UNSUSTAINABLE: A Strategy for Making Public Schooling More Productive, Effective, and Affordable (Innovations in Education)

138 Pages·2011·1.57 MB·English

by  Tim R. McDonald

INNOVATIONS IN EDUCATION SERIES
Edited by Robert J. Brown
1. Edward J. Dirkswager, editor. Teachers as Owners: A Key to Revital-
izing Public Education. 2002.
2. D arlene Leiding. The Won’t Learners: An Answer to Their Cry. 2002.
3. R onald J. Newell. Passion for Learning: How a Project-Based System
Meets the Needs of High School Students in the 21st Century. 2003.
4. S arah J. Noonan. The Elements of Leadership: What You Should
Know. 2003.
5. Jeffrey R. Cornwall. From the Ground Up: Entrepreneurial School
Leadership. 2003.
6. L inda Schaak Distad and Joan Cady Brownstein. Talking Teaching:
Implementing Reflective Practice in Groups. 2004.
7. D arlene Leiding. Managers Make the Difference: Managing vs. Lead-
ing in Our Schools. 2004.
8. D arlene Leiding: Racial Bias in the Classroom: Can Teachers Reach
All Children? 2006.
9. T im R. McDonald. UNSUSTAINABLE: A Strategy for Making Public
Schooling More Productive, Effective, and Affordable. 2010.
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UNSUSTAINABLE
A Strategy for Making Public
Schooling More Productive,
Effective, and Affordable
Tim R. McDonald
Innovations in Education Series, No. 9
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD EDUCATION
A division of
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC.
Lanham (cid:129) Boulder (cid:129) New York (cid:129) Toronto (cid:129) Plymouth, UK
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Published in the United States of America
by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
A wholly owned subsidiary of
The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.
4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706
http://www.rowmanlittlefield.com
Estover Road, Plymouth PL6 7PY, United Kingdom
Copyright © 2011 by Tim R. McDonald
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by
any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval
systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer
who may quote passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
McDonald, Tim R., 1985–
Unsustainable : a strategy for making public schooling more productive,
effective, and affordable / Tim R. McDonald.
p. cm. — (Innovations in education, no. 9)
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-1-60709-364-0 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-60709-365-7
(pbk. : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-60709-366-4 (ebook)
1. Public schools—United States. 2. School improvement programs—United
States. 3. Education—Parent participation—United States. 4. Public schools—
State supervision—United States. 5. Government aid to education—United
States—States. I. Title.
LA217.M274 2011
371.2'07—dc22 2010034997
™
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of
Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
Printed in the United States of America
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For my family
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Student moves on.
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Contents
List of Illustrations ix
Foreword xi
Preface xv
Acknowledgments xvii
Introduction xix
PART ONE: A STRATEGY FOR IMPROVEMENT 1
1 Redesigning the System 3
2 Change Requires a Viable Strategy 17
PART TWO: THE CURRENT SYSTEM OF
K–12 IS NOT SUSTAINABLE 29
3 There Is a Productivity Paradox in K–12 Education 31
4 Redesigning Schools for Performance 43
PART THREE: DESIGN MATTERS 51
5 Redesigning Schools and the Public Schooling System 53
6 Understanding New Technologies in Education 65
7 Properly Applying Information Technologies in Education 73
vii
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viii Contents
PART FOUR: MOVING THE STRATEGY FORWARD 83
8 Policy Opportunities 85
9 Solutions to Barriers 95
Notes 107
Bibliography 109
About the Author 115
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Illustrations
FIGURES
I.1 Rethinking growth xx
1.1 Enabling jumps in school performance 7
1.2 The Target model of managing change 9
1.3 Excess capacity and dissolution of districts 11
1.4 Cost discrepancy of factory versus super models of schools 14
1.5 The super model of school 15
1.6 The economics of the super model of school 15
2.1 Axis of innovation 26
3.1 Without productivity, inefficiency grows 33
3.2 Costs are rising faster than growth 34
3.3 The structural imbalance of K–12 costs in state budgets 37
5.1 Performance improvement and system design 54
5.2 Rethinking “how” 59
5.3 The composition of an incentive 62
6.1 The components of technology 65
7.1 The motifs of technological progress 74
ix
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