June 9, 2003
In Home
Schools, Private Schools and Systems Education, reference was made to Dr
William Bennett's K12® Virtual Academy. Is
K12® what it is cracked up to be?
On the homepage of the K12® website, the
first full sentence states, "K12 is an education company dedicated to
building a comprehensive, standards-based curriculum and learning
program."
"Standards-based" is
synonymous with outcome-based or education based on outcomes. This means, in
the words of the guru of outcome-based education, Dr William Spady, you start at the end and decide what you want the
student to look like as a result of his/her educational experience
― the end product or outcomes; then you work backward from the end
product, aligning the curriculum, instruction and teaching methodologies to the
outcomes wanted to insure that the student looks like the outcomes as a
result of the "process" or the educational experience. What the
student looks like is synonymous with "what the child should know
and be able to do" neither of which can be defined as "traditionally
academic."
This is given further credence on the
Educational Approach web page at K12®,
"The K12® curriculum
is designed to help you meet or exceed national and state standards."
Those national and state standards are
outcome-based, they are process oriented; they are not academic as most parents
would define the word.
Both the K12® Virtual Academy and
Homeschool curriculums boast a link to the Core Knowledge Foundation:
"The content
recommended in the Core Knowledge Sequence is one major foundation of the K12®
curriculum. K12 is also built upon analysis and comparison of state standards;
curricular recommendations of prominent professional organizations (such as the
National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, the American Association for the
Advancement of Science, and the National Council for History Education); and
extensive research into the cognitive psychology behind effective learning,
..."
Three things stand out in the above
quote and directly affect any assumption that might be made that K12 is
knowledge based: 1) The comparison to state standards.
State standards in every state are process oriented. This means that knowledge
is only incorporated as it is used and applied in addressing a unit theme or
thematic unit focusing on a social or life-related issue. 2) The curricular
recommendations of the prominent professional organizations listed above were
made as a direct result of the federal Goals 2000 law and are, therefore, also
process oriented. 3) The use of the term "effective learning" would
appear to be synonymous with the term "effective schooling" (more on
this later) and all the outcome-based standards related thereto. Bennett is a
known proponent of effective schooling practices.
Both the K12® Virtual Academy and the
K12® Home School curriculums are accompanied by "assessments." An
assessment is an opinion of the quality of the child's work as compared to a
rubric scale which is looking at how well the child demonstrates the wanted
process. The scale is benchmarked to the grade level indicated.
An assessment is not an objective
measure; it is a subjective measure open to the likes and dislikes, mood and
temperament of the one doing the assessing (the assessor). Assessments are the
tool used to determine if the curriculum, instruction and teaching
methodologies are moving the students to look like the outcomes established as
the end product or goals of the educational experience. What is the end product
of the educational experience? According to High Skills, High Wages
put out by the Workforce Training and Education Coordinating Board, Washington
State, in 1994, the end product is that students are proficient in
"teamwork, critical thinking, making decisions, communication, adapting to
change and understanding whole systems" (Page 65). These, of course, are a
direct outreach of the work of the Secretaries Commission on Achieving
Necessary Skills or, as better known, the SCANS competencies. Some might find
it of interest that Elizabeth Dole, Bob Dole's wife, was President Bush Sr's Secretary of Labor when the SCANS commission was
established and the SCANS competencies and reports were written and published.
If it walks like a duck, quacks like a
duck, and looks like a duck, you can pretty well figure it's a duck. K12® fits
the bill (no pun intended) of outcome-based education (aka,
systems education).
But this is not all. Dr William Bennett,
author of the Book of Virtues acknowledged, in a New York Times
article in 1985, that the most difficult time in his career was "the death
of my friend, boss, and mentor, Charles Frankel." Frankel served on the
editorial board of The Humanist with such notables as B. F.
Skinner and Betty Friedan, both of whom are signers
of the Humanist Manifesto II, 1973. This might explain why the
virtuous Dr Bennett has no reservations about his $18 million gambling habit.
Further, Dr Bennett, founder of K12®, is
no stranger to education reform. Bennett was the Secretary of Education during
the Reagan Administration. In 1985, while Secretary of Education, Bennett was
quoted, in a USA Today article, as supporting both a national
curriculum and national testing.
In 1991, his "outcome-based"
design team, The Modern Red Schoolhouse, was chosen by the New American Schools
Development Corporation (NASDC) as one of the
original design teams to "Reinvent American education by designing new
schools for a new century." (NASDC, 1991)
Sitting on the board of Bennett's design team was Dr Chester Finn. In the
overview document submitted by Bennett to NASDC as
part of his design team proposal, Bennett states that as Secretary of Education
"he became widely known as an outspoken proponent of education
reform." The Modern Red Schoolhouse design team was a member of the National Center for
Effective Schools as is the Core Knowledge Foundation (See Northwest Regional Educational Laboratories
for more information regarding "effective schooling practices").
In 1991, We Must Take Charge
by Dr Finn was published. In that book, Dr Finn states,
"... Perhaps the best
way to enforce this standard is to confer valuable benefits and privileges on
people who meet it, and to withhold them from those who do not. Work permits,
good jobs, and college admission are the most obvious, but there is ample scope
here for imagination in devising carrots and sticks. Drivers' licenses could be
deferred. So could eligibility for professional athletic teams. The minimum
wage paid to those who earn their certificates might be a dollar an hour
higher."
The "standard" to which Dr
Finn refers is the core learning standard of systems education and the
"certificate" to which he refers is the Certificate of Mastery (or
Initial Mastery), also called the CIM.
