Do We Need Teachers or Are They Becoming Obsolete?

This is not a rhetorical question.  Perhaps for the first time in history serious questions are being raised about the long-term need for flesh and blood classroom teachers.  For many this may seem ridiculous but for those on the frontier of technology it is anything but ridiculous.  Consider the following developments.

Computers Approach Human Capacity to Grade Essays

A recent NPR headline* asked: "Can A Computer Grade Essays As Well As A Human? Maybe Even Better, Study Says" According to the article, the answer is a qualified yes:

Computers have been grading multiple-choice tests in schools for years. To the relief of English teachers everywhere, essays have been tougher to gauge. But look out, teachers: A new study finds that software designed to automatically read and grade essays can do as good a job as humans — maybe even better.

The study, conducted at the University of Akron, ran more than 16,000 essays from both middle school and high school tests through automated systems developed by nine companies. The essays, from six different states, had originally been graded by humans.

In a piece in The New York Times, education columnist Michael Winerip described the outcome: "Computer scoring produced "virtually identical levels of accuracy, with the software in some cases proving to be more reliable."

Artificial Intelligence

Machines that can think like and interact with humans beings is the goal of Artificial Intelligence (AI).  While holding a conversation with a C3PO or R2D2 is unlikely in the near future, the possibility of holding an intelligent conversation with a machine is not as preposterous or as far away as one might think.  Consider just how unrealistic, preposterous, and futuristic today's technology would have seemed just twenty or thirty years ago.  Imagine your grandfather's reaction if you told him that you foresaw a world in which:

• Everyone will be connected by an invisible but all pervasive thing called the Internet.  We will access this Internet through computers (machines that can calculate faster than humans can think, play chess and beat the worlds best Chess Masters, and fly unmanned drones that can kill from miles in the sky), handheld phones called SMART phones (pocket sized computers), and tablet computers that look much like the slates seen on Star Trek with which one can store a digital library larger than the Library of Congress, read magazines and newspapers from around the world (mostly free), listen to music, watch streaming movies, shop online, take colleges courses online, book travel arrangements, access a map of your city or of the world, play games, socialize through something to be called Social Media, look up restaurant reviews, keep up with breaking news through Tweets (140 character ubiquitous updates), and search the Internet for almost anything you need to know.
• Using computers, SMART phones, or tablets, we will connect to the Internet wirelessly from virtually anywhere.
• Print books will slowly be replaced by digital books.
• We will be able to call a digital assistant named Siri and ask her for directions, product suggestions, make an appointment, send an email, send a text message, search the Internet, suggest a restaurant, check the weather, calculate a large equation, or create a reminder for us all by voice and she will often do so with a sense of humor.
• There will be driverless cars and pilotless planes
• We will send a pilotless rover to Mars that will scamper about on the surface of the planet sending back photos for several years.
• We will have voice enabled handheld mobile Global Positioning Systems on phones, tablets, and dedicated GPS devices) that communicate with satellites in space  that will give us turn-by-turn directions to our destination.

What once seemed preposterous, the stuff of science fiction, is now commonplace, illustrating that the uniformed and unimaginative dismiss the capacities and likelihood of AI to their own peril.  Consider this summary of research on the progress and promise of AI:

When will human-level AIs finally arrive? We don’t mean the narrow-AI software that already runs our trading systems, video games, battlebots and fraud detection systems. Those are great as far as they go, but when will we have really intelligent systems like C3PO, R2D2 and even beyond? When will we have Artificial General Intelligences (AGIs) we can talk to? Ones as smart as we are, or smarter?

Well, as Yogi Berra said, “it’s tough to predict, especially about the future.” But what do experts working on human-level AI think? To find out, we surveyed a number of leading specialists at the Artificial General Intelligence conference (AGI-09) in Washington DC in March 2009. These are the experts most involved in working toward the advanced AIs we’re talking about ... The majority of the experts who participated in our study were optimistic about AGI coming fairly quickly, although a few were more pessimistic about the timing. It is worth noting, however, that all the experts in our study, even the most pessimistic ones, gave at least a 10% chance of some AGI milestones being achieved within a few decades ... In broad terms, our results concur with those of the two studies mentioned above. All three studies suggest that significant numbers of interested, informed individuals believe it is likely that AGI at the human level or beyond will occur around the middle of this century, and plausibly even sooner. **

AI and Robot Teachers

Mobile technology and ubiquitous access to the Internet combined with online learning have many suggesting that the days of the traditional classroom teacher are limited.  Although hardly ready to take over the class, meet Saya, the substitute robot teacher.

