Steve Nelson is co-director of the Oregon Schools to Watch Program. Mr. Nelson is also the principal of Leslie Middle School in Salem, Oregon and the President of the Oregon Middle Level Association. He has worked in the field of education for 26 years as a teacher, assistant principal and principal in the Dayton School District, Salem-Keizer School District and at the American School in Puebla, Mexico.

The Oregon Middle Level Association is excited to announce that Oregon is now an official “Schools to Watch” state. The Schools to Watch (STW) initiative, sponsored by the National Forum to Accelerate Middle-Grades Reform, is an effort to ensure that young adolescents are prepared to be lifelong learners ready for college, career and citizenship. The STW initiative accomplishes its goal by identifying high-performing middle-grades schools that are on a solid upward trajectory in regard to academic excellence, developmental responsiveness, social equity and organizational effectiveness. Over the last ten years hundreds of middle-grades schools throughout the country have been designated as “Schools to Watch” because of their commitment to these STW core beliefs.

Now it’s Oregon’s turn to recognize the truly exceptional middle-grades schools we have in our state, providing an opportunity for all middle-grades schools to assess their progress and to learn from one another. In order to do this, the Oregon Middle Level Association needs your help! We are currently forming a statewide steering committee to direct the “Schools to Watch” Initiative in Oregon. We are looking for educators, community members, and business leaders who are interested in helping us to identify and promote the best of middle-grades education in Oregon. If you are interested in learning more about this truly incredible opportunity please contact one of the Oregon Co-Directors of the Schools to Watch Program (Steve Nelson, nelson_steve@salkeiz.k12.or.us or Jane Evans, jane.evans@albany.k12.or.us).

In order for our Oregon graduates to be ready for college, career and citizenship our schools need to be providing students with the best possible education. At the middle-grades level the “Schools to Watch” initiative is our best opportunity to recognize excellence and to provide all middle-grades schools in Oregon with exemplary models to learn from and network with. For more information on the national “Schools to Watch” initiative please visit www.middlegradesforum.org. To get involved in the Oregon chapter please contact one of the co-directors listed above. Oregon’s young adolescents are an investment worthy of our time and attention. Please consider getting involved today!

Harvard University professor Jal Mehta recently penned an editorial for the New York Times in which he argues, essentially, “American education is a failed profession.” His contention rests on the falsity of most reform propositions, that whether we are asked to take sides in the Michelle Rhee vs. Diane Ravitch debate, or whether we follow Waiting for Superman into a charter vs. public contest, we are operating in a place that will not lead to long-term, effective solutions. Interestingly, Mehta reasons that the major solution rests in the professionalization of the teaching profession, something that has been promulgated in books like Andy Hargreaves and Michael Fullan’s Professional Capital but has remained an elusive position for teacher leadership and reform advocates alike.

Rachel, who is finishing up her student teaching, has noticed the relatively strange position of teachers since she decided to join their ranks. Both highly educated and a veteran of programs like the Harlem Children’s Zone in New York, Rachel is one of those that the profession should be trying to attract. Yet, her initial foray has introduced a distinct conundrum. She notes:

“It’s been strange telling my friends, most of whom at this point are finishing up law school, med school, or writing for prestigious news outlets, that I am going to be a teacher. There is, I think, an unspoken disappointment that this is what I ‘have come to,’ that if I cannot be a famous writer, I will resort to standing in front of a classroom intoning the difference between a metaphor and a simile for a group of adolescents who may not care less, year after year, for the rest of my life. What I’ve been coming up against, as I just dip my toe into this profession, is the largely unspoken reality about American society’s perception of the amount of  skill, or to put it more bluntly, the intelligence, that is required to be an effective teacher.”

Part of Rachel’s issue is the fact that the teaching profession occupies a strange zone within the range of professions. In Shawn’s Issues and Ethics in Education class, he often muses about “what collar” a teacher wears. Rooms are often divided between those who argue blue and those who argue white, although the final denouement usually finds the class realizing that it is neither. The teaching profession straddles a line between these two worlds, and as long as it does so, it will perpetually face the labor strife that accompanies working class positions while seeking the protections normally associated with other career fields. Mehta suggests that teachers have to work harder to have teaching be seen as a “profession on par with fields like law and medicine.”

