By Nancy

 It can be easier to start from scratch, rather than change established systems. But if money was no object, and systemic obstacles were not a problem, here are five ways we could improve US education: staffing, facilities, schedule, setting standards, and teacher training.

1. Staffing: pay all teachers like professionals, increase paraprofessional pay, double the number of support staff and decrease class size across the grades. Administrative assistants for educators would allow teachers to delegate some tasks in order to focus on teaching, conferring, and planning. Volunteer coordinators at each site would schedule and facilitate use of the local community. school board members, administrators, and parents to become an integral part of each school (this would be a societal expectation).

2. Facilities: School buildings would be updated, well-maintained, comfortably furnished, inviting, and spacious. This would support fluid learning environments as well as eliminate physical obstacles for students and staff. Technology would be a given, updated regularly, and tech support would make it seamless and usable. There would not be separate facilities for administration, so that there is no "ivory tower" effect. On-site childcare from birth to kindergarten, with well-trained staff, would support families, child development, and provide a gradual transition into full-day academics. This support from birth on will help with numerous other issues as well. And as long as we are dreaming, some schools might share grounds with retail, industry, business sites.

3. Schedule: Year-long school is logical, cost-effective, and realistic in today's world. But don't stop there: learning resources should be available 24/7. Now that we have technology (see #2 above) online access might take care of most of this, but school sites may still be open from 7AM to 10 PM, 6 or 7 days a week. Most important with this new schedule (and increased staffing in #1 above) is that professional educators would be provided more time for planning, conferring, and collaborating. Direct teaching time would be no more than four hours per day (in line with other countries).

4. Standards: Teachers are the professionals, so should be key participants when developing any standards. Social promotion, grade levels organized by student age, and letter grades would be out; indivualized achievement of standards, and ungraded student groupings, would ensure that students are supported and successful. State and national standards boards would include professional educators to ensure quality and appropriate targets. Curriculum resources would be nationwide, free, and online, eliminating the use of outdated books and recurring textbook adoptions, saving major cash.

5. Teacher Time & support: The spectrum from pre-service teachers to veterans, would all receive support and funding for mentoring, to attend appropriate conferences, receive professional development training, pursue National Board certification, participate in standards boards, and promote continual growth and collaboration, within their regular work hours. Peer to peer collaboration is the norm, and all within the work day.

There are many ways we could improve education. Gathering ideas from teachers on the front lines is a great place to start. But how do we get there from here? Twenty years from now, will schools still look basically the same as they do today?