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Education Next: "EdNext Podcast: Should School Start Later? by Edu

EdNext Podcast: Should School Start Later? by Education Next
Averaging in Education by Samuel T. Moulton
Good News About Education Reform? Just Look Around by Jonathan Butcher

EdNext Podcast: Should School Start Later? by Education Next

Posted: 07 Sep 2016 01:36 AM PDT
Now that summer vacation is over, American students are trading sleeping in for morning alarms. Are early
start times a mistake? Would students perform better in school if classes started later?
In this episode of the EdNext podcast, Marty West talks with Finley Edwards, the author of Do Schools Begin
Too Early? about his findings that later school start times increase student achievement in math and reading,
decrease absences, increase time spent doing homework, and reduce time spent watching television.
The EdNext Podcast is available on iTunes, Soundcloud, Stitcher and here every Wednesday.
Education Next

Averaging in Education by Samuel T. Moulton

Posted: 07 Sep 2016 12:34 AM PDT

In his recent book The End of Average, Harvard neuroscientist Todd Rose argues that designing education for
the average student is fundamentally misguided because there are no average students. He deploys a central
analogy from the history of aeronautical design: In the 1940s, well-trained U.S. Air Force pilots began
mysteriously crashing their mechanically sound planes. It turned out that the new, more powerful jets were
hard to control because of their one-size-fits-all cockpit design. Although the Air Force had used the average
body measurements of its pilots to construct the cockpit, there were literally no pilots who fell within the
average range on 10 key dimensions. To prevent future crashes, engineers scrapped the standard cockpit and
replaced it with an adjustable one that could accommodate the jagged profile of individual pilots. Applying
this example to education, Rose argues against a standardized education system designed for the average
student and in favor of personalized learning designed for individual students.
How Many Students Are Average?
Inspired by Roses example, my colleagues and I at Panorama Education decided to ask the question, How
many students are average? We analyzed data collected from an entire high school on nine measures of socialemotional learning (SEL): teacher-student relationships, self-efficacy, grit, growth mindset, social awareness,
self-management, sense of belonging, school safety, and emotion regulation. Using the same statistical method

as in the Air Force examplewhich defined average as being between the 35th and 65th percentiles on all
variableswe found that only one out of the 1,142 students in the school was average across all nine SEL
measures.
Conversely, we found that 63 students were average on zero of the nine measures. In other words, students in
this school were 63 times more likely to be average on nothing than average on everything. Looking at other
school datasets, this ratio is typical. And because the SEL variables were all normally distributed, these findings
have nothing to do with well-known problems of using averages for data that dont fit a bell curve. Just as the
military shouldnt expect to find average pilots in their cockpits, schools shouldnt expect to find average
students in their classrooms. If anything, they should expect to find just the opposite.
Application Matters
Based on these examples and analyses, its easy to conclude that averaging is bad. But another historical
example of averaging suggests that things are not so simple. In 1907, Sir Francis Galton analyzed data from a
county fair competition in which 800 participants guessed the weight of a slaughtered ox. Galton discovered
that the average weight estimate (1,197 pounds) almost perfectly matched the actual weight of the dead ox
(1,198 pounds). Moreover, the average estimate was better than all (or nearly all its impossible to tell from
the original article) of the individual estimates. The aphorism that two heads are better than one turns out to be
true for much more than just ox estimates.
Why is averaging across individual variation a disastrous strategy for designing cockpits but a winning strategy
for estimating ox weight? How can the average both describe nobody and beat everybody?
The answer lies not in the statistic itself but in its application. When used to increase precision, understand
group differences, measure intervention effects, or characterize populations, averaging across individual
measurements can be extremely useful. But when used to characterize individuals or design individual
experiences, averaging can lead us astray.
In the field of education, we shouldnt think of the average student defined statistically in any way (for
example, using the mean, median, mode, or a percentile range) as more than a useful abstraction that allows
us to summarize student data. As Todd Rose argues now and educational psychologist Lee Cronbach argued 60
years ago, education systems should be designed for individual students and educators to avoid a mean
mindset. But averaging is vital, too: It provides us insight into teacher efficacy; school performance; trends
over time; group differences; and proposed policy, programmatic, or pedagogical interventions. We need
averages to test hypotheses, measure success, and communicate data.
Some Better Ways to Average
How can educators and education researchers average more wisely? One way is through language, by replacing
the phrase the average student with on average, students. Whereas the former personifies a statistic, the
latter separates people from statistics.
Another way is through data reporting and visualization by presenting raw data (such as histograms and
scatterplots) rather than just averaged data (such as bar or line plots).
Finally, whenever we present an average, we should also convey how much individuals diverge from that

average; such information offers necessary context.

A Case Study: Online Bullying
As an example, consider three descriptions of students self-reports of online bullying, based on Panorama
data. Figure 1 shows the least sophisticated (and probably the most common) presentation. After reviewing the
data as presented in Figure 1, the schools principal would likely conclude that online bullying is only a slight
problem at the school and focus his or her attention on other issues. But is this really the best course of action
based on the underlying data?

