Introduction

I live in the Berkshires. According to various measures, the Berkshires has both good and bad schools. The Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) test results show this for the lower grades:

Source: MA Dept. of Education

And for high schools:

Source: MA Dept. of Education

The US New and World Report offers a more comprehensive picture and tells the same story (the lower the rank, the better the school):

Source: US News and World Report

Problems in the lower-scoring schools stem largely from changing economic conditions in the Berkshires. Over the last few decades, the northern Berkshire towns have lost a huge number of manufacturing jobs. And for many of those who remained, a cycle of unemployment, poverty and alcohol/drugs has set in. Williamstown is an “oasis” in the northern Berkshires while tourism, culture, and health industries have spurred economic growth in the southern Berkshires.  

Many believe good schools reflect good teaching. But do they really? No doubt that the quality of teachers and school facilities are important. However, it is worth noting that in North Adams (Drury) and Pittsfield, towns with low ratings, the number of children living in single-parent homes is high: 61% in North Adams and 54% in Pittsfield. The single parent numbers are much lower in the Berkshire towns with high ratings: Great Barrington – 35% and only 22% in Lenox.

Putting single-parent homes together with poverty is certainly a formula for children to have their minds on things other than getting good educations. And certainly these factors go at least some of the way to explaining the differences in school performance scores.

The “Success Academy”

The Success Academy (SA) is a charter school system with located in New York City locales. Its students are predominantly from low-income/minority families. The Academy is notable because its students perform well. Robert Pondiscio wondered why to the point that he took the time to write a book about it. And unlike the claims made against other charter schools, he did not find that SA cherry-picked the best students. Rather, he found that SA “recruited” parents that were highly motivated for their children to succeed.     

I quote from a review on Podiscio’s book that appeared recently in the New York Times:

But the biggest revelation of Pondiscio’s research comes not from inside classrooms at all. While he does not believe Success cherry-picks students for high performance, as critics often charge, he demonstrates convincingly that what the network does cherry-pick is parents, to strategic effect. Decades of research have shown that engaged parents and a stable family are far more important than schools and teachers to a child’s academic achievement.

“Poverty/Broken Home Kids” and the Impact on Teachers

Suppose you are a teacher in a school where your kids – for good reason – have their minds elsewhere. You have been trained to teach and few of your students are listening. In such circumstances, one wonders how long before teachers start applying for jobs in higher-income locales.

Labor Market Futures

The contemporary message is that you need a good education to get a good job in the future. And as I have written, it is definitely true that a huge number of manual labor and service jobs have been eliminated. But that does not mean you have to get a STEM education to prosper in the coming years. The US Department of Labor publishes occupation projections for the next decade. It includes 808 occupations that can be accessed with these filters: median pay, required education, on-job training, projected jobs, and their growth rates.   

Providing young people access to these data is one of the most beneficial forms of “education” they can receive.  For example, here is the BLS’ list of 28 jobs paying between $60,000 and $80,000 that only require a high school education:

Source: US Bureau of Labor Statistics

Alternatively, one might be interested in the occupations growing most rapidly with starting pay $80,000+:

Source: US Bureau of Labor Statistics

In short, good information on job opportunities does exist. It should be accessed and discussed.

The Future of Teaching

Anyone who has taken lecture courses knows that there are good and bad lecturers. Is there any reason in the digital age that we depend on in-school teachers to give lectures? It makes no sense. Why not get great lecturers to digitalize materials that students can listen to on their own schedules. In-school teachers could oversee questions/discussions with students. This is effectively done in graduate schools where teaching fellows manage the follow-up discussions. 

Conclusions

The job market continues to change. But in the digital age, there are ways to better-equip students to take full advantage of the changes. And yes, having good teachers will always be important.