THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, October 1, 1995 TAG: 9509290611
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY PHILIP WALZER, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 163 lines
As scrutiny sharpens on the perceived failures of public schools, education deans at colleges have faced criticism, too, for not doing enough to push reform.
Three people are stepping into that tough role at Virginia colleges this semester.
David Breneman, Donna Evans and Virginia McLaughlin have become the new deans of education at the University of Virginia, Old Dominion University and the College of William and Mary, respectively.
McLaughlin, a W&M alumna, has worked at the college since 1983 as professor, associate dean and assistant to the president. The other two deans are newcomers to the area; Breneman came to U.Va. from Harvard University, where he was a visiting professor of education. Evans was the dean at the University of North Florida in Jacksonville.
In a recent discussion, the deans acknowledged that colleges have not done enough. Universities ``almost turned their backs on the (public) schools,'' Breneman said, partly to mimic the research orientation of other professors on campus.
But, the deans said, the universities are realizing the need to get back to working with schools - and the emphasis is on ``with.'' ``We've passed the time, thank goodness, when we go in as experts and do a workshop,'' Evans said. ``We don't know all the answers.
Below are excerpts from their discussion.
The Holmes Group, a coalition of schools of education, issued a pretty tough report about your colleagues earlier this year. One of the things it said was that colleges of education are partly to blame for the slow pace of reform in public schools. Do you think that's a fair criticism?
Evans: I think that the concerns the Holmes Group has expressed are partially true. Colleges of education, just like many other institutions, have been slow to change. Change is difficult, and it's hard to do. I think what we've done is look for somebody to blame. Last year's blame du jour was public schools, and this year it's colleges of education.
Breneman: My sense of this as a new dean is I think the quality of people we get into teaching is the most important thing we can do. Part of our job is to work to create attractive programs, to make sure the best people are entering teaching. My sense is that there has been quite an upturn recently in the quality of people interested in teaching careers, and that will show up down the road.
I think the uncertainties in other parts of the economy have become so dramatic that teaching has a certain stability and permanence and attractiveness. And salaries did go up in the '80s in many areas, if not all.
The report from the Holmes Group singled out the shortage of minority teachers as a key problem in education today. What can colleges do to attract more minorities?
Evans: That is a really tough one. I think it has to be a concentrated effort. We have to really make sure there are funds for kids who couldn't come, that they don't fall between the cracks once they get there. The other side is that people who would normally go into teaching as minorities have other avenues open to them. . . . It becomes a Catch-22.
Breneman: One of the current trends in the financing of college is certainly not helpful. We are shifting away from grant support for the students, and we are loading young people up with an enormous amount of debt.
If you're a young minority student with a significant undergraduate debt, you're looking at what's the payoff to all of this debt. And if you don't see a career path with a salary that's attractive, that's got to be a detriment. It's part of the overall tendency in this country now to be slowly but surely turning its back on access to higher education.
What specifically do you have to do to make sure that the shortage doesn't get worse?
McLaughlin: I think all of us are engaged in more focused recruitment efforts - reaching down to the elementary and middle schools, as well as the high schools; making contact with potential teachers and trying to interest them in education.
Evans: All of the above and making it possible for a student to stay once they get there. (In Florida) we found that some of the social issues and some of the issues of feeling comfortable were ones that sometimes made students leave, so we spent a lot of time developing support systems.
Let me go back to the role of schools of education in reform. How heavily involved should you be? Should we expect colleges of education to essentially adopt a local school system?
Breneman: My reading of the history of the schools of education is there was a period 20 years ago where a number of schools of education almost turned their backs on the schools and began emulating arts and science faculties in terms of being intensely research-oriented and being sort of uppity in their attitude toward daily practitioners. A number of the leading schools have realized that was a very serious error and are getting much more involved with local schools.
Evans: I happen to think that universities and colleges of education, particularly urban ones, like Old Dominion University, have an obligation to work very closely and very collaboratively with the community. Urban education is where most of our problems are, so no one institution can solve that. I believe we have to look at changing the role of classroom teachers and college professors and maybe even going in and out of each other's doors. We've passed the time, thank goodness, when we go in as experts and do a workshop. We don't know all the answers.
Of all the reforms that have been bouncing around these days - charter schools, privatization, choice - which do you think has the potential for making the biggest difference?
Breneman: In Massachusetts, Gov. Weld helped support a charter school provision which went through two rounds of applications and selections. Some of them will be opening this fall, and I've had occasion to look at some of those proposals, and they're quite exciting. I think the motivation, the energy and the interest people have probably should be encouraged. On the other hand, even if they're all implemented, the percentage of children that will be affected will still be minuscule - half of 1 percent or something like that. I don't think any of the charter school proposals in the country are going to have a large-scale effect.
McLaughlin: One reason I hesitate when you said which of these will have the greatest impact is I think that's been the fallacy of our thinking. We've tended to latch onto one or two simple quick fixes, and I think we should be learning at this point that that's not going to work. We do have the knowledge base right now to know the kinds of things that work, and to me, the reform initiatives that are going to be most successful are those that integrate them into some kind of coherent whole and approach problems on a number of different fronts.
Let me turn around the question and ask whether citizens have worked hard enough to promote school reform. In other words, what can parents do to improve the education in their son or daughter's school?
Evans: I think by and large most parents really do care a lot about what happens to their children at school. I know what is very heartening is that parents are interested, they are asking questions, they want to participate. I think it is up to us to make sure they have an opportunity to do that - to have the dialogue we're having and to maybe learn we're not quite sure either. We're willing to work together.
McLaughlin: Some of the most exciting things are happening at local communities, and this effort transcends political agendas. In Williamsburg, we have a community partnership for education that involves parents and other citizens, corporate players, the college and governing agencies working with the schools to address problems of local significance and be a catalyst for action.
Breneman: On the financial support side, with the growing political power of many of the groups in society that don't have children - we're in this awful situation of being set up to have one group pitted against another, the old versus the young, Medicare versus schooling, higher education funding versus lower education funding. Our children don't vote. And senior citizens do, and somehow parents have got to be child advocates and be alert to these issues and be active. ILLUSTRATION: Color photos
JIM WALKER/Staff
Virginia McLaughlin
Dean of Education
THE COLLEGE OF WILLIAM AND MARY
MARTIN SMITH-RODDEN/Staff
Donna Evans
Dean of Education
OLD DOMINION UNIVERSITY
Photo
COURTESTY THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA
David Breneman
Dean of Education
UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA
KEYWORDS: ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION INTERVIEWS SCHOOLS
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