard that when folks hide behind common platitudes like these it makes them feel better. I guess I’m just not wired that way. Even when I recognize something much larger than what is in my sphere of influence is a barrier it provides me no comfort. Our counselor, Ms. Nieto will often tell our students that if you can name, it you can tame it. She is talking about feelings that kids are experiencing, but I hope the same is true of the struggles we face as educators and families. If we can figure out what the problem is, exactly, then we have a real shot at resolving it. Otherwise, we are just throwing our hands up, or maybe worse, giving up entirely.
It all made me think about how we look at student data, meet in teams, collaboratively plan, and go through the RTI/IAT process to ensure we identify and address the issue. If we attributed student achievement struggles to larger, often loosely associated, assumptions we would be no better than the folks in London in the 1850s who never took the time, nor had the inclination, to drill down and really find the root of the issue. If you’re thinking Hey Dan, that was cholera which was a matter of life and death – this is different. I beg to differ.
#conditproud
Dan
Dan @ Condit 