So it's a few minutes before 2AM last night and Maureen and I are sitting at the bar in the downtown Baltimore Holiday Inn, talking to the sound guy for The Hold Steady, a band I started listening to a couple of years ago after buying their album, Boys and Girls in America, solely because it ended up near the top of a whole bunch of Best of 2006 lists from publications I like, such as The Onion. On first listen I was sort of unimpressed -- solid, entertaining bar rock to be sure, but lacking, I don't know--greatness? But that opinion started to change on the second go 'round, and then more so on the third, fourth, fifth, and tenth. And it turned to unreserved admiration after seeing them live at the 9:30 Club. Watching most bands live is fun but ultimately not much more than listening to a bunch of albums you like, by a band you like, played on shuffle, through a really great stereo, at a much louder volume than your neighbors will allow at home, standing alongside a bunch of like-minded fans who, like you, are in the process of enjoying numerous socially lubricating beverages. The Hold Steady, by contrast, are transcendent in concert, inhabiting an alternate reality of greatness, multiplied by 100 and then some. That band live is the closest you can get to joy in two hours while keeping your clothes on.
Anyway, we left the venue, which was in a somewhat horrible pre-fab restaurant and entertainment complex in Baltimore that Maureen aptly described as Applebee's rock and roll, and went out for a while before ending up back at the Holiday Inn, where we had Pricelined a cheap room because I'm getting too old to drive back down the Baltimore-Washington parkway at 1AM after a night on the town. And there they were, the sound guy, another roadie, and lead singer Craig Finn, who's sort of the dorkiest Midwestern rock-god-cool frontman in the world. There was nobody else -- The Hold Steady apparently has no groupies of note. Finn left after a half-hour and we ended up chatting with the sound guy. Audiences in Great Britain are the toughest, he says -- they have very specific opinions regarding proper sound mixing and will let you know if you're not getting the job done. We discussed our shared sense that Wall-E looks to be a good movie, and why. Then I asked him a question that had been bugging me: Why, if the band's new album (the much anticipated follow-up to Boys and Girls in America) was scheduled to be released on July 15th, was it available on iTunes now?
"It leaked," he said, grimly. "Probably a reviewer gave it to a friend who put in on Bit-Torrent or something." Given their recent breakout success, a lot of time and effort had gone into packaging, marketing, and timing the release – only to have it all blown to shreds by the leak. So they had no choice to but to put in on iTunes to provide a paying on-line alternative, while the physical CD launch couldn't be changed. "It's still going to hurt retail sales," he said, "Not just because people will already have the album, but because retailers won't want to spend money and shelf space promoting what's seen as an old product."
Which brings me to the subject of stealing music. I know that information wants to be free and that artists make all their money touring and selling merchandise anyway and that the big record companies deserve what they're getting and that music "sharing" builds the fan base in a time where competition for entertainment mindshare is more fierce than ever before, and I know there's some truth in all of those things. But I also know, and I think you do too, that there's a strong element of b.s. to these arguments, the fervency of which is substantially a function of latent guilt over the fact that people can be greedy and cheap and selfish and as such are enjoying the music of The Hold Steady and others like them without paying for it, and there is no real moral justification for this, none at all. For all the critical acclaim, the band is obviously not rich – they were staying in the Holiday Inn, for Pete's sake, and one of the reasons is that people who know better are using the Internet to steal. To whom I say, with good cheer as a fellow music fan and with faith that you can be better: Stop, thief.
Saturday, June 28, 2008
Friday, June 27, 2008
Over-Mentored?
I went to an event at AEI yesterday about the effect mentoring has had on the success of new teachers. Jonah Rockoff, economics and finance professor at Columbia, presented his findings on an evaluation of the $40 million NYC mentoring program. You can read more about Rockoff’s results here. Rockoff found slight increases in reading and math scores among teachers who were given more hours of mentoring. Teacher retention within a school was higher when the mentor previously worked in that particular school.
But though he found a strong connection between what teachers said about the quality of their mentor and success in their own classrooms, newbies with mentors were no more likely to remain in the profession on a long term basis. The tepid results drew a response from the panelists representing the UFT and AFT, who challenged that no statistics can match that of countless personal and professional examples they have either experienced in the classroom or seen while supporting those in the classroom. Unfortunately, they did not provide any hard data, only anecdotes. Indeed, there seemed to be a real lack of consensus among the panelists as to what mentoring really means. Thankfully, a woman finally stood up during the q and a and asked, “How are we defining mentoring?”
