As part of ASCD's annual Issues Process, now in its fifth year, we invite our members to voice their opinions on the education issues important to their work and help determine the direction the Association will take in the coming years.
This year's process began last fall, when more than 3,000 ASCD members responded to the 1997-98 Issues Survey. In November, ASCD's Issues Committee used the survey to generate a list of five critical issue areas to present to the Board of Directors. Members of the committee and the ASCD staff developed preliminary position statements for each issue area.
On Monday, March 23, during our Annual Conference, ASCD's Board of Directors will decide which of these five positions to adopt as part of the Association's influence agenda. The Board will be guided in their deliberations by (1) the importance of the position to ASCD's goals, values, and mission; and (2) the Association's potential for effective action on the position. Following the Annual Conference, ASCD staff members will develop action plans and strategies for moving the positions forward.
Before the Board makes its decisions, ASCD members will get a chance to discuss, debate, and reflect on the issues at four Town Meetings at the Annual Conference (see your Program book for details). ASCD members can also give feedback on the proposed positions through ASCD's Web site (http://www.ascd.org) or by mail addressed to Don Ernst—1998 ISSUES, ASCD, 1250 N. Pitt St., Alexandria, VA 22314 USA.
Only with the widest possible participation of ASCD members can this important work truly reflect the views of our membership and have a meaningful effect on ASCD's efforts to improve the education of every student.
Know the Learner: Making Education Personal
Proposed position:
ASCD believes that school renewal efforts should help match individual learner needs with appropriate pedagogy to increase student achievement. Efforts to personalize learning should celebrate the identity and sense of belonging of each child. The personalization of education demands a change in the way schools are organized so that instruction is designed to match the strengths and needs of students. Further, schools should be redesigned so that each student is known well—minimally, by one adult in the school community. The goal of school organization for personalization is to promote the uniqueness of each student. This sense of uniqueness can be achieved only within a reasonably sized school community that prevents anonymity. Further, personalization is critical in efforts to address the linguistic, cultural, ethnic, and socioeconomic diversity among students.
Rationale:
Advocacy for personalized learning provides meaning to the important aphorism "teaching all children." Emerging research and decades of experience identify personalized education as a significant factor in increased student achievement in both academic and nonacademic areas. Personalized education requires instructional practices that attend to learning styles, multiple intelligences theory, grouping techniques, teaming strategies, and the developmental needs of students. Technology should be used as an important tool to support and enrich personalized learning.
ASCD Positions, Values, and Beliefs:
ASCD has articulated, through its Strategic Plan, that fundamental to its mission is a concern for people both as individuals and as part of a larger community. ASCD believes that the individual has intrinsic worth; all people have the ability and the need to learn; all children have a right to safety, love, and learning; and that diversity strengthens society and should be honored and protected. ASCD has adopted positions (What We Believe: Positions of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 1997) on the related issues of Alternative Scheduling, Ability Grouping and Tracking, and Classroom Climate. Further, through the journal Educational Leadership, ASCD has provided a forum for educators to learn more about various strategies to personalize learning.
Assessment: Uses and Misuses
Proposed position:
Policy decisions in determining what assessments will measure and when to administer them should be guided by knowing the potential users of the assessment data and the purposes for which the data will be used. Assessment is useful when it can be used to guide programs, influence resource allocations, and authentically make judgments about student learning. The history of assessment reminds us that tests and their results can be misused, leading to the potentially harmful classification and tracking of students. This observation should always inform policy decisions relating to student assessment. Assessments might include norm-referenced tests, criterion-referenced tests, and performance tasks to evaluate students, schools, and programs. Assessments need to clearly reflect curriculum goals and their use should be guided by the involvement of all those affected or who have a stake in the assessment process. The general public also needs to be fully engaged in the purposes and uses of assessment data.
Rationale:
Assessment influences how communities feel about their schools and how parents feel about their children's educational experience. Assessment serves as the foundation for accountability, which includes the vital issues of funding and the creation, modification, or elimination of programs. Assessment, if properly administered, can enhance learning and understanding for students, teachers, administrators, parents, and the community. It informs school communities in their efforts of change and renewal.
ASCD Positions, Values, and Beliefs:
ASCD has adopted a position that articulates the concern for the misuses of norm-referenced testing (What We Believe, 1997, p. 15). ASCD has also adopted a position that acknowledges that schools should be held responsible for the results of educational programs and school restructuring (What We Believe, p. 12). ASCD has also stated that "external tests should not determine the goals and content of the curriculum. Educators and citizens should set curricular goals first, and teachers should have access to a variety of teaching materials and strategies by which to accomplish these goals" (What We Believe, p. 2).
