To a question asking what the teachers would like to see happen
to ODDM, a significant majority chose "Eliminated."
About 70% of the questionnaires contained voluntary remarks
concerning various items as well as general remarks about ODDM.
At least three were over 2 complete pages long. Some typical
examples follow:
"The problem with the J.C. program is not completely the fault of
the ODDM/OBE model. You have people in power who have made a lot
of money selling the [model] to other school districts across the
country. These people use nepotism to protect their power and
hurt people (teachers) who truly use the [model] for the benefit
of the students."
"There are teachers in the district who have complained about the
policies and practices for years. Now...these teachers are being
quiet because they have only a couple of years left before they
retire, or they fear retribution even if complaints are
anonymous."
"Instead of furthering reforms that help students to gain control
of the learning process and develop essential cognitive skills,
the JC High administration has given students almost entire
control of their learning and...of the teacher's role and
duties....[A] growing percentage of students have been creating
educational mayhem....Teachers must constantly add new duties
...to their already staggering agenda....Students cut class,
ignore deadlines, and refuse to submit major assignments. Yet
teachers have been 'told' to give all students with grades below
65 an "Incomplete," regardless of circumstances, effort, or
attendance pattern....The current policy of incompletes is
demoralizing and embarrassing to most teachers...."
"In the feverish rush to embrace and implant OBE and...to win
hefty grants for doing so, the administration has abandoned and
befuddled its control of student behavior....Most of these
teachers have also experienced the frustrations that their
district efforts are bringing more rewards to administrators and
an elite group of teachers than to the students....OBE is
corporate education's attempt to homogenize, equalize and
standardize the learning experience....This reform undermines the
teacher's pivotal role...."
"Even the teachers' union has been infiltrated. We have no
union....We have never been allowed a voice to even vote on any
of these philosophic issues, including incompletes, for 10-12
years....Yes, this is a school where there are no failures but
hundreds of incompletes, students wandering the halls, skipping
classes, doing their thing - with no real consequences....Call
this the "little nice school of the nation" that was taken over
by educational terrorists...."
"I feel that there are some very worthwhile aspects to the ODDM
model, but there are many phases..and philosophy of the model
that are not currently working well....[and that] need to be
addressed."
"You need to understand [that] OBE/ODDM are "buzzwords,"
"soundbites." They are in reality nothing but political rhetoric
and don't change the day to day life of the curriculum or
classroom."
"This philosophy is just a way to give titles to certain
individuals, and to give them much more money than their teaching
salary."
TEST SCORES
According to official statistics contained in the State Education
Department's 1994 annual Report to the Governor and Legislature
entitled "Statistical Profiles of Public School Districts,"
Johnson City ranks 9th overall out of 12 Broome County, N.Y.
Public School Districts in third to eighth grade PEP (Pupil
Evaluation Program) scores, and below county average on Regents
Exams (New York State's graduation exams). In Regents exams
Johnson City was in the lower half of Broome County in English,
U.S. History, Global Studies, Math I, Math II, and Spanish.
Overall the district averaged only 6th to 7th place out of 12
districts. In no subject was Johnson City higher than 4th.
Furthermore, only 55% of students enrolled in English took the
Regents exam, 50% of those taking global studies, 56% of those
taking U.S. History, 20% of those taking Spanish. The
percentages in Math were better but not by much: 72% for Math I,
67% for Math II, and 43% for Math 3.
Nor does the situation improve if one examines the statistics of
the last 5 years. In Regents scores combined for the school
years 89/90 through 92/93, Johnson City ranked in 7th place of
the 12 Broome County schools in Chemistry, 7th in Physics, 4th in
Earth Science, 6th in Biology, 7th in Spanish, 8th in Math I, 8th
in Math II, 8th in Math III, 11th in English, 8th in Global
Studies, 10th in History, 7th in French.
It is interesting to note that whereas in 1988 62% of graduating
seniors received Regents diplomas, in l994 only 48% did. In 1988
45 students of a class of 228, or almost 20%, were admitted to
the National Honor Society. In 1995 only 25 students, including
both juniors and seniors, are members of the Society.
State mandated PEP (Pupil Evaluation Program) scores for 1992-3
in reading, writing, science, and social studies in the lower
grades showed Johnson City's average ranking as 8th out of the 12
districts. It ranked 11th in 6th grade reading, and dead last in
3rd grade reading. The 1993-94 scores were not much better.
