The Cost of Doing Nothing

Thank you to all of you who are e-mailing your concerns to me or directly to your SBOE members.  I have received many and plan to include each one I receive in my presentation materials for the Instruction on Committee Members.

As I prepare for my trip this week, I am researching possible solutions, such as asking the SBOE to test on common TEKS this year and asking them to postpone the second reading and final adoption of the TEKS.  But I have also learned a lot about the cost of doing nothing.  It's something we should all consider.  Expecting our students to perform poorly but ignoring the impact that will have on students and educators is irresponsible.  The impact in the classroom and at home is real.  Some of the negative effects are:

• ·      Math Anxiety – According to a July 14, 2011 News Release from Texas Instruments titled “Easing your child’s math anxiety”: Math anxious kids aren’t always just ‘stressed out’ or dislike math; many feel they are unable to succeed in mathematics. They may have struggled in the past and are convinced they’ll always have trouble.  In the second six week of the 2014-2015 school year teachers are already expressing their concerns that students are developing a paranoia of math due to the fast paced curriculum with significant instructional gaps brought on by TEKS revisions.  Math anxiety can have real and long lasting effects.  In his article published in the Journal of Cognition and Development, University of Chicago Psychology Professor Sian Beilock recounts these findings from his research: “Early math anxiety may lead to a snowball effect that exerts an increasing cost on math achievement by changing students’ attitudes and motivational approaches towards math, increasing math avoidance, and ultimately reducing math competence,” - See more at: http://news.uchicago.edu/article/2012/09/12/math-anxiety-causes-trouble-students-early-first-grade#sthash.uOGuz6p1.dpuf

• ·      Aggression/Depression– According to Victoria Tennant of John Hopkins School of Education, negative stress occurs when a person feels threatened or unable to manage a situation.  By creating intentional gaps that illicit significant challenges in the classroom, children are faced with situations that solicit threatening or out of control feelings.  John Hopkins’ scholars say these feelings lead to impulsive, aggressive behaviors or withdrawal and depression.  Those students who react aggressively will be at risk for violence at home or at school and bullying behaviors.  And according to the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, students who become depressed are also at risk for lethargy and apathy in the classroom, or even worse, thoughts and attempts of suicide.  This cost alarms me even more when I consider that my SBOE member, David Bradley, provided me with information that indicated Singapore math was one resource used for developing these TEKS.  This is not a country we want to follow considering facts presented by the Singapore Democratic Party: 22 percent of Singaporean children aged between 6-12 indicated or entertained thoughts of killing themselves and 17.2 percent of primary-school children in Singapore have symptoms of depression.

• ·       Decrease in Extracurricular Activities – Struggling students are being pulled out of extracurricular activities that could benefit them socially, physically and creatively either because parents do not feel their children can handle school work and extracurricular activities or because students’ poor performance at school precludes them from being allowed to participate.  According to the National Center for Education Statistics, which is the primary federal entity for collecting and analyzing data related to education in the U.S. and other nations, participation in extracurricular activities is key to student success.  This is asserted in the following excerpt from the June 1995 NCES Education Policy Issues series:  Extracurricular activities provide a channel for reinforcing the lessons learned in the classroom, offering students the opportunity to apply academic skills in a real-world context, and are thus considered part of a well-rounded education. Recent research suggests that participation in extracurricular activities may increase students' sense of engagement or attachment to their school, and thereby decrease the likelihood of school failure and dropping out (Lamborn et al, 1992; Finn, 1993).

• ·      A Breakdown in Parent-Teacher Relationships - Many parents who are upset about the new standards in the classroom unfairly blame teachers for the unreasonable expectations placed on their children causing stress in the parent-teacher relationship.  According to the National Education Association’s article “Research Spotlight on Parental Involvement in Education,” regardless of family income or background good parent-teacher collaboration is key to achieving the following: Earn higher grades and test scores, and enroll in higher-level programs; be promoted, pass their classes, and earn credits; attend school regularly; Have better social skills, show improved behavior, and adapt well to school; Graduate and go on to postsecondary education

• ·      Financial Burden on Parents – According to the online service, payscale.com, the average US tutor makes $16.94 per hour.  Students are typically tutored for one to two hours each week, making the financial burden on families between $600 and $1,200 per child per year.  Locally, private math tutors are in high demand.  I pay $20.00 per week to have my child tutored for one hour a week.  Mathnasium, a local learning center to boost math skills boasts record enrollment with a cost of $279 per month per child.  These costly extra resources have become necessary, especially because parents often cannot help their children in math.  The NY Times recognized the trend with this quote in their June 29, 2014 edition, “Across the country, parents who once conceded that their homework expertise petered out by high school trigonometry are now feeling helpless when confronted with first-grade work sheets.”  While it may be difficult to fit tutoring into the budget, it is a sacrifice many parents are willing to make.  But what about the families who cannot afford this service?  The 2010 U.S. Census reported there are 3,434,533 families with children under the age of 18 in Texas, and 19.9% of those, or 683,472, are at or below poverty level.  That represents hundreds of thousands of children who most likely have nowhere to turn for extra help.

• ·      Teacher Turnover – According to the Texas Center for Educational Research, teacher turnover is costly – “the cost estimate is between $3,000 and $4,000 per teacher for most districts, depending on geographic, economic, and community characteristics, as well as ability to pay signing bonuses and stipends for shortage areas. “  Teachers are expressing frustration and stress at unprecedented levels this year.  Cy-Fair TSTA has voiced their concern about the effects these new TEKS are having on teachers and students through social media outlets.  Bill Conway, who serves as a TEA consultant for campus intervention and a private campus coach for several districts in the state says he is hearing frustration from teachers at every campus he goes to.  The costs will be felt both financially and in the classrooms if we loose good teachers because of the stress caused by the rushed implementation of these new TEKS.

If our leaders were told that their children would loose their love for learning, but children behind them will be better in math; that their granddaughter will have to quit the ballet class she loves so she can attend tutoring instead of dance; or that their son will develop a fear of math that he will carry with him for the rest of his life, I imagine that would be an unacceptable cost to them.  As the mother of a bright nine year old who says she used to be smart, but she doesn't know what happened because she can't do math this year, I find those costs unacceptable too.