Myth: We need Innovation for schools to improve

Many people think that for our schools to improve, we need more Innovation.

Some folks believe that to improve schools, we need to Integrate Technology, Write across the Curriculum, Be more aware of the seven Multiple Intelligences, teach Self Esteem, do more in Cooperative Learning groups, teach in a more Constructivist manner, and subert the dominant Factory School paradigm.

Unfortunately these folks don't realize that education reform is not a contest to see who can come up with the most innovative program. Thomas Sowell calls innovation "a magic word in the wonderland of educational Newspeak." It may produce a lot of foamy lather, but doesn't usually translate into better results.

For example, at one inner-city middle school, they chose a commercial reform model to help children improve in Math, Science and Reading. One of the innovative aspects of the reform package was a routine similar to the cooperative-learning technique known as TAPS: Think And Pair Share. The experts said this should take the entire class period, preferably once a week.

This is really great. What you do is you pair up the students and they talk to each other! Brilliant! This way, when they get to college, they'll have the skills neccessary to participate in all-night BS sessions.

Now I don't know about you but we don't think that students need more expertise in the area of socialization with their friends.

We could make similarly sardonic jabs at innovative English programs that abandon spelling and grammar, or innovative Math programs that take amazing flights of fancy with calculators, wresting children from the evil grasp of paper-and-pencil arithmetic.

Innovation is only required when you're trying to do something that has never been done before!

Innovation was needed to land a man on the moon and return him safely to Earth. With the rocket technology of the day it would have been a fairly straightforward matter to design a vehicle which could escape Earth's gravity and fly to and land a man on the moon.

However once on the moon's surface the rocket would not have been able to lift off carrying all the fuel needed for the return trip back to Earth.

The innovation was to divide the lunar module into two parts: the Command Module and the Lunar Excursion Module (LEM). Giving the Command Module the return-trip fuel made the LEM a much lighter craft that could land on the moon. The LEM itself could split in two to save even more weight, rejoining the Command Module in lunar orbit for the trip back to Earth.

Innovation was also needed in the design of the Space Shuttle—the design criteria was basically, "Take off like a rocket, land like a plane, and be reusable."

School success, and urban school success, and especially poor, urban school success was a reality yesterday and is a reality today!

All we need to do is learn from and model what successful schools have done and success will be within our grasp as well.

These poor, urban schools who've had great success show us that achievement is hard work, but it certainly does not need to be rocket science.

(For more on school success see No Excuses: 21 High-Performing, High Poverty Schools by Samuel Casey Carter. This is an excellent resource for those folks, like us, who believe that success comes from hard work, not gravy.)