Grade 3 Reading: 12th; Grade 3 Math: tie for 9th; Grade 5
Writing: last; Grade 6 Reading: last; Grade 6 Math: 5th; Grade 4
Science: 11th; Grade 6 Social Studies: 11th; Grade 8 Social
Studies: last. It perhaps should not come as a surprise that the
report also shows teacher turnover rate and student drop-out rate
as the worst in the county. Results for 94-95 are not much
better.
Another interesting statistic found in the Report has to do with
the district's socioeconomic level. Officials love to point out
that "We're the lowest socioeconomic school district in this
area. ["A Conversation with Al Mamary," Quality Outcomes-Driven
Education, Vol. 4, No. 2, December, 1994, p.35] A glance at the
"Poverty Index" appearing in the New York State statistical
report shows that among the 12 local districts Johnson City ranks
fourth or fifth, being tied with another district. So at least 4
other districts in our area are lower on the socioeconomic ladder
than ours. Similarly, in a category showing the percentage of
free or reduced lunches supplied by the district, Johnson City
again ranks fourth. What is more, the 1993-94 median salary for
teachers ($36,500) as well as the cost-per-pupil ($7577) fall at
or above the county average. The same held for the 1992-93
school year. Considering the fact that the national per-pupil
average for 93-94 was $53l3, such figures hardly reflect a low
socioeconomic level.
An official announcement made to a student assembly on February
28, 1995, the end of the second marking period, shows the extent
to which the Johnson City program seems to be collapsing under
its own weight. According to the announcement, over 1000
Incompletes were given to a student body of about 1000 in our
high school. Five hundred students were failing more than 2
subjects. Of the 78 seniors receiving Incompletes, 12 had 4 or
more. In the past, 2 or 3 serious disciplinary hearings were held
by the superintendent by the end of the second marking period.
This year 11 students have already been expelled and 8 have been
confined to home teaching because of uncontrollable behavior.
There have also been 12 dismissals for academic reasons, 20
dropouts. In the eighth grade 28 students have multiple
Incompletes while 20 have been put on probation. At the same time
half the class is on the honor roll. In June of 1994, 2000
Incompletes were given to a student body of 1200. Of the 164
students in the June, 1995 graduating class, 78 had received
Incompletes by mid-year. Interestingly, almost all of these had
been taught reading using the whole language system.
PARENTS' PERSPECTIVE
As in so many other districts throughout the country, most
Johnson City parents are not truly aware of what is taking place
in their schools. Since it is rather clear that any OBE system
represents a "dumbing down" of programs, many parents who see
their children receive good report cards and/or portfolios with
very few or no failures, simply assume that their children are
doing quite well, and that the schools are doing a good job.
While Johnson City parents are no different, we do have at least
25 families who have recently removed their children from the
public schools in protest. In each case the decision was made
after parents received very little satisfaction from officials
who felt that what parents considered problems were not really
problems. In many cases parents felt that their children were
being encouraged by their teachers to disagree with parents on
issues of concern. One parent told of how he and his wife had
come almost to hate their son because they could not believe his
accounts of why he never had homework, of how teachers would lie
to students about their progress, etc. They would inevitably
side with the teachers against their son. Only when the father
got involved and went to the school to hold conferences with
the boy's teachers did the parents realize that the son was the
one to be believed and supported. Since transferring him to a
private school, they have noticed great gains in his academic
progress and in his general interest in school and learning. As
of the winter of 1994, 318 students were being transported to
alternative schools.
Issues of particular concern to parents included the following:
inadequate spelling and reading levels, lack of skills to take
standardized tests, no homework, failure to address the needs of
average to above-average children, lack of cursive writing
programs, minimal use of workbooks and textbooks, parents
uninformed of their child's true grade level, avoidance of
numerical grades and failing grades, overemphasis on self-esteem,
site-based committees loaded with supporters of administration
positions. Some parents with 2 or more children 3 or 4 years
apart could not believe the differences between the older and
younger ones in ability to read, write, or compute.
At a meeting of a representative group of 6 such families it
became clear that the failure of officials seriously to address
parents' concerns caused parents to decide to remove most if not
all of their children from public schools. Some turned to
parochial schools, some to home schooling, and some to other
private schools. They all agreed that from that point on their
children's progress became satisfactory. One parent pointed out
that her elementary school child was thrilled not only to have
her own books, but to be allowed to take them home! The father
who had had a falling out with his son reported that relations
had returned to normal.
