The Two Million Minutes Blog

Why “THE” 21st Century Solution?

There has been just a bit of criticism raised by educators about me naming my new documentary on Arizona’s BASIS Charter Schools “THE 21st Century Solution.”  Let me clarify why I view the school as such a powerful model for America.

It is NOT because the BASIS school is “THE” solution, but because it embodies two fundamental attributes necessary for “THE” dramatic improvement in U.S. education:

1- it meets the President’s agenda for K-12 education improvement – an agenda, which I believe, makes sense for 21st century America, and

2- because it passes critical business tests necessary for large-scale replication.

President Obama and Secretary of Education Duncan have articulated an Education Agenda that, to the general public, makes common sense.

Here is Secretary Duncan's 6-point public school agenda:

1- Make U.S. Education World-Class – set world-class academic standards and a curriculum that fosters critical thinking, problem solving, and the innovative use of knowledge to prepare students for college or career.

2 - Assessment and Accountability - require systems that provide timely and useful information about the progress of individual students and the capability of individual teachers.

3- Pay For Performance – use rewards and incentives to keep talented teachers in the schools that need them the most and demonstrate we value their skills.

4- Recruit Best and Brightest to Teaching – support efforts to fast-track private sector professionals with advanced degrees into teaching and push for expansion of Teach For America.

5- Remove Poor Performing Teachers - challenge State and school districts to quickly remove ineffective teachers from the classroom.

6- No Restrictions on Charter Schools – school boards should not limit the number of charter schools; should allow charter schools to create their own rules regarding hiring, curriculum, tenure and unionization; and per student funding should be equal to that of other public schools within the same district. High-quality charter schools give children and parents the option to find the school that best fits their needs.

I titled my film “The 21st Century Solution” because, in addition to Secretary Duncan’s Education Agenda, the BASIS school’s economics make it the most compelling business model I have found for a world-class 5th-12th grade school.

If we are to prepare America’s 54 million K-12 students to compete globally with the nearly 600 million other K-12 students in the world, we must have 21st century schools that:

1- meet the needs of students,

2- can be affordably scaled, and

3- are economically sustainable with the $668 Billion we annually spend on K-12 education -- an amount that exceeds any other country.

Our economy simply cannot support massive increases in education spending –we must get creative, entrepreneurial and frugal. BASIS, more than High Tech High, New Tech High or KIPP, meets the test of business scalability and sustainability.

That is what I’m referring to as The 21st Century Solution. Here are the specifics:

1- Modest Start-Up Costs – a BASIS school can be started for ~ $150,000. That is extraordinarily affordable. BASIS Tucson is located in a strip mall across from Office Depot on East Broadway. It has very humble facilities. That's fine for a school.

2- A Curriculum Above The Global Standard – in math, science, English, history, foreign language, etc. We must educate our children to at least the level of those with whom they will compete for the high-wage jobs of the future.

3- An Inspiring Culture – can ordinary American kids, middle and low income, achieve at extraordinary academic levels? BASIS proves they can. That is reassuring and inspiring!

4- A School Year of 180 days – lengthening the school day, week, year will take lots of debate and will add to cost. Kids need to compete now. That is not to say that many children would not benefit from a longer day, week and year - it just will add to cost.

5- Sustainable Economics for a “Free Public Education”  - for an annual cost of $6,500 per student, BASIS is delivering a world-standard, free public education – that cost is below the national per student average of $8,700 and well below my daughters’ private school tuition of $15,000/yr in Memphis.

6- Passionate, Expert, Inspiring Teachers - all of BASIS teachers are professionals with Master’s or PhD’s in their fields of expertise. Over 80% are NOT certified teachers.

7- College and Graduate School As Students' Goal – 100% of BASIS students go on to top colleges and most plan for graduate school.

8- Entirely replicable – no new curriculum needs to be developed; no major foundation grants are needed to fund start-up; no corporate contributions are required to sustain the school. This model can be scaled quickly across the country and is affordable to ANY community.

My film may have disappointed the pedagogues, but for helping typical Americans and their typical local and State leaders envision a way to bring American children up to world-standard, at a price we can afford, I contend BASIS is “The 21st Century Solution.”

So, I used BASIS as a conceptual metaphor, much as the film uses time lapse photography, slow-motion video, a tiny bird at the end and the song Une Annee Sans Lumiere by Arcade Fire: metaphorically.

Bob Compton

Whitney Tilson Delivers Compelling Lecture on Achievement Gap

On 4-4-09, after a few brief comments by DC School Chancellor Michelle Rhee, TFA Co-founder Whitney Tilson delivered a calm, cogent, compelling, data-packed talk explaining why the Achievement Gap exists. It was brilliant!

