Schools Must Adjust To The Times, Student Needs

Dr. Austin Buffum is a retired educator and school administrator from southern California and is very well-known in educational circles.

He was in Northwest Arkansas this summer to provide training about how schools must intervene for students who are in danger of failing.

At an age in which most educators are retired, Buffum said he continues to be involved in education for the sake of his grandchildren, explaining that the success or failure of our schools has a direct impact on the world that our children and grandchildren will have.

He was speaking at the Northwest Arkansas Educational Services Cooperative (NWAESC) in Farmington in July, and very early in his presentation he asked, “What is the world going to be like for our kids?”

He said that schools in America should be reconfigured to better meet the needs of every student.

Traditionally in American schools, teachers have worked in isolation from the rest of the faculty, but trends in recent years have been for them to collaborate together to coordinate lessons and to decide what will be done when students do not learn what they should.

Buffum talked about this during his July presentation, calling for a change in how schools function.

The way schools were set up 30, 40, and 50 years ago worked fine for most of us, but because there have been many changes in society with many changes in the lives of students, schools must make certain departures from the traditional approach.

Buffum said the problem with schools today is not that teachers aren’t dedicated. “Many teachers are highly committed,” he said. “They work very hard. But we are working in a system that was not designed for all kids to learn. It was designed to give them the opportunity to learn.”

In light of that, it is no longer adequate for any teacher to simply teach and let some students fail while others succeed.

More and more often in today’s world, our society does not have a place for individuals who are not successful in school.

So now, more than ever, a student must meet with academic success to be fully equipped to have success in life.

And that means a burden falls on schools to do much more to reach students who may have difficulty.

Buffum said that we can’t give up on students who have a difficult home life. To make sure all of them succeed requires organizing schools in such a way that teachers can work together and pool their expertise in an effort to reach every child.

“It’s not working harder,” he said. “It is changing the system.”

Buffum isn’t alone in his contention that schools cannot do business the way they did in previous generations.

Every school district that I’m familiar with that is having success (including many in Northwest Arkansas) is seeking to follow newer and more innovative models of instruction.

In addition, among practitioners and educational researchers, Buffum isn’t the only voice that calls for such changes. If you do a google search on educators such as Bill Daggett, Richard DuFour, Cassandra Erkens, Robert Marzano, Mike Mattos, Anthony Muhammad, Doug Reeves, Mike Schmoker, or Rick Stiggins, you will see that all of them touch on the idea that schools need to operate differently than before.

All are well established researchers, authors, and presenters who are on the same page about what schools should be doing. I know. I’ve heard them speak. I’ve read their work.

So when a person like Buffum helps train teachers in Northwest Arkansas to help all struggling students, you may be assured that he is in very good company in what he advocates.

“Schools are here to prepare children to be adults,” he said. “We want them to be successful, not to just get ready for a test.”

Exactly! The questions for all of us now are: Do we want our local schools to simply get the students ready for more school? Or to get every last one of them ready for life?