Japanese School Tests Robot Teacher

Crude yes, but by what standard?  Twenty years ago this would have been amazing.  What will Saya be capable of 20 years from now?  The questions is not what is possible now but what may be possible in the not too distant future?

I am not ready to dismiss AI or robots or some other yet to be imagined technology as capable of teaching if one defines teaching as conveying information, assessing knowledge and measurable skills, and then customizing a new teaching routine to address identified weaknesses.  Such technology is already available in rudimentary form through computer aided instruction (CAI).

Teaching versus Educating

However, the transmission of information and the use of sophisticated algorithms to customize lessons and testing are not the same thing as educating students.  Transmitting knowledge is necessary for a good education but is not sufficient.  Teaching and educating are not necessarily synonymous.  No matter how sophisticated our technology becomes, it is doubtful that it can replace educators.  Here is why; the transfer of information does not:

• Equal nor impart wisdom
• Provide a role model
• Convey passion and a love of a subject
• Discipline
• Build relationships nor teach how to navigate difficult relationships
• Add the emotional element vital to learning
• Question deeply by engaging in Socratic dialog
• Mentor students
• Serve students
• Pray for students
• Love students

Technology can only be conceived as a replacement for traditional classroom teachers if we reduce teaching to the transfer of information, drilling skills, and preparation for test taking.  Sadly, too many teachers have been reduced to this mundane level: such teachers ARE replaceable.

Loving, wise, dedicated, servant-hearted, educators who mentor, pray for, and discipline their students will never be replaced.  They have nothing to fear from technology.  For such educators, technology is their servant, not their masters or replacements.

Sources

*  http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2012/04/24/151308789/for-automatic-essay-graders-efficiency-trumps-accuracy

** http://hplusmagazine.com/2010/02/05/how-long-till-human-level-ai/

An Open Letter to Teachers

 

Source: Justin Tarte:

Dear teachers,

We have a lot of respect for what you do. Your job is extremely difficult, and we understand the many difficulties that encompass being a teacher. Your ability to lead an entire class is frankly amazing, and more importantly, you always seem cool, calm and collected despite what might be going on. There are times when we would love to be back in the classroom; there are other times when we can't imagine going back. Your job is definitely not an easy job, but as administrators, here are a few things we would like you to keep in mind:

1) - When we ask you and your fellow teachers for opinions and feedback, we would really appreciate it if you would take us seriously and put some thought into ways we can improve our school. We know you have a lot on your mind, but if we are going to take the time to ask you, we are doing it because we value your opinion.

2) - We love visiting your classrooms to see the students growing and developing, but when we visit a classroom and the students are having a free day or are watching a movie unrelated to anything of any real value, we are disappointed and feel as if the students are being cheated. We all have bad days and difficult things going on in our lives, but please make it a priority to do something valuable for your students every single day.

3) - Professional development is something we really enjoy, but please don't rely on us to plan and develop every single PD day. We want you to have a say and a voice in YOUR professional growth, and as such we would love to hear your ideas and suggestions. We also really would like you to take our PD days seriously and go into each session with the mindset of, "what can I learn today?"

4) - Can you please stop writing office referrals and sending students to the office for not coming to class prepared or coming late to class. We are here to support you and help you do your job, but if we are constantly tied up dealing with small and petty issues like this then how are we going to have any time to tackle some of the larger issues? Please talk with some of your colleagues and see how they handle these issues...contact the student's parents...take a moment and talk to the student BEFORE sending them down to us.

5) - We understand the importance of being visible and in the halls in between classes, but our administrative team is not very large. We will try our best to be in the halls as often as possible, but sometimes things come up and they need to be dealt with immediately, consequently we need your help. We need you in the halls helping to cover the spots we aren't able to cover. It's a group effort, and you play a crucial role in our overall effectiveness.

6) - Sometimes a lesson doesn't take the entire class period, or the students get done quicker than expected, but please do not allow your students to line up at the door. Furthermore, please do not let your students stand in the hallway as they wait to leave your class. Your class time is valuable and should not be discarded so easily. If your students end class 5 minutes early every day it adds up to over 3 weeks of instructional time over the course of the year. Think what your students could learn in that much time.

