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NBC Education Nation: Second event on work skills today

1:03 pm May 7, 2012, by Maureen Downey

What do our young people need to know?

That question was the centerpiece of the second major event that NBC Education Nation sponsored during in its visit to Atlanta this week. In a noon panel today at the Georgia Aquarium Monday hosted by NBC reporter David Gregory, Gov. Nathan Deal, Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and U.S. Sen Johnny Isakson tackled the question.

The responses were fairly straightforward and essentially gave each politician an opportunity to tout their own efforts on behalf of education. Deal began by saying that the state has a constitutional obligation to educate its children. (I was surprised no teachers jumped to their feet then to ask if that constitutional obligation included adequate funding.)

The governor’s main theme was that Georgia schools were on their way to offering industry a deep and qualified workforce. He listed the various companies that have chosen to open new facilities in Georgia during his term, in part, he says, because they trust that they can find the workers they need.

Mayor Reed said that everyone was now aware how linked education excellence and economic prosperity were. There was a new sense of urgency, he said. “It went from something that may have in the top 5 to something that is in the top two,” he said.

Because of the importance of education, Reed said he begged retiring University System Chancellor Erroll Davis to take over Atlanta Public schools, adding, “We went out and found the best person we could after going through a terrible cheating scandal in the Atlanta school system.”

Isakson said the federal government needs to be a leader in supporting education, but noted it holds a subsidiary role in funding. The federal government only funds 7 percent of public education, he said.

Gregory asked Reed about what he learned about education in a recent trip to China.

While recognizing China’s technical competency and its emphasis on science and math, Reed said, “I was less favorably impressed with the amount of creativity. They do have focus and force of will there — they are able to execute faster because they don’t have robust debate…We also can’t forget that, on focusing on the success of China, at the end of the day this creative component can’t be lost.”

Reed called for changing the popular shorthand term “STEM,” which stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, to “STEAM.”  The added “A” represents the vital role of the arts in developing a talented and competent workforce, he said.

China is rising because the size of its market, said Reed: “In America, if we appropriately educate black people, Latinos and rural kids, we would see $400 billion a year in expanded economic productivity. We do not have ability to leave anyone on the side of the road anymore.”

(Reed was quoting New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, who has written: “If we had closed the racial achievement gap and black and Latino student performance had caught up with that of white students by 1998, G.D.P. in 2008 would have been between $310 billion and $525 billion higher. If the gap between low-income students and the rest had been narrowed, G.D.P. in 2008 would have been $400 billion to $670 billion higher.”)

A second panel featured business leaders, all of whom agreed that problem-solving skills were more critical than any other today.

“We need people who can think, who can solve problems that haven’t been solved before,” said Val Rahmani, CEO of Damballa Inc.,  an Internet security firm.  “We started here because of Georgia Tech. We stayed here because of Georgia Tech. At the end of the day, the people who create the best companies in the world will have the best skills. I will be put in as much effort as it takes to get those people.”

“If you really want to look at creating news jobs, innovation is probably the key,” said Ken Cornelius, president and CEO of Siemens One. “Learning how to solve problems is what is going to keep people employed.”

The conversation shifted to whether Georgia was providing enough aid to students to attend college. From the audience,  University Chancellor Hank Huckaby acknowledged that Georgia must increase its need-based student aid programs.

–From Maureen Downey, for the AJC Get Schooled blog

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23 comments Add your comment

Beverly Fraud

May 7th, 2012
1:09 pm

Because of the importance of education, Reed said he begged retiring University System Chancellor Erroll Davis to take over Atlanta Public schools, adding, “We went out and found the best person we could after going through a terrible cheating scandal in the Atlanta school system.”

Perhaps if he had added “After I did everything in my power to carry the Chamber’s water and keep Beverly Hall in power by trying to strong arm the one board member who FINALLY got sick and tired of cheating into resigning” he’d have more credibility.

Beverly Fraud

May 7th, 2012
1:15 pm

If you can have TWO events on education, and still not make discipline front and center, not only do you not have a clue, you don’t WANT to have a clue.

Deal and Isakson, allegedly from the party of “respect for the rule of law” and “personal responsibility.” Can they point to a SINGLE policy that has a direct tangible effect on empowering teachers to hold students accountable for behavior and academics?

And Reed, the guy who tried to keep as APS board chair a person the AJC said (correct if wrong please) helped Beverly Hall hide the Porter report, in essence an attempt to cover up the cheating scandal. We are supposed to believe he is an advocate for quality education?

Laughable, if not so PATHETIC.

Dunwoody Mom

May 7th, 2012
1:23 pm

Maureen, a question. I was not able to view at work – videos are “filtered”, so I followed Julie Wolfe’s tweets. Did you get that there seems to be a disconnect between the direction the education community is going and what the business community is looking for in terms of the skills employees will need?

