College ... or die

 We had an amazing opportunity to visit Tindley Accelerated High School, a charter school in Indianapolis. The school was started to allow African American children to see that going to college (university) is absolutely within the realms of possibility and that through effort and persistence, they will achieve a college education. All ethic origins are welcome to attend this school (they even have an Aussie exchange student), however, the majority of the students are African American. The motto "College ... or die" shows the high expectations there are for all students to achieve.

 The mission for the school states that "The Tindley Accelerated Schools, in cooperation with parents and the broader community, will empower its students -- regardless of past academic performance -- to become successful scholars who graduate with the capacity for selective college opportunities."

Going to Tindley School was an eye-opener for me. It was my first experience of a Charter School, and there has been such a lot of politicizing about charter schools in NZ. Here at Tindley, although the population demographic is mainly black and low income, there is a real drive, both from the school and the community, to achieve success. In fact, the school has Title 1 funding and ALL of the students are entitled to free or reduced cost lunch. 

All students in this school are doing honours classes (like an extension programme). The students might not be classed as honours students in other public schools, however, at Tindley, all do Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Calculus, Algebra, Geometry, Social Studies, Spanish and Advanced Placement English. The only options available are Physical Education, Art and Vocal Music. There is no Home Economics or Wood shop; all subjects are directly leading to a high level, academic programme that will ensure entry into top universities.

If students struggle, they stay at school until 5.30 for extra tuition. One parent provides food at 3.30 every day for students who are staying to get extra help.The expectation is that ALL students will go to college and ALL will succeed. Students are called scholars. The cohort groupings (like our houses) are named after universities -- Harvard, Carnegie Mellon, Brown, Purdue, Columbia, Stanford, etc. 

Most of these students (oops, I mean scholars) were never exposed to the idea of college being an option for them when they were young. Many white kids grow up with college being discussed in their families and so it is always part of their thinking -- these students don't know names of universities before they come to Tindley. They become scholars by being given a high expectation. They choose the school and then work to make learning successful.

 It's not softly, softly either; the students have to work hard and so do the teachers. There is a high turn-over of teachers because of the burn out that comes with devoting so many hours a day to their students' success. I remember a parent in New Zealand saying once that her son needed to be pushed, and I wondered what she meant. Was she prepared for him to do extra work? Was she prepared for him to make up extra time at school if assignments weren't completed on time? The parents in this community are totally behind the rules and structures of this school. I wonder if some people in New Zealand want success for their children, but without the student having to put in the effort.

This is our wonderful Friday seminar coordinator, Hope Rias, who is a doctoral student at Indiana University. She used to teach at Tindley before she started her Ph.D programme and arranged this inspiring visit for us.

Bloomington Worldwide Friendship

A highlight of my stay here in Bloomington has been being part of the Bloomington Worldwide Friendship group. Volunteers act as hosts to international students and meet with them occasionally for outings. Jeremy Lee, from Singapore, and I have been very fortunate to be linked to Michael Molenda and Janet Stavropoulos while we have been staying in Bloomington. I have also had the chance to go on some outings with Cyndi who is the host of my colleague, Taina Wewer from Finland.

Michael and Janet also have a wealth of knowledge about the history of the local area, and the history of the US in general. Michael has taught me some quirky pieces of general knowledge, for example, how the town of French Lick got its name. Another odd fact I learned from him was that Peshtigo, Wisconsin, had a huge fire the same day as the great fire in Chicago in 1871. More lives were lost in Peshtigo, but because the Chicago fire happened, Chicago got all the publicity and many people don't even know about the Peshtigo tragedy.

Here are some pictures of the wonderful times I have had being part of the Bloomington Worldwide Friendship group.

Brown County Forest Park

Michael and Janet in Nashville, Indiana

Janet in Nashville, Indiana

Nashville, Indiana

Local product of Nashville, Indiana

Janet and I at at the opera; The Italian Girl in Algiers

Friends of Music Society dinner

Bloomington Worldwide Friendship Group picnic at Lake Lemon

Jeremy, Taina and I on the boat trip at Lake Lemon

Taina, Mohana, Ousama and Cyndi talk with a lady whose family used to own the surrounding land.

Ousama, Taina, Mohana and I on the covered bridges trip with Cyndi

Cyndi, Mohana, Taina and I on the Covered Bridges trip

Janet and I with our silver ferns

West Baden Hotel

Michael and I inside the luxurious West Baden Hotel, in the middle of nowhere.

Bus ride to the neighbouring French Lick Hotel

Dinner inside French Lick Hotel

A shopping trip to the outlet stores in Edinburgh, Indiana with Taina and Cyndi

Griffy lake with TsaiYi and Michael

Griffy Lake

Dinner at Janet and Michael's house after our walk through the woods.

Articles in the local "Indiana Daily Student" newspaper

The local student newspaper is interviewing all of the Fulbright Distinguished Award teachers. Below are the links to the articles about people from New Zealand (me), Finland, Singapore, Morocco and India.

