The Role of Students in School Policy in NH

In his April 15 editorial, Frank Edelblut outlines the process recently taken to update the Minimum Standards for Public School, aka the 306's. While his accounting of the process is not wrong, it's not an entirely honest portrayal of what happened, why and when.

As an educator who was involved in the first pilot of competency-based assessment in NH over twenty years ago, I think some of the updates are necessary. We DO need to shift our thinking about the role of educators, especially at the secondary level from teaching to facilitating. We DO need to expand our definitions of where kids learn from within four walls of a classroom to the outdoors and in community. However, in shifting these ideas, we cannot discredit the value of public school where kids from diverse backgrounds come together to learn how to be in community despite differences. These positive shifts can and must occur within a strong public school system.

Unfortunately, the State Board of Education and the Commissioner are actively undermining and dismantling public education as evidenced by their support of the school voucher scheme, expansion of charter schools, and their lack of transparency in recent audits. On the upside, this has ensured public school advocates are paying closer attention to decisions and processes that could further harm kids and communities. Had Edelblut and the Board not been so extreme over their tenure, the updating of the minimum standards would have been a lot quieter process, of that I'm sure.

And I'm sure of it, because historically past updates have been written by a very small group of people. Since the original legislation was passed to create these standards, there are some voices that have been notably absent from the process; students.

We should have a widespread, diverse set of student and parent voices from around the state providing honest feedback about what's working and what's not in public schools. And we should use that information to improve a system that is so vital to democracy.

Where's the analysis of the last ten years? How have the current standards been implemented? What is working and what is not? Has there been an independent needs assessment, conducted by someone who has not been part of previous policy updates?

During his quick presentation to the board, Wednesday, April 3, Fred Bramante, who was tapped to lead the 306 rewrite by Commissioner Edelblut, noted that once the new standards are approved, he is eager to share the document with students and parents. My question: why weren't students and parents from various walks of life, experiencing school in different ways across the state, brought in before a rewrite even began?

Yes, this has been a very public updating of the standards, but not because anyone intended it to be transparent. Had public school advocates not raised red flags, the 306s wouldn't have made a news cycle. 

There is nothing in the law that says the standards must be changed every ten years, only reviewed. Afterall, if the current rules work well enough, there may be no need to change them. And, we don't know if they are working because we actually haven't stepped back to reflect with those most affected by policy: students.

New Hampshire students, some who haven't even born yet, deserve a better process, a more inclusive process that allows us to reflect on what's working and what's not before setting the blueprint for the next decade that will impact a generation at least.

It's also worth noting that NH chooses to separate the dialogue between purpose, structure, function and funding. While NH was first in the country to adopt a statewide competency based education policy, schools and districts struggled to make the switch, some are still struggling. Without a drastic increase to the state’s contribution to public school funding, how will we ensure schools can even meet the standards without creating more burden for local property tax payers?

We can't compartmentalize the standards conversation from the funding one; they are intertwined. Continue to do so undermines NH’s public education system, and maybe that's another strategy in the attempt to dismantle public schools in NH.

We also can't separate the standards conversation and students. Their perspective is most important.

An Open Letter to Colleges and Universities: New Hampshire Needs Your Help

Dear College and University Systems,

The NH Education Department, led by a non-educator is cheapening our transcripts.

We need your help on a national level. Public school advocates showed up in force at the hearings to encourage the board of education to deny Prager “U” application as a Learn Everywhere opportunity. They are not listening. 

To earn a half a credit for Financial Literacy using this option, students watch fifteen, five-minute videos and take a 40 question multiple-guess test. There are no discussions, no teacher, and no performance tasks. 

In addition, the content itself is insufficient and offers a biased perspective of financial life in the United States.

It's not the fault of New Hampshire public schools that they must accept Learn Everywhere credit, even when they know it's not rigorous. And, it is the choice of students and families to take advantage of this sub-par opportunity. 

By publicly announcing that you will not accept PU credit as part of your transcript reviews, you will be sending a message to students and families that just because you can get this credit, does not mean you should. 

Edu-facism is here. We need your help as academic institutions to help us stop it. 

Part 3: The Process for Competency Design

We use this graphic to communicate the process for competency development.

What Standards Does PragerU meet?

The debate about PragerU is about much more than the political leanings of its producers. Yes, we should all be concerned that the NH Board of Education and the Education Commissioner are seriously considering requiring that schools accept the video series created by the self-described “world's leading conservative nonprofit that is focused on changing minds through the creative use of digital media.” And, we should be more concerned that the leaders of public education in New Hampshire are advocating for poor pedagogical practices, are setting a bad example for our local school systems, and taking away local control, cheapening transcripts across the state.

Without getting too technical, I’d like to walk through a quality learning design process that educators in New Hampshire and across the country use. First, we start with the outcomes and expectations. “What do we hope students will learn from the experience? What will they be able to do with their knowledge?” The answers to these questions are found in a set of standards that have been adopted locally.

It's important to note that there are two types of standards in New Hampshire when we’re talking about education. Minimum Standards, which are required by statute and Academic Standards, which are guides for districts, not mandates.  

The Minimum Standards, updated every decade, describe broad categories of what students need to learn in high school. Schools have to offer courses "relative to English Language Arts and Reading" but the minimum standards do not precisely describe what that looks like. It is up to the local school districts to adopt its standards.

