Monumental shakeout

I often contemplate the slogan I see so often these days by a number of school districts. They say they are educating for the 21st century. But the words of the slogan are just words that blow in the wind. They are merely rhetoric given to a public that would like to hear it since they are paying tax dollars to fund the so called 21st century education.

But if people were to go into the classrooms, what would they see? They would not see their tax dollars at work. They would see their tax dollars misrepresented. They would see 5-8% of the students absent on any given day. They would see a steady stream of students (2-5%) in the office any given hour of the day for disciplinary matters such as sleeping in class, being combative to teachers, or simply trying to miss a particular class. They would see the tremendous unpreparedness of the students for class to the tune of 25-50% any given hour of the day. They would see students sittting in their cars in the parking lot (about 2%) while class is going on. They would see 5th grade students telling their teachers to go to hell. They would hear 4th graders telling off their vice prinicpal and shouting, "?*# off." They would see from 1-4 computers for student use sitting on the walls of the classroom. In reality the computers would be used less than 10% of the class time. They would see junior high teachers trying to be friends and pals to the students to get them to behave. They would go into a class with a substitute and see continuous talking by students because it would be considered an off-day for them. No work would be accomplished that day. They would see 3rd grade teachers who don't know how to teach the math required for instructing 8-year-olds. They would smell bathrooms that stink and graffiti on mirrors and stall doors if the stall doors are still in place. Many toilet stall doors are missing because students smoke marijuana behind them when they're closed or use them as weapons if a fight breaks out there. Certainly there would be no toilet paper or paper towels for hands.

My idea of a 21st century education is vastly different.

I see pockets of it once in a while, but seldom. I know what it would take - an encounter with a 6-mile wide meteor that would wipe out the dinosaurs in the education system. We need a KT boundary to look back on through which only 5% of life made it through. Then, we could believe the slogan if a school were to use it.

It's about to happen. By 2017, those who have tried to keep books and reading and writing alive will have been buried for the most part. A new breed of teacher will have replaced the dinosaurs - ones who know that the visual is a quantum amount more powerful than the written word - that the holograph is more experiential than the artificial words loquaciously presented by the dinosaurs. A new kind of school will be leading the way out of the darkness for the 3/4 of the 21st century that is left. It will not be run by public tax dollars. It will be backed by a global economy that requires production from kids instead of the small amount of work produced by the lazy, entitlement kids of the dinosaur schools.

I am ready for a 21st century school, and I am applauding those who have the vision already. I see reform trying to start. I know public school leaders who are doing their share of trying to oversee 21st century schools. They will live past the KT boundary experience. They will lead in the world after dinosaurs have died out. I support them 100%. The generation they lead will truly end up prepared for a globally run world.

Hang on for the ride. True 21st century schools are right around the corner.