Fiona Jeffries, New Zealand.
http://www.idsnews.com/article/2014/10/a-qa-with-fulbright-distinguished-award-in-teachin-g-program-winner-fiona-jeffries

Petteri Granat, Finland
http://www.idsnews.com/article/2014/10/qa-with-fulbright-distinguished-award-in-teaching-program-winner-petteri-granat


Mohana Ratnam, Singapore
http://www.idsnews.com/article/2014/10/qa-with-fulbright-winner-mohana-ratnam

Christine Sim, Singapore
http://www.idsnews.com/article/2014/10/qa-with-fulbright-distinguished-teacher-christine-sim

Sutapa Mukund, New Zealand
http://www.idsnews.com/article/2014/10/qa-with-fulbright-distinguished-teacher-sutapa-mukund

Taina Wewer, Finland
http://www.idsnews.com/article/2014/10/qa-with-fulbright-distinguished-award-in-teaching-program-winner-taina-wewer

Remya Iyer Parameshwar, India
http://www.idsnews.com/article/2014/10/qa-with-fulbright-distinguished-teacher-remya-iyer

Sanaa Hissame, Morocco
http://www.idsnews.com/article/2014/10/qa-with-fulbright-distinguished-teacher-sanaa-hissame

Columbus Signature Academy High School -- A Project Based Learning Secondary School

This school is led by the Principal, Mike Reed (who incidentally, would love to get an invitation to come to New Zealand to talk about his school and this type of learning ... and then fit in seeing the sights of course. :-) ) This school is a New Tech Network school and is based on using 21st century skills. The training was done in Napa Valley. The school is based on the skills valued by industry -- being tech-rich, having a collaborative environment and having the skills of agency, being able to discuss, communicate and negotiate. The philosophy is to use authentic projects to solve authentic problems. The school opened with 100 Freshmen, and added 100 each year. (Freshmen, Sophomore, Junior, Senior.) There are 400 in this school, as opposed to 2100 in Columbus North and 1600 in East High School. This is classed as a Magnet school; students have a home school of East or South, but they  do most of their classes at CSA, and only go to their home school for things not offered at CSA such as sports teams, high level French and music. This way they can be in sports teams and band in the other schools.

New Tech schools have been driven by economic development. To attract business to a town, you need to have good schools. The town of Columbus is the base of Cummins Diesel Engineering Company and as such the town has more engineers per capita than any other town in the US. The school has a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) focus, but not all go on to do engineering. They use Project Lead the Way as the basis of their learning. All projects are applied using science and maths and using a problem solving process. Many of the courses are integrated. For example, Probability and Statistics is integrated with English in a course called Social Justice. It looks at how data is used and decisions are made.

Like the other Signature Academy schools, it is representative of the community and must have students who are entitled to texts and lunch being provided by the state, it must have Special Ed students and also English as New Language (ENL) learners as well. Their study hall is called an Ac. Lab (Academic Lab). The corridor is the "Collaborador" where students get together to work on their projects. No bells are used in this school and students have a five minute 'passing period' to get from one class to the next. Students here are also required to do 100 hours of community service to graduate. (North High School requires 10 hours of community service.)

There is a consensus model of decision making. Students are involved in the timetable making process, as are the staff. It is not just done by an administrator. Students are always on interview committees when new staff are appointed. The transition to this type of learning can be tricky for new students. They need to ask questions, analyze an issue, not wait to be told by a teacher. Students learn to advocate for themselves, to problem solve and to find answers. In saying all this, Mike was realistic that he is dealing with teenagers and there have been some suspensions of students in the time he has been there; generally for second offense substance abuse and continued defiance.

No complaints if you wear a bow tie.

And, you can wear what you like to school.

Columbus Signature Academy, Fodrea -- A Project Based Learning School in Columbus, Indiana

We went out to Columbus, Indiana to visit an elementary school and a high school that does all their learning through Project Based Learning. Columbus Signature Academy is led by Dr Diane Clancy. All of the teachers are called 'facilitators' - students will talk about their 'facilitators' and the term 'teachers' isn't used. Their mission is to prepare socially engaged citizens who excel in an information and technology rich society. Here, students are empowered to seek answers and create solutions. There is a ballot system to get into this school, but the school must be representative of the local community so it is not all capable learners and high socioeconomic families who are represented. All have made a choice to be there, however.

BYOD started this year, but they also have in class a 2:1 ratio of Netbooks for grades 1 and 2 and all students from Grade 3 up have their own Netbook. Projects are chosen based on the interest of the students. Students have voice and choice in what is being learned, yet the state standards are included in all projects. Students are engaged in the learning because they are involved in the brainstorming of ideas, the voting on an idea and they then work in groups to carry out parts of the project they have selected to be involved in. Students do well in State Standardized tests because they have an authentic memory of doing a skill.

As part of the PBL, students have 'stations' in their classes that are literacy and numeracy based. All groups are heterogeneous, except their reading groups and their maths groups. For these stations, teachers differentiate the work according to the ability levels of the students. The morning stations are usually Maths and Language Arts focused and the afternoon stations are Social Studies and Science based. Facilitators plan the stations with a co-teacher, and students complete the stations in both classes. The school has been purpose built so that there is a large door that allows access between two classes. Every two days, new stations are presented to the students.

The up side is that students are highly engaged, become more confident, enjoy their learning and are doing well in State testing. There is no bullying; there is a culture of support and empathy for others. Students are eager to learn and see success. The only down side that I saw was that teachers are spending huge hours in their jobs. Some reported being at school at 7.30am and working until 10pm. I know dedication to your job is important, but it seems these teachers don't have a life outside of school. One even spoke about her buddy facilitator becoming her best friend and they catch up in the weekends. Teachers don't get paid well in the US, so to be working lawyers' hours and to get teachers' pay somehow doesn't sit well with me. Also, what about teachers own families? Great for the students, but just some red flags raised in my thinking.

An early start, after a late night.

The library is the hub of the school; not a separate room.

Lots of writing being done.

Coming up with ideas for the next project. (Grade 2.)

All classes have Smart Boards