Academic Standards, such as the Common Core Standards, are adopted by the state as guides for school districts as they develop their programs. These standards are supposed to be aligned to the state test. Theoretically, if schools use the state endorsed standards, that will prepare students for the test. I say theoretically because there is no evidence that one leads to the other. In fact, the best indicator of "Proficiency" is not the standards a school uses, but the socio-economic status of the test taker. 

The beauty of local control is that school districts can choose to adopt a different set of standards if they don’t live up to their local expectations. A good example of this is in the Manchester School District which created its own set of standards rather than use the Common Core as adopted by New Hampshire. They are still held accountable for the same state tests, but the standards they set are up to them.

Let’s return to the debate about adopting far-right publishers’ ideas on financial literacy. The NH Education Department has yet to publish or adopt any Financial Literacy standards since the new requirement was established by the legislature. The closest we can get are a couple of standards from the 2006 Social Studies Framework, a document that's nearing twenty years old. Without a set of learning outcomes to refer back to, there is no way to even check alignment between the proposed course and those outcomes. Even if this wasn’t a product from a conservative propagandist, it wouldn't meet the high standard of curriculum alignment we expect from our districts. 

In a September 15, 2022 Technical Advisory, the Education Department noted that schools should have more guidance from the state before the start of the 2023-2024 school year. That guidance has not been given. Instead they focused on adopting a curriculum that doesn't even fully align with the language set forth by the legislature in RSA 189:10 "The school board shall ensure that personal finance literacy instruction designed to prepare students for success in making financial decisions is taught as part of the curriculum." Note the learning outcome, students will be prepared to make financial decisions.

I think we can all agree that fifteen, five-minute videos and a multiple guess test will not prepare students for making financial decisions. There's no rigorous practice problems, no competency based performance tasks, no space to talk through the nuances of financial health or to ask clarifying questions. 

Standards always come before curriculum adoption in a quality system, NH educators know this. It’s our pedagogical expectation for our schools at the local level, it should be the same for our state education leaders. They should be setting the example of what quality educational practice looks like. Perhaps it’s time we put an educator back in charge of the New Hampshire Education Department, not a politician.

Let's Get Honest About Our Systems in NH

While Ryan Terrell makes some good points in his recent essay "Teachers Do Deserve More, but NH Schools Aren't Underfunded," many of them are without full context and miss the mark. And, similar to his uncouth assessment of a professional educator in the Manchester School District, he offers no solutions except to simply ignore realities such as systemic racism and our current system's structure.

I'd like to offer a new conversation, an honest one, that doesn't ignore the lived experiences of our community members. Let's earnestly look how our system functions and consider how structures are hindering everyone from making real educational progress. 

First, we have to be willing to do an honest assessment of where we are and where we hope to be. Honestly, we need to recognize systemic racism and stop trying to hide it under a rug. 

The truth is, interpersonal racism still exists and most NH teachers don't have the skills to address it in their schools, in part because they've had the privilege not to have experienced racism themselves.

This interpersonal racism is exhibited in many ways including use of derogatory words, slights, as well as implicit bias we all hold and explicit bias that some extreme members of our community hold. If a student is receiving these negative energies from others on a daily basis, whether it's intended or not, that student is not being afforded even an adequate learning environment. 

When this interpersonal racism overflows into policy and practice, we see systemic racism and discrimination. 

Need some evidence? It exists, but we don't collect it. When a kid uses the N word in casual conversation, they might get a consequence, but it's not necessarily recorded or recorded in such a way that we could understand how many times derogatory language is used in a school. At best, that data collection would be based only on what teachers witness anyway.

All to say, when folks say systemic racism doesn't exist in our schools and BIPOC students say "Yes it does", the next logical step would be to collect data. 

That is part of the work of our DEIJ professionals. Local school districts who have introduced these positions are responding to data they've received from current learners, alumni and teachers. Their work is to help name the injustice and educate their school community so that each NH child has access to a free adequate education. 

The long term goal should be that everyone has the skills, knowledge and will to recognize and address injustice when they see it, and to help repair the harm. I think DEIJ directors would actually prefer a NH where their role was no longer needed. That's just not where we're at in most NH schools and so we need folks to lead this work and be the educators that our educators never had.

We should be lifting up and supporting change ideas, not knocking them down before they have a chance. These positions are new in NH. Let's give it a few school cycles, allow folks some freedom to have difficult conversations and collect some data before we start critiquing the efficacy or worth of these positions. 

A second critique I have of of Mr. Terrell's argument is on teacher salaries compared to Massachsettes. The numbers may be right, but Massachusetts is a completely different system soup to nuts. 

Based solely on their numbers their teachers unions are stronger and have more bargaining power. If NH had ten districts instead of over one hundred, our teacher salaries would look a lot different. In fact, our insistence and pride around local control and our school funding formula has ensured salaries stay low and communities are pitted against one another. 

And if Mr. Terrell wants NH teachers to be more like their Massachusetts peers, perhaps we should also take a look at the conversations they are having. Teachers there have a level of competency and comfort with conversations about implicit bias and systemic racism far above that of NH educators because they're facing their truths. I'm not saying they're perfect, but they've been engaged in some real learning and don't have laws that create barriers to honest conversations. 

Finally, when talking about schools in New Hampshire, we can't use one broad stroke. No two districts are alike. Yes, some of our superintendents are making more than they should, and some probably aren't making enough. But honestly, with a shortage of administrators, they have negotiating power. In a country that celebrates a free market economy, this should be no surprise. Unfortunately, this supply and demand issue will not affect the teacher salaries in some districts and the support salaries in all districts. And it won't affect salaries, because of the NH school system's structure and that it is indeed underfunded.