The Power of Community to Create Change in Disadvantaged Schools

Foundations for Change in Secular Education

While this blog has focused largely on pedagogy in faith-based schools, I've been reminded recently that secular schools face similar challenges with students, and also in relation to teacher development, I think there is more common ground than we might imagine. Having started my teaching life as a non-Christian in secular government run education, I have spent many years helping to develop teachers and schools in both sectors. As such, I have been an insider to both. I often ponder what's the same and what is different? In this post, I want to concentrate on teacher and school development.

A Helpful Recent Case Study of School Transformation

Cessnock is a rural town in Australia about 112km from Sydney. I know this area well. As a child, I spent all of my school holidays with my maternal Grandparents in Cessnock. My Mother also grew up there, and fell in love with a smooth Scotsman who was working in the coal mines nearby. Her family owned and ran mixed businesses, essentially 'General Stores' or shops in the days before major supermarkets, department stores, huge shopping centres and online shopping. My mother's family were staunch Methodists and from the late 1890s until 1964 they ran General Stores in the area.

 

Above: One of my Grandparents' Stores (Closed in 1964)

My Mother and her brothers attended a government primary school at Kearsley, just two doors from their store in the town. Later they attended Cessnock High School. One of my uncles (my Mother's brother) eventually taught at Cessnock High for many years and was Science Master. In those days, it was a 'tough' school and achievements were mixed. Decades later, I was posted to the town in the 1990s as a curriculum consultant for the Hunter region for English and Literacy learning, and could see that there were many problems. It was a tough place to be a teacher.

So, how is education going in this once difficult place for teachers? Cessnock High has been dramatically transformed! The change in this particular school has been so significant, that the Department of Education in our State (New South Wales) has decided to adopt and 'role out' the Cessnock model to seek reform in all of the schools in the Hunter Region of NSW, and perhaps the whole state, if not the nation.

 

Above: Cessnock High School

The school where teachers once feared having to work due to student violence and indifference, has undergone an amazing transformation. A dedicated principal, some excellent teachers and new education methods, have led to some of the most improved NAPLAN scores in the country. NAPLAN is an international assessment program that assesses student performance on a common test covering reading, writing, language and numeracy. I sat on the national committee that oversaw these tests for 15 years and understand how difficult it was to affect change and improvement.

Surprisingly, Cessnock High now has some of the most improved NAPLAN scores in the country. Its year 12 results have improved by 50 per cent. The learning model they have adopted may well be rolled out across Australia. I find this extraordinary. In a school where violence amongst students was rife and school performance was so poor, there has been such an incredible transformation.

While the principal is clearly a great leader, he is reluctant to take too much credit. He explains the change in these words:

"We've been able to build a culture … where there are very few negative behaviours," he said. "The violence doesn't exist at all in our school anymore and school is a calm place." Of course, there is more to it than that!

 A Whole School Approach

The transformation in this school is remarkable. One of the keys reasons appears to be a whole of school approach using a model developed with Newcastle University staff that they label "Quality Teaching Rounds". 

 

Just what is this model? In essence, it is a structured learning model to improve classroom teaching and student results. It does this by creating small groups of teachers who take turns to observe and critique colleague's lesson against three criteria:

• Quality teaching: demonstrates a deep understanding of important knowledge and the best ways to communicate this to students.
• Quality learning environment: ensures the classroom environment is optimized so students can absorb knowledge and learn.
  
• Significance: effort is made to ensure lessons are relevant to students' lives and hold significance in order to boost engagement.

What have they found? In the words of the Principal, the "lessons are more engaging, the environment to learn is safer and the learning is more significant." As a result of the changes, the behaviour of students has changed dramatically allowing learning to blossom and as a result, academic achievement has risen markedly. I think our Christian schools can learn much from this, but how might it be slightly different?

So What's Different?

My definition of education in 'Pedagogy and Education for Life' is in short:

"Education is the whole of life of a community, and the experience of its members learning to live this life, from the standpoint of a specific goal."

There is no doubt that Cessnock High School has created a desire amongst parents, teachers and students to change community life, and in particular classroom behaviour and application to school and learning. One of the features of the 'Cessnock' approach is that teachers collaborate together, and even sit in on each other's lessons to offer feedback and advice. This is very helpful and shows that they are concerned not only for their own teaching, but that of others and even more importantly, the learning and welfare of their students. 

It would be wonderful if teachers could sit in each others classrooms at times to help one another reflect on how in the cut and thrust of each day, they are not only teaching their students, but are also shaping them for life. As I write this, I recall a colleague who taught next to me in a primary school in Sydney. His class was always out of control and he screamed constantly at the students, while they laughed and messed about. I coped by closing my door to shut out the chaos. But might I have been able to help him?

Above: My first school as a teacher

What might be different if used by Christian schools?

Central to the 'Cessnock Model' is the visitation of teachers to one another's classrooms. They do this to watch, learn from and help colleagues for example to:

• Use effective and sound methods,
• Maintain student attention,
• Offer feedback and support to students, and
  
• Use more engaging approaches to teach subject content etc.
  

But what might a Christian colleague also be looking for? Might they also use some extra lenses? For example:

• How does the content and learning relate to their lives;
• How does content (especially in the Humanities) relate to Christian views of the world;
• How might student non-engagement with content, teaching etc, reflect more than disinterest or boredom;
• How might some behaviour relate to life outside the classroom not just within it; and
  
• How do student responses at times offer windows into where students stand in terms of personal happiness, faith and trust in God.
  

A good way to test such an approach in Christian schools would be to consider first the approach being used by Cessnock, and reflect on how their school might benefit. Some questions might help:

First, what is the balance in classroom and school life between promoting success in school learning and growth as people, citizens and ultimately, children of God. How is the school different to public schools, and what is common?

Second, staff might consider how the approach could be implemented in a way not only to make them better students, but also to help shape our student's as God's children who develop a whole of life understanding of how their faith should shape all of life.

I will continue to ponder how Christian Schools might respond to this new work. I hope you will too. I'd be keen to hear your thoughts on the topic which I might revisit later.