The Happiness Budget Loop

Image Credit: Lorenabuena

All schools want happy students. It makes sense. Happy students mean easier days for everyone involved. Less fights, less distractions, better performance. As I thought about this I realized the following:

1. Schools want their students to be happy
2. Schools need money to provide those happy things
3. Schools budgets are tied to testing results
4. Schools cut non-essentials in order to focus on tested subjects to raise scores/budgets
5. Students are unhappy at school
6. Test scores go down
7. Schools loose money
8. Schools cannot make student happy
9. Back to Step 1

The worst of it is that this is what people were saying when NCLB was first introduced. The educators said this would happen. They were ignored. They said that students and schools would suffer. They were ignored. Now American students, while improving are being outpaced by students in Latvia, Brazil, Hong Kong, Germany and Poland by as much as 3-1 in gains.

Now I read this post, The Education Reformers End Game by Marc Epstein which asks the obvious question, what happens if the reformers get their way. Won't we revert right back into the same situation they put the public schools in? I have a feeling that many charter schools are posting better results because they are able to choose which students they enroll. If all parents have choice these schools will no longer be able to deny admittance to under performing students. So I guess it will be back to step one again? I wonder who will be the Michelle Rhee of the new age?