This is the exact question I contemplated this past year, as I finished my first year as a Teach for America 8th grade language arts teacher in Charlotte, NC. We’re often told that new teachers have little support, causing them to leave the field within three years, but in my experience, I was overwhelmed with those looking to pass on wisdom, encouragement, and advice. Four different mentors seemed to have four different ideas as to their obligations and role as a support system. I found myself confused and uncertain of their purpose, but confident that the vagueness and excess support was stressing me out! Were we to meet sporadically and informally to discuss upcoming lessons, troubleshoot for the problem-child, and lament the newfound struggle to multitask, or was this a formal, regular meeting to evaluate my strategy and skillfulness or lack thereof?
If the purpose of mentoring is to provide support in order to keep good teachers and make them better, then the responsibility of a mentor must be clear to both parties involved. When there are numerous goals and assorted models of mentoring, it is clear that we need to find “a best practice” in carrying out these programs. Mentoring is one of those good ideas in theory, but is far more complicated than it seems. Until we really understand what we are-and aren’t-trying to accomplish with mentoring programs, it is likely that like the NYC program, we will not accomplish much.
- Posted by Laura Guarino
But though he found a strong connection between what teachers said about the quality of their mentor and success in their own classrooms, newbies with mentors were no more likely to remain in the profession on a long term basis. The tepid results drew a response from the panelists representing the UFT and AFT, who challenged that no statistics can match that of countless personal and professional examples they have either experienced in the classroom or seen while supporting those in the classroom. Unfortunately, they did not provide any hard data, only anecdotes. Indeed, there seemed to be a real lack of consensus among the panelists as to what mentoring really means. Thankfully, a woman finally stood up during the q and a and asked, “How are we defining mentoring?”
This is the exact question I contemplated this past year, as I finished my first year as a Teach for America 8th grade language arts teacher in Charlotte, NC. We’re often told that new teachers have little support, causing them to leave the field within three years, but in my experience, I was overwhelmed with those looking to pass on wisdom, encouragement, and advice. Four different mentors seemed to have four different ideas as to their obligations and role as a support system. I found myself confused and uncertain of their purpose, but confident that the vagueness and excess support was stressing me out! Were we to meet sporadically and informally to discuss upcoming lessons, troubleshoot for the problem-child, and lament the newfound struggle to multitask, or was this a formal, regular meeting to evaluate my strategy and skillfulness or lack thereof?
If the purpose of mentoring is to provide support in order to keep good teachers and make them better, then the responsibility of a mentor must be clear to both parties involved. When there are numerous goals and assorted models of mentoring, it is clear that we need to find “a best practice” in carrying out these programs. Mentoring is one of those good ideas in theory, but is far more complicated than it seems. Until we really understand what we are-and aren’t-trying to accomplish with mentoring programs, it is likely that like the NYC program, we will not accomplish much.
- Posted by Laura Guarino
in no other industry
In no other industry is a man allowed to etch a cross into a child's arm and keep his job. Only now, six months later and a lawsuit filed, did the district seek to fire 8th grade science teacher John Freshwater.
This story is ripe with missteps. The principal dealt with 11 years of complaints. The district failed to respond to high school science teachers chronicling how his students needed to be re-taught the curriculum every year. A former superintendent tried to re-assign him but couldn't because Freshwater was "only certified in science." To top it all off, in December he burned a cross into a student's arm that lasted 3-4 weeks. Yet, the district waited until May to hire a private consultant to document Freshwater's misconduct in order to fire him. That report, while damning, should have been unnecessary.
There are a lot of news stories making this about Freshwater's teaching of creationism in his 8th grade science curriculum. That's not what's relevant here. What is relevant is that, after the cross incident, it took the district six months, a lawsuit, and a report from a private contractor to finally muster the evidence to fire the teacher who burned a cross into a student's arm. I can't repeat that enough.
This story is ripe with missteps. The principal dealt with 11 years of complaints. The district failed to respond to high school science teachers chronicling how his students needed to be re-taught the curriculum every year. A former superintendent tried to re-assign him but couldn't because Freshwater was "only certified in science." To top it all off, in December he burned a cross into a student's arm that lasted 3-4 weeks. Yet, the district waited until May to hire a private consultant to document Freshwater's misconduct in order to fire him. That report, while damning, should have been unnecessary.
There are a lot of news stories making this about Freshwater's teaching of creationism in his 8th grade science curriculum. That's not what's relevant here. What is relevant is that, after the cross incident, it took the district six months, a lawsuit, and a report from a private contractor to finally muster the evidence to fire the teacher who burned a cross into a student's arm. I can't repeat that enough.
