DPS (Update: Mr. Roberts / Well Played)

Detroit schools' progress cited as emergency manager Roy Roberts announces retirement

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Roy Roberts / Andre J. Jackson/Detroit Free Press

By Chastity Pratt Dawsey

Detroit Free Press Education Writer

May 2, 2013

After two years as the emergency manager for Detroit Public Schools, state-appointee Roy Roberts will retire in the next two weeks from his job at the helm of the state’s largest school district.

Roberts, 74, said in an interview with the Free Press that he will step down when his contract expires May 16.

He said recent financial and academic progress, capped with the announcement earlier this month of the five-year strategic plan developed with input from 600 participants, has put the district on a path toward self-governance. Roberts expects the financial emergency will be over in the next three years.

“I’m confident that what we have put together is meaningful. ... If I didn’t believe that, I wouldn’t leave,” Roberts said. “The deficit-elimination plan says we’re going to get rid of the deficit at the end of the 2015-16 school year — and we’re on track for that — and get out of here and turn (DPS) back over to the local people to run it.”

With his departure, Roberts said, chief financial officer Bill Aldridge will take on more responsibilities and become the chief financial and administrative officer, partly to ensure that some stability and institutional knowledge remain. Aldridge will oversee the procurement and logistics department, as well as technology and information services.

Gov. Rick Snyder, a Republican, appointed Roberts, a Democrat, to the job in May 2011 for one year, then reappointed him last year. Snyder has not committed to a time line for when he will announce Roberts’ replacement.

“Detroiters and Michiganders alike can be thankful for Roy’s leadership,” Snyder said in a written statement.

“He has been successful in restoring fiscal responsibility, including reducing spending, saving money and balancing budgets. The plan that Roy and his team have implemented is working and it is making a difference in students’ lives. Today, more resources are being directed in the classroom so teachers can focus on teaching. Schools are safer, more parents are involved, attendance is up, test scores are improving across the board, and more seniors are graduating.”

■ Related: Snyder: $1.5-million grant will support students, neighborhoods

Roberts recommended a successor, but declined to name the person. “I would be honored if they saw fit to to take somebody from this staff,” Roberts said of his administration. “But it’s not my decision, and I don’t have the authority. ... The governor does.”

Before Roberts arrived, a plan was in place to shrink Detroit Public Schools into a smaller district and close more schools because of declining enrollment. Roberts, at the behest of the governor, signed an interlocal agreement that created a separate state reform district in 2011 and relinquished 15 low-performing schools to the new district last fall.

He also reduced the district deficit from $327 million to about $76 million by selling more than $200 million in bonds, increasing long-term debt even though the deficit was cut. He used 10% wage cuts, school closures and layoffs to help cut spending.

The estimated $76-million deficit lingers, and the school district continues to lose students, but Roberts ended the past two years’ budgets with more money left over in the coffers than expected. Instead of using it to pay down the deficit, he gave some of it out as 2% bonuses last December to build good faith among disenchanted employees.

Under Roberts, DPS’s scores on the state’s standardized MEAP tests increased this year; however, the achievement gap between Detroit’s scores and the state averages since 2009 has worsened, data show.

Over the past two years, Roberts largely ignored the school board. He used his power over hiring and payroll to deny the board the academic authority it had under a prior emergency financial manager law. A court battle with the board ensured and Roberts lost, but a new emergency manager law restored all powers to the emergency manager in March.

Union and school board members who heard about the leadership change in a closed meeting with Roberts this morning were stunned.

Keith Johnson, president of the Detroit Federation of Teachers, said he had expected Roberts to discuss Monday’s upcoming visit by U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.

“When he said, ‘I’m stepping down,’ all of our mouths just dropped,” Johnson said. “I can’t say it’s a bad day. I can’t say it’s a good day, because we don’t know who’s coming next.”

Roberts also told those gathered that when he arrived at DPS, he was told to “blow up” the district and dismantle it, Johnson said.

“Blow it up — those were his exact words,” Detroit School Board member Tawanna Simpson confirmed.

