Making Jordan What It Should Be

How do we get there from here? The symptoms of what ails our school are many and so will be the prescriptions. Let’s focus on one, us and...them. By us I mean teachers and them, administrators. Of course, this dichotomy should not exist. We are a team aren’t we? Well, here lies one of Jordan’s ailments. So what’s the prescription?

The Understanding

Teams work together and everyone has a critical role to play in the achievement of the objective. Members of the team provide constructive feedback when someone is not living up to their obligations. There is this understanding, an agreement, if you want. It’s a simple concept yet provides a proven system. In education, everyone on the team is seen as essential to reaching the educational objectives.

Problems arise when the rules of the game are changed midcourse simply because we are losing the game. Instead, in light of being behind on the score, the rules of the game ought be given greater attention. It’s going back to the basics approach. But here lies the problem, the basics are deemed too simplistic. Simple systems require few oversights—less goes wrong or breaks. More complexity, more oversight. More expertise necessary, more to make people feel inadequate about. More programs, more money to spend, more excuses not to focus on basics concerns.

The Teacher

What are the rules of the education game being played at Jordan? Teachers should, at some point , be so good at what they do that the best administrators can do is stay out of their way. The less the administrator gets in the way of such a teacher, the more this type of teacher excels in their teaching. This is the mentor teacher that should be used to help new teachers learn the ropes (what happened to this proven model?)

Until then, it’s good for teachers to feel the pressure of their colleagues first and then the administrator that will STULL them. This kind of pressure that produces constructive recommendations is healthy. At best, this system should help teachers fine-tune their professional skills. At worse, it produces useless feedback and extends teachers no real support.

The Administrator

What makes administrators accountable? Who applies the right kind of pressure and feedback so they can modify their approach? One would expect their superiors to provide this for them. But is this sufficient? No. As teachers we are obligated to provide constructive feedback to our administrators. They in turn should not hesitate to use this information and make modifications to their style. This type of feedback should be viewed as positive and, in fact, invited. At Jordan, most teachers don’t feel they can safely, much less bluntly, provide this kind of feedback. The contrary is more accurate, they are shy in doing so for they sense it is genuinely not welcomed. It may not be an exaggeration to say that it is discouraged. This is not good for an educational environment. Notice the lack of dialogue during faculty meetings? Teachers vocal for years are silent. Is this a mere happenstance? I don’t think so. It is a symptom screaming for a remedy.

Information is the currency of democracy —

Thomas Jefferson