Thursday, June 26, 2008
NCLB this and that
The Hoff notes some new poll numbers that show some racial / ethnic differences in perceptions of No Child Left Behind:
This shouldn't be surprising, and the explanation is pretty simple: minority groups like NCLB better than whites because NCLB is in fact better for minority groups than for whites. As Eduwonk noted last week, there are resource allocation and prioritization choices embedded in NCLB and any other kind of education law. The authors of NCLB saw an education landscape in which minority, poor and disadvantaged students were falling short in resources and success by every available measure, and so they deliberately designed a system that would change allocations and priorities accordingly. And it seems to be working; as this week's CEP report found, "Student scores on state tests of reading and mathematics have risen since 2002, and achievement gaps between various groups of students have narrowed more often than they have widened."
While lots of things besides NCLB have happened in the last six years that affect student achievement, and the overall improvement is less robust than many hoped, it seems pretty clear at this point that the law is moving things the way it intended: getting more students to basic proficiency levels in reading and math, with an emphasis on traditionally disadvantaged students. That has undoubtedly come at a cost in some areas--we may be paying less attention to other subjects, or to high achievers, or to non-disadvantaged students. That's not a "flaw," as many would have it, but a choice--the kind of choice that grown-ups make, and a choice that I think is more than justified given the catastrophic and all-too-common educational failure that marginalized students have traditionally experienced. It's not, however, a zero-sum choice--I'm pretty sure that a unit of educational resources transfered from a well-off student to a disadvantaged student produces a net gain to society, in that the former student has an abundance of out-of-school resources to fall back on, while the latter does not.
Eduwonkette tries to take on the equity assumptions underlying the proficiency-based NCLB model by saying:
I take her point but still think this is most wrong. At the very upper reaches of society, like UC-Berkeley or a super-selective university in New York City, this is true. But for the vast majority of people, the relationship between education and opportunity is much more a matter of passing through various gates / getting over various hurdles / choose your metaphor, each of which is based on meeting a specific, non-relative standard. You need to learn enough to graduate from high school, and then enough to get into college, and then enough to earn a college degree, and then enough to land a career-oriented job. Once you're in the job, the relative stuff starts to make a difference. But you're a whole lot better off being in the 10th percentile of bachelor's degree holders than the 90th percentile of high school dropouts in this country. Specific milestones and credentials matter, a lot. And there really are levels of learning that have absolute meaning, particularly with respect to literacy and numeracy, which is why--surprise!--NCLB focuses there.
Forty-one percent of blacks and 39 percent of Hispanics believe that NCLB has helped improve their schools. Only 21 percent of African-Americans and 23 percent of Hispanics say the law is hurting their schools. (The rest says there's no difference.) By contrast, 27 percent of whites say the law is helping schools, 31 percent say it is hurting, and 27 percent say it hasn't had an impact.
This shouldn't be surprising, and the explanation is pretty simple: minority groups like NCLB better than whites because NCLB is in fact better for minority groups than for whites. As Eduwonk noted last week, there are resource allocation and prioritization choices embedded in NCLB and any other kind of education law. The authors of NCLB saw an education landscape in which minority, poor and disadvantaged students were falling short in resources and success by every available measure, and so they deliberately designed a system that would change allocations and priorities accordingly. And it seems to be working; as this week's CEP report found, "Student scores on state tests of reading and mathematics have risen since 2002, and achievement gaps between various groups of students have narrowed more often than they have widened."
While lots of things besides NCLB have happened in the last six years that affect student achievement, and the overall improvement is less robust than many hoped, it seems pretty clear at this point that the law is moving things the way it intended: getting more students to basic proficiency levels in reading and math, with an emphasis on traditionally disadvantaged students. That has undoubtedly come at a cost in some areas--we may be paying less attention to other subjects, or to high achievers, or to non-disadvantaged students. That's not a "flaw," as many would have it, but a choice--the kind of choice that grown-ups make, and a choice that I think is more than justified given the catastrophic and all-too-common educational failure that marginalized students have traditionally experienced. It's not, however, a zero-sum choice--I'm pretty sure that a unit of educational resources transfered from a well-off student to a disadvantaged student produces a net gain to society, in that the former student has an abundance of out-of-school resources to fall back on, while the latter does not.
