We need innovation in education
Yesterday we posted Senator Kyl’s comments on the need for creative problem solving in education.
Cory Booker (mayor of Newark, NJ), John Doerr (partner at venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers) and Ted Mitchell (chief executive of NewSchools Venture Fund and president of the California Board of Education) echo those sentiments and call for more innovation in education in their article, “Better education through innovation.”
The evidence for making a national commitment to innovation in educationis compelling. Today, many of the most promising solutions are emerging from entrepreneurial organizations that embrace freedom and accountability. Indeed, such social entrepreneurs represent a growing force. They have started nimble, typically nonprofit organizations that work in partnership with creative mayors and school superintendents.
Entrepreneurial charter schools such as KIPP, Uncommon Schools, Aspire, the Inner-City Education Foundation, the Alliance for College-Ready Public Schools and Green Dot demonstrate what a single-minded focus on excellence can achieve with low-income students. These public schools, open to all students, are dedicated to the idea that college success and wide career choices must be a reality regardless of the ZIP Code of a child’s birth. And they are proving what’s possible, sending students from the poorest neighborhoods to college at rates typical of far more affluent communities.
“Learning Desires”
Charter schools are just one of many options that can help provide better educational opportunities. And in school systems around the country, charter schools, such as KIPP (Knowledge is Power Program), are showing amazing results.
The students buy into the program because they want to succeed and need the structure, says Mdolelle Dolo, who is 13 and began eighth grade this month. “It helps because if we didn’t have the discipline we’d be free to do whatever we wanted, and I don’t think that would benefit us in the long run,” said Dolo, who dreams of going to Harvard and becoming a doctor.
For Khalil Flemming, discipline and earning are keys to success. “If you earn something you’ll be able to do whatever you want, and that’s a good thing to know in life,” said Flemming, 14, a recent eighth-grade graduate who received a four-year scholarship to Phillips Academy.
Leandro Diaz calls KIPP his second home, and credits KIPP with shaping his character. At 16, he is one of the oldest eighth-graders, but that doesn’t bother Diaz, who came to Lynn from the Dominican Republic in 2004, speaking only Spanish. He didn’t learn to speak English until he came to KIPP in 2005. “This school has changed my life. It’s something I call my second life. . . . I now realize things I may never have realized, like wanting to help people,” said Diaz, who plans to go to college and become a social worker.
