“Fortune favors the prepared mind.” — Louis Pasteur
In less than a month millions of children will begin the 2014-15 school year. They start a new academic year in which every child will be instructed and assessed and expected to demonstrate the approximation of a year’s growth in learning. The quality of their learning is of an exceptionally high importance to these children, to their parents, and to the communities and states that authorize and fund their education. Never before will the data portraying the degree and extent of learning and the equitable acquisition of learning be as monitored and evaluated and politically publicized as it will be in June 2015.
In the week before children arrive, teachers are returning to their employment for their before-school-starts professional development day or days. For many teachers these in-service days are jam packed with district, school and grade level or subject level meetings. Administrators have laid claim to at least half of the diminutive in-service time. They need to assure that all employees receive mandated information relative to educator effectiveness and this year’s performance targets. The remainder of contracted in-service time will be dedicated to each teachers’ classroom and teaching assignment preparation.
This is where I pause. School teachers will have two or three days of in-service time to prepare for a school year. If Pasteur was correct, we are not looking at “fortune” but at misfortune. We are assuring the replication of the past. “Déjà vu all over again,” Yogi called it. An in-service of sitting and listening and arranging the stuff of classrooms is not a preparation for effective instruction and quality learning.
Why is this? We all tend to repeat our pasts. It not only may be human nature, but it certainly is the nature of institutions. In Wisconsin, the number of and distribution of in-service days was historically bargained in most school districts. By tradition, two or three days of in-service before the first day of school, a day or two later in the year for clerical needs, and a day to attend the annual WEA convention were bargained into the contract. If teachers or Board members wanted additional days for teachers’ professional development, they had to bargain it into the contract. Sadly, adding time for teacher training was painful and costly and, if bargained in during “good times,” it was quickly bargained out during “bad times.” Both sides of the bargaining table were to blame for this.
Now that ACT 10 has removed in-service time from the scope of bargaining, it is indeed strange that most school district Working Agreements have retained the old lack of commitment to in-service and professional development time. Districts are required to have plans for the professional development of each employee, but the commitment of district time and resources remains mighty thin.
Is this historical and antiquated in-service planning really the best application of the truth that fortune really does favor the prepared mind? Why do we continue to do what we know is not in our best interest? Good questions, eh!
Adults who play the children’s games provide us with a valid counterpoint to what schools do relative to preparation. Practice and rehearsal for a professional level performance is essential. The Green Bay Packers would no sooner think of playing their first regular season game after two days of practice than they would consider selling Lambeau Field. Would the Milwaukee Brewers forego spring training? Professional sports knows the importance of professional preparation. If these organizations committed to playing children’s games for our entertainment spend so much time and effort in preparing their players for a successful season, why shouldn’t schools spend a commensurate level of time and effort in preparing their teachers for a successful season? The successful education of a generation of children should be as important as an MLB or NFL championship.
A quality pre-season for an academic year begins with an intensive study of the past year’s results. It takes time and study to identify and understand the relationship of end-of-year results with instructional practices. A second phase of pre-season should address the correction of instructional inefficiency and strengthening of good teaching strategies. The third phase should focus on the learning needs of children assigned to each teacher and the creation of a game plan for matching best instruction to each child’s needs. When parsed out over the weeks of summer, a school’s pre-season is the commitment to episodes of professional work preparing for the best of professional classroom performances during the next school year. A month of time is needed, if not more.
Instead, a school’s pre-season remains lip service to preparation at best and most teachers spend days if not weeks of instructional time gearing up for their seasonal work. How sad.