7) - Time is limited, and when we try to implement new programs we are doing so because we believe they can help students. Unfortunately, when we try to initiate a new program it seems as if a lot of teachers immediately disregard the program because they think the program will be pushed to the side and simply forgotten by next year. We realize it's difficult to implement several programs simultaneously, but they are aimed at improving the educational experience for our students. Please give our programs a chance before casting them to the side...our students could be missing out.

8) - When you were hired you were hired because we think you are the best, and because we think you are the best we want to get out of your way so you can do great things. We want to empower you, encourage you, and watch you take risks in an attempt to do some awesome things, but when we see you do the same thing every year we wonder if you really want autonomy. Additionally, we would be more than happy to provide you time to observe some of your colleagues if this time was used productively. Please be the awesome teacher you were hired to be.

Don't take this open letter as us trying to tell you how to do your job. As Educators we must all be open for suggestions and advice, and we hope that if anyone had any advice or suggestions, they would take the time to inform us. As previously mentioned, we understand all the parts of your job because we were once in your shoes, but we hope this letter provides a small reminder of how much your decisions and actions affect others.

Thank you for your time, and we look forward to your response,

The administrators

In Memoriam

By Mark Kennedy

2:30.

2:30 a.m., ante meridiem – the 2:30 that’s too early in the morning. It’s a time when babies make their debut on the world’s stage wailing from the shock of fresh air in new lungs.

But at 2:30 a.m. on August 11^th one old man, my ‘old man’, was making his final exit, gasping for each remaining breathe. At 2:30 I sat beside my 83 year old father’s bed, held his hand and waited for that slow train that comes for all of us sooner or later.

“All the world’s a stage”, says Shakespeare, “and all the men and women merely players.”

If that’s true, my father’s best performances were given on a stage made of ice.

From 1942 to 1957, he was part of the Toronto Maple Leaf hockey team. Statisticians will tell you that Ted “Teeder” Kennedy played his first Leaf game at age 17, that he was the youngest Maple Leaf captain, that he led 5 Stanley Cup winning teams, that he still holds the record for most Leaf playoff goals and that he received the Hart Trophy in 1955 as the NHL’s most valuable player. But numbers and trophies don’t tell the whole story.

His audience, the people who saw him play, talk about his unflinching courage, his unremitting hard work and his indomitable determination in the face of adversity – character traits that produced the statistics and a lot more.

Where do personal qualities like these come from?

No one is a self-made man. There are no demigods with genetic codes pre-programmed to accomplish great things solely by their own abilities. Events and circumstances enter into it, but more than any other factor, human influences shape character and inspire achievements. Parents, teachers and heroes matter.

“Who was your hero when you were growing up?” I once asked my father, expecting him to name an old time hockey player, like maybe Charlie Conacher.

“My mother.” he said, “The things she did were absolutely unbelievable.” We both sat silent for a while and I thought about that little Irish woman who immigrated to Canada almost 100 years ago. Margaret Burns was a teenager then, full of hopes and dreams for an exciting life in a new land. It was a beautiful fantasy - a song of innocence. Fifteen years later, tragedy was the theme of her song of experience.

She began her new life as a maid in what were wryly dubbed ‘summer cottages’ – American owned mansions on the north shore of Lake Erie in the town of Port Colborne, Ontario. Cooking, cleaning and mending were familiar duties for her and for so many other women of her generation and at least they provided her with a living.

At a community event she met Tom King, a worker at the local cement plant. They fell in love, married and had a son named Joseph. But while Joseph was still a toddler, tragedy struck. Tom King along with more than 20 million other people worldwide died in the flu epidemic of 1918. As a young widow with a little boy to raise she persevered through her grief. A few years later another local man came into her life. She and Gordon Kennedy married and began building a new family. Over the next five years Jessie, Jim and Gordon Jr. joined Joseph, as part of a rollicking, boisterous, happy clan of children.

But tragedy continued to stalk Margaret. At the age of one, little Gordon Jr. tried to climb a ladder, lost his balance and tumbled to his death.

Another heartbreak followed soon after. Weeks before the birth of my father, Gordon Sr. was critically wounded in a hunting accident. It took several agonizing days for him to die in hospital.

Hamlet’s stepfather Claudius said it eloquently, “When sorrows come, they come not as single spies but in battalions.”

