FIXING OUR AILING SCHOOLS Imagine attending a school where students really learn something, where teachers are concerned enough to make sure that all their students meet the criteria for completion of every course, and where few kids fail. The students that fail are those who either make no attempt to complete the work, or who drop out because they don't see the value in what the educational system is attempting to do for them. Two years ago, the American educational system was preparing to make a massive shift to Outcome Based Education (OBE). Congress, educators, and parents were advocating it. Students would earn a diploma by demonstrating proficiency in desired outcomes. Since then, the OBE movement stalled. In Pennsylvania, the state was forced to curtail its ambitious OBE plan in the wake of fierce opposition from organized religion and other conservative groups. Critics claimed that the state's proposed outcomes watered down academics in favor of "ill-defined values and process skills." One of the reasons OBE sparked such controversy was that many educators defined the term differently. At one level, OBE is nothing more than the simple principle that decisions about curriculum and instruction should be driven by the outcomes we'd like students to display at the end of their educational experiences. At another level, policy makers increasingly talk about creating out-come driven education, or systems that would redefine traditional approaches to accountability. This means that schools should be accountable for demonstrating that students have mastered important outcomes or outputs, not for their per-pupil ratio or the number of books in the school library (so called inputs). The different interpretations of OBE help to explain why, even among those who support and outcomes-driven system, sharp divisions exist over what it would look like. Business leaders and policymakers appear to strongly support the idea of outcome- based accountability systems, but their conceptions of desirable learning outcomes appears to be very different from that offered by educators. The rub is that the very nature of OBE forces the educational system to address the controversial issue of what's worth knowing and what's the purpose of schooling. Jay McTighe, the director of the Maryland Assessment Consortium, say, "OBE gets to the heart of the matter." Proponents like McTighe suggest that OBE would help address some of the problematic conditions confronting contemporary schools. Numerous experts believe that current outcomes for student learning are not rigorous nor appropriate for the requirements of students' adult lives. One national study showed that graduates of U.S. schools are able to demonstrate very basic skills and knowledge, but they lack higher order thinking skills. Under OBE, students would be required to demonstrate outcomes before graduation. The futures of many students are compromised because the outcomes held for them are low or unclear. As they progress through school, such students are frequently tracked into lower level courses where they are not held responsible for the outcomes necessary for success after graduation. As long as the credentialing system is based upon "seat time," students are not being prepared for their future roles in society. According to OBE philosophy, all students will be responsible for attaining common outcomes. Schools will be responsible for altering present conditions to prepare them to do it. In the system envisioned by OBE proponents, the desired learner outcomes become the foundation upon which decisions about curriculum, instruction, assessment, and staff development are based. OBE supporters believe strongly that an educated graduate is not just someone who has absorbed a set of discrete experiences in the traditional academic domain. OBE architects find it difficult to convince traditional educators that it is possible to learn from a variety of sources. For example, if the purpose of literature is to teach people to communicate more effectively, then it doesn't matter if the learner studies Judy Blume or Shakespeare to accomplish that end. Good outcomes must contain three elements: (1) the content knowledge, (2) the competence (what the student is doing), and (3) the setting (under what conditions the student is performing. Dubious outcomes and the prospect that assessment would be used fueled the criticisms about OBE in Pennsylvania. The Kentucky accountability system measures schools on their ability to help students to attain state-defined learner outcomes. The dilemma facing traditional educators is that if OBE is eventually implemented, they will be required to not only learn new ways of doing things, but they will be accountable for making sure that students learn what they are supposed to during the 13 years of primary and secondary education. Presently, few states are likely to abolish the Carnegie unit system for OBE as Pennsylvania plans to do. Even in PA, there will be a hue and cry to retain the present system. Yet with all the dissatisfaction over how our schools are failing to prepare our children for the future, the solution coming from most educational experts is to "return to the basics," and not take a good, hard look at how the world is changing and preparing our next generation to effectively assimilate into that world. How can a student leave high school today and be computer illiterate and expect to adapt to the service-economy and the information age that is already upon us? How can an educator teach students to be computer literate when they are illiterate themselves? Yes, educators and parents are interested in school improvement, but neither seem to be prepared for a "break-the- mold" educational revolution. America's next generation is at stake. The old adage was, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." Well, from many vantage points, the system is broken. OBE offers an alternative to what is going on today. Yes, teachers will resist having to learn new teaching methods, new skills, and new assessment strategies that will take away from them the dictatorial power they now hold over a student's future. If it sounds like I favor OBE, you're right. Tell me what I am supposed to learn, give me a clear idea of how you will measure whether or not I have learned something, and assess it fairly based upon some criteria for completion, and dog gone it, I'll bet you that I'll learn. What's scares many educators is that under OBE many students might actually learn what they are supposed to. Gone will be the F's and the frustrated learners who cannot "brownie or suck up to a teacher." Gone will be the curved grading system that demands that some must fail and only some can get high marks. Gone will be the sense of failure that many students carry with them into their adult lives. Yes, the system is broken. Rural, suburban, and urban schools are wallowing in a quagmire. OBE presents a realistic, exciting alternative.