For many readers, this may seem laughable, but we both know, effective teaching requires a skill set that few develop in earnest (which, we believe, is why teaching turnover is so high). Planning a quality, engaging unit requires foresight about how much students can absorb in lesson. Running a decent classroom discussion requires one’s brain to be operating on several different pathways at once: trying to follow the thread of students’ sometimes clouded reasoning, keeping track of who has not yet contributed, rephrasing questions six different ways until they strike the right chord and stopping disruptions before they start. Having the aptitude to decipher when is the right moment to challenge an ambitious adolescent and when is the precise time to encourage a flailing teenager is crucial. An effective teacher has these facilities—and they require a precise combination of psychological, emotional, and analytical intelligence.

Mehta opines that in order to fix this, we need “money, political will, and the audacity to imagine that teaching could be a profession on par with fields like law and medicine.” That’s pretty grand of Dr. Mehta, and while it may be spot on, its odds of happening here in Oregon are slim. Yet, maybe the recent (belabored) PERS reform that just passed gives us an opportunity to start from ground zero, and maybe, with the right imagination from teacher leadership, we can start the process of transforming the profession.

Dr. Judith A. Ramaley is President Emerita and Distinguished Professor of Public Service at Portland State University in the Mark O. Hatfield School of Government and President Emerita of Winona State University in Minnesota and The University of Vermont. Dr. Ramaley holds an appointment as a Senior Scholar with the Association of American Colleges and Universities. She is also a member of the board of Second Nature, an organization committed is to create a healthy, just, and sustainable society through the transformation of higher education and Oregon Campus Compact. She has worked with preK-12/higher education collaborations for many years. 

Read Dr. Ramaley’s paper in its entirety. 

In brief, not yet, but read on. A flurry of articles and books in the 1970s and 1980s explored concepts of professionalism. Educators have followed a path similar to other fields but K-12 teaching is still not seen as a true profession by many. There are several reasons for this, including how education itself has developed over the last century, where teachers receive their education (largely in less prestigious institutions) and who enters the field (mostly women).

Prior to the mid-nineteenth century, almost anyone could be a teacher as long as he or she had completed a level of education slightly above that of their pupils. The emergence of a formal school system throughout the 19^th century carried with it both a demand for more and better trained teachers. The pathway to teaching branched in two main directions—preparation at a research university or at a regional comprehensive institution. The prestige enjoyed by research universities made it attractive to prospective practitioners of all sorts. However, research universities focused more on theory than on practice. Although these institutions welcomed the steady stream of tuition-paying students seeking to become teachers, they did not, as a rule, prepare highly qualified teachers who could both master the content of their chosen area of emphasis and practice the skills to help students succeed in school.

Regional comprehensives generally expanded their teacher education programs to prepare a large number of teachers. The fact that most teachers were being prepared in less prestigious institutions and that the majority of these students were women reinforced the assumption that teaching was not really a true profession. Policymakers and community leaders often questioned the intelligence and preparation of these future teachers.

In its 1976 report entitled Educating a Profession, The Bicentennial Commission on Education for the Profession of Teaching[i] concluded that teaching flunked the “professions test.” The Commission labeled teaching as a “semi-profession.” At that time, teaching was seen as being of lower occupational status, often requiring a shorter training period. Teaching lacked consistent societal acceptance and respect, drew upon a body of knowledge that was generally regarded as unscientific and unsupported by a widely accepted theoretical and conceptual basis for practice. Teachers lacked autonomy and were more accountable to supervisors and often others such as parents or community members rather than to the profession itself.

More recent observers and reformers have offered ways to “elevate” the practice of teaching. Most prescriptions for improved status have emphasized a blend of greater mastery of content knowledge, solid pedagogical skills and pedagogical content knowledge about how people learn and “loads of clinical experience[ii],” all to be provided by professional schools operating on a clinical model. Each of these expectations carries a price—increasing student debt, longer preparation times, the difficulty of fitting more meaningful instruction and learning experiences into a crowded school calendar, pressure on the limited number of available clinical training sites and problems with recruiting enough participating teachers willing and able to spend the time needed to foster the development of a future teacher.

Yet, there is hope. The schools that we consider successful today, whether public or charter, have several features in common. They have a clear mission attuned to the communities they serve and the interests and needs of students who come from those communities. They have talented and well-prepared teachers who have the time to work together both to improve their own practice and to discuss problems presented by particular students or difficult topics in the curriculum. School days are longer and/or supplemented with after-school programs that allow for direct application of what is being taught in school. There are feedback cycles in place that generate information that can lead to continuing improvements and an active culture of inquiry in the school that engages both teachers and administrators.[1] In those settings, teachers have the time and opportunity to act like professionals, exercising their own professional judgment actively and in a collaborative manner. We have a clear set of existence proofs to show that teaching IS a profession when it is conducted in an environment that respects and supports our teachers.