Eduwonkette tries to take on the equity assumptions underlying the proficiency-based NCLB model by saying:
There are at least two ways of thinking about the relationship between achievement and kids' life chances. The first is to consider, in absolute terms, the set of skills that students have. The second views achievement as relative. Most coveted opportunities - jobs, college admission, a good grade in a college course, or positive evaluations in the workplace - are not divvied up based on students crossing an arbitrary line of proficiency or competence. We don't give everyone a job who's passed a basic reading test, nor do we admit everyone to UC-Berkeley who's received more than a 700 on the verbal SAT. Every student in a college course at NYU can't get an A, and faculty measure students' performance against others to assign grades. In short, all of these decisions are made by comparing the performance of those in a pool, and choosing those who come out near the top.
The proficiency view, to my mind, is certainly important to consider when we are thinking about building stocks of human capital. But if we are concerned about inequality and social stratification - ensuring that, on average, every demographic and socioeconomic group is equally prepared to compete in higher education and the workplace - relative achievement measured on a continuous scale is what matters, not proficiency rates.
I take her point but still think this is most wrong. At the very upper reaches of society, like UC-Berkeley or a super-selective university in New York City, this is true. But for the vast majority of people, the relationship between education and opportunity is much more a matter of passing through various gates / getting over various hurdles / choose your metaphor, each of which is based on meeting a specific, non-relative standard. You need to learn enough to graduate from high school, and then enough to get into college, and then enough to earn a college degree, and then enough to land a career-oriented job. Once you're in the job, the relative stuff starts to make a difference. But you're a whole lot better off being in the 10th percentile of bachelor's degree holders than the 90th percentile of high school dropouts in this country. Specific milestones and credentials matter, a lot. And there really are levels of learning that have absolute meaning, particularly with respect to literacy and numeracy, which is why--surprise!--NCLB focuses there.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
The Baby Borrowers
NBC debuted a new reality show tonight called The Baby Borrowers. Five teenage (unmarried) couples attempt to parent a baby for three days. It's horrendously riveting television.
Tonight's episode began by introducing the couples. First there's the stereotypes. The show describes Kelly and Austin as the "preppy Southern couple," Daton and Morgan as the Southern California surfers, and Alicea and Cory as children of teenage parents who want to experience it themselves. Sean and Kelsey are from New Hampshire. Sean's trying to prove to Kelsey they aren't ready for a baby, and Kelsey's trying to prove they are. And then there's Jordan and Sasha, the only normal, loving couple in the bunch.
The couples are brought in mini-vans to a cul-de-sac of new homes, one for each of them. After getting a chance to settle in, the girls must don pregnancy vests for a day that starts with them all getting instruction from a registered nurse. Kelly, the Southern belle, flips out at the weight of the vest, begins crying, and refuses to leave the house. Austin feebly attempts to get her to leave, but, after he fails, goes to the class alone. Kelly spends the day crying in bed.
After returning home, the couples receive boxes of toys, diapers, and a crib, which they must assemble before the babies arrive. In the show's only real tender moment, Jordan understands that Sasha is worn out from wearing the pregnancy vest all day and tells her to lie down while he puts the crib together.
The babies arrive the following morning. The parents express various reasons for participating in the experiment, give the teenagers basic instructions, and then leave. Of course, the show takes precautions. The parents are able to watch the action unfold from a live feed, and trained nannies watch over the teenagers at all times.
Hilarity ensues, assuming you can laugh at ten teenagers in charge of a babies. This week's episode treated us to only 12 hours of real time passage, yet we've already seen one teenage "mother" giving up in frustration (Alicea) and one unexpected surprise: the tables have turned on Kelsey, who feels the baby likes Sean more than her. Next week, one of the teenage parents will have to go to work while one stays at home.
My biggest question left unanswered is what's in this for the participating parents. Why would they let their child be taken for three days by incredibly nervous, angsty teenagers? I only hope the babies are getting college scholarships out of this...
Tonight's episode began by introducing the couples. First there's the stereotypes. The show describes Kelly and Austin as the "preppy Southern couple," Daton and Morgan as the Southern California surfers, and Alicea and Cory as children of teenage parents who want to experience it themselves. Sean and Kelsey are from New Hampshire. Sean's trying to prove to Kelsey they aren't ready for a baby, and Kelsey's trying to prove they are. And then there's Jordan and Sasha, the only normal, loving couple in the bunch.