Becoming a Whole Society: Improving Attitudes About Our Differences
Proposed position:
Proper participation in a democratic society requires authentic inclusion of everyone. Acceptance of the differences among all people requires skills and understandings that must be developed in educational leaders, teachers, and students. Educators have special responsibilities in creating program models, learning materials, and schools that move societies toward greater acceptance of differences among people.
Rationale:
Learning communities are enriched by the differences of their own members. These differences of race, color, ethnicity, gender, culture, and language should be perceived as strengths that support and undergird positive participation not only in a democratic society but also in an increasingly global society. ASCD recognizes that facilitating this process requires the necessary resources to promote, create, and sustain the best possible environment for all learners. Students, and therefore educators, must have the appropriate tools to analyze issues from a global perspective, to conceptualize alternatives to current and future situations, and to develop solutions that transcend geographical and cultural boundaries.
ASCD Positions, Values, and Beliefs:
ASCD has a long and distinguished history in the area of diversity, multicultural understanding, and the view that all children must have equal access to education no matter what their circumstances. ASCD has taken bold positions (What We Believe) on Affirmative Action, p. 2; Multicultural Education, p. 9; Gender Equity, p. 7; Inclusion, p. 8; Racial Desegregation, p. 11; Schools' Responsibilities (U.S.), p. 12; Restructuring of Schools, p. 12; Service Learning, p. 13; Native American Schools, p. 10; Student Sexual Orientation, p. 13; Students at Risk, p. 13; Teaching Strategies, p. 14; Thinking Skills, p. 15; United Nations, p. 15; Values Promoted in the Media, p. 16; and Urban Schools, p. 16.
Attacking Poverty in Education
Proposed position:
All children, despite the economic, social, and geographical (e.g., rural or urban) circumstances in which they are born, are entitled to an education of the highest quality. Financial support of schools, especially those serving poor children, must be allocated in ways that enable students to meet academic and civic expectations.
Rationale:
ASCD's Strategic Plan identifies the education of children in poverty as a priority. Because the issues associated with poverty continue to plague most communities and because little progress has been made to halt the growth in numbers of those living in poverty, the Issues Committee determined that this issue must continue to get attention. Poverty continues to be a powerful factor in the education of children worldwide. Despite the growing wealth being generated in several nations and the best efforts of many (e.g., Title I in the United States), there are still far too many children whose educational lives suffer because of chronic poverty. Poverty transcends mere material resources. Children who come to school hungry, fearful, angry, and academically unprepared cannot live up to their potential. Teachers who work in schools and communities struggling with the implications of dramatic poverty often struggle with feelings of demoralization and cynicism. Many parents feel disenfranchised from their children's education, and schools continue to be perceived by many as uninviting, unfriendly, uncaring places.
ASCD Positions, Values, and Beliefs:
ASCD's Strategic Plan firmly places the educational struggle against poverty as central to its mission. Moreover, ASCD has taken positions on the related issue of hunger (What We Believe, p. 3) and sees the role of community-based organizations and other youth-serving organizations as important collaborators in the struggle to improve the educational and social lives of children (p. 4).
Living in a Global Society
Proposed position:
To succeed, or even to survive, in the global society we all live in, people must have the capacity to compete and cooperate in an international market and social system. Educators have a responsibility to educate students in global understanding to ensure the healthy future of all societies. Educators must provide leadership in the research and design of curriculums and teaching and learning to prepare students to live, work, and participate in a global society.
Rationale:
The idea of a global society implies understanding our own unique microcosms. Migration, immigration, new communications technologies, international business and recent efforts to promote greater economic cooperation among nations, and the need to solve global and regional conflicts, make education for global understanding more critical than ever. Integral to education for a global society is the need to promote literate and culturally grounded proficiencies in languages other than English.
ASCD Positions, Values, and Beliefs:
ASCD has placed significant value on the importance of meeting the needs of children who come to school with languages of the globe (What We Believe, pp. 3, 7). ASCD has recognized the significance of teaching about the United Nations (p. 15). ASCD has also taken a position that undocumented children should not be denied access to educational opportunities in public schools (p. 8). Further, ASCD believes schools should foster world peace by teaching students how to resolve individual and group conflict through nonviolent means.