Darren Stowell is the CEO of ActivEd, a Portland based education company developing online content for k-3 classrooms that get kids moving, while developing fundamental reading and math skills. He’s spent 15 years in the education space, most notably as a senior leader with both Teach For America and Kaplan. He lives in NE Portland with his wife and two young boys.

walkabouts.org

As a lifelong advocate for public education, a father of two boys and an avid athlete, I have experienced the many effects physical activity and inactivity can have on people—most importantly kids. Through my work as an educator working with communities around the country, one thing that holds true is that physically active kids enjoy themselves more and perform better in school. 

I became acutely aware of that truth over the last few years with my four-year-old son, Isaac. Isaac is an incredible little boy, with a hunger for learning and a commitment to squeezing every second out of every day. At first, we saw this energy as a boy “just being a boy,” but after our second son was born, we started to understand that Isaac’s energy and his need to be active throughout the day was related to his unique learning style. 

He is a kinesthetic learner and needs movement to learn, channel his energy and be the best version of himself. Allowing Isaac to be physically active has not only benefitted him in school, it has also had a positive effect on his health. My son Isaac is one very personal reason I am committed to bringing more physical activity to the classroom.

Regrettably, the current emphasis on performance pedagogy and standardized testing related to No Child Left Behind has led many school districts to reduce physical education offerings, and in some instances reduce the amount of daily recess time to increase classroom contact hours to boost test scores. So unfortunately, in many schools, students are expected to stay put at their desks as teachers prepare them for upcoming tests.

There is, however, an abundance of research illustrating how movement and physical activity can provide an array of health benefits ranging from maintaining a healthy weight, preventing cardiovascular disease, Type 2 diabetes and reducing the risks of developing certain cancers to developing muscles and strong bones. Nevertheless kids are moving less and unfortunately learning less too. What is frequently overlooked are the links between movement and enhanced cognition. 

In 2004, 13 researchers from various disciplines conducted a review of 850 research studies examining the effects of physical activity and school aged children. They determined that physical activity has a positive effect on memory, cognition, concentration and classroom behavior, along with academic achievement measured by standardized tests. Current brain research also suggests that increasing movement can enhance learning and decrease behavioral issues, simultaneously influencing the health of our nation’s children. Physical activity has also been found to promote structural changes in the hippocampus region of the brain, an important area for memory.

We have lost sight as educators of the fact that when we move, we learn, and we learn as we move. Movement, according to Dr. Paul Dennison, author of Brain Gym, is the primary way we integrate our learning into expressive action. Children and adults learn, according to Dennison, by practicing and doing things, and by putting knowledge into action. We need to allow our youngest generation to learn kinesthetically, in a natural way, instead of requiring them to learn by passive listening and rote memorization.

Kinesthetic Intelligence suggests kids who prefer this learning style create or solve problems by moving their bodies. Children with a strong Kinesthetic Intelligence often prefer to learn by doing. But, this learning style is often the most neglected in the classroom.

By encouraging more movement in the classroom, we can make curriculum-specific content more fun and engaging while simultaneously reducing the prevalence of childhood obesity. Whether you are the parent of a child like my son Isaac, or a teacher with 25 different learning styles in your classroom, research demonstrates that kids need to move not only to be healthy, but also to learn.

In the age of technology and with increased pressure on academic results, it is easy to fall victim to efficiency and traditional teaching methods. As parents and educators, we have a responsibility to teach, encourage, inspire AND keep our kids active and healthy. Please STAND and MOVE with me to ensure that all kids are physically active at home and in the classroom. Please STAND UP for education!

Early childhood practitioners get this. They do a remarkable job of engaging and involving parents in every aspect of their work—from home visits and encouraging reading with children at home, to decision-making in the school and classroom and providing basic supports and tools. They build this into their practice because it works, and because the children are much more likely to succeed.

Unfortunately for our children and their families, from a parent engagement perspective, the K-12 years more resemble a cliff than solid ground from which to provide increased foundation and support. Meaningful parent engagement often transforms into information sharing and checking a box on a to-do list. There are pockets of excellence that defy this characterization to be sure, but the underfunding of our public education system makes for a constant stream of false choices and unfortunate compromise.