How could anyone bare the weight of these accumulated sorrows? Margaret faced a future without any significant work skills or government safety net and with 4 young children to support.

To solve the critical problem of financial survival she turned her home into a restaurant and, in off hours, cleaned floors in local office buildings. In summers she operated a beachside snack bar and for the rest of the year at night she ran the concession booth at the local hockey arena with the help of her children. After all the teams had left her children would lace up their skates and play shinny.

It was a hard and wearing life for Margaret. Her daughter Jessie recalled often hearing her come home weeping in the early hours of the morning. “I’m so tired!” she would cry out, maybe to God. Nonetheless next morning she would be up early for another day of wearying physical labour.

And there it was. She was the personification of unflinching courage, unremitting hard work and indomitable determination in the face of adversity - it’s no wonder my father brought those character traits to the Maple Leaf hockey team. He learned them from his hero and he chose his hero well.

But there was something more, something that carried Margaret far beyond normal human capacities.

The New Testament book of Matthew records an amazing event that took place in the middle of a wind swept sea. Jesus astonishes and terrifies a boat full of his disciples by walking on top of the water toward them! He then challenges his friend Peter to step out of the boat and walk on the water too! And Peter actually does it for a few seconds! When he looks at Jesus he does the seemingly impossible but when he looks down into the tempestuous depths fear replaces faith and he begins to sink. Jesus has to rescue him.

Margaret turned to God in the tragedies that threatened to overwhelm her and her children and He lifted her above them. I know that because I knew her and because I found a remarkable letter in a box of jumbled correspondence and bills. She wrote it to my dad when he was struggling to finalize the purchase of his first home – a pretty minor thing in comparison to her troubles:

“Dec 28- 1948

Dear Theodore,” (She always used his full, formal name) “I am so sorry you have run into so much trouble with the house but dear don’t be discouraged. If you put your trust in God He will help you to overcome all the difficulties you run into. You will realize that as you get older.”

She wrote that after having lived through the deaths of two husbands and a beloved child. She knew what she was talking about. She had lived it.

2:30 August 11^th came and went. I would sit up for two more nights with my father before the spirit left his worn out body. Even in those last hours he wouldn’t give up easily. How could he with the heritage of his hero always in his heart.

As I wrote this I couldn’t help thinking about the heroes teaching in some of our Christian schools – the folks who, like my grandmother, work so hard and without ever receiving public celebrity status. Maybe some of them come home late at nights exhausted, maybe sometimes in tears. Maybe in the day to day grind they just don’t see any fruit from their efforts. For them I hope this article is an encouragement. Their work is not in vain. They are heroes for children who may just change our world for the better some day – and chances are many of those future world changers are the children from whom they would least expect it.

Educational Leadership, Relationships, and the Eternal Value of Christian Schooling

The following is an excellent book review on “Schools as Communities: Educational Leadership, Relationships, and the Eternal Value of Christian Schooling.”  Click on the image to see the book on Amazon.

This is a book that you should seriously consider reading.  (Disclaimer: I am a contributor author, Barrett Mosbacker).

The review was published in The ICCTE Journal. 

Reviewed by Dr. David W. Robinson, Adjunct Professor, D.Mgt. program, George Fox University.

“Where there is no vision, the people perish…” Proverbs 29:18a (KJV)

Anyone who has engaged in the calling of Christian education knows that it can be — and usually is — one of the most exciting, delightful, fulfilling, and joyous ministries that a believer can know. Its golden days are a real “foretaste of glory divine,” its opportunities for those who truly love the possibilities of the mind and heart of Christ in the lives of our students are the very aroma of the Lord in our work. Lives are changed; parents are supportive; administrators are helpful; the board is productive. Sacrifices are engaged willingly, trials are gladly borne. We go home at the end of the day, and can hardly wait to return in the morning…

And anyone who has engaged in the calling of Christian education also knows that it can be — and usually is — one of the most daunting, exhausting, demoralizing, and frustrating ministries that same believer can know. Golden days can morph into drabness from one year to the next, or even overnight; its opportunities can suddenly vanish, with the mind and heart of Christ being trampled underfoot by institutional change, upheavals in leadership, financial uncertainty, or divisions and offenses within the school community…and suddenly, the aroma of Christ is seemingly nowhere to be found. Lives are no longer transformed; parents are arguing among themselves or sniping the administration/board; administrators run for the bomb shelter; the board seems unable to resolve the issues. Sacrifices now seem imposed, with trials producing grumbling, not grace. We go home at the end of the day, and are tempted to circulate our résumés…

Strange to say, this roller coaster ride is well known to all too many Christian school teachers, administrators, parents, students, and board members. The shift can happen over time, or even overnight. The results are commonly tragic (and predictable) if resolution and healing are not accomplished in time: high rates of teacher turnover; a loss of students and their families; the demoralization of the remaining students, faculty and staff; friction between boards and administrative leadership that leads to recriminations, or even terminations; and so on.

