March 21, 2023
Dear Board of Trustees,
I am writing this, and I hope that you take the time to read this in consideration of the agenda item put forth by Students First about detracking.
By holding a position on the school board, I know you believe that education can be one of the most tangible ways that we are going to be able to combat problems in the world. I hope that in your decision-making process, you are keeping up with the literature about education and the ways that schools can prepare students for the future. The World Economic Forum has stated that the most valuable skills for workers in the 21st century include analytical thinking and innovation, active learning and learning strategies, complex problem solving, critical thinking and analysis, and leadership and social influence. Empathy is at the core of this work and these skills in order to execute them well. These skills emphasize the importance of developing, what have previously been referred to as, soft skills: to work with people who are different from us, to have and navigate difficult conversations with people about difficult topics, and to become knowledgeable, not just in content, but in perspective.
With this, we learn how to solve problems better with more input, consideration, and care about the impact and influence that decisions have on different groups of people. Longitudinal research from UC Berkeley shows that students who are in diverse contexts in school are more successful because they learn to listen and engage with people who are not like them and understand that difference of opinion is not a deficit of knowledge.
I hope that when and if the board makes a decision on this, they have heard from teachers about their experiences with detracking in their classrooms and talked to parents outside of the group that is advocating against it. I also hope that you will model for our students what leadership looks like. At this moment, I hope that leadership will not fall into the common behaviors that prevent progress in most organizations:
- Rushing into ineffective or unsustainable solutions rather than staying with problem identification and solving. When we fix something for the wrong reason, the same problems are going to continue to surface. I can’t think of a more demoralizing (and costly) move for teachers. What are you modeling for students if you overhaul a project when it starts to get hard for people in it?
- Perfectionism and fear keep people from learning and growing. I hope that the parents, students, and community members who are advocating against detracking realize the power that they have to create the fair and equitable (and dare I say, a more thoughtful) world that they want rather than adapting for the shaming, blaming, and cynical culture that creates more of the same and does not allow for innovation. As a teacher, one of the worst things that I can do with my pedagogy is to make students experience the same processes that I experienced (almost 20) years ago because I assume that their lived, educational experiences have to mirror mine. I don’t want to go back. I want to move forward.
- Maintaining our organizational ideas as aspirational and not walking the walk it takes to make them a reality. What is the point of making goals around equity and diversity and access in education if we do not have the systems in place to support?
I do agree that the district should be monitoring the detracking process at school sites, and they should also be investing in ways to help teachers with this adaptation. They should be paying for professional development, having the afterschool PD focus on learning more about student and teacher experience with detracking, and also learning about the conversations embedded in the work of detracking around scaffolding and supports. Harvard Education professor, Jal Mehta, writes about deep learning and that it exists in all students’ capacities. It is flawed to assume that students cannot participate in deep thinking and further flawed to assume that teachers are not offering chances to do so. Remember, we want our students to be the best for the world, not only the best in the world.
If you want to see students thinking deeply and grappling with difficult tasks, I invite you to visit any of my Health Careers Academy courses to see students thinking deeply and analytically in IB English Language and Literature.
With respect,
Nichole Vaughan
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