The couples are brought in mini-vans to a cul-de-sac of new homes, one for each of them. After getting a chance to settle in, the girls must don pregnancy vests for a day that starts with them all getting instruction from a registered nurse. Kelly, the Southern belle, flips out at the weight of the vest, begins crying, and refuses to leave the house. Austin feebly attempts to get her to leave, but, after he fails, goes to the class alone. Kelly spends the day crying in bed.
After returning home, the couples receive boxes of toys, diapers, and a crib, which they must assemble before the babies arrive. In the show's only real tender moment, Jordan understands that Sasha is worn out from wearing the pregnancy vest all day and tells her to lie down while he puts the crib together.
The babies arrive the following morning. The parents express various reasons for participating in the experiment, give the teenagers basic instructions, and then leave. Of course, the show takes precautions. The parents are able to watch the action unfold from a live feed, and trained nannies watch over the teenagers at all times.
Hilarity ensues, assuming you can laugh at ten teenagers in charge of a babies. This week's episode treated us to only 12 hours of real time passage, yet we've already seen one teenage "mother" giving up in frustration (Alicea) and one unexpected surprise: the tables have turned on Kelsey, who feels the baby likes Sean more than her. Next week, one of the teenage parents will have to go to work while one stays at home.
My biggest question left unanswered is what's in this for the participating parents. Why would they let their child be taken for three days by incredibly nervous, angsty teenagers? I only hope the babies are getting college scholarships out of this...
Casting Blame
Richard DiFeliciantonio, who is the vice president for enrollment at Ursinus College, and who if I'm not mistaken put out a very popular cover of "Light My Fire" back in the day, wrote an op-ed($) in the Chronicle of Higher Education this week decrying "America's Damaging Lack of Investment of Higher Education." As evidence, he notes that:
"Moreover"? Shouldn't that read "That's because" or perhaps even "In Congress' defense"? He's saying that in the 1970s Congress established a financial aid program for lower-income students and funded it at a level that covered most of the cost of college. Over the years, Congress boosted funding so that the grants would keep up with inflation, plus added more money to account for the fact that more students are going to college. The latter factor has been particularly expensive in recent years as the demographic wave of the baby boom echo has crested; as the College Board noted in a recent report (See Table 1b) total Pell grant funding increased by 73% in constant dollars from 1997 to 2007.
Yet during the same time colleges and universities collectively engaged in a two decade-long festival of tuition hikes that shows no sign of letting up anytime soon, radically devaluing the Pell grant relative to students costs. How, exactly, is this public disinvestment?
The dwindling role of the Pell Grant is a case study in how changing national priorities have resulted in fewer opportunities for the less wealthy. Not long after the program was established, in the 1970s, a Pell Grant covered more than 50 percent of a student's direct costs at a public four-year college and peaked at almost 80 percent. Today the average grant covers only about 30 percent of tuition, room, and board.
Moreover, in constant dollars, the average Pell Grant has remained virtually unchanged, while college tuition has skyrocketed.
"Moreover"? Shouldn't that read "That's because" or perhaps even "In Congress' defense"? He's saying that in the 1970s Congress established a financial aid program for lower-income students and funded it at a level that covered most of the cost of college. Over the years, Congress boosted funding so that the grants would keep up with inflation, plus added more money to account for the fact that more students are going to college. The latter factor has been particularly expensive in recent years as the demographic wave of the baby boom echo has crested; as the College Board noted in a recent report (See Table 1b) total Pell grant funding increased by 73% in constant dollars from 1997 to 2007.
Yet during the same time colleges and universities collectively engaged in a two decade-long festival of tuition hikes that shows no sign of letting up anytime soon, radically devaluing the Pell grant relative to students costs. How, exactly, is this public disinvestment?
Monday, June 23, 2008
Worth Repeating
Matt Yglesias makes a point that can't be made often enough (we make it here at least once a year): when you compare urban school districts on a common measure (the NAEP) and break the numbers out by socioeconomic status, some are much better than others. Which, to my mind, suggests that it's reasonable to focus on the school districts that are doing worse (e.g. DC) and expect that they could improve, a lot.
Of course NAEP results are only one measure but when you look at these districts from other perspectives the results tend to be similar. So when the Washington Post gave the pre-Fenty/Rhee DCPS the full-scale investigative journalism treatment, lo and behold they found that all kinds of non-NAEP reasons to believe that the city schools were, in fact, quite terrible. New York City, by contrast, does quite well on the NAEP compared to other districts and when the new state-specific (i.e. non-NAEP) NYC tests results were released today--hey, major gains. It's hard not to see the pattern.