More can and must be done.

We must move beyond an intellectual understanding that parent and family engagement is critical for our children’s success and demand action. We must get beyond random acts of parent engagement and create a system of support and intentionality. While it is heartening that the OEIB has made parent engagement a critical bucket of work, underlying this seems to be little more than a hope that by saying it is important, a change in practice will follow. When our local school classrooms, buildings, and districts are feeling embattled, expecting practice change without underlying policy and system support feels a fool’s errand. School improvement and increased student success relies on positive systemic change.

Here are changes I believe could have impact:

• Create formal professional learning opportunities for K-12 practitioners to explore parent engagement best practices with their early childhood colleagues. Then encourage and demand that K-12 take action. Pay for this with Title I parent engagement funds.
• Advocate that local bargaining between districts and unions should include intentional language that supports parental engagement practice as a key to student success.
• Start at the foundational level of our teaching colleges and universities and create intentional parent engagement strategies for our new teachers to bring with them in to our K-12 schools. Pay for this by reorganizing existing curriculum and efforts.
• Create real collaboration with nonprofits and other community organizations that are our experts on engaging families in culturally-appropriate and community-specific ways. In addition to Title I parent engagement funds, Districts, nonprofits, and the local philanthropic community can form partnerships to create funding opportunities for this meaningful change.
• Create regional and statewide opportunities for meaningful engagement of parents and families in decision-making, process improvement, and changing practice. Pay for this small allocation through a reorganization of existing Department of Education operational funds.
• Create a formal and accountable function at the Department of Education that oversees these efforts, providing encouragement and support, while also demanding action and results. Pay for this through a reorganization of existing Department resources.
• Explore the use of existing parent engagement curricula that provides opportunities for parents to grow in their ability to support all children. This often includes analyzing data, accountability and governance, effective collaboration, and understanding barriers to learning. It can be paid for locally through Title I parent engagement funds.

Parents and other caring adults are an untapped resource in a time of constraint. Let’s work together to move beyond rhetorical statements of support, and instead create shared action and intentionality. Our kids deserve no less.

Lois Cohen is President of Lois D. Cohen Associates, a full-service communications firm. In 2005, she developed the School-based Outreach Program, a program that educates students

I have always had an interest in working with children. I often tell people that, when I eventually retire, I want to spend the majority of my time reading to and/or teaching children to read. When I started the unique School-based Outreach Program in 2005, initially for the Oregon Department of Transportation, we focused on increasing public awareness of important projects or initiatives by connecting with our future leaders and future members of the workforce—students. Since that time, we have worked with more than 3,500 students throughout the state of Oregon to impart an awareness of public and private projects, inculcate a sense of civic awareness and civic responsibility among students, develop an awareness of the various careers and associated educational paths aligned with each project, and introduce a fun, age-appropriate hands on activity to extend the students’ learning experience.

I strongly believe that students are ambassadors to their families and communities. Much of what students learn in school goes home to their parents. Connecting with students via public involvement or outreach creates a linear line of communication that will connect information from classes students attend to their families at home. Students represent an important segment of the community, as they are the ones who will grow up to ultimately lead their families, our communities, our civic institutions, and businesses. 

Lois D. Cohen Associates‘ School-based Outreach Program is currently being utilized by Multnomah County on the Sellwood Bridge Replacement Project and by Howard S. Wright Constructors and the U.S. General Services Administration on the Edith Green Federal Office Building in downtown Portland. And, let me tell you, the students’ enthusiasm is contagious as they engage in hands on activities such as building gum drop bridges or bat boxes that will be placed under the new bridge for bat habitats;  their words of wisdom impressive (particularly when the middle school students assumed the roles of the key neighborhood stakeholders and County staff as they conducted a mock public meeting during which they were deciding how wide to build the bridge); and their talent is awe-inspiring (as when the Architecture, Construction and Engineering (ACE) Academy students presented a model (with working parts!!) of the new bridge to the County Commissioners during a Commission meeting last year.

We’re ending this year with a bang, as students from ACE Academy will be presenting the model they constructed of the retaining walls on the west side of the bridge to the Multnomah County Commissioners, and students from Benson H.S. will be presenting their models of the landslide to the Sellwood Bridge Project team leadership.