And so the question is: How can Christian schools resolve the chasm between the experiences of the first and second paragraphs above, prevent the sort of divisions and offenses within the educational body that the scriptures warn about, embody healthy and continuous educational improvement, and become the dwelling places of shalom and agapé that will transform the lives of all who are touched by that community?

This is a daunting question, cutting to the heart of what every generation of Christian educators and academic leaders must face, ready or not. In the case of Schools as Communities, it is addressed by James L. Drexler and the excellent group of nearly two dozen scholar-practitioners that he assembled for this volume. As the title states, the main theme of the work is that of community. All eighteen of the essays are represent separate explorations of particular subsets of the main challenge of fostering koinonia within the imperative for continuous school improvement in the service of Christ and our students. This is a worthy but highly ambitious task; frankly, as I read it, I wondered how well Drexler and his collaborators would carry it off.

Drexler and company proceeded by dividing the task into four main sections:

• “Building Community: Foundational Principles”
• “Building Community Among Faculty and Staff”
• “Building Community for Students”; and
• “Building Community with Others.”

Drexler doesn’t leave community without conceptual support, however; he explicitly adds supportive themes of grace, scriptural priority (“the weightier issues of the Law,” prophetically stated by the Lord in Matthew 23:23), and cultural relevance/engagement to the content of the book (xiv-xviii). Nor is the work merely theoretical; each chapter concludes with a call to praxis entitled “Now What? Application to Practice”. Its purpose is to help the reader understand how the contents of each chapter might be used in their school setting and their own ministry of leadership. Finally, each chapter has a references section that provides useful sources and online links for the reader to extend his or her ongoing exploration of educational leadership and community.

In Part One, foundational principles are explored in essays examining the primacy of grace in Christian school settings (Bruce Hekman); mercy, justice and social change as imperatives of transformational Christian education (Vernard T. Gant); the life of the leader and his or her grace-filled life as an embodiment of the Lord’s grace (Jeff Hall); and godly risk taking on the part of the school leader (Stephen R. Kaufmann and Kevin J. Eames).

Hekman encourages the Christian school to embody true grace to its students, eschewing both “sloppy grace” and formal legalism as it becomes a real community in pursuit of a profoundly Christian educational mission. In Gant’s contribution, the Christian school is viewed from the vantage point of God’s call to mercy and justice. Rather than harboring bias or prejudice, for example with respect to lower SES students and their families, our schools ought to be seeking opportunities to reform all aspects of their operations — from their curriculum to their service programs to the “habits of the heart.” As we seek to serve the Lord in our schools, we should turn away from the all-too-prevalent paternalism within our educational work, from the majoring-on-minors that so easily entangles us, and strive for a deeply Christ-like way of life (cf. Galatians 3:26-28). Faithful educational leadership will seek real community with all people, and not merely those within comfortable shouting distance.

Hall’s article shifts the focus to the educational leader, to the very life and calling of the one who shepherds a school. The love of Christ must compel leaders to love those who are collaborators in their school community, so that they are effective models of His grace to those who work in that setting. The first section rounds out with Kaufmann and Eames’ very interesting chapter on educational leadership and risk taking. Christ’s call to His people often involves radical, transformational living; a Christian school that seeks to follow Him faithfully will find itself pressing against social conventions and embedded attitudes among its own constituencies. The authors argue that Christian school leaders should look for opportunities “to engage students in culturally relevant ideas and activities,” even when they involve the risk of controversy and discomfort (76).