At a news conference today, Roberts said the governor never instructed him to dismantle DPS, but factions from Lansing to Detroit, from community members to educators, had wanted him to make wholesale changes in DPS and “blow it up,” figuratively speaking.

“They had totally given up,” Roberts said. “But we can make it work.”

Aldridge, the new chief financial and administrative officer, said one of the best outcomes during Roberts’ administration was the U.S. Department of Education’s decision last week to release DPS from “high risk” status. In 2008, the USDE’s Office of Inspector General slapped the district with financial restrictions and oversight after a kickback scandal that would land the former executive director of the Risk Management Department in jail in 2011.

DPS was one of only two districts in the nation under high-risk status, Aldridge said.

Aldridge is in his third stint as a top administrator for Detroit Public Schools. In 1988, he worked as divisional director of financial planning and budget and chief accounting officer until 1992. From 1996 to 2000, he returned to the school system to serve as chief financial officer and chief operating officer. He played the lead role in negotiating a Detroit Federation of Teachers contract that established the union’s first financial performance-based compensation bonus, the district said. He also established the district’s first rainy day fund of over $40 million.

In his new role, Aldridge expects to replace the decade-old computer system used by human resources and financial departments with a new, more efficient one. “It’s going to change the face of DPS. There’s too much paper and pencil, manual human intervention now. (A new system) will allow me to take some of the costs out of the district,” he said.

Prior to coming to the district, Roberts was known for having become the highest-ranking African-American executive in the U.S. automobile industry when he was promoted to group vice president for North American Vehicle Sales, Service and Marketing of General Motors.

“If somebody comes to my funeral,” Roberts said, “I would rather they say, ‘He did all he could for the children of the city of Detroit.’ That’s more important than saying, ‘He was the highest-ranking African American in the auto industry.’ We touched lives here.”

EAA (Update)

GRADING THE EAA

It’s way too early to deem authority a savior — or a failure

   The Education Achievement Authority has operated schools in Detroit for all of seven months, and already the argument over its success or failure is making me weary.

   Supporters are hailing the EAA as a savior in breathless new releases touting test scores and impassioned legislative testimony urging quick, massive expansion.

   Critics are declaring it a failure of abject proportion, decrying the very idea of a turnaround district.

   Come on. Nearly everyone is ahead of themselves.

   I’ve been a supporter of the EAA, in concept, since before Gov. Rick Snyder even unveiled the idea. It simply makes no sense to let schools in Detroit (or anywhere else in the state) fail persistently, without intervention.

   And there are many models around the country, in states that have been much more aggressive about reform than Michigan, for so-called “turnaround” districts. Michigan just needed to pick one, and begin applying a pretty simple concept: Failing schools should be improving or closing.

   The EAA’s harshest critics have focused on everything but that standard. They’re concerned about control and whether the 15 EAA schools are still part of DPS.

   But they’ve offered no antidote to the decades-long failures that saw generations of kids passed along without even the most basic skills, and where support for struggling teachers, reform of curriculum and accountability for everyone was nothing more than myth. And the hangups over governance are infuriatingly shortsighted.

   Michigan has an obligation — a constitutional one, you could argue — to focus intently on the worst, chronically failing schools. The EAA is the first real attempt at it, and it deserves more than seven months to prove it can make a difference.

   The model it’s using — a highly individualized curriculum that’s tailored toward meeting kids at their current academic level and moving them from there, rather than lumping them into rigid grade-levels — is not just intuitive but also innovative.

   At the same time, there has been enough about the execution of the EAA to raise some cautionary flags, and to hold back from a hurried expansion based on — again — just seven months that have produced paltry supporting data.

   The EAA has been operating with a disturbing amount of secrecy, for example. The district is getting extra funding from philanthropic interests, but the state has refused to share the sources of that funding, or to quantify it.

   And last week, there was news that the EAA borrowed money from DPS without the knowledge of some EAA board members.

