Author Archive for Tunya Audain

Abolishing school boards should lead to parents being the governors of their own individual schools. Yes, like the one-room school house of old.

Consumers, the parents on behalf of their children, would determine the needs of that school, and would NOT succumb to pressures of the self-interests of so many in the industry –  catering to their own agendas and survival/growth/power  “needs”.

That is how private and independent schools operate, so why shouldn’t public (government) schools follow the same principles?

As a young parent in the 70’s I quickly perceived that trustees and the whole machinery of the school board system was counterproductive to the hopes and aspirations of parents. I took advantage of a traveling government commission to express my disappointment with large school districts and trustees overseeing large populations.  Attending board meetings did not help parents in individual schools. 

I was flattered to have a member of the audience ask me for a copy of my brief. A few weeks later I was flattered to be invited to a dinner with the trustee association. It was not till years later that I had a “Eureka” experience, and realized I was being grilled as to my "dangerous" views and assessed as to my influence on others.

Also, I realize now that some of the very “helpful” and “friendly” officials who talked to parents at board meetings were probably “assigned” to keep tabs on parents and the groups they belonged to.  In some instances these same people asked to be involved with our advocacy groups, whether it was for more attention to the basics or special needs. 

I think it is detrimental to parent causes to have activist teachers and trustees shape briefs, letters, demonstrations, etc.  Too often, naive and trusting parents become pawns in advocating for more funding, better working conditions for teachers, and on and on.  They have been diverted from advocating for their children.

Continuing to archive material from my files, I came across this letter to the editor deploring lack of proper evaluation in schools and a preponderance of teachers on school boards. Notice the mood being described. Parents and public want concrete information about the achievements (or otherwise) of their schools. But the response is more PR – public relations. In today’s scenario the teachers union is actively campaigning in the press and with parents to withdraw students from FSA (fundamental skills assessment in reading, writing and numeracy) in Grades 4 and 7 in public schools and provincially funded independent schools.

Parents, students and taxpayers are the losers when evaluation is not routine in our schools. We must begin with the premise that if anything is worth doing, it is worth assessing. So, why is education exempt?

But, the majority of teachers have little experience, training or inclination to prepare tests. Nor should we expect it. While checking and feedback are part and parcel of everyday teaching, evaluation of the broader effort is best measured by objective, unbiased means. 

There seems to be an ominous defensiveness surrounding the whole area of student and teacher evaluation. What is there to hide? Is there a cover-up? This reluctance to assess results and effectiveness is probably the number one reason the public education system suffers credibility problems today. 

To further blur objectivity regarding schools, we see more and more teachers becoming trustees, thereby eroding the democratic principle of public control of public education. (Need I say that part of trustees’ jobs is to ensure competency of school staffs and effectiveness of instruction?) 

In BC we have had provincial testing of basic subjects for a number of years, but it is disappointing to realize that the testing is provincially referenced and has little comparative value against Canadian norms. In the most recent round of testing of reading, our own school district, though scoring well, felt the tests were themselves inadequate. Inflation of scores (making the students look good) was the perceived result since many of the questions were ambiguous, irrelevant to the skills tested, and some were downright too easy. 

Poor, watered-down tests (or no tests at all) are not the way to go if parents are to be assured that they have enrolled their children in good schools, that students are not being cheated of their education, and that taxpayers are to be convinced that their money is well-spent. So far, educators have failed to convince me that evaluation is detrimental. Surely, quality is possible to demonstrate, especially at a time when there is so much concern about rising educational costs and people are questioning their support of such a high expense service. 

Parents sending their children to the University of BC for their first year are not happy to hear that their son or daughter stands as much chance of failing as of passing their English composition test. The controversy that this year’s record 46% failure has unleashed is showing no abatement, with as yet, little agreement over the source of the problem or the means for solution.

However, we are grateful that we have at least one concrete measure of school success (?) that helps focus concern and problem-solving. We do NOT have, as the United States does, the kind of reputable testing programs which caused Dr. John Goodlad (a Canadian educator, now working in the U.S.) to question parents’ misplaced faith in American schools After completing a massive 7-year study of U.S. education this is what he said: 

I don’t think parents are as acutely aware of the achievement decline as many other people are….I think there’s an enormous unawareness on the part of parents as to what the schools are doing.” (Christian Science Monitor, June 9, 1980) 

Is this the kind of evidence we are being steered away from in Canada?