                      

Here are a few of his most damning slides:

STAGNANT EDUCATION FOR OVER 30 YEARS

 

PISA RESULTS:
 

LONGER KIDS ARE IN SCHOOL THE WORSE THEY GET INTELLECTUALLY

 

WHILE U.S. EDUCATION STAGNATES

AND THE MOST DAMNING FACTS OF ALL:

 

THE KIDS WHO STRUGGLE ARE ASSIGNED TO THE WORST TEACHERS

2 Million Minutes Recognized in U.S. Congressional Record

Courtesy of Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords,the film Two Million Minutes is now immortalized in the US Congressional Record as show below:

Honorable Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona
Congressional Recognition for BASIS Charter Schools
Entered into the Congressional Record on September 30, 2009

Madam Speaker, I rise today to recognize the nationally acclaimed BASIS Charter Schools which provide outstanding educational services in Tucson, Arizona.

American students often lag behind their counterparts in other countries and we know that action must be taken to reverse this trend.  BASIS Charter Schools give us a national model that demonstrates how we can effectively address this serious decline in educational performance.

Ten year ago, Michael and Olga Block embarked on their mission to create a “New American” school.  They established the BASIS Charter Schools.  The BASIS philosophy understands that math and science are essentially the languages of the 21st century.

These forward-thinking founders say that great teachers are responsible for the schools’ successes.  At BASIS, the teachers hold themselves and their students to high standards and levels of accountability.  Students engage in a demanding course of study that gives them the skills needed to compete in the new global economy.

BASIS has received many well deserved awards.  The high school has been selected in each of the last four years by Newsweek magazine as one of the top 10 high schools in the United States.  During the 2008-2009 academic year, BASIS students received perfect marks on the Arizona Instrument to Measure Standards (AIMS) exam.  In 2009, BASIS was the only high school in Arizona with 100 percent of its students passing the AIMS exam in every subject tested.

Documentary filmmaker, Robert A. Compton, has produced a film about BASIS schools entitled 2 Million Minutes:  The 21st Century Solution.  The title comes from the time a student spends in school from eighth grade until high school graduation.  The filmmaker lauds BASIS schools saying that they “demonstrate that American students are capable of competing academically with the best in the world.”  The film will premiere in Tucson on October 1, 2009.

I am proud to acknowledge the great achievements of BASIS Charter Schools.  The founders, the teachers, the students and their parents are leading the way for the critical improvements we must bring about in our public education system.

Gabrielle Giffords
Member of Congress

Evidence Mounts - Charters Improve Traditional Schools, too

The salient points from todays WSJ Editorial (11-4-09) - "No Child Left Behind"

"Opponents of school choice are running out of excuses as evidence continues to roll in about the positive impact of charter schools."

"Marcus Winters, who follows education for the Manhattan Institute, has released a paper showing that even students who don't attend a charter school benefit academically when their public school is exposed to charter competition.""

...without the burden of work rules and other constraints imposed by unions and the bureaucracy, [charters] are hugely popular with parents, and more than 1.4 million kids now attend 4,578 charters in 41 states. [NOTE: the US has 54 million K-12 students]

"The result has been, on balance, a superior education for the charter-bound kids and pressure on local public schools to improve or lose students. Public schools that must compete with charters are no longer insulated from the consequences for failing to educate their charges."

"Imagine that. Competition works."

READ FULL EDITORIAL

It's Time To Break the Teachers' College Cartel says Harvard Lecturer

"Take heed of this message from Katherine Merseth, a senior lecturer and director of the teacher education program at Harvard University:

"The dirty little secret about schools of education is that they have been the cash cows of universities for many, many years, and it's time to say, 'Show us what you can do, or get out of the business.'"

"It's high time that we broke up the cartel," she said. "We need to hold graduate schools of education more accountable." Merseth says that of the 1,300 graduate teacher training programs in the country, about 100 or so are adequately preparing teachers and "the others could be shut down tomorrow."

READ ARTICLE

Welcome to the "New Economy" - where are the jobs?

Constraining America’s Brightest

Op-Ed Columnist

By BOB HERBERT

Published: October 30, 2009

...

"So the gloomy outlook that this economy is offering so many of America’s brightest young people is not just disconcerting, it’s a cultural shift, a harbinger.

As jobs become increasingly scarce, more and more college graduates are working for free, at internships, which is great for employers but something of a handicap for a young man or woman who has to pay for food or a place to live.

"Welcome to the new world of employment in America as we approach the second decade of the 21st century."

READ ARTICLE

____________________________________________________________

The one common theme in Herbert's examples? Everyone is trying to TAKE a job, rather than MAKE a job.