   The loans were necessary, likely because the EAA’s lack of formal codification in state law prevents it from borrowing on its own. And the philanthropic support is key — a sign of intense interest in the district’s success.

   But the secrecy, in either case, is unacceptable. The EAA ought to be operating like any other school district, in the light of day. And if it’s getting extra money from philanthropic interests, we ought to know who they are and why they’re giving.

   In truth, the state should be ultra-transparent about what’s going on in the EAA, given the importance of its approach and the great need to replicate any success it experiences.

   And if it’s costing more to make the EAA run than it does to operate ordinary public schools, that’s important, too, as a lesson about the extreme level of difficulty involved in educational turnaround.

   It will be at least a few years before it’s fair to say what the EAA proves, or doesn’t, about failing schools. Test scores over the first year will begin to tell the story, but it’s progress over time that will matter most.

   That should be a good guide for critics and advocates alike: Wait until there are actual results, and more than a year’s worth, to either declare the EAA worthy of expansion or doomed to failure.

   Anything else is a rush to judgment that can’t yield the solution Detroit and the whole state need for schools that just can’t seem to get it right.

   Stephen Henderson is editorial page editor for the Free Press and the host of “American

   Black Journal,” which airs at 1p.m. Sundays on Detroit Public Television. Follow

   Henderson on Twitter@ShendersonFreep, or contact him at 313-222-6659 or shenderson600@freepress.com  .

Elexus Spencer, left, and Darius Jones, both 16, listen to teacher Vincent Smith along with fellow student Bridgette Chandler, 18, a senior, at Mumford High School, part of the Education Achievement Authority. 2012 PHOTO BY MANDI WRIGHT/DETROIT FREE PRESS

STEPHEN HENDERSON EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR

Local commentary

Trust and transparency among issues with EAA

By Thomas Pedroni

   It’s been a month of bad optics for the Education Achievement Authority.

   First, there was the fivefold increase in discipline incidents in the second quarter. The 8,000-student district recorded 5,200 incidents in less than three months.

   Then the EAA, a public entity, required Rep. Ellen Cogen Lipton of the House Education Committee to pay thousands of dollars for information to assess the district’s capacity and performance. The documents Lip-ton, D-Huntington Woods, obtained reveal high rates of midyear teacher turnover, falling enrollment and persistent financial difficulties.

   With discipline, enrollment, teacher retention and finances lagging (we might add transparency), supporters of legislation to codify and expand the district are banking on academic results.

   Enter Mary Esselman, the EAA’s chief accountability officer, who told legislators 43% of math students and 48% of reading students were on track for a year’s academic growth. Even better, many of those students had already achieved a year’s growth.

   Of course, spun a different way, the same numbers tell us 57% of students in math and 52% in reading are not on track to make expected gains.

   And her claims about what the results say about the EAA’s effectiveness might hold more water if Scantron, the producer of the assessment underlying her claims, signed off on those conclusions.

   To find out more about the EAA’s use of the assessment, I filed a Freedom of Information Act request. Documents I received raise questions about the integrity of EAA’s implementation of the assessment.

   First, hundreds of e-mails attest to significant disruptions during the baseline administration of the assessment, in the fall. Headsets needed for audio were not available; weak wireless signals could not accommodate the online testing load; many students couldn’t log in, and when they did, many were dumped from the system.

   In contrast, the winter assessment, which was measured against the fall baseline for growth, ran much more smoothly.

   There were other stark differences between the fall and winter administrations.

   While 91% of students took a reading test in the fall, only 72% did so in the winter.

   And while in the fall 14% of students in grades 2 through 9 took a modified reading foundations test, less than 1% did in the winter.

   The modified test is intended for K-1 students and supplies non-readers with audio. Sue Newell, Scantron’s EAA consultant, explained in a phone interview that the modified and regular test icons are side-by-side on the login screen. Many older students “took the foundations incorrectly” in the fall.

   By the winter administration, they knew better.