Looking forward, I am anticipating a very fun and enriching 2013-2014. We are really delighted to add Faubion School in NE Portland to the list of those with whom we’ll be working: we will head back to the Sellwood community and introduce students to watersheds, the environmental considerations that must be taken into account on a project like the Sellwood Bridge replacement, and we plan to continue to delve into civics and explore how decisions are reached and what factors and tradeoffs  must be considered. One of the most exciting parts of the school program for the next year will be having high school students build the benches that will be a permanent part of the viewing areas on the bridge. It will be nice for them, 20 years down the road, to take their children to the bridge and point out what they did while they were still in high school. What an honor!

We are very grateful to be a part of Multnomah County’s Sellwood Bridge Project, as a subcontractor to T.Y. Lin International. We are lucky to work with an organization that places such high value on being a civic asset and inspiring our youngest citizens, and we are fortunate to be able to work with students in ways that will hopefully impact their lives, their dreams, and their futures.

Tyler Nice has been teaching for over ten years in the Springfield School District. He started his career at Hamlin Middle School. Tyler is currently teaching economics, government and history in the Social Studies department at Thurston High School. 

“I know that we haven’t always agreed on every issue thus far, and there are surely times in the future when we will part ways. But I also know that every American who is sitting here this evening loves this country, and wants it to succeed. That must be the starting point of every debate we have in the coming months, and where we return after those debates are done. That is the foundation on which the American people expect us to build common ground.”

- Barack Obama, State of the Union Address, Tuesday, February 4, 2009

I remember watching the State of the Union address in the late winter of 2009. A paragraph toward the tail end of the speech caught my attention. The message was poignant and powerful. I have thoughts of the sentiment often in the years since. The message is that we have competing visions for success. We can focus on the competing methods, or we can focus on the ultimate goal: a safe and prospering nation for all.

Politics is not the only field in which this message applies. It applies to all arenas of life that have competing methods. In my chosen career there are no shortage of competing methods. Proficiency, tracking, charter schools, weighted grades, merit pay, school choice vouchers, STEM and common core all have their evangelists. These advocates of methodology argue and persuade that their method is the ideal to help students. These issues are all battlegrounds for competing visions. We find ourselves in a perilous situation in which we may lose our train of focus. Some in the field of education have chosen to devote themselves to the method, minimizing their focus on the underlying mission.

What is the mission? While our mission is not easy, it is clear. I believe my mission is to care. I care about the students in my classroom, both their wellbeing and their academic growth. I care about them as people. That is why I teach them about government, economics and history. I also care about students progressing toward the acquisition of new content and skills. I truly believe that being in my class will help them to become the people that they want to become. I have opinions on many of the controversial topics and methodologies in our field. But, my hope is that my opinions on various methodologies will never supersede my mission to help every student.

Three years ago I dropped my son off to begin his kindergarten year. I want him to have twelve years of passionate teachers who care. I want to continue to work hard to be the kind of teacher that I hope my own children are taught by.

In what ways have you seen methodology trump mission in education? Do you see similar issues in other fields? In what ways can we protect the mission, while still pushing for the most effective methods?

During my junior year, my guidance counselor noticed that I was getting good grades in my other classes and wondered why I wasn’t challenging myself with more rigorous coursework. She encouraged me to put aside my fear of failure and enroll in my first advanced placement course, AP Government. This course not only inspired my later work in policy, it also served as a gateway to other AP courses that boosted my confidence, pushed my critical thinking, and prepared me for college-level work.

Education research affirms my experience. Two landmark studies conducted by researchers at the University of Texas found that “students who took one or more AP tests and courses had higher college GPAs, earned more credit hours, and were more likely to graduate in four years or fewer.”[i]

In Federal Way Public Schools (Washington’s eighth largest school district), Superintendent Rob Neu and Assistant Superintendent Josh Garcia took this research to the next level by implementing Academic Acceleration in 2010, an advanced placement policy that works by automatically enrolling students in grades 6-12 into advanced classes when they score proficient or better on the state exams. For example, if students meet the standard for math, they are automatically enrolled in an advanced math course that their high school offers. 

Automatic enrollment breaks down barriers that might prevent a student from enrolling in an advanced placement course. Some of these barriers include fear, negative perceptions, and lack of information about what courses might be available. To ensure financial barriers don’t remain, Federal Way also covers the advanced placement exam fees for all students. The decision still ultimately lies with the students’ families; parents can opt students out of the advanced coursework if desired.