Maureen Downey

May 7th, 2012
1:29 pm

@Dunwoody, I found today’s panels to be a bit shallow in that I am not sure what the CEOs mean by teaching kids to think. Doesn’t teaching literature and history teach kids to think and problem solve?
No one was specific on what schools should be doing to increase critical thinking and problem solving skills, beyond making classes interesting and integrating technology. There was a clear effort today to let a lot of business leaders and chamber types in the audience speak so that prevented any deep dive on anything being said. I like hour-long panels with three people and I like lots of unscripted audience questions.
Maureen

Rockerbabe

May 7th, 2012
1:29 pm

“At the end of the day, the people who create the best companies in the world will have the best skills. I will be put in as much effort as it takes to get those people.”

Really! Does that also mean paying them a very good salary and benefit package? One befitting their education level and skill set? Or does that also include denigrading teachers and their union? Taking away salaries and promised raises? Increasing classroom sizes to unmanageable levels and taking away paraprofessionals that help with such large classes? Does that also include relying on teachers to pay for classroom supplies out of their own money? Does that include listening to teachers when they speak, especially when they speak about topics and hold opinions contray to upper management and the latest political hack on the scene?

Seems to me a lot of promises made, but few resources on the horizon. Words and more words.
PS: I am NOT a teacher in anyone’s school.

Beverly Fraud

May 7th, 2012
1:33 pm

From the AJC today:

This has been a rough decade for teachers. In our ham-handed attempts to overhaul schools, we treated teachers as the stains on the carpet that had to be scrubbed clean or the weeds in the garden that had to be pulled.

Maureen Downey wrote THAT???!!!

Grab the bottled water and MRE’s and lock and load the guns and ammo. The first sign of the Apocalypse is surely upon us.

Dr. John Trotter

May 7th, 2012
2:52 pm

I have been watching the wringing of hands and the gnashing of teeth over public education for the last 30 years. Nothing changes. Politicians like to grandstand and act like they have done something. Nothing changes because no one seems to have the temerity to talk about the unpleasant and politically incorrect things. Until these “unpleasantries” (did I just make up a word?) are addressed, there will be NO IMPROVEMENT. [Yes, a little metaphorical shouting is in order. Ha!]

Beverly Fraud

May 7th, 2012
3:00 pm

“We need people who can think, who can solve problems that haven’t been solved before,” said Val Rahmani, CEO of Damballa Inc., an Internet security firm.

And I guess the best way to think “outside the box” is to practice coloring within the ovals of a ScanTron sheet?

Accountant 101

May 7th, 2012
3:10 pm

Maureen,

I believe what they meant is that so many young people today coming out of school do not know basic problem solving skills. They lack the ability, in many cases, to research the answers to a problem, how to get to the root cause of a problem, or how to apply a theory outside of a direct relationship to a problem they saw in a textbook.

I refer to one of my coworkers who is going back to school and studying accounting. When it comes to cost accounting, if the homework problems don’t have a direct relationship to the problems in the chapter, the student is lost.

I have my thoughts on why our schools suffer, mainly the removal of God from our schools. But please look at textbooks from the early 1900s. The problems most kids learned in 6th grade then are 10th grade problems today. And there was no such thing as a “D”.

Education succeeds only in two areas: When parents are present and involved with their children, or when the child sees education as an opportunity to escape their condition or better themselves. I fear that too many times neither of the above are the option for our children anymore.

Tony

May 7th, 2012
3:45 pm

The words from these guys on the podium today ring hollow. The current political emphasis on testing students ad nauseum will do nothing to improve the kinds of skills and critical thinking they talked about. It’s a shame that our state has underfunded education during the last 10 years. If we are to teach the students the kinds of lessons that will make a difference, we will need resources and money to do it.

WAR

May 7th, 2012
4:27 pm

young people know that if they complain long enough to parents, they will eventually pass.

Beverly Fraud

May 7th, 2012
4:29 pm

Why won’t the AJC just send a query to Reed along the lines of “Did you, do did you not meet with SACS in an attempt to restore Butler Burks as APS board chair AFTER you knew that she conspired with Beverly Hall to delete the Porter report?”

Simple straightforward question. An reporter with decent typing skills could probably knock it out in less than a two minutes. Isn’t truth and accountability worth 2 minutes of a reporter’s time?

Lynn43

May 7th, 2012
4:30 pm

I just returned from this event. The Governor made two statements at which I could only shake my head. 1) “Thankfully, Georgia does not have teacher unions which gives us more leeway.” The dictionary definition of leeway-”room for freedom of action”. and 2) Education is number one in Georgia”. With whom, Governor?

Being a musician, I commend Mayor Reed for wanting to add the “A” to STEM. Academics and Arts go hand in hand.

JW

May 7th, 2012
5:44 pm

So is there an archived copy of this event online somewhere?