    Newell also explained a category of test-takers identified in the winter but not the fall — invalids. These were students whose test scores showed considerable decline since the baseline. Scantron assumes, probably correctly, that these students did not take the winter test seriously.

   Logically, there is no special designation for students who did not take the fall administration seriously, because there is no earlier data to which their scores could be compared.

   I asked Newell whether students who did not take the test seriously in the fall but did in the winter might constitute a bias in the results much like the invalids — one that would inflate the appearance of student growth. Newell agreed, but said, “There’s no way to measure that.”

   Stacey Ridgeway, senior manager at Global Scholar/ Scantron answered my final question.

   Given the severe technological glitches, frustrations and incorrect test selection in the fall, and the much lower proportion of students tested in the winter, did Scantron stand behind the claims about student progress?

   Ridgeway expressed confidence that the numbers indicated that amount of growth, but conceded, “The testing environment has gotten a whole lot better.” Although gains could therefore appear larger than they really were, “you don’t throw the whole thing out just because of those issues.”

   Future tests, Ridgeway argued, will give us “a more realistic look” at how successful the EAA model really is.

   In every respect, the Legislature should take a more realistic look at the EAA. And it should do so before approving the expansion and codification legislation before it.

   Thomas Pedroni is an associate professor of curriculum studies at

   Wayne State University.

Put education first, not failed ways of the past

By John Covington

   One of the most disheartening parts of the ongoing discussion of the Education Achievement Authority of Michigan is the way so much of the educational establishment has banded together to try to kill this innovative approach to educating young people who have been abjectly failed by an outdated system of public schooling.

   The EAA was created to transform the worst of the worst — schools that have been consistently, over a number of years, failing the young people they are supposed to educate. At the beginning of the school year, baseline testing showed only 2% of elementary and middle school students coming into the EAA were proficient in math — none in the sixth grade — and only 18% were proficient in reading.

   I see no value for students to force them to remain in a system that allows them to graduate and receive a diploma that they are unable to read. This will have severe adverse effects on Michigan’s economy for decades and on the communities in which these young people reside.

   The EAA approach is based on the belief that children in failing schools want to learn, can learn and will learn if they are provided the right environment.

   The EAA approach is student-centered, which means each student works on a curriculum that is designed to meet that student’s specific needs. If the student is reading at the second grade level, his or her reading assignments are at the second grade level. As the student improves to the third- and fourth-grade level, the reading assignments are elevated. A student doesn’t have to wait a year to go to the next level. The student advances at his or her own speed.

   The EAA also assembled its teaching corps from scratch, hiring new principals for each school. These principals were able to hire their own faculty at each school. The principals and teachers were initially screened by the Harvard University Graduate School of education, with the final hiring decisions made locally. All the teachers are fully certified.

   The initial results are encouraging. Tests administered in late January and early February showed that in reading, after just four months under the new system, more than 27% of EAA students in second through ninth grades achieved a full year’s growth or more. In mathematics, 22% achieved one or more year’s growth.

   How do parents react to the new system?

   We’ve heard lots of positive reaction. One parent Sharon Reed Thompson said her son couldn’t read when he completed the third grade last year at Brenda Scott Elementary/Middle School, an EAA school But this year, she said, it took only a week for her to realize that her son would make progress.

   How does the educational establishment react to all of this? Many teachers, unions, principals, superintendents and Democrats in the State Legislature are fighting it tooth and nail, along with some political allies who should be expected to welcome the opportunity for a better education for urban school children.

   When the EAA was a finalist for Race to the Top funding last fall, the Michigan educational establishment united in a frenzied attempt to block the selection of the EAA. And they have bombarded the EAA at times with outright falsehoods, such as claiming EAA teachers are not certified and that college students are teaching in EAA schools. How much longer do we place adult issues at the forefront rather than what’s truly best for young people?

   The schools that are part of the EAA were failing before the EAA took them over. Now they show early, clear and welcome signs of success.

   I see no value for students in forcing them to remain in a system that allows them to graduate and receive a diploma that they are unable to read.

