Scot Graden's Blog

Recently I read an interview of Thomas Friedman, a best selling author and New York Times columnist. He is the author of The World Is Flat, which describes ten forces that are “flattening” the world economy – making it simple for China, India and others around the world to compete with America. While I may be in the minority based on popular conversation and book sales figures – I never completely agreed with some of his basic arguments. In my opinion to make matters worse, many educators took his book as the new guide for making curriculum decisions.

Recently I was pleased to read that Mr. Friedman has further developed his thoughts on the “flat world” and education. Interestingly, his wife and daughter are public school teachers (I’m guessing they got to him). His new position – which is outlined in the new paperback version of The World Is Flat – describes why the liberal arts are more important than ever. He states, “It’s not that I don’t think math and science are important. They still are. But more than ever our secret sauce comes from our ability to integrate art, science, music, literature with the hard sciences.”

His more balanced view of how to educate students for success in the future economy is closer to my own philosophy. I tend to feel that no matter what the subject or activity – too much of one thing is not healthy. Providing a wide variety of quality choices for our students should be our goal. We should focus on skills and preparing well-rounded students with healthy doses of technology throughout.

In an effort to improve our “balanced” offerings to our secondary students – we have posted a Drama teacher position. This staff member will be hired this spring for the 2008-2009 school year to help expand our performing arts opportunities.

This week I visited our SWWC Cosmetology program. Those of you familiar with my hairstyle will understand this was simply a business visit.

I had the opportunity to speak with Ms. Kohl, a 20+ year veteran instructor in the program. The students have classroom and vocational experiences. We have numerous Saline students in the program. The program operates all year long and was busy with students and customers while I was getting the official tour of the facility. For those interested, the program is located in Ann Arbor on Stadium Boulevard just east of Liberty Street – it’s $7.50 for a haircut.

They are excited to be moving to the Washtenaw Intermediate School District offices located on Wagner Road, just north of Scio Church Road for the 2008-2009 school year.

While the our middle school staff joins over 400 other educators from around the state at Saline Middle School for the 2008 MAMSE Conference – our students are having fun at “Middle School Mayhem”. Sponsored by Saline Parks and Recreation and held at Liberty School, over 75 students are enjoying a number of games, food and activities.

At last night’s meeting we had an excellent presentation from Ms. Jody Geilinski regarding the South and West Washtenaw Consortium. Ms. Liz Galimore and Mr. Tim Timoszyk were also present to share information regarding the program.

The SWWC is a five district consortium – Saline, Chelsea, Dexter, Manchester and Milan – providing Career and Technical Education programs. It was interesting to see the new developments in program offerings, and also the funding issues tied to the federal government.

Among other items discussed…

We continue to work on overhauling the board policy manual – moving to a version aligned with the Michigan School Board Association model manual.

Assistant Superintendent Thomas Wall shared funding information from Lansing – gloomy – but predictable.

We also thanked Trustee Kim Van Hoek for her work coordinating our Meal-In-A-Basket, which finished 2nd in voting at the Craft Show.

It was noted that the Woodland Meadows Principal position for 2008-2009 is now posted and we are accepting applications.

Using and Teaching Competition.

I am not referring to the endless pursuit of rankings and grades. I’m thinking of the fantastic things that can happen when competition is used as an instructional tool. I mean having students race to solve puzzles, or sort number cards into Pythagorean triples. I mean getting a wild energy in the classroom, and having students speak up who never said a word before.

In much of the “modern” education literature that I’ve been reading, education is paired with the word “cooperation”. What happened to competition? Why is it so wrong? What’s wrong with students competing to solve an Internet math hunt, or students challenging each other to ever-harder problems?

Getting into college is competitive. Getting a job is competitive. Trust me on this one. Why should we shy away from using competition to increase achievement and prepare our students?

I assume that public education has moved away for reasons around creating “winners” and “losers”. I feel the more we compete, the better we learn that winning and losing isn’t really part of the equation. Competing, and pushing oneself is the goal. For example, if a student competes to have the highest score in class on a test but finishes third – and along the way increases their overall score from prior assessments – did they really “lose”?

The Board of Education submitted an entry in the “Meal-In-A-Basket” contest at the March 8th Craft Show. Kim Van Hoek planned and coordinated the school board basket.

Stop by, do some shopping and vote for your favorite basket. The proceeds and food baskets will go to families through Saline Social Services.

The show is being held at Saline Middle School from 8am to 3:30pm. Admission is $2 at the door and the proceeds benefit various youth programs in Saline.

Community & Staff:

As your new Superintendent, I would like to take this opportunity to communicate with you for two reasons. The first reason is to let you know what a humbling honor it is to serve this district in this new role. Having attended Saline Area Schools as a student and now having worked here for over 13 years, I can think of no better place to work and raise my family. I would like thank the Board of Education for allowing me this opportunity.

The second reason is to share my commitment to moving this district forward. We are blessed with talented students, a talented and dedicated staff and an extremely supportive community. It is now my role to use these resources and push us to new levels of student achievement. With the fiscal issues at hand and the rapidly changing times ahead – this will be a challenge!

The key to our success is open, honest, and constructive dialog between all parties in our community. Again, I look forward to working hard to continue our tradition of success and achieve even greater successes in the future.

Thank you,
Scot Graden

We lost our internet connection last night, which meant I was unable to post the “school closed” message. If that happens be sure to call the 429-8000 number or check other media sources for school closing information. Thankfully, it came back up around 7:00am this morning.

One of the great programs offered by the South & West Washtenaw Consortium is the Building Trades class. In this class students learn construction techniques – literally from the ground up!

Mr. Ruhlig works with local contractors to provide a complete overview of home construction. While there is a “classroom” space in an on-site trailer, the students are eager to get moving and work on the house. He typically pairs the students up and they work on specific sections of the house so they get to look back at (and show off to visitors) areas where their skills were put to the test.

The current house is located on Judd Road, just east of Warner Road. When it is finished it will be a very nice 3 bedroom ranch home.

I took a picture of the backpack rack – clearly, it is the only one of its’ kind in the district.

The “Homework” issue has been a debate in public education for as long as I can recall – I had strong opinions on this “too much” concept when I was in Research Seminar with Mr. Marcero back in the day… On the surface it seems like it should be an easy answer. Use homework to assess understanding and target trends within the class to review areas that reflect the need for more coverage. In addition, it allows parents to see what is being covered in school. Seems simple, right?

Well, what if doing that means an hour of homework each night at the elementary level? We have be told (by who? – I’m not sure) that homework should be targeted to 10 minutes per grade level – so every 3rd grader should have a half hour of homework each night.

A quick web search finds numerous sites and blogs discussing the issue. Over the last several years both Time and Newsweek have included articles. NPR put on a four part series – including the very real issue of “family stress” related to homework.

There are studies saying homework doesn’t help, others that say there is a positive correlation between homework and student achievement. The Brookings Institute has a study that says the amount of student time dedicated to homework is largely unchanged over the last 20 years – how come it doesn’t feel that way?

Clearly this is not only an issue in Saline but throughout the educational world. It is one we need to look at to make sure we are aware of the various aspects and strive for appropriate amounts and targeted instructional benefits.

I welcome your comments on this topic. (None regarding my performance in Mr. Marcero’s class please.)