Before Academic Acceleration, Federal Way administrators identified alarming gaps in graduation rates and advanced coursework enrollment among different racial groups—gaps that are common throughout Washington state. They found that 80% of Federal Way students were proficient on the state reading and writing exams, but only 30% were signing up for advanced coursework.[ii] The students who signed up for advanced courses were disproportionately White and Asian.

When administrators asked other students of color why they didn’t take the advanced courses, many student responses included “No one asked me” and “I didn’t think those classes were for me.”[iii]

School leaders found this reality unacceptable.  

To close the achievement and opportunity gaps, Federal Way implemented Academic Acceleration to increase student access to and enrollment in advanced courses. The policy has helped students like Richard Dietz increase their confidence and ability to succeed in rigorous courses. Dietz states that, “I didn’t think I could do well in an AP class before.  Now, I understand I can.”[iv]

Federal Way was able to implement Academic Acceleration while simultaneously undergoing major funding cuts. Since its implementation in 2010, Academic Acceleration has produced incredible results for students across the board:

• The number of students enrolled in advanced coursework has more than doubled, which is an average 195% increase in participation.[v]
• 11th-and 12th-grade students of color taking at least one advanced class has jumped by 76%.[vi]
• Students enrolled in advanced classes now reflect the diversity of the district.[vii]
• 1,400% increase in advanced coursework enrollment among multiracial students, 600% increase for Pacific Islander students, nearly 400% increase for Latino students, and 200% increase for Black students.
• An astounding 94% of students enrolled in advanced classes got a C or better in all of their first semester grades.[viii]
• AP exam performance did not drop. “In fact, it’s 38% more 3s, 4s, and 5s,” [ix] stated Nancy Potter, College Board Representative.

Federal Way’s successful Academic Acceleration policy and how its making college possible for more students is catching on. Community members from the nearby city of Tacoma want to replicate Federal Way’s achievements. Over 500 community supporters have signed their petition to bring Academic Acceleration to middle and high schools in Tacoma by the 2014-2015 school year—and they are on their way to introducing this new policy that will open doors of opportunity and change the of life trajectories of many underserved students and families.

To push for Academic Acceleration across the state, Stand for Children in Washington partnered with Federal Way Public Schools and other education advocates and introduced SB 5243 (sponsored by Sen. Steve Litzow), a bill that would require all school districts across Washington to adopt an Academic Acceleration policy. In its companion bill, HB 1642 (sponsored by Rep. Eric Pettigrew), school districts are encouraged to adopt Academic Acceleration as an advanced placement policy.

Both bill versions include an option for students to opt out with parent permission. They also provide an incentive program that rewards schools for every student that earns college credit through advanced classes. The incentive is meant to help schools cover the costs of providing more advanced courses and acknowledge student success. School districts can also use these rewards for teacher training, materials, and student exam fees.

The impact of Academic Acceleration is three-fold. First, it will help close the opportunity gap. Second, it will prepare more students for college. And last, it will push Washington to address the “unintentional elitism and racism that personifies itself in the policies, practices, and culture of our schools and our school districts,”[x] explained Dave Powell, Government Affairs Director at Stand for Children Washington.

This policy does not replace traditional guidance counseling, instead it can help enhance those meetings.[xi] Most important, this policy is necessary to ensure that all students rise to the challenge of rigorous coursework and graduate from high school prepared for college.

Rosalund Jenkins, Director of the Black Education Roundtable at the League of Education Voters, also spoke in support of the bill, “There are thousands of black and brown students and low-income students of every ethnicity who are being kept out of highly capable coursework by traditional practice and the policies and procedures being implemented in many districts.”

“The bottom line,” Jenkins concludes, “is that this bill forces the conversation about stopping [the] picking of champions and starting to train many more of them in the college track pathway we already have.”[xii]

On April 22, the House version of the bill (HB 1642) was passed off the Senate floor after a long journey through the House and Senate education committees. It awaits the governor’s signature. In the final version of the bill, districts that chose to adopt automatic enrollment policies like Federal Way’s will be eligible for grant funding to help them implement the program.

Like most legislation, the original version (SB 5243) was stronger. It would have required all districts in Washington State to adopt the policy. As it stands, the bill will give districts like Tacoma that are ready to follow Federal Way’s lead the supports and funding needed to help more students access the classes they need to be successful in college. And the conversation has started to shift on what’s possible for students, regardless of their background.