   The shame is that those who should welcome this improvement for the kids who need it most are wedded so resolutely to the old, failed status quo. Our kids deserve better from them. They deserve for us to fight for their chance to succeed in life — a chance that those of us working in the EAA intend to make sure they get.

   John Covington is chancellor of the Education Achievement Authority of Michigan.

John Covington

Discovery Education hosts Sir Ken Robinson (Topic: Creativity & Innovation in Education / The Element a Great Read!)

Join us on Monday, May 6, at 7:00 PM ET, as we kick off Teacher Appreciation Week with a conversation with Sir Ken Robinson: Finding Your Element .  For an hour, Sir Ken Robinson will speak on digital learning and creativity.  There will also be time for questions and answers. Register Today. Sir Ken Robinson, PhD is an internationally recognized leader in the development of creativity, innovation and human resources in education and in business. He is also one of the world's leading speakers on these topics, with a profound impact on audiences everywhere. The videos of his famous 2006 and 2010 talks to the prestigious TED Conference have been viewed more than 25 million times and seen by an estimated 250 million people in over 150 countries. His 2006 talk is the most viewed in TED's history. In 2011 he was listed as "one of the world's elite thinkers on creativity and innovation" by Fast Company magazine, and was ranked among the Thinkers50 list of the world's top business thought leaders.

@Garage Hack (Brain Space!)

Garage Hack!
http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2013/05/02/garden/20130502-HACKER.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20130502&_r=0#2

Detroit Public Schools Partners with U.S. Army TARDEC on STEM Initiative

Detroit Public Schools partner with U.S. Army to help kids succeed

Posted: 11:56 AM

Last Updated: 2 hours and 1 minute ago

•  By: Nima Shaffe

DETROIT (WXYZ) - Detroit Public Schools have forged a partnership with the U.S. Army.  It's a partnership aimed at shining the light on STEM education.

STEM stands for science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

7th grader James Whittaker is pumped for the days activities.

"The reason this day is exciting for me is because I love the STEM curriculum," Whittaker said.

Whittaker was among more than a dozen students participating in the forensics activity.

Wednesday s the third anniversary for STEM day. Since its inception, it has been hosted at Carver Elementary School.

Whittaker is part of an effort to engage, empower and excite interest in STEM education. 

"My favorite part of the day is like the math, the science because that's basically the field I want to get into," Whittaker said.

He's only in the 7th grade and already has his eyes forward focused. 

"I was thinking of biomedical engineering which is making like the parts that go inside your body," Whittaker tells Action news.

Since the start the DPS has partnered with TARDEC, the Army's major research, development and engineering center for the Army Materiel Command's Research, Development and Engineering Command headquartered at the Army's Detroit Arsenal in Warren.

For the 100 kids participating in STEM day, the day will be filled with a number of hands-on activities. 

In one classroom, you find students learning how police detectives raise fingerprints from the crime scene.

 In another, you see students timing chemical reactions inline with how chemists in the lab may complete tests and across the hall you find a number of students lighting their experiments on fire.

All of this in the name of STEM and in an effort to engage, empower and excite students.

So why is STEM education so important?  Why are DPS educators engaging kids so early?  You could say that it's all in the numbers.

According to the U.S. Department of Commerce Economics and Statistics Administration, STEM jobs are projected to grow by 17 precent compared to fewer than 10% for non-stem professions.

"I take a lot of like things to look forward to like say if I wanted to switch careers, I could go to one of those and know what I'm getting into. It's like giving me a little experience without actually going to there," Whittaker said of the different workshops. Each workshop provided a glimpse into various STEM career fields.

For more information click here: http://mistempartnership.com/

Manufacturing Renaissance (Update: Time Magazine)

Manufacturing

Bangladesh Factory Collapse Will Force Companies to Rethink Outsourced Manufacturing

By Rana ForooharApril 30, 2013

Just a couple of weeks ago, my colleague Bill Saporito and I published a Time cover story about the renaissance of American manufacturing, and the decline of the outsourcing boom to emerging markets. Among the many reasons that we listed for this trend was the sense that complex supply chains increase the risk of health, safety, labor and environmental catastrophes, which can destroy the reputation of the Western multinational firms doing the outsourcing.