A slightly more sophisticated analysis might include subgroups, as shown in Figure 2, and lead to a different
outcome: The schools principal might still conclude that the school is relatively safe but would probably not
dismiss the issue of online bullying altogether. He or she might wonder why girls report more online bullying
than boys do, and what the school could do to reduce this gender gap. But is this really the story these data tell?

Consider the third description in Figure 3 that altogether avoids a mean mindset. It most fully represents the
data and, in doing so, tells a very different story. This presentation doesnt just emphasize individuals over
averages: It reveals important realities that the others conceal. Although the likelihood of online bullying is low
on average, lots of students are effectively sounding an alarm about their experiences one that goes unheard
in the first two presentations but comes across clearly in the third. From Figure 3, a principal would likely
conclude that the problem of online bullying should be confronted rather than dismissed. And although there is
a gender difference in online bullying, its relatively small compared with the differences among individuals. In
addressing online bullying, a principal would be more likely to treat students as individuals first and as boys or
girls second, and not view bullying as just a girl problem.

A Case Study: GPAs and Growth Mindset

Consider another example from the same dataset in which high school students cumulative grade point
averages (GPAs) are related to their scores on Panoramas Growth Mindset scale, which measures how much
students believe they can change their intelligence, behavior, and other factors central to their school
performance. Figure 4a typifies a mean-centric approach, and Figure 4b shows a better approach. Both
presentations reveal that a growth mindset is associated with higher grades, but only Figure 4b reveals
individual variability. Consumers of Figure 4a are more likely to overstate the relationship between GPA and a
growth mindset, and consumers of Figure 4b are more likely to appreciate that mindset is neither a limiting
factor nor a major determinant of academic success.

Good News About Education Reform? Just Look Around by Jonathan Butcher
Posted: 06 Sep 2016 08:31 PM PDT
Lector, si monumentum requiris, circumspice. Those debating reforms to American education should
remember this memorial to Sir Christopher Wren, architect of Londons St. Pauls Cathedral. Wren is buried
inside his masterpiece with no marking for his resting place other than the inscription: If you seek a
monument, look around.
twenty20.com
Some education reform advocates are starting to wonder whether the long battle to increase parental choice in
schooling (among other things) is really making a difference, particularly in light of the growing criticism of
public charter schools. Despite recent victories giving students more opportunities in education, Robert
Pondiscio, senior fellow with the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, recently accused education reform advocates of
cowardice of having lost their will to fight.
Yet, in states around the country, families and advocates still struggle on students behalf. Parental choice in
education has seen great success, and stories of students changed lives and parents and policymakers acts of
courage are all around us.
Lets start in Washington State. In 2015, a successful union lawsuit shut down the states new charter school
law. Prior to the ruling, unionized Seattle teachers went on strike just as the school year began, leaving charter
schools the only public schools in the city open for business. District schools forced students to stay home,
disrupting their educations and family life, while charter school students and teachers showed up ready to
learn and work. Earlier this year, lawmakers and parents banded together to change state law yet again in order
to keep charter schools operating a victory for reformers. Now sights have turned to Mississippi, where
Governor Phil Bryant is defending charter schools from opponents trying to close them down.
North Carolina lawmakers removed the cap on how many charter schools can open in the state in 2011, causing
a boom in such schools, according to the Charlotte Observer. Attention has turned to Massachusetts, where
parents and advocates are gearing up for a ballot initiative in November to raise the cap on charter schools in
the state. A recent poll shows that parents support lifting the cap by a 3-1 margin.
Charter schools are just the beginning. Elsewhere, in just the last two years, lawmakers in almost two dozen
states have introduced nearly 40 pieces of legislation to create or expand public and private learning options
through education savings accounts. Parents can use the accounts to choose multiple opportunities
simultaneously, such as online classes and personal tutors, thus customizing their childs education.
Since 2011, lawmakers in five states have enacted such accounts. In Florida, Tennessee, and Mississippi,
children with special needs can use them to pay for educational therapies and private schools, to name a few
possible uses. And lawmakers in Arizona and Nevada enacted far-reaching provisions that allow hundreds of
thousands of children from different walks of life to access these accounts.
The Goldwater Institute and the Institute for Justice successfully defended Arizonas education savings
accounts in court from a teachers union challenge in 2014, and now the Institute for Justice is defending
Nevadas law from a similar challenge. Around the nation, there seems to be plenty of fight left in these

reformers.
These successes at the state level are not lost on Congress. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) has introduced
legislation to allow Native American students attending Bureau of Indian Education schools some of the
lowest performing schools in the country access to education savings accounts. Former presidential
candidate and Texas Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX)introduced a similar education savings account bill for students
in Washington, D.C.
The Fordham Institute Pondiscios own institution hosted an event last month featuring a report card that
ranks two dozen private school choice opportunities in the various states. It shows that the number of private
school choice options in the U.S. has doubled in the last six years.
One can only conclude that reform has lost its mojo if one ignores whats happening in every one of these
states. Opposition to parental efforts to ensure a quality education for the nations children might make
headlines, but it will only slow us down if we let it.
Jonathan Butcher
Jonathan Butcher is education director at the Goldwater Institute and senior fellow at the Beacon Center of
Tennessee