Maureen Downey

May 7th, 2012
6:18 pm

@JW, I found news clips, but not the full videos.

http://www.11alive.com/video/default.aspx?bctid=1625022340001

echo

May 7th, 2012
6:20 pm

I don’t believe they really want people who are “problem solvers”. If people were actually able to figure out & fix the real problems there wouldn’t be as many politicians around to make up problems.

Does anyone know?

May 7th, 2012
10:06 pm

Is anyone aware that all teachers at the small high schools ( Washington, Carver, Therrell, and South Atlanta) must interview tomorrow in an effort to keep their jobs even though they already have signed contracts?

If they are chosen by one of the small schools listed above, then they get to keep their jobs. If they are not chosen, then they must return on Saturday to compete with teachers from outside the district. If they are not chosen Saturday, then they are out of a job.

The reason originally given for this was that there would be a reduction-in-force necessitated by the closing of the small schools. When they decided to not close the small schools, they said that the teachers must still interview because there would be a drop in enrollment.

There seem to be several laws/policies in question:

1) According to Georgia state law & APS policy, a reduction-in-force is a SYSTEM-WIDE personnel action which must follow a UNIFORM criteria. I believe that these rules are in place to prevent a system from doing exactly what’s being done: placing employee A in jeopardy of losing their job while employee B (with an identical contract) is safe. This means that a 25 year veteran working at a small school could lose her job while a first year teacher at another school is safe.

2) According to APS policy, the superintendent must submit a reduction-in-force plan to the BOE for approval explaining how it will be implemented. To my knowledge. this plan of a job fair has not been submitted or approved. Furthermore, I don’t believe that the BOE would approve of this plan.

3) The news I found most frustrating was given to us today. An administrator relayed to us that even if less teachers show up than there are positions for them to fill, they can still be rejected (leaving an unfilled vacancy and an unemployed teacher WITH A CONTRACT). The positions can then be given to applicants from outside the district. I thought that the only way a person with a contract could be denied a job was if there were not enough jobs. I don’t see how anyone can propose to do this without thinking there might be problems later.

In the end, I assume almost all of the teachers will land jobs. However, I am frightened by the thought of school districts not being more careful about due process.

what's best for kids???

May 8th, 2012
7:49 am

Ironic that teh feds fund 7% yet mandate much much more money from our schools.
Keep it simple, keep it local, and keep the feds out of our schools.

Dunwoody Mom

May 8th, 2012
8:21 am

University Chancellor Hank Huckaby acknowledged that Georgia must increase its need-based student aid programs

But, year after year, tuition and fee hikes have become part of the norm for this Chancellor.

And There It Is

May 8th, 2012
9:45 am

Interesting that they were all not educators once again telling schools what their problems are.

All talk, no action, or at least no real action.

school_is_home

May 8th, 2012
10:07 am

Stop spoon-feeding them. Stop spending months in the beginning of each school year re-teaching.
School districts should post packets for incoming students. Parents would then be responsible for ensuring their children have mastered the material (or choose to place your 7th grader in the 4th grade class). Each year, have students complete a group science project. The artists do the artwork, the historians research the history behind the concepts, and so on (multiple intelligences, if you must).
Really the kids can build cars, windmills, cool tools for Batman, or houses. Have them create a new game or toy and market it to WalMart or Hasbro, with proceeds benefitting the school (and future generations). In each year the projects become more sophisticated. This doesn’t have to be expensive – let the kids create a business plan to raise funds in the first semester to buy materials. Reach out to the community to engage engineers, accountants, artists, whomever will work for free and honorable mention.
It is doable – and I’d be happy to design the program if any schools are interested.

Truth in Moderation

May 8th, 2012
7:05 pm

“What do our young people need to know?”

“The governor’s main theme was that Georgia schools were on their way to offering industry a deep and qualified workforce. He listed the various companies that have chosen to open new facilities in Georgia during his term, in part, he says, because they trust that they can find the workers they need.”

Oh PLEASE! This is just Outcomes Based Education (OBE) Deja Vu!
True Classical education trains students how to teach themselves by giving them a foundation in Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, and the Scientific Method thrown in for good measure. K-12 should focus on skill mastery, and it is UP TO THE STUDENT how they want to tailor their skills to fit THEIR chosen field of endeavor. THIS IS THE FREEDOM SPOKEN OF IN THE DECLARATION AND THE CONSTITUTION! Our governor is pushing nothing but CORPORATE FASCISM! He’s turning the American debt slaves over to the Globalist Corporations. Free yourselves and your children from this bondage. Stay out of debt and home school. It is our only hope for the future. Start a million family owned small businesses. Make your own stuff instead of buying cheap goods from overseas. Get a backbone like the Icelanders. JUST SAY NO!

Montgomery

May 12th, 2012
4:37 pm

Teacher leaders and political leaders speaking in seperate forums again. We are never going to solve problems when we have seperate viewpoints and seperate agendas.