Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
The Harlem Miracle: lessons for Haringey?
The New York Times has an interesting piece titled the Harlem Miracle, about startling new teaching policies that have transformed real educational outcomes in a disadvantaged part of New York.
Can Haringey learn any lessons from this?
Can Haringey learn any lessons from this?
Tags for Forum Posts: education
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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Just like the Guardian's experiment with Katine, this model does not scale.
Nice to see someone else agrees with me that teaching children how to shake hands is important though.
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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter on
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How can you be so sure it does not scale?
Has anyone tried to scale it and the scaling failed?
Is there any reason why you think it would not scale?
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Permalink Reply by Stuart on
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Roland Fryer is also the economist who's advocated paying students for getting good grades:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=95949912
There was a very interesting interview with him on that Baddiel Panorama programme about children's intelligence, and he's also much discussed in Freakonomics.
I think we can all learn from him, not just Haringey.
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Permalink Reply by John D on
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" we have had success with intrusive government programs that combine paternalistic leadership, sufficient funding and a ferocious commitment to traditional, middle-class values. "
My impression is that current thinking in this country is that we should move away from this attitude (apart from the funding, of course ).
The policies seem to be based on insisting on good manners and behaviour generally, resulting in an improved attitude to school work. Wonderful if it works, but what sanctions do they have if the student doesn't comply ?
Exclusion ?
I don't know what John M and Clive mean by scale. Is it that it works in one school in Harlem and would have to be scaled up to be applied to Haringey ?
You notice also that there is a degree of selection for entry to the system - on what basis ?
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I'm not entirely sure what John means by "this model does not scale". Perhaps he suggests discipline "does not scale", but shaking hands scales and looking people in the eye also scales. I think perhaps the scales need to fall from the eyes of those who think that Haringey's current education is a model and needs no improvement.
"Scale", seems to me to be a glib marketing phrase used to sell (or not sell) an idea or a process, suggesting that something can be adapted to a larger environment.
I think what John means is that the experience and methods in New York cannot be expanded or adapted for a larger environment.
But I'd like to know what is the evidence for that, or whether it's just an off-the-cuff opinion, without any particular basis.
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The children from this system go into places at those awesome ivy league institutions in the USA. The model does not scale because there is not room for everybody in there. Some of us have to be mechanics and street cleaners. I do not disagree that you could put the effort into making sure that every capable child (and it's more than a lottery John D, lots of kids drop out because they can't hack the workload) got this opportunity. Anyone remember that Dr Suzuki bloke?
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Let's agree that there's not room for everybody in the ivy league universities (or Oxbridge).
But why should that be the test of whether the model "scales"? Are the limits to Ivy League intake really evidence of the Harlem experience being unable to "scale"? Even if none of the Harlem pupils made it to the Ivy League, would that invalidate the methods?
Does the fact that Yale, Harvard and Princeton etc cannot accommodate everyone, mean that attempts should not be made to improve education further down the pecking order, especially for the disadvantaged?
And does this mean that the principles established in the Harlem High Schools should not be expanded, even if those pupils can't all get into the Ivy League? Should getting into the Ivy League be the sole test of what makes for a worthwhile secondary education?
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Malcolm Gladwell has a chapter about one of these schools in his new book, Outliers. The children work VERY hard. The staff do too. Children can get 5-6 hours sleep a night, the school is open from 7 until 6 (I think) and there are no traditional "school holidays". Fancy getting that past the teachers unions?
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Permalink Reply by Judith Box on
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It's true the children work hard, but the "5-6 hrs sleep" is an slight misrepresentation - it was an example of one child who happened to live a long way from the school.
The school day is long, there's homework and yes, shorter school holidays because (surprise) disadvantaged kids drop back during the holidays compared with their (richer, more advantaged) peers.
As for whether you could get it past the teacher's unions, I agree it might be impossible but the self-interest of teachers is not an argument against the proposal - merely a vested interest that would need to be challenged.
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Judith: agree. If there's a horse and a cart here, the horse must be education policy and getting the best results for the disadvantaged children: and if there has to be a cart in this picture, it might be teaching unions.
That is a managerial objection rather than a principled one.
If there is any truth in the assertion that "this model does not scale", then it may be the difficulty of getting suitable teachers, in the short term (as indicated in the NYT article). But these are not necessarily objections in the long run: we need to be guided by the goal of better educational outcomes for disadvantaged children, which affects their life chances. Not by difficulty in getting policy past teaching unions this year or next.
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Difficulty? Impossibility! And it's not getting them, it's getting enough of them.
I'm not against it Clive, I just think it can't be done for everyone.
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