A STUDENT'S PERSPECTIVE
A 1991 graduate of Johnson City wrote of her experience in the
program in a student publication of SUNY-Binghamton. The article
is entitled "Outcome-Based Idiocy," and opens with the student's
declaration that as a theory Outcome-Based Education "is an
undeniable failure, for it is completely detrimental to a
student's cognitive process." Defining OBE as a process that
"disregards traditional methods of teaching by instead
emphasizing self-esteem in students," she turns to the principle
of Mastery Learning to which she was subjected in Johnson City
schools and which is part and parcel of OBE. She analyzes the
many weaknesses that characterize Mastery Learning, especially
the retesting that it allows which enables many students
eventually to achieve a high grade in a test even though he/she
may have failed it several times. As a result, "Grades become
meaningless, which results in a mockery of our educational
system." Students who cannot pass a test are given the grade of
Incomplete which must be made up by year's end or receive no
credit for the course. "In this system, nobody ever fails
anything." As a result, the system "encourages laziness and
apathy....resulting in a uniform level of mediocrity." She also
recalls how her 12th grade government class was involved in the
OBE agenda. "The class was forced to sit in groups of four
every day in order to learn in a 'cooperative' manner. We were
not only responsible for our own work, but the other three people
as well....In this class we were bombarded with issues of
multiculturalism, recycling, and other environmental causes. We
learned very little about the structure of the United States
government....grades were based on projects like collages. It is
not surprising that incoming freshmen in colleges cannot write.
This 12th grade class was taught on a junior high level."
CONCLUSION
Some information on the founder of the program might be helpful
at this point. In an article significantly entitled "Leadership:
A Change Agent's View," [Quality Outcomes-Driven Education,
February, 1994, 7-17] John Champlin describes how he imposed ODDM
on the Johnson City school district starting in 1971. "I began a
crusade as a 'born again educator' dedicated to the idea that
schools should be organized according to how we know young people
learn....That sense of mission became one of the main driving
forces in my life." He thereupon set out "to alter and perhaps
even revolutionize the status quo." Starting 3 months before his
official appointment "with a commitment to renewal that disallows
compromising," he began working on plans to involve the community
and to develop effective leadership throughout the system.
Having delivered his central message to the entire staff to the
effect that the "current program...is substantially ineffective,"
he started his mission as a "change agent." All staff roles
simply had to change to accomodate the Champlin "vision." Divide
and conquer became the rule in working with the community.
Meeting with parents were limited to "small groups ...with 8 to
10 parents." Large groups were avoided because they "serve as a
forum for dissidents." He boasts that "One of our most
successful strategies was to identify and isolate possible
irritants in a small group." This would insure that "their
contamination of others like themselves would not hurt us at
all." Ultimately, "we kept rescheduling appointments until we
captured over 90% of a school's parent group." Champlin boasts
that, like in Frank Sinatra's song, "I Did It My Way," he was
able to impose on Johnson City "a vision carefully conceived,
thoughtfully managed, and doggedly sustained."
It was not until January of 1994 that most Johnson City parents
discovered how far John Champlin's original "vision" had come in
23 years. Students were performing no better than average, and
were having trouble entering and remaining in 4-year colleges,
teachers were having increasing difficulty maintaining reasonable
discipline, a growing number of families were placing children in
private schools, not one of the other local districts had adopted
the Johnson City model, and selected administrators and teachers
were receiving handsome fees for traveling around the country
helping over 150 school districts in 25 states and Canada adopt
ODDM. Of these, almost a dozen have dropped the Model, and many
others are desperately seeking relief if not release from it.
Adding to this is Johnson City's complete adoption of the radical
views of the well-know psychiatrist, William Glasser. In his
book, The Quality School, [Harper Perennial, 1992] Glasser hails
Johnson City as the American model district. He then proceeds to
enunciate his "control theory," which releases students from any
form of coercion while in school, renounces homework and failing
grades as evils, advocates the dropping of grades, the adoption
of cooperative learning, thematic teaching, and total quality
management, and ultimately preaches that the true quality school
is one that allows students to determine what school should mean.
It is no wonder that so many Johnson City parents are concluding
that their school district's program is based more on fiction
than on fact. Nor is it any wonder that OBE's leading guru,
William Spady, this past spring called the Johnson City program a
good example of BAD implementation of OBE because of its
overemphasis on self-esteem and insufficient emphasis on high
standards.
[Aldo S. Bernardo is Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus
from State University of New York at Binghamton and chairman of
the citizens group, ESTEEM, a state-wide grass-roots movement
that has been monitoring educational reform in New York state
since April of 1994.]
email: bernie@binghamton.edu