Why Schools Aren't Businesses (Or shouldn't be!)

[lib_wit_it]

Educators who haven't heard this one may be rare, but how many non-teachers have? Please share!

One of the most misguided suggestions is that schools should be run more like businesses. In this business model, students are “clients” and instruction is a “delivered service.”

Whenever I hear this business accountability analogy, I’m reminded of the story of Jaime Vollmer, a one-time outspoken critic of public schools.

Because of his notoriety, Vollmer frequently spoke to business groups on total quality management, zero defects, continuous improvement, and how to produce the highest-quality product. During one of his talks, at a business and education roundtable in Iowa, Vollmer lashed out at the inefficiency and lack of quality in public schools.

Vollmer ended his speech with a pointed statement: “If I ran my business the way you people operate your schools, I wouldn’t be in business very long.”

After Vollmer’s speech, a teacher in the audience raised her hand with a question. In an account he later published on his web site, Vollmer recounts their exchange.

The teacher began quietly, “We are told, sir, that you manage a company that makes good ice cream.”

Vollmer replied smugly. “Best ice cream in America, Ma’am.”

“How nice,” she said. “Is it rich and smooth?”

“Sixteen percent butterfat,” Vollmer said.

“Premium ingredients?” she asked.

“Super premium! Nothing but AAA,” said Vollmer.

“Mr. Vollmer,” the teacher asked, “when you are standing on your receiving dock and you see an inferior shipment of blueberries arrive, what do you do?” A silent room awaited Vollmer’s response.

“I send them back,” he said.

“That’s right!” she snapped, “but we can never send back our blueberries. We take them big, small, rich, poor, gifted, exceptional, abused, frightened, confident, homeless, rude, and brilliant. We take them with ADHD, junior rheumatoid arthritis, and English as their second language.

We take them all! Every one! And that, Mr. Vollmer, is why it is not a business. It’s a school.”

The exchange between the teacher and Vollmer is complete, that leading up to it is snipped excerpts. Read the entire article, including how Vollmer actually listened and learned from this teacher:
http://www.openeducation.net/2007/12/21/what-does-a-business-do-with-inferior-blueberries/

[no_hypocrisy]

1. This is one of several reasons why I strongly oppose merit pay.

If a teacher doesn't "turn out" a certain percentage of "successful" students, then s/he gets a mean basis for pay. If that teacher has a combination of kids that "produces results", then that teacher gets a bonus on top of the mean pay.

Children are more than numbers. They are amazing individuals and even more fascinating in combinations with their peers. They have so much potential and the school system is not designed for their individual needs.

[Idealism]

2. Thats how education is in Florida

Schools must pass the F-Cat test or get their federal funding cut. The schools that get the higher grades, get more and more funding, while the schools who receive lower grades (and need the funding most) get their budgets cut. This makes teachers teach how to take the F-Cat, and not really about learning the concepts in the subjects. Its a self-fulfilling prophecy about the students who need more instruction receive less and those already doing exceptionally well get more than they need.

[lib_wit_it]

4. Yeah, same in PA (the PSSA is the test here.) And your point about the punitive funding

is one I try to make people understand all the time. All the wealthy school districts just get rewarded for not having the masses of disadvantaged kids the poorer districts often are overwhelmed by. People don't seem to get that NCLB was an unfunded mandate, either. Gee, with all that "liberal bias," you'd think the MSM would be all over that.

[lib_wit_it]

3. Exactly! And the most dedicated teachers are often given the most "difficult" students.

[proud2BlibKansan]

5. The biggest problem with merit pay

is how do you decide how much to pay the nurse and the Art teacher and the Gym teacher and the Counselor? What are their merit pay raises based on? And what about ESL and Special Ed?

Not every teacher in a school has student test scores to support a merit raise.

[lib_wit_it]

6. Obviously, I disagree. The biggest problem with merit pay is that we do not send back the less than

perfect blueberries and they are not distributed equally amongst the faculty.

[proud2BlibKansan]

7. If you were the parent of a less than perfect blueberry, would you want

a less than excellent teacher for your child? After all, those teachers still learning how to handle those less than perfect blueberries need to practice on someone's child. :)