There's going to be a lot of back-and-forth in the coming days about how much of these gains are legit, and this is a healthy conversation to have. Test scores increases are plausibly the result of many things, virtuous and otherwise. But on some level it's going to be tricky for those who simultaneously think that public education needs large new infusions of money but can't be expected to boost test scores for poor and minority students to argue their way through this, since New York City has in fact received large amounts of new money in the past decade, made teacher salaries more competitive with surrounding suburbs, reduced the percentage of uncertified teachers, won a massive school funding lawsuit, etc., etc. Maybe some of that stuff worked? And, thus, maybe we should raise our expectations for how much NYC educators can accomplish on behalf of their students?
Of course NAEP results are only one measure but when you look at these districts from other perspectives the results tend to be similar. So when the Washington Post gave the pre-Fenty/Rhee DCPS the full-scale investigative journalism treatment, lo and behold they found that all kinds of non-NAEP reasons to believe that the city schools were, in fact, quite terrible. New York City, by contrast, does quite well on the NAEP compared to other districts and when the new state-specific (i.e. non-NAEP) NYC tests results were released today--hey, major gains. It's hard not to see the pattern.
There's going to be a lot of back-and-forth in the coming days about how much of these gains are legit, and this is a healthy conversation to have. Test scores increases are plausibly the result of many things, virtuous and otherwise. But on some level it's going to be tricky for those who simultaneously think that public education needs large new infusions of money but can't be expected to boost test scores for poor and minority students to argue their way through this, since New York City has in fact received large amounts of new money in the past decade, made teacher salaries more competitive with surrounding suburbs, reduced the percentage of uncertified teachers, won a massive school funding lawsuit, etc., etc. Maybe some of that stuff worked? And, thus, maybe we should raise our expectations for how much NYC educators can accomplish on behalf of their students?
TEACH
It's unfortunate when good ideas become bad policies. Today's posting of final regulations for the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant program serves as just such an example. The rules take effect July 1.
The TEACH grants sound like a great idea on the surface: give students who agree to teach in low-income, high-needs areas $4,000 grants for up to four years while they attend accredited education programs. It's the details that become sticky:
The TEACH grants sound like a great idea on the surface: give students who agree to teach in low-income, high-needs areas $4,000 grants for up to four years while they attend accredited education programs. It's the details that become sticky:
- The "grants" aren't really grants at all; they convert automatically to loans if the student doesn't meet certain conditions. Recipients must teach four academic years in a high-poverty school and in a high-needs area, by at most eight years after finishing coursework.
- Interest accumulates from the moment the student receives the TEACH "grant," not from the time they fail to meet their commitment.
- Regardless of how long the teacher taught, if it's less than four years, he or she owes the full amount (plus the aforementioned interest).
- No matter how many years the student received the "grants," he or she must commit to the full four-year teaching requirement.
- "High-needs" does not stay the same year-to-year. While some categories of teachers would be guaranteed by federal law to meet the "high-needs" requirement, those qualifying under state rules would be more susceptible to changes. If a TEACH recipient moved to a different state or if their home state changed their "high-needs" definition, they may suddenly have to pay off what they once thought was a grant. This document shows the changes over time of state teacher shortage areas. Compare any two states, or even a single state over time, and the differences are striking. North Dakota, for example, had 19 teacher shortage areas in 2007-8 while South Dakota had only six. Kansas had 14 areas in 2006-7, but only seven this year. Michigan had elementary teachers listed from 2002 to 2004, but hasn't since (the inclusion of elementary teachers is particularly important, because the federal regulations deal with them ambiguously).
Transfer to Nowhere
I was having lunch with a colleague last week, and she told me a story about her daughter, who began college at a public four-year university in Virginia and eventually decided to transfer to another public four-year university in Virginia. Upon arriving at the second university, she asked how many of the credits she earned at the first university would transfer over. The answer was, "we don't know -- we're looking into it." One of the courses they didn't know about was introduction to geology, taken at a university with a national reputation in the sciences. Her parents got so frustrated that they drove to the second university, picked up their daughter, and brought her back to the first one, where she re-enrolled.
Stories like this are not uncommon in higher education. Credit transfer in America is something of a disaster, with little transparency for students and huge amounts of time and money wasted as transfer students are forced to re-take--and re-pay for--courses because their new college won't accept the old credits--a problem students are invariably alerted to after they make the move. It's a consequence of our decentralized higher education system -- institutional incentives run one way while public and student interests run another. There's got to be a better way -- as I explain in this new column in InsideHigherEd.
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