Some months ago there appeared an idea; it sprang from one of those long nights where there is little sleep but lots of BrainStorming. That night the BS was about how to improve public education in Mississippi. You see, Mississippi is a wonderful place to live, full of good people who care about their neighbors. The weather is mild. “The fish still swarm & the pine trees keep growing all by themselves. The soil so acid the watermelons and tomatoes are cherished, both sweet and crazy good? True, like everywhere else there are the bad days; but on the whole, it is a fine place to wake up to the Mocking Bird’s song and the magic smell of Sweet Olive”, he eloquently waxes.
Anyway, back to the idea. It’s genesis emerged from “father football”. A team won a State Championship. It was hailed as a “Great” school, a place where there were winners. The media went wild about how fine School was, how great was the coach and the players. Never mind that the annual teacher turn over rate was 40%, the drop out rate was 30%, parental activity was minimal. The State Dept. of Ed had it listed as “Fail Watch”. Sad news is that few were watching, regardless of the cost of a ticket.
The questions kept coming, “How much money is spent on that football program? How much extra time does the football coach spend teaching his team members how to play the game? How much parental and community support is lavished upon the football program? How much school time is spent announcing over the PA system that a pep really would take place at 2 to pep up the football team to win in Friday night?” Question after question. One of the best: What happens at season end if the football team has gone 0 wins & total losses? You know the answer.
You see where this is going? What if pubic schools used the same approach in academics as football? What if one uses MicroSoft Word ‘find and replace’ function to substitute “math” for ‘football’. Read the previous paragraph back with that substitution.
Take a qualified MATH COACH, let them recruit a team, spend the time and energy to teach the game staying after hours, summers, and evenings to their team and then go out and challenge other teams to see who has the best.
It came to me that we need to find a way to recruit teachers willing to live like that. I used ‘live’ since many, many teachers don’t work for the money, they live to teach, it is a calling. Let’s find a way to unlock the talents held back by school Systems stuck in the past where old ways no longer work with today’s youngsters. Let’s do what it takes to get them rewarded, if it’s money, so be it. If it’s trophies, Great! Most likely, it’s the reward of sending to college well prepared students ready to build on the foundation they got at that teacher’s side.
More next week:
