Chalkboard Project—Inside-the-Box

The Chalkboard Project gave me a wonderful example of that mysterious phenomenon of inside-the-box-thinking that I find so fascinating. The Chalkboard Project is absorbing much of the talk and reform efforts around the state, something that now appears unfortunate for reformers and the kids. Why? Well, from indications so far this ITBT is producing remarkably trivial ideas. As it is turning out, it is presenting itself as an effort that fundamentally wants to keep and preserve the existing dysfunctional system by trying to patch it up and give it more money. The CP's strategy of public discussions seems to be based on the hope that citizens will somehow figure out how to make the old government system of schools work better. That's not leadership.That's stasis. CP apparently thinks citizens are supposed to have answers for taking the existing system arrangements of government schools for granted and making them improve. Of course it won't happen. These failures of the maisntream system to educate all kids and to decrease its efficiency over time are deep problems of system design. Neither can this democratic process CP is using turn citizens into researchers and developers of fundamental change in the system. Of course, without fundamental change, the system will never be able to control its costs. and so CP must assume its effort will be coupled with finding more money for public schools as well.

None of the ideas CP has proposed so far are new; they are things we all agree it would be nice to have—reduced class sizes, improved teachers, individual student ed plans, clearer budget documents, and all the rest. In spite of the inference by CP that the people running the schools need to be told what to do, educators are not dumb, and educators certainly have long believed it would be nice to have all the things CP is discovering long before CP placed them on their wish list. But wishes aren't a strategy for reform even if we all agree it would be nice if we had better educational practices, more qualified people, and lots and lots of money. Even citizen involvement isn't a strategy for the challenging problem of redesign and change of the system. That's a leadership responsibility achieved through some serious research and development.

The real problem for CP isn't to compile a wish list of all the wonderful things we'd like. The fundamental problem for CP is figure out exactly why, if these reforms are all good ideas, why don't schools adopt them themselves? Educators aren't stupid or evil. What is it about the public system of government schools such that good ideas don't spread, are even prevented? If the Arthur Academy Charter Schools are doing a better job that district schools, why do they face so many obstacles from the mainline system? We have a system that can't change and improve itself, and in spite of its massived failure, it won't let anyhone else have a try. That's clear from decades long reform failures. The system is not self-improving. It is fundamentally about stasis. So the big problem for CP (if it really is interested in solving public education problems) is to figure out what causes stasis? What is it about the design of the system that blocks change and pushes it towards inefficiency? Why must someone else outside the system try to 'make' the schools change, and why is money always the issue? Since system redesign is not about programs or in what the schools do or in its people or operating procedures or money, that process focused on finding the fundamental causes for the dysfunctions in the system would have nothing to do with polling and citizen discussions. It would look for more like an R&D process by experts trained in educational development.

But even if CP were to understand the basics of system redesign so it could shed at least a little more insight than currently we hear in Oregon (and I can’t find any indication from CP so far that CP is aware of even the introductory material in the field of system redesign), it still faces a much more complex problem of how exactly it can help the leaders responsible for the system develop out-of-the-box thinking. In fact outside-the-box thinking isn't all that difficult but it does require considerable study and intellectual effort. For years Education/Evolving has been offering direct help to state level policy leaders who want to rethink system design. But still, the real challenge, once understood, may be how to help those who are responsible for the design of the system, or who could take the lead, understand system redesign. It is, of course, the legislature who is responsible for the design of the public school system, and it must change the rules, not the citizens. The challenge for CP is the political problem: how to help legislators develop their understanding and plans for system redesign.

CP says nothing about these problems; it apparently takes the box for granted. As a result, it must take the dysfunctions caused by this inside-the-box thinking for granted. It will have to assume the system must have more money. But those dysfunctions are hurting the kids and causing inefficiency in the use of resources. It is no longer a moral position to protect the system from itself. Giving your profligate teenager more money for his allowance won't help him learn to manage his finances. If we love our teenager, would we protect his profligate ways and give him more money or would we sit down with him and help him tackle his money management? Citizens do not understand why the system results in dysfunctional results. Presupposing CP understands the causes inherent in the design of a system of government schools that produces the dysfunctions, its mission should focus on helping leaders understand how to redesign the system so that schools are accountable, efficient, and serve all kids.

Even the Chalkboard Project's Mission is misguided and vague. Is its mission really citizen discussion? What kind of mindset thinks citizens are the source of a serious effort to understand the causes of failure of the system and develop system redesign plans? Does the medical profession convene a bunch of citizens to solve a health problem and then develop medical treatments? It is not the role of citizens, in spite of advocates of democracy, to investigate, design, and develop better systems. Citizens are properly in the evaluative role of consumers who choose among products once developed and offered by organizations. Citizens don't design IPods and vote to say we all want these before Apple has designed and developed them and then offered them to the public. Citizens shouldn't be asked to design school programs. Educators should. Change involves research and development involving an expertise that can produce the new and better. Where the Chalkboard Project got the roadmap for its work is a mystery. Certainly not from any businessmen or organizational change experts. That is why their program is so frustrating to change-oriented educators.

The very process of finding a consensus, attempting to discover the common opinions about education reform, dooms CP. Talking only to the active supporters of the existing system means CP will only hear about Band-Aids for the existing system. Almost by design CP seems to want to exclude the hard facts of system failure or to hear from those with the fundamentally different ideas focused on system redesign. CP's agenda apparently is to enable the dysfunctional system to continue in its current design. This seems obvious since CP has done nothing to actively include the large segment of experts and citizens who disagree with their limited conception of reform and what is possible. Besides talking only to the protective organizations and supporters of public schools who are against any kind of fundamental change, CP hired no consultants, save one, who actively discuss system effects and system redesign. And none of the Resources and Links it gives, again save one to the Oregon Education Coalition, support discussion much less advocacy of change of the existing system.

Unless it makes some remarkable change in direction, the Chalkboard Project's process is by design an inadvertent (or purposive? I hope not) effort to protect the existing system against change. It's within-the-box thinking apparently directed to shoring up a failing system; so far it has added nothing new to the political debate about schools and apparently is going to support anti-change, anti-reform. It is a terrible waste of an opportunity since it is one of the few organizations free of direct, vested interest in maintaining the status quo that has resources that could help the legislature understand and redesign our dysfunctional system. Good for the adults in the system but too bad for you Oregon kids carrying those signs.