Sunday, April 18, 2010

GIVING KIDS THE BUSINESS - LITERALLY!

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. - Chinese Proverb


One teacher walks along the 2nd grade lunch line of mostly talkative, shuffling students, handing out an M&M here and there to a quiet kid. Another gives a piece of candy for good behavior. Many use stickers for completed homework or for groups with "on task" behavior. Rewards? Bribery?

In a Time magazine article published April 19, 2010, the cover story was called "Should Schools Bribe Children?". In this article we learn that Harvard economics professor Roland Fryer, Jr., using mostly private money, conducted studies in four cities. He used four combinations of metrics. In Dallas, second graders were paid money per book read. In Chicago, ninth-graders were paid for grades received. In Washington, D.C., sixth and seventh-graders were paid money every two weeks based on various actions, i.e. attendance. In New York City, fourth and seventh graders were paid for higher test scores. The results were mixed and surprising, with students from Dallas showing the most positive results and those from NYC showing the least.

Rewarding kids for what they should be doing is repugnant to many. Others take a different view, including some parents who want their children to do well in school, to stop playing video games, or even to keep from getting pregnant. Parents in the latter group who "pay for As" on a report card could actually be helping to widen the existing disparity. What is the answer?

There is much discussion about closing the achievement gap in our schools. Fingers are pointed at poor teaching, lack of parental involvement, overcrowding and insufficient school funding, showing the complexity of the issue. The problem seems greatest in economically disadvantaged areas, particularly inner cities with underserved minority students. Add in drugs and crime and one feels hopeless and helpless to solve the dilemma.

How about a novel approach to a different kind of study? What about giving kids a real life experience in running their own school like a business, with the students being shareholders, and earning either play or real money, thereby instituting or perpetuating programs and products that most school children use or need? If millions of private dollars can fund studies like that of Dr. Fryer, why couldn't similar amounts of money be used to target one needy inner city high school, perhaps even a middle school, and teach children all they need to know about being successful in business? If it worked, it could be a model for helping other schools to do the same thing, as they learn about the world of work. Besides money, donors could bring in their expertise in various areas in order to mentor and teach how businesses operate outside the school house walls. Using "kickstart" money from a wide variety of donors, Dr. Fryer, or a researcher like him, could launch a new study based on the above idea. Add in the practical abilities of business leaders who want to make a difference. Show the school staff how to implement "best business practices". Bring in members of the community and families to volunteer where needed. I think we could teach children how to be successful in the real world AND motivate them to do better in school.

For example, basic business skills could be taught. Besides mandatory keyboarding, all children could learn how to write resumes in order to apply for jobs within the schools. There would be an understanding that good attendance is part of the job market, and that jobs can be lost with poor attendance. Jobs might include working in the school store, helping out in the office, becoming classroom assistants, being a custodial assistant, becoming groundskeepers, learning about food service, what goes on in security, and many other real life experiences that are involved in running a school. Students who have an artistic bent could learn about graphic arts, and make money by designing t-shirts for the student body, logos for folders, letterheads, etc. By making contracts to do their work, they could learn how to write simplified legal contracts. For problems that arise, learning how to arbitrate them in a school court system could be taught and overseen by legal experts volunteering their time. One could even bring in drug awareness. DUI or other infractions that might impact a student's employment would give a "heads up" to a young person's ignorance about the law. A peer counseling program, already available in some schools, could be incorporated. I could go on but I am sure you are getting the point.

In my view, many of today's children lack purpose. Instead of seeing what needs to be done, then doing it, they ask, "What's in it for me?". I think the work ethic is missing because parents have a hard time coming up with meaningful tasks and showing their kids how important working as a team is. Children need to understand that parents go to work to bring in an income, and that children go to school to prepare for the future. They all work together as a team to make life more comfortable in the family.

For me growing up on a farm provided its own work ethic. There were no worries about child labor laws then. I milked cows every night from an early age. I picked strawberries, raspberries and beans from the age of five or six. This enabled me to buy some clothes and even to save a little for college. In fact, my whole first year at the University of Washington was paid for with many years of berry picking money. I may not have liked it, but it certainly gave me an understanding of what a dollar was. There was no room or need for bribery.

It is a different time now, and we must adapt. Besides teaching the 3 Rs, the humanities and learning about cultural differences, I think the idea of turning schools into learning centers that help kids get ready for the world of work is exciting. Like the old Chinese proverb above says, "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." And isn't that what education is all about? We want to teach our students the skills they need for a successful lifetime.

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