Unfortunately, when dissatisfaction about schools surfaces, the response is for more PR – public relations – rather than black-and-white evidence. What I find happening is that parents who are denied concrete information about their children’s school success, and who are denied meaningful voice in their schools are responding in a way which is telling indeed – flight rather than fight. Frustrated parents are looking for exits from the public education system and are pleased to find attractive alternatives via private schools, correspondence courses or home teaching. 

My message is this: If the public school system does not respond intelligently to consumer need for accurate information, they may find themselves without consumers.

North Shore News, April 16, 2003

Parents deliberately left out in educational malpractice

Dear Editor:

I applaud the move by the education minister to restore some power to principals, particularly in supervision of best practice. After all, they are supposed to be the "principal" teacher and be a model and guide. Also the principal should have a close relationship with the parents so that the prime constituency – parents and students – are satisfied.

The need for this move demonstrates how far our system has drifted from its intent. I would suggest the whole School Act should be examined and reformed. Look at the drift and the costs. Why is it that school boards run community education and recreation programs (with principals) which should be run by community colleges or recreation departments? Why are school boards dabbling in international education? Why are school boards selling locally-developed courses? And on and on.

I hope others can add to this list of marginal and unnecessary, costly and diverting, behaviours. Why can’t school boards focus on education of the young as intended?

In the 30 years that I have been involved in education as a parent and grandparent I have always felt that parents were being deliberately excluded. I contend that this exclusion amounts to educational malpractice. Because parents are left out, everything has gotten off course, and serving the wrong "stakeholders" (employees and petty politicians). If parents ran the schools as they do in private schools we would have much better results.

Why not abolish the "babes in the woods" centralized school boards and have school-based management with parents as governors?

Tunya Audain West Vancouver

I just received this post from Deb of Education Consumers Clearinghouse. I am still tracing the larger item from which the following quotes originate: But, is it still true?

Rare is the school board that takes parent concerns seriously. Have you ever observed how they treat parents that dare go to a school board meeting and complain about curriculum? In many cases, the parents have to remove their child from the district.

To quote National School Boards Association Executive Director Ann Bryant 3-05-02 "School Board Members are instructed to not think of themselves as a representative for their constituency." Rare is the school board that takes parent concerns seriously. Curriculum is a private matter for the school to decide. Have you ever observed how they treat parents that dare go to a school board meeting and complain about curriculum? In many cases, the parents have to remove their child from the district. In the US, courts have ruled twice in the last year that the school decides curriculum, parents have no say. In Oregon, there is a law that states parents must be included in the curriculum decision making. The district didn’t comply, the parents got a lawyer and lost. We have TERC for math and the chicken squawking and mirrors included in algebra I wrote about previously. It has seemed to me that school boards get their "Wacko Mom red flag" training early. My reply to Deb included the following:

These references mirror my experience, and why I have called for the last 30 years for abolishing school board systems. They are an illusion of democracy, as well as a protection racket for the empire builders who feed off their self-perpetuating industry, and a cruel hoax on parents. I did come across literature from our School Board Association 20 years ago which trained new trustees by role playing. One took the role of an irate mother, with feathery hat and rolled up Enquirer in her hand, flouncing around….! There is our example of your “Wacko Mom Red Flag” stereotype. Have attended two different school board meetings lately to reaquaint myself after 20 year absence from the school reform cause. Still the same bobble heads rubber-stamping establishment directives.

Press Release April 24, 1985

A parents rights advocate today called for the dismantling of the school board system as one way to help youth better prepare for the future. Mrs. Audain, Co-ordinator of an advocacy service for parents said school boards have become irrelevant to education and in fact were an obstacle to meeting student needs. By being a buffer between parents and their schools, school boards prevented alienated parents from their duty to obtain the best education for their children. Mrs. Audain said with the removal of school boards, parents would then sit on the managing boards of individual schools and would achieve far greater responsiveness than the present arm’s length system now in place. The school board is a totally unnecessary level of government, which is not only expensive and over-administered but also susceptible to partisan politics and captive of many vested interest groups such as teacher unions. Parents are told to leave education to the experts but those who feel they should be involved too often are made to feel inadequate and unwelcome. With this hands-off attitude, parents become deskilled in their competencies and the cumulative effect is that parents fail to be useful resources to their children in career planning, character-building and employment seeking. "Parents cannot take their meaningful role in supervising their children’s education as long as we have this colonial structure called school boards telling parents what’s best for them" says Mrs. Audain.