Professional educators commonly recognize and lament the cyclical nature of education. It seems that ideas are often recycled without any modification save changing the name by which the technique or idea is identified. More importantly, these ideas often vacillate from one extreme to the other. This is what is commonly called the education pendulum.

In this model, administrators being pressured by political and social forces to raise test scores attempt to find solutions and improvements that will help student succeed in both the short term and the long term. However, this quest by administrators often leaves classroom teachers feeling they are at the mercy of an inept administration that foolishly succumbs to every wind of change. Classroom teachers can react negatively to the barrage of frequent changes and may resent the intrusion of a disconnected administration into the daily workings of the classroom. The end result is that either as a result of its own inabilities or less than enthusiastic implementation, the method fails. This sends the administration searching for the next idea - typically something totally opposite to the failed methodology. As a result, the pendulum swings to the opposite extreme, and the implementation/failure cycle continues.  

How can this cycle be broken? Can it actually be broken, or are there truly no new ideas in the field of education? There appear to be two ideas central to beginning to address these questions. While neither of these taken alone will completely stop the education pendulum, taken together they might help lessen the extremes to which the pendulum swings and help education focus on what is actually important: education. First, collaboration between administration and faculty is critical. Notice that the word deliberately chosen here is collaboration and not communication. It is possible to communicate while not collaborating. To lessen the extremes of the education pendulum requires the integration of intentional collaboration between administration and faculty into the culture of the school or district. Notice, this is an internal cultural change that must be accomplished. The we/they model and mentality that is often the norm between faculty and administration must change to an us model if the education pendulum is to be stopped and real progress is to be made. The reciprocal blaming must end; administrators must cease to blame teachers for lack of student success, and teachers must stop blaming administrators for hindering student progress. Once this collaborative model is implemented and integrated into the culture of the school or district, the community (including lawmakers) can be assimilated into this culture for a truly collaborative environment that focuses on the best interests of our diverse population of learners.

This will not solve all of the issues in education, but it can be a start toward a new mindset. Coupled with significant research, the topic of the next installment of this series, perhaps the pendulum can be slowed and progress can be made in a forward direction.