Years ago, I was talking to a dean at my school, getting interviewing tips. I asked what a good response is to “What is one of your weaknesses?” He laughed and said a good one is always, “I just don’t always have time to keep up on my educational journal reading.” Brilliant! I laughed too!
Fast forward five years, and I’m in a new school in a new state. I found myself part of a year-long fellowship, and things started to change. It didn’t take me long after meeting the 40+ teachers from around the country who were fellows with me to wonder how in the heck I actually was chosen. How did I get in if these people did? Was there an error? Did they just need someone from my state? Did no one else apply from my general region?
That group was full–and I mean full–of Teachers of the Year in their state, National Board Certified teachers, authors, teachers with doctorates, and too many other accolades to name. I didn’t have any of that. Not one, single thing.
Being among this group of some of the best educators in the country made me realize I had a choice:
a. I could thank my lucky stars I somehow flew under the radar and got in, and just continue to fly under the radar, hoping no one will notice I’m a fraud.
b. I could rise to the occasion and learn from them.
…I think you see where this is going…
This group of educators inspired me to get better. I felt challenged to live up to the example they set. One of the fellows recommended that we read Ted Dintersmith’s book What School Could Be. This guy is in the National Teachers Hall of Fame (yes, that’s a thing), so I figured if this book is good enough for him, it’s good enough for me. I’ve since made an attempt to expand my professional reading, despite the consequence of having to think of a different answer to that pesky interview question…
The Premise
Ted Dintersmith made a name for himself in education, but it wasn’t because he was a teacher. He wasn’t a support professional, nor was he an administrator. Dintersmith’s claim to education fame is as the executive producer of the well-known documentary, Most Likely to Succeed.
What School Could Be takes the documentary to the next step and attempts to answer the following questions:
Who (schools, teachers, districts, states) is innovating?
How do they do it?
What is working well for kids?
How will these new models better equip children for the future?
Dintersmith asserts that the current educational model, established in 1893, was effective in creating an industrial workforce, but it falls short in the 2000s. We no longer are preparing students for factory jobs; instead, for the first time in history, we’re preparing students for jobs that haven’t even been invented yet. As such, we need to change our public education model to fit the needs of creativity and innovation.
He describes educational environments that center on what he calls PEAK principles:
Purpose – Students attack challenges they know to be important, that make the world better
Essentials – Students acquire the skills sets and mind-sets needed in an increasingly innovative world
Agency – Students own their learning, becoming self-directed, intrinsically motivated adults
Knowledge – What students learn is deep and retained, enabling them to create, to make, to teach others
What This Book Does Well
Although this book was recommended to me from a reputable colleague, when I first read Dintersmith’s bio I immediately became skeptical:
Ted Dintersmith is one of the nation’s leading voices on innovation and education. His four-decade career spans technology, business, public policy, and education philanthropy.
Hmm…soooo, never been a teacher? Never worked in a school? Trying to change the very core of public education in the United States? Is this guy a DeVos minion? (I felt that last question was fair.)
But I started reading anyway, and I’m so glad I did. This book brilliantly challenges the status quo while simultaneously celebrating teachers, and I can’t think of any other similar “reformer” who can accomplish both. Unlike so many non-educators who are quick to bash public education, Dintersmith celebrates teachers instead of vilifying them. He sees teachers as the most important piece in the puzzle of how we transform education to be innovation-centric.
The book is essentially a travel log, as Dintersmith spent a year traveling the country, visiting schools, and observing educational practices. I appreciate that he writes both about teachers and schools he sees that are innovative as well as teachers and schools that fall short…but that may fly under the radar because of high test scores. (Parents, students, community members, and citizens do not often know how to read between the lines of the test scores of a school, often at a detriment to kids.)
Why only 4 out of 5 stars then?
This was a fabulous read, for sure…so why only 4 out of 5 stars? I give two main reasons for this:
- As a teacher, I am skeptical of some of the practices Dintersmith saw and detailed. I think it’s easy to spin new practices as “innovative” and “different” when, in fact, they turn into a big ol’ mess with little valuable learning actually happening. The problem is that there’s no way Dintersmith could really know which of these practices truly were innovative and will lead to long-term learning and change without spending months or years (and more books!) profiling each of these schools/teachers. Despite being skeptical, I remain hopeful about these case studies he presented. At they very least, they got me thinking, questioning, and wondering about changes I could make in my own classroom. That’s a positive outcome.
- 4 out of 5 stars, to me, is a fantastic book! More than that, it’s one that I’d definitely recommend to others. Those 5 out of 5 star ratings I save for the books that I’d classify as “OMG, I can’t put this down!” type of books. The “Harry Potters” of the book world, so to speak.
Hooray! We survived another school year! To celebrate, take 15% off everything in my Teachers Pay Teachers store here on Wednesday, June 19!