The news of yet another disaster in the Bangladeshi garment industry last week brings this point into stark relief. The death toll from the collapsed garment factory plaza in Savar, which housed subcontractors working with major global brands like Britain’s Primark, is at least 386, and may rise to over a thousand once authorities are done counting the bodies. This follows a devastating fire that killed 112 people at another Bangladeshi factory last year, one that was churning out goods for Wal-Mart without the company’s knowledge. Wal-Mart says it wasn’t officially using the Savar complex for outsourcing but is looking into whether any unauthorized subcontracting was done there, as the factory’s owner initially claimed. The company is also now desperately trying to repair its reputation in the region, issuing stern warnings about dropping any suppliers that violate its labor policies, and contributing $1.6 million to launch a new Environmental Health and Safety academy inBangladesh, to provide training on workplace health and safety practices, an issue that has traditionally been handled by government.

(MORE: Fast, Cheap, Dead: Shopping and the Bangladesh Factory Collapse)

The message is that such disasters can be avoided with the proper precautions. But the truth is that high publicized supply chain issues – from melamine tainted milk to unsafe working conditions at factories used by outsourcers to companies like Apple in China – have cost multinational brands billions of dollars, not to mention huge reputational downgrades, in recent years. A recent McKinsey survey of global executives found that 2/3rds believed that supply chain risk had increased since the 2008 recession, and executives working in Asian nations were particularly worried – 82 percent believed the risks would continue to increase over the next 5 years. Part of this is due to the growth of complex supply chains in countries with more lax regulations, but it’s also about energy volatility (volatility in the oil market has more than doubled in recent years, thanks to both political conflict and increased high frequency trading of commodities), and more extreme weather patterns. “The truth is that supply chain risks [like what we saw in Bangladesh, or natural events like the Japanese tsunami last year] are not an exception – they are the norm. It’s important for companies to think of them not as black swan events, but as things that must be prepared for, and prevented,” says Alex Niemeyer, who leads McKinsey’s global supply chain practice.

(PHOTOS: Hundreds Dead as Garment Factory in Bangladesh Collapses)

But preventing them typically involves one of two things – getting involved in nation building (a la Wal-Mart’s donations in Bangladesh), or diversifying supply chains and moving them closer to customers (which is increasingly the practice of large multinational firms like Caterpillar, which pushes “localnomics” not only to reduce risk but also energy costs involved in the transport of goods from far flung places). Eric Olson, a senior VP at BSR, a non-profit that works with 250 global companies on sustainability and issues like supply chain strategy, says that events like those in Bangladesh are encouraging a number of companies to rethink far-flung supply chains, and move business closer to home. “Even if multinationals are policing their direct suppliers, it’s impossible for them to investigate every small scale, household operation surrounding those factories,” he says, noting that he’s seeing the trend towards more local sourcing amongst white goods makers, electronics firms, and automotive companies, because of high energy costs. “Apparel is less likely to move, because it’s so dependent on cheap labor, but I think in the next 6-18 months, you may see Western multinationals start to shift production from places like Asia to Mexico, and to look at domestic insourcing as well.”

(MORE: The Economy’s New Rules: Go Glocal)

Indeed, as Saporito and I noted in our manufacturing cover, cheap apparel and technology assembly operations are likely to remain overseas indefinitely, because of the cost/productivity arbitrage. But the ways in which the multinationals involved in those businesses interact with governments and workers on the ground is likely to change. Over a hundred years ago, firms like the British East India company were involved not only in money making, but in governing the countries in which they did business. I don’t think we’re headed in quite that direction yet, but I do think that the Bangladeshi tragedies underline the fact that companies that profit from doing business in places with cheap labor and lax regulations will ultimately have to get more involved in the expensive, time consuming work of helping those regions reform – or they’ll have to get out, if only to save their own reputations.