Now, all Washington school districts have the opportunity to create a system with Academic Acceleration that removes unintentional cultural biases regarding students’ potential, and keeps them from falling through the cracks—I just hope our school districts choose to rise to the challenge.

Fortunately, I was taught and mentored by a marvelous master language arts teacher, Diana Carlson. Our first meeting was memorable. “Mr. Jamison, I have good news for you. In the coming weeks you will become the Language Arts Department at Colton High School.”

With thirty-five years of distance and perspective since that spring, and wonderful experiences along the way, I am deeply grateful for the high expectations and rigorous regime framed by this fine educator. Diana required me to teach four different grade levels of high school English, business communication, a social studies class, and to assist in directing the high school play after hours. Working fifty to sixty hours a week, I planned, created, delivered, evaluated…breathed, ate, laughed, fretted and lived… with these students and classrooms consuming my life.

We all know the importance of strong induction and mentorship supports for our newest professionals. While I benefitted the following year from an equally strong teacher who mentored me in my first full-time teaching job in Independence, lately I have looked back on that experience in Colton for an entirely different reason. Increasingly, I am concerned we are not adequately serving and supporting Oregon’s rural schools. 

In the Portland metropolitan area, the suburbs, and certainly in Salem, many of us often forget some key facts about Oregon’s school districts. With slightly less than 200 K-12 districts statewide, more than half enroll less than 1,000 students. Even more surprising, more than one fourth enroll less than 250. What are the additional challenges faced by these small schools and districts? In a state that is finally beginning to commit resources and supports in educator effectiveness, how should these efforts be delivered in our districts that look less like Portland, Oregon and more like Colton, Washington? 

Recently I travelled with a colleague and friend to a meeting in Burns. We met with educators and leaders from several small districts in eastern Oregon. Some came from schools with less than ten students. Others had driven more than two hours from their sites to attend the meeting. While we shared some updates about the new performance evaluation law, CLASS grant opportunities, and developments in national and state policy, the most powerful aspect of this gathering was simply listening to their needs.

How many additional roles and responsibilities do our rural teachers and leaders take on? For the school leader who is principal, athletic director, fiscal officer, and director of transportation, how do we provide the time and training needed to also be an effective evaluator of instruction? What are their opportunities to network and collaborate with other teachers and leaders in other schools and districts? What are the primary needs for professional growth? Our key leaders in Oregon’s educational enterprise must adjust delivery and supports to meet these hard-working rural professionals where they are. 

We have a lot to learn. In my experiences working with our CLASS partner districts for the last three years, I have been impressed and inspired by the power of local educators coming together to design, shape and map the education profession of the future. There is great collective intelligence and wisdom in the field, and we can benefit only if we are willing to tap it.

If Oregon is to be successful in strengthening teaching and learning for all, we must somehow find a way to reach, strengthen, and cultivate a new reality for our rural professional colleagues. We are a state that cannot afford to leave half of our schools and districts behind.

Tim Nesbitt writes on public affairs, has served as an adviser to Govs. Ted Kulongoski and John Kitzhaber, and is past president of the Oregon AFL-CIO. He writes an opinion column for The Oregonian on alternate Tuesdays. This column was originally posted to OregonLive.com on April 30, 2013 and can be found in its entirety here. 

A few hours after Oregon House Democrats failed to pass a tax increase for high-income individuals and corporations last week, I mentioned to a staffer for one of their members that an alternative revenue package might now be in order. But when I suggested shaving personal income tax deductions by 5 percent as a better way to meet their revenue goal, the staffer surprised me by saying, “not 5 percent of my deductions.” And, having listened to the Democrats’ pleas for more revenue to save our schools, my response was just as emphatic: “Then it’s not worth it to you to pay more for schools — that’s the problem!”

This is the issue that we have yet to resolve at the state level. As I wrote in my last column, the message implicit in the House Democrats’ revenue package was that some services, such as schools, are so important that someone else should pay for them. Perhaps I oversimplified. The Democrats’ argument is that when it comes to getting back what we’ve lost — teachers, school days or shop classes — we should turn to those who used to pay more and are now paying less to support schools and services (insert your least favorite corporations here) and those who have benefited most from our economy (variously defined as the top 1 to 3 percent of income earners). That approach is arguably fair but decidedly limited if we want to secure the funding we need for our education system.

Read more.