We are about to discuss, to parse, a single paragraph from our Lords of Education at DCSS that is so asinine, so intellectually bankrupt, that in the absence of profanity it leaves one speechless. So therefore we bomb not out of joy, and not without a certain degree of revulsion. But bomb we must for they have left us no other option.
Open
the
bomb
bay
doors...
What you are about to read is one paragraph of a mere four sentences spanning seven lines (in its original form) consuming one hundred words and only six hundred and thirty one characters (including punctuation and spacing). Though a fraction of the size of the Gettysburg address it clearly and completely exposes the horror that is public education in DeKalb County Georgia.
Without further ado.
The DCSS Management Information Systems Department (MIS) has created the Technology Plan to keep up with progress and excitement. The plan resonates the passion for extended and expanded learning fueled by efficient and effective integration of technology and the mission and goal of the district. The mission of the MIS Department is to establish and maintain a technology-rich teaching and learning environment where students and staff develop 21st century skills to be successful citizens in a global community. More so, the mission is to enable students with the skills they will need to work, learn, and live in their future.Please. Take a moment and re-read this paragraph. Once more. Now, again.
Had enough?
Good. Let's talk amongst ourselves.
This was authored by three members of the DCSS administration including the superintendent with the assistance and guidance of a professor at Kennesaw State University. No kidding. Fact is you simply cannot write this kind of drivel with a routine education and a normal background. This requires the kind of PhD one is so proud of that one would never indicate the field (probably "Classroom Management" or "Playground Administration") and a background in the insular bubble of the Education Industry. These are the kinds of "professionals" whose "professional" web page includes links to "See My Children" and "Birthday Pics". No siree, it takes a special kind.
And lots of them. In addition to these four intellectual giants, referred to as the "Core Team", a "Planning Team" of four additional dim-bulbs was required. But wait! There's more! Clearly the genius of even this one paragraph cannot be the work of a mere eight educrats. And it isn't. These eight were supported by a brain trust of THIRTY FOUR others who participated in the brainstorming sessions resulting in what we have before us today. In order to appreciate this genius, the inspiration, the perspiration, perhaps the least we can do is give it just one more read.
The DCSS Management Information Systems Department (MIS) has created the Technology Plan to keep up with progress and excitement. The plan resonates the passion for extended and expanded learning fueled by efficient and effective integration of technology and the mission and goal of the district. The mission of the MIS Department is to establish and maintain a technology-rich teaching and learning environment where students and staff develop 21st century skills to be successful citizens in a global community. More so, the mission is to enable students with the skills they will need to work, learn, and live in their future.Now admit it, you could never write something like that, even if you have an advanced degree in education something or another from a top online diploma mill. Though it will hurt, let's try to examine this masterpiece so we can better appreciate the genius behind it. One sentence at a time.
The DCSS Management Information Systems Department (MIS) has created the Technology Plan to keep up with progress and excitement.It is common practice to spell out an acronym and immediately follow this with the first usage in parenthesis. This one sentence blows it twice. MIS should follow "Systems" and just what is DCSS? And you're thinking "it's DeKalb County School System--everybody knows that". Indeed. By the same token anyone writing or reading a Technology Plan should know that "MIS" is "Management Information Systems", but it appears this is written by idiots for even more profound idiots. Perhaps the best way to fix this slip-up is to change MIS to MISD. Pronounced "missed" as in "wouldn't be".
But that is merely the harvesting of nits. Let's look at something more significant, the phrase "to keep up with progress and excitement". "Keep up with progress" almost makes sense as progress implies some form of forward motion. We'll pretend it is in the right direction (though we know it isn't). But "keep up with excitement"? What in the [non-educational] world does that mean? Are these people more than just figuratively circle-jerking? Do they need adult supervision? Do they need to be arrested?
But this is indeed one of the diseases that has destroyed public education in America: the notion that any activity even remotely associated with learning must be exciting. Sometimes, most times, learning is hard work. It isn't exciting. It is hard. Ultimately, where there is no hard work there is no learning and if your child is not complaining about how hard a subject is then they are not reaching their potential. And you're a bad parent.
The plan resonates the passion for extended and expanded learning fueled by efficient and effective integration of technology and the mission and goal of the district.Now that we're all jiggy with excitement let's resonate a little passion.That's right, we just know there's a whole lotta passion out there and it's for extended and expanded learning, whatever the hell that is. And you might think, especially in a school setting, that extending or expanding learning would set a pretty high bar. You would be wrong. But it is a common mistake in DeKalb to assume there is already quite a bit of learning going on, and that any more learning might just pop all those intellectual blivets. By any objective measure (ie: not self-assessment) there is actually very little learning going on in DCSS so any additional learning would be, percentage wise, quite an increase.
We won't even talk about the "mission and goal of the district" as attempting to read even small parts of the document wherein that is revealed has been known to cause projectile vomiting. In readers with a brain anyway. So...not the target audience.
The mission of the MIS Department is to establish and maintain a technology-rich teaching and learning environment where students and staff develop 21st century skills to be successful citizens in a global community.Wow, this is a platinum mine of insight into how genius at DCSS really works. "Establish and maintain a technology-rich teaching and learning environment"!!! This is pure edu-speak for "piss away taxpayer money on the latest and greatest toys without any proof of efficacy".
And just what are these "21st century skills" and how do they know, barely 10% into the century just what skills are needed for the next 80+ years? Seriously, if they were that smart they'd write something better than this drivel.
"Skills to be successful citizens in a global community" at first blush appears to be meaningless blather or a political nod to the money men who seem hellbent on ensuring public education produces compliant "citizens" to do their bidding. Perhaps if our children learned to read, write, do a little math and picked up a couple of challenging lessons in logic and ethics we might have a better society and a better country. Probably wouldn't have their kind of citizen though.
More so, the mission is to enable students with the skills they will need to work, learn, and live in their future."More so"--you gotta wonder--how did this beat out "Moreover"? Can you imagine the meetings? The emails flying around the internet? "What should we do? Should it be 'more so' or 'moreover'?" Dollars to donuts there were meetings where this was seriously debated. They probably brought in lunch. On our dime.
And "more so" than what? "More so" than the claptrap in the previous three sentences? And again with the "skills". Since when is it all about skills? Isn't the current, totally intangible education goal "critical thinking" and "high order though processes". "Skills" sounds like you're training a plumber. DCSS should be so good.
And again, they're the Great Prognosticators, with a clear vision of Other People's Futures. Perhaps it is best to live in the future when you're such a miserable failure in the present.
To wrap up, go back and read it one more time. Doesn't it just sound nice? The problem is that it ONLY sounds nice and it contains no real meaning of any sort. And this is what the entire education industry has become: people, schools, organizations, businesses, operations and processes of no real substance that simply and only sound good. And this takes a lot of hard work. Problem is it has nothing to do with educating our children.
And if you read that one paragraph with the understanding that it took forty-two highly compensated "professionals" and you think "well, that's about right", then you are part of the problem.
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