Hawaii’s World

By A.A. Smyser

Tuesday, February 10, 1998

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Where ‘teachers of
teachers’ disconnect

YEARS ago pollster George Gallup observed that the public often is ahead of the politicians on major policy issues.

Maybe it is also ahead of education elitists.

I thought of that as I read a report called "Different Drummers" from Public Agenda, a foundation created in 1975 by social scientist and author Daniel Yankelovich and former Secretary of State Cyrus Vance to study disconnects between the views of the public and our nation's leaders. Goal: To have them better understand each other.

The report focuses on the views of "teachers of teachers" about how to educate our children. It contrasts them with the views of other groups it has studied, including parents, students and classroom teachers.

At about the same time last year that the public was marveling at the precision and success of our Mars Pathfinder mission, Public Agenda did extensive telephone interviews with 900 professors of education at American colleges and universities.

The teachers of teachers gave low priority to maintaining classroom discipline, stressing correct spelling, grammar and punctuation and expecting students to be neat, on time and polite.

Their top priorities are turning students into lifelong learners and constantly updating their skills, encouraging kids to be active learners who know how to learn, and holding high expectations of all students.

My "Joe Blow" bias is that their low priority items are a necessary basis for moving on to the laudable long-term goals.

I don't think the Mars lander crews could have succeeded had they tolerated imprecision.

The disconnect goes on:

By 88 percent to 12 percent the teachers of teachers value students struggling with the process to get the right answer over actually getting the right answer.

By 93 percent to 7 percent they think teachers should be facilitators of learning who enable students to learn on their own over being conveyors of knowledge who enlighten students with what they know.

The teachers of teachers have little use for stars for good behavior, memorization and standardized tests. They say parents and politicians like scores because they are simple. Education professors prefer more reliance on portfolios on each student.

Seventy-nine percent of the teachers of teachers say the public has outmoded and mistaken beliefs about what good education means. They don't put much stock in having students know the names of all 50 states or knowing when Columbus sailed for America.

When asked in a focus group whether they are letting the perfect be the enemy of the good, one declared, "It is my obligation to follow my heart." Another asked: "If we aren't the idealists, who is going to be?"

The teachers of teachers and a lot of the public do agree strongly on one point: Public school systems are top-heavy with bureaucracy and administration.

A later Public Agenda study shows another disconnect. Most classroom teachers, parents and high school students think our schools are doing a pretty good job of teaching basics. Heavy majorities of employers and teachers of college freshmen and sophomores say they aren't.