When Ellen Brentine powered up her car radio last week after a frustrating day at West/Indianola Elementary School, the airwaves were filled with disheartening news. U.S. Secretary of Education Lamar Alexander had just released the National Education Goals Panel’s first report card, highlighting the underperformance of the nation’s schools. Feeling overwhelmed, she turned off the radio and went home. As she arrived, her husband was engrossed in the television and beckoned her to listen to the same discouraging news. Fed up, she expressed her exhaustion, saying, "Sometimes, you just want to tune it all out. It feels like we’re stuck in a never-ending cycle."
In the Seaman School District, located a few miles away from the urban streets of Topeka in the serene Kansas prairie, the residents pay little attention to national education goals and other policy decisions made in Washington. The educators in Seaman are more concerned with budget cuts that prevent the debate team from traveling, the increased sports insurance fees for high school athletes (up to $91 this year), and the new math textbook they need to start using. While they have heard about the national goals, none of the teachers, administrators, or students interviewed could name all six. Majority of them could only recall "drug-free schools."
"I probably have them written down somewhere, and I briefly thought about each one when they were announced," shared Karen McConnell, a teacher at West Indianola. "But honestly, I found them to be quite ridiculous." The pleas of Governor Roy Romer of Colorado, urging communities to publicly adopt these goals, have also fallen on deaf ears in Seaman. The last staff meeting they recall discussing a national issue was in 1983 upon the release of A Nation At Risk. President Bush’s education package and his call for every community to become "an America 2000 community" have also gone unnoticed by Seaman educators and students. When asked about Mr. Bush’s proposals for education, Kristi Feyh, a 12th grader, could only guess that he wanted students to challenge themselves more. She believed that parental choice meant parents needing to become more involved in their children’s education.
It is evident that the education revolution that supposedly began at the Charlottesville summit two years ago will have to proceed without the participation of the Seaman School District. However, the faculty members here promised to make up for lost time in the future. "There’s always a gap between Kansas and the coastal areas," explained Ms. McConnell. "We’ll eventually catch up."
West Indianola Elementary and nearby Seaman High School are situated on the flat prairie land, seemingly trying to shield themselves from the strong winds that sweep across the surrounding fields. The vast expanse of land suggests that the schools have ample space to explore and grow. However, within the Topeka area, the district lacks a distinctive identity. They may not be the best or the worst schools, nor the wealthiest or the poorest. The students are solidly considered "middle, middle class," according to Principal Donald Pierce of Seaman High. Many of their parents work at the nearby Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company factory. Classes at Seaman High are well-maintained and disciplined. There are no incidents of drive-by shootings, metal detectors at the doors, or drug dealers at the gates. However, as Kay Coles, a spokesperson for the Kansas affiliate of the National Education Association noted, there is also a lack of reform or innovation happening in the district. Seaman represents the majority of American education, often overlooked, but challenging to bring about change.
"In Washington, they claim that we’re in a crisis, but they fail to understand that they’re talking about us, the people in the Midwest," said Nancy Fusaro, a 1st-grade teacher. "They don’t realize that we are all at risk as a nation."
Seaman may not be in the spotlight currently, but it is one of the top districts in the country
"Teachers didn’t have the goals in mind," suggested Ms. Edmonds. "The goals were intended to give education a national perspective beyond just schools." The teachers feel resentment because they believe that solutions are being forced upon them from higher authorities, while politicians like Gov. Joan Finney deny them the necessary resources to do their job. In May, Governor Finney vetoed a provision in the state education budget that would have increased school aid by $55.1 million. Additionally, she rejected a measure to raise $138 million in sales and income taxes. As a result, the Seaman School District had to reduce spending on instructional supplies, new equipment, libraries, and extracurricular activities. For instance, Pamela Tipton, a math teacher at the high school, has a new textbook that requires computer instruction. However, due to the shortage of computers, she usually demonstrates the exercises on the only terminal in the back of her classroom. "All the criticism we heard last week makes me quite angry," Ms. McConnell remarked. "They’re basically saying we’re doing a poor job, but what are they doing to assist us?" Ms. Brentine mentioned that the last time the federal government helped her was in the early 1960s when she received a National Defense Education Act grant and a National Science Foundation scholarship for educational purposes. Now, teachers claim that they can’t even receive transportation funding for field trips beyond the adjacent county.
Seeking Guidance
Nevertheless, teachers also argue that they require guidance from policymakers, or at the very least, better guidance. They acknowledge that the reforms they are implementing are scattered, with bits of "whole language" here and some "outcome-based education" there, but lacking the comprehensive changes necessary to make it all work. "At the national level, they talk about ‘restructuring,’" said Jane Klusenur, a 3rd-grade teacher, "but by the time it reaches us, all that’s left is a little whole language." Teachers express a preference for year-round schooling, a departure from the traditional daily schedule of six 55-minute classes, an extended school day, evening community programs, and more integrated curricula. "We need the appropriate structure to effectively apply all these new theories of teaching and curriculum," said Kelly Walker, a student-teacher at Seaman High. However, the teachers also recognize that the conservative community they work in is not yet ready for education to be radically different from how it was during their own youth.
Indications of Change
Nonetheless, educators in this area do perceive some signs of change. Rick Hull is incorporating more cooperative learning into his senior physics class, which has received mixed reviews from students. Ms. Edmonds’s popular government class has an informal and lively atmosphere. "I think teachers now realize that in order to learn, you have to be more relaxed," said one of her students. The math department at Seaman High is abuzz about a new textbook that emphasizes problem-solving instead of rote learning. Students may complain about having more and harder homework, but they also admit that they are learning more. "I can remember what I learned in the previous chapter," said Julie Adams in Ms. Tipton’s multi-grade Algebra 2 class. "I haven’t been able to do that before." Thomas Hamre, a 17-year-old exchange student from Norway, smiled at his classmates’ complaints. He mentioned that his homework load in the United States is much lighter than it was in his home country, which is supposedly surpassed by the United States in math and science within nine years. "I’d like to catch up with the countries we’re behind," Ms. Adams remarked. "But it’s difficult to change the way I’ve always studied." Some teachers here believe that national education authorities need to do a better job of addressing schools in rural areas if they want the educational revolution to achieve its objectives. "I see a lot of money being spent to fix this major global issue," observed Ms. Fusaro, "but no one is coming to Topeka and saying, ‘This is Topeka, Kansas. This is what needs to be done here.’"
