The RCEF Blog 博客

The 2008 Clinton Global Initiative starts in New York City tomorrow. For the second year, RCEF has been invited to attend, which is a big honor and unique opportunity to network with the likes of President Clinton, innovative NGOs, corporate heads, and influential people in many fields. Last year, Wei Ji Ma represented RCEF and got to know some pioneering educational leaders who were subsequently helpful in exchanging experiences with us. These included Vicky Colbert of Escuela Nueva, a very successful NGO that launched teaching reforms in Colombia, and Wendy Kopp, the founder of Teach for America.

This year, I’ve come to New York as RCEF’s rep. The person I’m most excited to meet is Michelle Rhee, the Chancellor of the Washington, DC school district. I’ve been reading about raising teacher quality lately and Michelle is one of the boldest reformers around. Since taking over one of the worst school districts in America, she has attacked failing schools at their hearts–human resources. She fired over a hundred central office bureaucrats and replaced one out of every four principals. Now she wants all teachers to give up their “iron rice bowl” union contracts in exchange for huge salary increases tied to their students’ performance. Many of the young teachers like the deal but most older teachers are wary. We also have the “iron rice bowl” problem in rural China where a lot of the funding for teacher slaries is tied up in some very bad public school teachers and principals while new and better blood can’t get hired. I envy Michelle’s ability to smash iron rice bowls with the full support of the mayor, often in front of screaming parents.

Michelle wants to realign the whole system around what’s best for student academic achievement…not the district, not the existing teachers, and not the schools as “territorial” institutions. For example, if charter schools run by private management do better than her public schools, it appears she’s not opposed to letting the old system “wither away,” according to a recent Newsweek article. Still, she’s trying her best to re-write the rules of the old system so it has a fighting chance. Her use of economic incentives to get teachers to produce results and students to cooperate is innovative but her immediate goals are still quite different from what we’re facing in China. The mandate to raise student test scores is not disputed in China and the formula of long school hours and test drilling is second nature. DC students are so far behind grade level that solid work on basic academics is essential. But beyond that, there are other skills and frames of mind that well-rounded students need to develop. Figuring out which teachers are good at that–and how to get more of such teachers–is to me the more important “quality” question.

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