One of our biggest educational challenges will be to teach our children to be creators of new products and to become entrepreneurs, not employees.

The Chinese have figured this out and begun teaching entrepreneurial concepts, even on TV:

Colleges of Education focus too much on how to teach and not enough on the subject matter

“The reforms proposed by the Department of Education offer important remedies for two major problems in teacher education.

The first is that many teacher preparation programs focus too much on how to teach and not enough on the subject matter their graduates are planning to teach. The new requirement that future teachers have a major in a subject area provides a much needed remedy.

The second issue is professional development. Historically, teachers have gotten salary increases by accumulating credits and degrees, which may or may not be germane to the students and subjects they teach. The new requirement that professional development focus on the skills and knowledge that will best serve school and student needs is an urgently needed policy change.

Arthur Levine, president of the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation and former president and professor of education at Teachers College, Columbia University

Tipping Point...Slipping Point...Point of No Return

I spent two days in Detroit last week, a portion of which was simply driving around once prosperous neighborhoods now dying and decaying.

 

I also visited the Cornerstone Charter School - a school that is educating the next generation of Detroit citizens and doing it very well.

But as I look at the moribund U.S. auto industry, I wonder whether Detroit can ever return to prosperity. The city lived beyond it means for decades, failed to educate its population and relied on two industries for economic vitality - autos and banking.

Global competition and all that that implies has crushed Detroit's economy. I cannot see the economic sector that ever brings that once great city back to life, unless it is the Baseball Industry. The nicest building in Detroit? Tiger Stadium!

How China Subsidized "The American Way Of Life" Over 10 Years

This article is 18 months old, but well worth re-reading.

From James Fallows - The Atlantic Monthly

"Through the quarter-century in which China has been opening to world trade, Chinese leaders have deliberately held down living standards for their own people and propped them up in the United States. This is the real meaning of the vast trade surplus—$1.4 trillion and counting, going up by about $1 billion per day—that the Chinese government has mostly parked in U.S. Treasury notes."

"In effect, every person in the (rich) United States has over the past 10 years or so borrowed about $4,000 from someone in the (poor) People’s Republic of China. Like so many imbalances in economics, this one can’t go on indefinitely, and therefore won’t.

"But the way it ends—suddenly versus gradually, for predictable reasons versus during a panic—will make an enormous difference to the U.S. and Chinese economies over the next few years, to say nothing of bystanders in Europe and elsewhere."

READ ARTICLE

Immigrant Scientists Create Jobs and Win Nobels - WSJ 10-20-09

Sadly, I think it is too late to be kind to immigrant scientists - most of the ones I know are seriously thinking of leaving the U.S. and taking their talent, technology and treasure back to their home countries.

In an OP/Ed piece in today's WSJ, Ms. Susan Hockfield, president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, explains why foreigners are so desirable to America.

Here are excerpts:

"Of the nine people who shared this year's Nobel Prizes in chemistry, physics and medicine, eight are American citizens, a testament to this country's support for pioneering research. But those numbers disguise a more important story. Four of the American winners were born outside of the United States and only came here as graduate or post-doctoral students or as scientists. They came because our system of higher education and advanced research has been a magnet for creative talent."

"Of the 35 young innovators recognized this year by Technology Review magazine for their exceptional new ideas, only six went to high school in the United States.

"In the 1960s, the U.S. had the highest high-school completion rate in the developed world; by 2005, we ranked 21st. In college completion, as recently as 1995 we ranked second. In 2005, we ranked 15th.

"From 1989 to 2003, despite a growing population, the number of American science and engineering Ph.D.s remained constant: an average of 26,600 a year. Over the same period and in the same fields, Ph.D.s awarded in China shot up to 12,000 from just 1,000."

"Today, discovery and innovation increasingly spring from a creative network of the finest talent everywhere across the globe. From new advances in medicine to scientific breakthroughs that spawn new industries and sustainable jobs, the work of science and engineering is being done by individuals who can live almost anywhere."

READ ARTICLE

NY About to Become Nation's Most Aggressive Ed Reform State

From the October 20 New York Post:

A sweeping proposal to be unveiled today by a leading advocate for charter schools aims to catapult New York to the front of the pack in a nationwide scramble for billions of dollars in federal education funding.

The proposal, by Buffalo Assemblyman Sam Hoyt, would, among other things, strike from law what many education reform advocates agree represents the state's single biggest roadblock to claiming its share of the $4.3 billion "Race to the Top" fund: the cap on charters.

"If, in fact, it became law -- if, in fact, half of it became law -- New York state, by most accounts, would be at the very top of the charts when it comes to education reform," he said.

Full Story