The rapid rise of education savings accounts is transformative for parents and students, but also for teachers. There are boundless opportunities and significant risks.
"If achievable, sustainable progress is our aim—and it must be our aim—the job has to be doable by the teachers we have, not the teachers we wish we had. Let’s be honest: Almost anyone can teach students who are motivated, curious, and engaged. But some students are none of those. They need a school staffed by our most gifted and expert teachers. And to complicate things further, we’re simply not training teachers adequately for success with even average students, let alone the hardest to reach, motivate, and teach."
"This crucial point about understanding complex language is also discussed in Comprehending Comprehension: Is Knowledge Enough (2025). Trina Spencer and Doug Petersen emphasize the importance of developing language, how students must be taught language skills that help them access the knowledge in the text. They ask: What's doable for teachers? This echoes Robert Pondiscio's common sense conclusion: The job has to be doable by the teachers we have—not the teachers we wish we had."
I've long been intrigued by the successes of so many home schooled kids who by any fair measurement are high achievers, often well above the average for kids who attended more traditional public or private schools. My layman's sense is that when homeschooling does well it's a combination of good curriculum and lots of individual attention, i.e. excellent tutoring by whomever is the teacher. Can that combination be replicated in education settings that are funded with public money?
How about elementary classes with 6-8 students to get the kids off to as strong an academic start as possible? Then class sizes could increase as kids get older and become more self-directed. Technology could play a role; everyone learns much (good and bad) on their computers.
The biggest challenge is what to do with: (1) The existing education infrastructure and (2) The economics of converting to a "Pandemic Pod" model rather than large buildings where kids are herded into classrooms of 20+ students. 8 students x $20,000 = $160,000. Is that enough to recruit and retain high caliber teachers while also paying for other expenses (administration, facility costs, books, supplies, etc.)? No matter how inspiring this idea is, it has to be financially practical.
I agree with a lot of this. I've never been too warm on "school choice" mainly for the reasons Hirsch stated. But as a teacher in an experimental magnet-type public school in upstate New York, I have found other reasons to be suspicious too. The "student as customer" model that I can already see at work at both schools that students choose to attend and the public schools that are terrified of losing enrollment has been a disaster. Overall enrollment declines are all but guaranteed everywhere in the next few decades. I see little evidence that the race to enroll those declining numbers of students will be a race to the top. Instead, I've seen administrators rush to make students and parents happy-- regardless of the overall effects on the school-- rather than uphold standards that improve the culture and academics. The same has very obviously happened at many of the local charters. I'd love to be wrong about this, but I have a feeling that universal school choice will be a disaster for academics, especially as the numbers start to drop everywhere.
Beautifully expressed--especially this:
"If achievable, sustainable progress is our aim—and it must be our aim—the job has to be doable by the teachers we have, not the teachers we wish we had. Let’s be honest: Almost anyone can teach students who are motivated, curious, and engaged. But some students are none of those. They need a school staffed by our most gifted and expert teachers. And to complicate things further, we’re simply not training teachers adequately for success with even average students, let alone the hardest to reach, motivate, and teach."
From Pathways to Information: Accessing Knowledge by Leveraging Language (https://harriettjanetos.substack.com/p/pathways-to-information-accessing-a31 ):
"This crucial point about understanding complex language is also discussed in Comprehending Comprehension: Is Knowledge Enough (2025). Trina Spencer and Doug Petersen emphasize the importance of developing language, how students must be taught language skills that help them access the knowledge in the text. They ask: What's doable for teachers? This echoes Robert Pondiscio's common sense conclusion: The job has to be doable by the teachers we have—not the teachers we wish we had."
I've long been intrigued by the successes of so many home schooled kids who by any fair measurement are high achievers, often well above the average for kids who attended more traditional public or private schools. My layman's sense is that when homeschooling does well it's a combination of good curriculum and lots of individual attention, i.e. excellent tutoring by whomever is the teacher. Can that combination be replicated in education settings that are funded with public money?
How about elementary classes with 6-8 students to get the kids off to as strong an academic start as possible? Then class sizes could increase as kids get older and become more self-directed. Technology could play a role; everyone learns much (good and bad) on their computers.
The biggest challenge is what to do with: (1) The existing education infrastructure and (2) The economics of converting to a "Pandemic Pod" model rather than large buildings where kids are herded into classrooms of 20+ students. 8 students x $20,000 = $160,000. Is that enough to recruit and retain high caliber teachers while also paying for other expenses (administration, facility costs, books, supplies, etc.)? No matter how inspiring this idea is, it has to be financially practical.
I agree with a lot of this. I've never been too warm on "school choice" mainly for the reasons Hirsch stated. But as a teacher in an experimental magnet-type public school in upstate New York, I have found other reasons to be suspicious too. The "student as customer" model that I can already see at work at both schools that students choose to attend and the public schools that are terrified of losing enrollment has been a disaster. Overall enrollment declines are all but guaranteed everywhere in the next few decades. I see little evidence that the race to enroll those declining numbers of students will be a race to the top. Instead, I've seen administrators rush to make students and parents happy-- regardless of the overall effects on the school-- rather than uphold standards that improve the culture and academics. The same has very obviously happened at many of the local charters. I'd love to be wrong about this, but I have a feeling that universal school choice will be a disaster for academics, especially as the numbers start to drop everywhere.