Read more: http://business.time.com/2013/04/30/bangladesh-factory-collapse-will-force-companies-to-rethink-outsourced-manufacturing/#ixzz2S35dQGEz

ASCD Revisits A NATION at RISK (Update: Policy Points)

VIEW MOBILE/WEB VERSION HERE   |  April 30, 2013    APRIL 30, 2013 ASCD’s Look Back at A Nation at Risk Thirty years ago this month, the National Commission on Excellence in Education released A Nation at Risk, its seminal report on the state of U.S. education. Since then,A Nation at Risk has become shorthand for pessimists who wish to describe a declining education system and the urgent need for reform. But was the report accurate in its depiction of a “rising tide of mediocrity?” And should education reformers have relied on A Nation at Risk to the extent that they have? ASCD’s newest Policy Points (PDF) takes a closer look at the report, its recommendations, and what has transpired since then. The publication examines whether the report’s dire predictions about the country’s education failings and the implications for U.S. economic stability and international status came to fruition. Policy Points also looks at the commission’s specific recommendations related to rigorous standards and curricula, teacher preparation and respect, testing, and social-emotional learning. The issue shares progress, or lack thereof, on the recommendations from A Nation at Risk and highlights changes in thinking since the commission released its report. Read Policy Points (PDF). Read A Nation at Risk (PDF) and draw your own conclusions. Visit the Policy Points archive for a look at other timely education topics, including state teacher evaluation systems. 1703 North Beauregard Street, Alexandria, VA 22311 © 2013 ASCD. All Rights Reserved. Visit our website www.ascd.org/policy Contact Us

STEM and the National Academy of Sciences (Video: President Obama / Call to Action: All Hands, Dreamers and Risk Takers on Deck!)

President Obama Addresses the National Academy of Sciences  Yesterday morning, the National Academy of Sciences had the honor of President Barack Obama delivering an historic speech in celebration of NAS's 150th anniversary. President Obama reflected on Abraham Lincoln's fortitude in founding the National Academy of Sciences 150 years ago, and also explained the importance of setting priorities for research, continuing our nation's scientific advance, and maintaining our cutting edge with a fidelity to facts, truth, and following the evidence. The President emphasized that investments made today in science, technology, engineering, and medicine are all critical to the nation's prosperity, and are bound to pay off for many years to come. This second visit by President Obama continues a succession of Presidential milestones, beginning with the founding of the NAS by President Lincoln in 1863, President Coolidge's participation in the dedication of the NAS Building in 1924, President Kennedy's address at the Academy's centennial celebration in 1963, as well as speeches by Jimmy Carter in 1979 and by George H.W. Bush in 1990.

Rising Above the Gathering Storm, Revisited: Rapidly Approaching Category 5104 pages | Paperback | Price: $17.95

In the face of so many daunting near-term challenges, U.S. government and industry are letting the crucial strategic issues of U.S. competitiveness slip below the surface. Five years ago, the National Academies prepared Rising Above the Gathering... [more]

Successful K-12 STEM Education: Identifying Effective Approaches in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics44 pages | Paperback | Price: $11.65

Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) are cultural achievements that reflect our humanity, power our economy, and constitute fundamental aspects of our lives as citizens, consumers, parents, and members of the workforce. Providing all... [more]

How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School: Expanded Edition This popular trade book, originally released in hardcover in the Spring of 1999, has been newly expanded to show how the theories and insights from the original book can translate into actions and practice, now making a real connection between... [read more]

Connected: Education & Workforce Development (Don't Become a Modern Day Passenger Pigeon)

New York Times OP-ED COLUMNIST

It’s a 401(k) World

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

Published: April 30, 2013

Thomas L. Friedman

It’s hard to have a conversation today with any worker, teacher, student or boss who doesn’t tell you some version of this: More things seem to be changing in my world than ever before, but I can’t quite put my finger on it, let alone know how to adapt. So let me try to put my finger on it: We now live in a 401(k) world — a world of defined contributions, not defined benefits — where everyone needs to pass the bar exam and no one can escape the most e-mailed list.