Part Two shifts focus to the question of community building with the faculty and staff. Gordon Brown addresses the important question of leadership models and decision making. His survey covers an impressive amount of ground in short order, with discussions of models that concentrate on the leader, models that emphasize the instructional enterprise, and models that focus on community transformation. Kevin J. Eames then shifts our gaze to organizational theory, and the ironic fact that organizations do not organize themselves. Eames draws our attention to the fact that older hierarchical, top-down, and linear organizational models have been supplanted in recent decades by approaches based on systems theory. He builds a convincing case for a biblical basis for systems theory in Christian education; all that I need point out is that anyone who links Herman Dooyeweerd’s extraordinarily important framework of domains, modalities, and sphere sovereignty to organizational theory and praxis is on the trail of something big. Really big. (Yes, that is your warm invitation to further study.)

Neil Neilson then introduces us to the notion that tensions within Christian educational enterprises are common, inescapable in this age, and actually should be “welcomed as friends” (cf. James 1:2-8), since these “liberating dichotomies” actually spur our growth and development, both personally and institutionally. He lists six provocative oppositions, and makes a good case for their role in stirring up our leadership and vision in response. Jack Beckman then takes up the baton, looking at the vital issue of professional development as a means of community building within our schools. I view such work as a vital outworking of “the equipping of the saints” (Ephesians 4:11-13), one that Beckman clearly advocates for school leaders.

In Part Three, Drexler’s team moves to the central question of community formation with and for our students. Barrett Mosbacker summarizes the challenges facing our schools in a very informative chapter on strategic stewardship. I found myself agreeing strongly with his comments about the need for an understanding of the economic underpinnings of stewardship and development work in our Christian schools, an area that is regularly bedeviled with sentiment, pietism, and even presumption masquerading as “faith.” Mosbacker’s essay is a call to arms, a medicine that can bring healing in such things; our school community will be strengthened as its leadership adopts a more focused approach in its strategic financial vision. Derek J. Keenan then shifts our attention to the question of curricular leadership. His essay calls us to consider curricular formation to be a wonderful opportunity for gathering all the stakeholders in our educational community around the challenge of creating a dynamic, holistic, Christ-honoring course system for our students. Our curriculum ought to be a profound expression of our deeply-held values, our commitments to the Lord, the world, and each other; Keenan encourages us to act on these beliefs, and to make them real in our schools.

From this platform, it is a natural progression to shift from reaching inwards — building community at home — to reaching outwards. Daphne Wharton Haddad and Susan Schneider Hasseler follow Keenan’s essay by discussing the need to construct culturally inclusive communities in Christian education. For far too long, our “outreach” to our world has reflected a paternalistic “tolerance” (“I put up with you because it makes me feel good.”) rather than a truly transformational way of living. (“We are one in the Lord, and we all have things to teach and learn from each other.” Romans 1:11-12; Galatians 3:26-28; and Romans 12:2…enough said!) Haddad and Hasseler’s call is to reform all aspects of our school community, from relationships to curriculum to classroom practice, to produce a true model of the Lord’s kingdom.

In chapter twelve, Matthew Lucas gives a framework for the very important — and very misunderstood — process of assessment. Too many in Christian school leadership map “assessment” to standardized testing alone. Lucas posits that we must move to a much broader, multi-modal approach to truly assess the effectiveness of what we are doing in our schools. All of this must be done in a way that reflects a Christian worldview in all aspects; a willy-nilly adoption of the techniques of the world without deep reflection on the values of the Lord’s kingdom will actually harm our work, giving us a “form of godliness, but denying the power thereof” (2 Timothy 3:5a; KJV). James L. Drexler follows Lucas by addressing the question of discipline and community building within our Christian schools. Drexler points out the plethora of books on this topic, and then espouses a biblical approach for the development of godly discipline. A proper anthropology allows us to avoid mere sentimentality, and also to avoid a purely legalistic/punitive view of school discipline. The scriptures do provide us with guidelines for a redemptive approach to such matters — 2 Timothy 3:16-17 comes to mind immediately, as an example — and Drexler advocates such a stance. In a community that “cares enough to confront,” many discipline issues can be prevented entirely, or can be dealt with locally and privately, as the Lord instructed us in Matthew 18. For the balance of issues, the agapé community can escalate properly through a sequence of corrective steps, always seeking to give a student the opportunity to truly repent and experience restoration to the community.