Lamar Alexander, US Secretary of
Education in 1991, endorsed Finn's book, stating,
"This book saved me
six months. It explains the educational successes and ― more to the point
― the failures of the 1980s and frames the 90s debate better than
anything else I have seen. ..."
It was in 1991, under President George W
Bush, Sr, that America 2000, the precursor to Goals
2000, came into being and the New American Schools Development Corporation was
established. The abstract to an article published in U.S. News and World
Report in 1991, stated,
"The Bush
Administration's true educational philosopher is Chester Finn, Jr., a professor
of education and public policy at Vanderbilt University. Finn is the chief
architect of Bush's plan to fix the nation's schools."
William Bennett also endorsed Finn's
book, stating,
"Chester Finn gives
us a war plan for the educational battles of the nineties. The issues he
discusses ― and the common sense answers he proposes — will set the terms
of the education debate for years to come."
In 1982, Finn wrote,
"Some to be sure,
like to think they can have it both ways; i.e., can obtain aid without saddling
themselves with unacceptable forms of regulation. But most acknowledge the
general applicability of the old adage that he who pays the piper calls the
tune, and are more or less resigned to amalgamating or choosing between
assistance and autonomy."
Dr Finn also sits on the board of K12®.
On the Education Advisory Committee at K12®
is Michael Kirst of Stanford University. Kirst has an extensive background in systems education,
including being on the Educational Advisory Panel of the New American Schools
Development Corporation. In 1992, Michael Kirst also
shows up as an "expert consultant" to the Governor's Council on
Education Reform and Funding (GCERF) in Washington
State along with Marc Tucker, the head of another NASDC
design team, the National Alliance for Restructuring Education (NARE) which later became America's Choice® and which also
promotes and makes its money implementing systems education.
In Senior Management at K12® is Dr
Thomas Boysen, senior vice president of the Miliken Family Foundation. Boysen
served as the commissioner of education in Kentucky, bringing the Kentucky
Education Reform Act (KERA) to that state. As an
outcome-based system, KERA was held up as the model
for all states to copy until it became obvious that it was an abysmal failure,
at which point it slid into obscurity. Dr Boysen has
been involved in education reform (systems education) all over the United
States.
Then there is Lowell Miliken
who comes to K12® as the president of the Miliken
Family Foundation, a foundation which promotes systems education nation-wide
and with which Bennett associates.
There is yet more.
In exploring the K12® website, no
mention is made of the FTE (full time equivalent) money Bennett receives from
the states where K12® Virtual Academies have been established. While it is
stated that the Virtual Academy is "tuition free," that term is not
defined. No reference is made to the fact that "tuition free" means
the student is considered a public school student subject to the control of the
government education system. "Tuition free" is nebulous, misleading,
open to interpretation, while its unspoken definition is not.
It is obvious, in looking through the
K12® website, that the Virtual Academy is the priority of K12®. At the same
time, the Virtual Academy home page makes no direct reference to being
connected to the government education system, instead stating,
"K12® Virtual
Academies combine the best elements of homeschooling ― flexibility and
individual instruction ― with the support and accountability of a public
or private school."
This statement gives the impression, but
does not state outright, that the Virtual Academy is tantamount to
homeschooling. It is not. The statement is misleading.
As stated in Home Schools, Private Schools and Systems Education, in the
arena of systems education, all really does mean all and the system
must, by its very construct, include all.
It is interesting to note that the home
school page on K12® requires the home schooler
wishing to use the K12® curriculum to "enroll." While most home
school curriculum companies simply set up an account for anyone wishing to
order and use the curriculum offered by the company, at K12® the home schooler must "enroll" in order to purchase
curriculum. "Enroll" means to sign on or join. What is the home schooler joining in purchasing the K12® home school
curriculum? As with other nebulous terms used on the K12® website, this term is
not defined.
K12® gives the impression that it is
about home schooling without stating such outright, using the term home
school to refer to a school in the home but under the control of the
government. Such takes a term that has traditionally meant a school in the home
independent of government control and changed it to mean just the opposite.
Such changing of the meaning is, of course, beneficial to systems education,
just as the changing of the meaning of academic to mean process
benefits systems education while giving parents the impression it retains its
traditional meaning.
But parents, educating their children at
home, like the K12® curriculum. Whether parents like the K12® curriculum is not
the issue. The issue is the manner in which K12® is presented and that K12® is
a buy-in to systems education. The way K12® is presented is misleading. The
nebulous terms used mean one thing to parents but actually mean something
entirely different in the context of the systems education process supported by
Bennett and those involved in his company, K12. Parents are allowed to assume
the terms mean what they believe they do.
Some parents don't care that being
involved with the K12® Virtual Academy keeps them under the control of the
government, or that being part of the K12® Virtual Academy cedes to the
government the right to interfere in the education of the child in the home.
But some parents do care. And they care
about the changing of the meaning of "homeschool" as used by K12®.
Considering that systems education must include all, it is
neither paranoid nor irrational for home schoolers wishing to maintain their
autonomy to guard carefully the meaning of the word "homeschool."
Sources:—
Finn,
Jr, Chester E; NAASP
Bulletin; "Public Service, Public Support, Public
Accountability", p .69; March, 1982.
Finn,
Jr, Chester E; We Must Take Charge; New
York: The Free Press; 1991.
Governor's Council on Education Reform and Funding;
Putting Children First; Washington State; 1992.
New
American Schools Development Corporation; Designs for A New Generation of
American Schools; Request for Proposals; Arlington, VA; October 1991.
Toch, Thomas; "The Wizard of Education"; U.S.
News and World Report; July 15, 1991; p. 46.
© 2003 Lynn M. Stuter
- All Rights Reserved