Here is what I mean: Something really big happened in the world’s wiring in the last decade, but it was obscured by the financial crisis and post-9/11. We went from a connected world to a hyperconnected world. I’m always struck that Facebook, Twitter, 4G, iPhones, iPads, high-speech broadband, ubiquitous wireless and Web-enabled cellphones, the cloud, Big Data, cellphone apps and Skype did not exist or were in their infancy a decade ago when I wrote a book called “The World Is Flat.” All of that came since then, and the combination of these tools of connectivity and creativity has created a global education, commercial, communication and innovation platform on which more people can start stuff, collaborate on stuff, learn stuff, make stuff (and destroy stuff) with more other people than ever before.

What’s exciting is that this platform empowers individuals to access learning, retrain, engage in commerce, seek or advertise a job, invent, invest and crowd source — all online. But this huge expansion in an individual’s ability to do all these things comes with one big difference: more now rests on you.

If you are self-motivated, wow, this world is tailored for you. The boundaries are all gone. But if you’re not self-motivated, this world will be a challenge because the walls, ceilings and floors that protected people are also disappearing. That is what I mean when I say “it is a 401(k) world.” Government will do less for you. Companies will do less for you. Unions can do less for you. There will be fewer limits, but also fewer guarantees. Yourspecific contribution will define your specific benefits much more. Just showing up will not cut it.

The policy implications? “Just as having a 401(k) defined contribution plan requires you to learn more about investing in your retirement, a 401(k) world requires you to learn much more about investing in yourself: how do I build my own competencies to be attractive to employers and flourish in this world,” said Byron Auguste, a director at McKinsey and one of the founders of Hope Street Group, which develops policies to help Americans navigate this changing economy. “As young people rise to that challenge, the value of mentors, social networks and role models will rise.”

Indeed, parenting, teaching or leadership that “inspires” individuals to act on their own will be the most valued of all.

When I say that “everyone has to pass the bar now,” I mean that, as the world got hyperconnected, all these things happened at once: Jobs started changing much faster, requiring more skill with each iteration. Schools could not keep up with the competencies needed for these jobs, so employers got frustrated because, in a hyperconnected world, they did not have the time or money to spend on extensive training. So more employers are demanding that students prove their competencies for a specific job by obtaining not only college degrees but by passing “certification” exams that measure specific skills — the way lawyers have to pass the bar. Last week, The Economist quoted one labor expert, Peter Cappelli of the Wharton business school, as saying that companies now regard filling a job as being “like buying a spare part: you expect it to fit.”

Finally, every major news Web site today has a “most e-mailed list” that tracks what’s popular. Journalists who tell you they don’t check to see if their stories make the list are lying. What makes those lists possible is the use of Big Data and the cloud, which can also measure almost any performance in any profession in real-time and tailor rewards accordingly. More schools can now instantly measure which teachers’ kids are on grade level in math every week, Jamba Juice can see which clerk sells the most between 8 and 10 a.m., and factories in China can find out which assembly lines have the fewest errors. On schoolloop.com, you can track your kid’s homework assignments and daily progress in every K-12 class. A most e-mailed list is coming to a job near you.

I find a lot of this scary. We’re entering a world that increasingly rewards individual aspiration and persistence and can measure precisely who is contributing and who is not. This is not going away, so we better think how we help every citizen benefit from it.

It has to start, argues Ryan Burke, the director of jobs and workforce for Hope Street, with changing our education-to-work system to one that “enables and credits a variety of viable pathways to needed skills.” But “for students and workers to take advantage of the opportunities open to them in a ‘defined contribution’ world, they will need much better information to inform their decisions. Right now it’s much easier to evaluate a choice about buying a car or picking a mutual fund” than to find the competencies employers are looking for and the best cost-effective way to obtain them.

Historical Retrospective of Distance Learning (Passenger Pigeon omitted possibly due to its extinction)