Part Three concludes with David L. Roth and Jon Keith’s examination of changing the culture in Christian schools. Anyone familiar with Christian education is aware of the problem; as the traditional Spanish proverb put it quite succinctly, “Que no haya novedad.” Or in modern English, “Let no new thing arise.” (Even more loosely: “All change is bad.”) Resistance to change, regardless of how faithful or promising it is, is a fact of organizational life. Educational leaders who assume that their vision of new opportunities will automatically be accepted by their constituencies is cruising for a bruising; a reading of the life of Moses alone would cure any romanticism on this topic. Roth and Keith advance Jesus Christ as the model for generating change in our schools, and advocate that school leaders take key elements of His leadership as a template for their own practice.

Schools as Communities concludes with Part Four, a survey of our relationships with others. Whether we know it or not, the constituencies that a Christian school addresses include those who may be far outside of our immediate school setting. In chapter fifteen, Bruce Young makes the case for collaboration in Christian education. No community can exist without working together to achieve common goals and a mission shared by all. Drawing on Urie Bronfenbrenner’s ecological model, Young usefully restructures that multi-level model (once again, via Dooyeweerd’s pioneering schema) to produce a biblical framework for envisioning the larger perspectives of our work within the kingdom of God, and under his sovereign reign.

James C. Marsh then moves to the very significant question of the relationship between the educational leader and his or her board. Any leader who doesn’t realize fully the critical nature of this connection is a leader who will probably not last very long in that position. Marsh points out that statistics bear out the fact that there is trouble in paradise: according to a 2005 study, some 70% of all school leaders are fired, and do not leave voluntarily. There is no optimistic reading of this number; clearly “churn and burn” has become the model for many Christian schools. The author surveys the three main models of Christian school governance, and then outlines a number of recommendations for a redemptive, rewarding relationship between school leadership and its board. Only in this way, says Marsh, can we have any hope of reversing the current dreary attrition in Christian school administration.

Scot Headley and Stephen Cathers follow Marsh in their essay on continual school improvement. Drawing an important distinction between assessment and evaluation, Headley and Cathers seek to enhance educational community by the creation of a culture of quality, reflection, and ongoing reformation involving all members of a school. Their school evaluation cycle (Planning, Action, Assessment, and Reflection, 350) is a concise and very useful model for practicing excellence in all realms while simultaneously maintaining close relationships throughout the process. I see this as a very well-focused embodiment of the biblical principle that the apostle Paul stated when he advised Timothy, “Be diligent in these matters; give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress. Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save [that is, ‘benefit and bless’] both yourself and your hearers.” (I Timothy 4:15-16, NIV) In other words, our schools can only progress towards the standards of our Lord in these things if it constantly watches its life and teaching, thus blessing all the members of its community.

In the final chapter, Brian Fikkert reminds us that our schools should be places of shalom, seeking to produce students who fully and radically embody a biblical world and life view. To do this, they will need to be lovingly and wisely trained in how to engage every dimension of the world around them in the name of the Lord’s kingdom. There are significant challenges to every aspect of traditional Christian school operations here, but also prospects for very significant blessings in the lives of every member of a Christian school community as a result. James L. Drexler then concludes quite fittingly on how all these things, wisely and lovingly accomplished in our school communities, can redound to the glory of God, and the praise of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Early in this review, I mentioned the fact that I was curious to see how well Drexler and company delivered on the ambitious promise of the full title of Schools as Communities. I don’t think that anyone could be more sympathetic to their stated aim, but I also have seen enough of educational tomes to be a bit skeptical of whether or not this volume would delight more than it would disappoint. I am pleased to say that my doubts were unjustified, and that my hopes were fulfilled. Schools as Communities does a fine job of treating its subject from a number of vectors, giving its reader a well-balanced view of the challenges and possibilities for leaders in Christian school community building. Even those new to this world — for example, prospective Christian board members, or parents, or staff members — will find this book to be very useful as a guide to the issues and possible answers that they face.

Christian colleges and universities will also find it to be useful as a candidate textbook for undergraduate studies in education, and as an adjunctive textbook (at least) in graduate schools. Certainly graduate and doctoral programs will use this as a survey-level point of departure for further studies, but Schools as Communities will function quite well in that application. The resources listed are a treasure trove for the student, and will provide the researcher with a number of leads for improving their own professional library — always a good thing!

In conclusion, Schools as Communities turned out to be a genuine delight: a pleasure to read, well grounded in scriptural principle, current theory and practice, and embodying the very sort of Christian community that it advocates. What could be better? Consider this to be an enthusiastic recommendation by a person who is not usually impressed by many educational books, even those done in the name of the Lord….