Redesigning New Hampshire Schools through Outcome Based Education

After a few years of “Competency Based Education” in New Hampshire high schools, how’s that working out for us?

Competency Based Education is Outcome Based Education.  Outcome Based Education (OBE) was once called Mastery Learning.  In Maine OBE is called Standards Based Education.  While the name has changed over the years, the system hasn’t changed much.

OBE was implemented in New Hampshire High Schools through a grant from The Nellie Mae Foundation.  The Nellie Mae Foundation's primary goal when offering grants to schools, is to focus on "community organizing efforts".   As you can see on page 1, the focus is not on academic excellence but on community organizing.  Note that Saul Alinsky is referenced at the end of page one.  

OBE has been used in school districts across the country.  This is not new or innovative, however OBE has had its share of controversy.  

OBE has been criticized for in its efforts to change the attitudes, beliefs and values in students.  Parents have noted the deemphasizing of academic subject content in favor of soft-skills often times called "workforce skills".  This has left educators trying to determine what actual content should remain in the curriculum.

How does one objectively test students on broad-based outcomes?  That too has been a concern to those using traditional grading practices.  This could be one reason that some schools in New Hampshire are removing traditional grades.

Bruno V. Manno, wrote: “Outcome-Based Education: Has It Become More Affliction Than Cure?”   In this piece Manno discusses how the conflict with OBE lies mainly with those in charge of the public schools.  He identifies how states turned over the task of defining outcomes to education officials who are most threatened by the process.  These educators then promoted vague Outcomes that emphasized values, attitudes and behaviors.  These outcomes reflected politically motivated positions rather than actual academic knowledge.

An example where OBE has already been used to change the political attitudes among students at the expense of academic knowledge happened in Bedford a couple of years ago. 

Bedford parents objected to an assigned book in the Personal Finance Class.  This book, according to the Curriculum Superintendent, was chosen to meet the Competencies in the Personal Finance class.  The political message was overt and came from an author who had no knowledge or expertise in Personal Finance.  Students were subjected to a biased political opinion with no alternative political views.  It was a great way to change the political opinions of students at the expense of learning personal finance skills.

Now one might think the core academic subjects like Algebra 1 “competencies” would be free of controversy.  Unfortunately that’s not the case either.

I contacted Professor W. Stephen Wilson of Johns Hopkins University to ask him about the Algebra Competencies in a couple of our high schools along with what the New Hampshire Dept. of Ed has listed on their web site.  Please keep in mind that he offered a quick and informal analysis in his e-mails. 

Per the Rochester Algebra 1 Competencies:

Prof. Wilson said: “The "Curriculum Outline" is weak.  It is tech heavy.  In the very first "Description of the Course" we get "verbal, tabular, graphical, and symbolic forms."  Sorry, yes, learn other stuff, but algebra is about "symbolic forms."  The way this is phrased, symbolic stuff comes off as 25%.

Further down, in the "concepts," there is some thought process, and then some serious vagueness that should be most of algebra, i.e. M:G&A:HS:2 and M:F&A:10:2.  Those two could equally be used to describe a rigorous calculus course.

The next 3 sections M:F&A:HS:3, M:F&A:10:3 and M:F&A:10:4, are good."

Per the Litchfield Algebra 1 Competencies Prof. Wilson said,

…”the first 2 are real sort of algebra, but really middle

school…..  The next 2 problem solving, i.e. no content.  Then we have 3 for "communication" that could be summed up by "show work," except that they mean more than that.

 Finally, the truth comes out.  The "suggested text" is Discovering Algebra.  Oh well, that says it all.  See page 3 of:"

 http://www.math.jhu.edu/~wsw/ED/SThs.pdf

 or the more lengthy discussions in:

 http://www.math.jhu.edu/~wsw/ED/wahighschoolwsw.pdf

 Any curriculum that wants to use this text must be flawed.

What did Prof. Wilson have to say about the Algebra Competencies listed at the New Hampshire Dept. of Ed Web site?

“It is quite an interesting document full of compromises.  There is some real content mixed with blather.  The "competencies" and "process skills" are so general and vague that they are meaningless.  A reasonable person would just ignore them because of that.  (An unreasonable person, however, might not.)

Then, when it comes to content you have great things like:

Add, subtract, multiply and divide polynomial and rational expressions and 

 Determine solutions to quadratic equations (with real roots) by factoring, completing the square, or using the quadratic formula and demonstrate equivalence of methods.

Both of which are great!  There is real content. 

On the other hand, even in the content section there is incoherence of the sort:

Generalizes a nonlinear relationship using words or symbols or generalizes a common nonlinear relationship to a specific case.

How you generalize to a specific is beyond me!  I always thought you generalized from a specific.  This is just nonsense. 

The point is that I've seen worse.  The two good things I quote above are really good, and unusual for their clarity and specificity. 

This is balanced out by the utter nonsense that is all over the place.

I wouldn't want to buy this, but I don't believe in standards for competencies and process."

Prof. Wilson did offer positive comments on the Algebra 1 Competencies in Bedford but as you can see with the numerous flaws in other school districts and the Algebra 1 Competencies suggested by the New Hampshire Dept. of Ed, there is no guarantee your child will receive a quality Algebra 1 education with Competency Based Education.

For those who want schools to focus on academic excellence in the core academic subjects, his critique should concern everyone.

There are many flawed math textbooks and programs being used in New Hampshire schools today.  If the Competencies are aligned to a flawed textbook, then what is the purpose of Competencies other than to add another layer of assessing to a math education that lacks a quality curriculum? 

SB 82 “An Act establishing a commission to identify strategies needed for developing and implementing a competency-based public education system" was proposed during this year’s legislative session.  SB82 was retained in the House Education Committee because of the numerous issues presented at the Committee hearing.  

Unfortunately the New Hampshire Board of Education is moving forward with Competency Based Education in their recent “rules” proposal.  The appointed Board of Education should not usurp the elected legislators by mandating rules that the legislature did not support.

Many local districts had this financial burden placed upon them and so far we are not hearing how Competency Based Ed is helping students academically.

OBE has a long history of controversy and failure because the implementation has been shown to be problematic.  After several years of Competency Based Ed in New Hampshire High Schools, where is the independent data that shows this has improved academic outcomes?

With 65% of New Hampshire High School graduates in need of remedial education upon entering college, the focus should be on literacy.  Instead New Hampshire is participating in President Obama's redesigning of public education across the country.  Competency Based Ed. is part of that redesign effort along with the Common Core Initiative.  

The Board of Education should refrain from mandating Competency Based Education and further burdening local disctircts both financially and at the expense of academic excellence.  It's time to go back to the basics and focus on literacy instead of soft skills that further dilute academic content and ignore the real problems in public education.