Muncie Times, Muncie, Delaware County, 28 January 1993 — Page 8

The Muncie Times, Thursday, 28 January 1993, Page 8

Clinton has opportunity to become 'ednation president'

Bill Clinton’s commitment to education reform suggests that he will want to earn the title “the education president.” He can win that title by targeting disadvantaged students with policies and resources that help them to academic excellence. His administration should expand federal education funding, and shift priorities so that the children at greatest risk of failure get what-

To Be Equal

ever assistance they need to excel in school. But one of the most important things the new president can do for education won’t cost a dime. The presidency has often been called a “bully pulpit” for focusing people’s attention on issues. That bully pulpit now can be a vehicle

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to help change people’s thinking about education. Instead of peddling bromides like “choice,” as his predecessors did, the president should use the prestige of his office to change the underlying concepts that doom American education to failure. We are locked into a

discrimination is an everyday fact of life, it’s not too ^hard to figure out who gets onto the accelerated track and who gets dumped. Since children are led to [believe in the same intelligence myth as their elders, those in “gifted” classes come to think they are smart and those in “slow” classes believe they just can’t learn. But in fact, all children [are born with the intelligence to develop and to “get

smart.”

Howard says that develop- „ ment is a process that adults

traditional and wrong way of have the r t0 man

thinking that says some If managed corr e Ct ly, all children are born smart, children can develop the some dumb, and the rest in a hility to perform at a high

between and that nothing can academic level

change that. He s that jf children

But in fact every normal think th can , ear lh

child has the mental capacity wiu work hard a( jt will

John E. Jacob

to learn and to excel aca-

demically.

As Dr. Jeff Howard, of the influential Efficacy Institute, has consistently

learn, or, as he says, “get

smart.”

Helping children believe in themselves can’t be, as it sometimes is, a “feel good’

pointed out most recently m s of in their the Urban League s publtca- se i f . esteeIn . Rath it is tIOn ’, n o?; ! f 0fB ‘ aC ^ m J n ' communicating to them the ca, 1993” - the belief in idea , hat sch K oolwork is the false idea of innate importa „ tj that we know ability has been a deterrent th can do u and that we to educating all of our chil- wil , help them succeed ren ' As children see their

Howard cha enges the effective effoits off myth that intelligence is win be wi , lin ^ ^ ^ d™eto mem Pe ° P on more challenging assign- ^ ‘ ments. Each new success

He shows how it leads to

a ... . pushes the boundaries of assessing intelligence in very f. . ... _ 1,-ij . , * therr accomplishment fur-

young children and then h

using those assessments to determine how much education they are capable of

absorbing.

Then we track those

What does this have to do with the “education presi-

dent?”

Mr. Clinton should use the White House as a bully

youngsters throughout their pulpit to destroy the myth of school careers. Some are innate intelligence and to get

placed in “gifted” classes where they are challenged to develop further and faster.

Other are dumped in

Americans to believe that all of our children can learn. By doing that, he can change the damaging think-

“slow” classes, where their ing that prevents so many of supposed lack of ability be- our people from mastering comes a self-fulfilling proph- what they need to know to Bey- survive in this new Informa-

In a society where racial tion Age.