EAI Teaching Methods
The Sun has done quite a few articles on EAI's contract with Baltimore City, covering School Superintendent Walter Amprey's apparent loss of objectivity and the adjustment of statistics by EAI's panel of analysts.
I have seen virtually no investigation, however, of two other critical aspects of EAI's work. The first pertains to teaching methods, and the second to a basic question about possible inequities in per-pupil funding.
There are no deep and dark secrets in the realm of methodology. Given a firm understanding of numerical concepts and language structure, any competent teacher can lead her students through the early ABCs and 1-2-3s.
A love of teaching, effective behavior management strategies and administrative support in dealing with truly unmanageable children are the other necessary factors in the equation.
If waxed floors, rocking chairs, puppets and computers were sufficient for improving basic skills, the Tesseract scores should be unambiguous by now. They are not.
No amount of equipment can make up for the program's lack of theoretical underpinnings.
While working with special education children in a Tesseract school, I happened to watch an excellent math lesson in a regular classroom. The teacher used simple plastic chips and led the enthusiastic class through a well-conceptualized introduction to addition.
This teacher's students were succeeding before Tesseract came town, and will do so after.
In the same school, a poorly-trained teacher floundered and drowned in the middle of all the shiny new props.
Her students looked impressively studious whenever EAI officials toured the building, and they ran the hallways as soon as an entourage would leave.
By contrast, I spent some time last year in a non-Tesseract but comparable school. An ordinary first grade class was making extraordinary progress in reading. The teacher has firm control of the class and a deep understanding of how to build sounds into words and words into sentences.
By May her children were attacking anything with print on it. What were her "high-tech" tools? Individual slate boards and chalk for each child.
Any thorough assessment of EAI should focus on a clear-eyed analysis of its teaching methods. Without help for teachers in behavior management, without a sequential and systematic conceptual framework, all of the material goods and pep rallies are just trimmings on an empty package.
A realistic comparison of Baltimore City and EAI schools must include an honest explanation of the per-pupil funding formula. In receiving the Baltimore City average of $5,918 per pupil, it appears to me that EAI has an unfair advantage.
The average is skewed upward because Baltimore City must fund some students with extremely expensive needs. For example, it supports each child at Baer School with over $29,000 a year, and each student at Harbor View with $22,000.
This leaves the city in reality with closer to $3,000 for any student with no special needs. If it is true that EAI receives nearly $6,000 for these same children, they have negotiated an enviable advantage for themselves.
To make a valid comparison of EAI and Baltimore City schools, a pilot group of city schools needs to have similar decision-making autonomy, plus $6,000 for each "regular" child.
We could then see whether the schools hire aides, buy computers, improve test scores.
And, as a bonus, any leftover money could be plowed back into our own school system, rather then leaving the state in the form of corporate profits.
Adine Panitch
Hunt Valley
Finding Real Solutions to Urban Sprawl's Devastation
Walter T. Anderson (Opinion * Commentary, Nov. 23) discussed the interesting change pending in World Bank environmental priorities: toward the challenges of cities where the majority of world population will soon be residing.
Mr. Anderson calls this shift in emphasis an "opening salvo in a new controversy about environmentalism," calling into question its purported primary focus upon a non-anthropocentric world view -- one which favors a "non-urban, low-density vision of the future . . ."
Mr. Anderson's premise simplifies and distorts a complicated global construct.
Two core tenets of environmentalism, and the cornerstones of its historical development, will always be (1) its belief in the interrelatedness of natural systems, and (2) its understanding that plants and animals have their own inherent worth and sanctity.
But Mr. Anderson has turned true environmentalism on its head with his artificial distinction between concern for the cities and environmentalists' "traditional" concern for the countryside.
I can't agree with his conclusion that the seemingly singular reason why conservationists might join in this "new" endeavor is because of the connection between rural ecosystems and the cities that need them for sustenance -- though that is surely true.
In fact, the primary reasons why environmentalists can and should embrace this new emphasis represent nearly the converse of Mr. Anderson's argument.
First, we must attend to the great and growing problems of cities if we are ever to resolve some of the weightiest dilemmas of the countryside -- one of the most important of which is surely its willy-nilly displacement by and conversion to urbanized use.
Second, the environmental problems of the world's mega-cities reach far beyond those cities' borders, and the borders themselves have become so vast that tens of thousands of square miles are directly impacted by a wide variety of intense environmental insults.
The first point is crucial, and those of us involved in both urbanism and environmentalism have understood it for some years.
As cities inefficiently sprawl ever outward into the hinterland, beyond the fiscal and physical means to effectively serve such growth with city services and appropriate infrastructure, they lose the comparative advantage that made them of such central importance to begin with.
They lose tax-paying citizens and businesses. Their educational system suffers greatly. As economic opportunity diminishes, the social pathology of crime increases.
They become dysfunctional and hollow cores in urban regions that spread irrespective of natural laws or resource constraints.
Then, the dysfunctionality itself spreads outward, encumbering inner ring suburbs with the same problems that beset the inner core.
Of essential importance, the sprawl of mega-cities and urban regions gobbles up farmland, forest, wetland and stream valley with relative impunity.
These are, of course, resources that we now know help the "city" to survive and prosper, but they are also of great natural consequence in and of themselves.
The second point is also of paramount significance to environmentalists.
Compared to the environmental degradation in some of the world's urban regions, we in the Chesapeake Bay watershed -- vast as it is and influenced as it is by the great eastern U.S. megalopolis -- appear fortunate. Yet growth and development here, of an expected 3 million more people in just a few years hence, is one of the Chesapeake Bay's most pressing problems.
Indeed, the way land is used -- our patterns for living and moving across the landscape -- is the bay's single most limiting factor toward restoration and health.
And so, too, around the world. The problems of air pollution in greater Cairo and Bangkok (mainly from cars, trucks and other mobile sources) are not just affecting the health and eventual welfare of those cities' tens of millions of inhabitants; those problems have much broader regional ramifications on crops and on the water quality of the Nile and Chao Pya rivers.
The burning of soft brown coal to heat some of Eastern Europe's emerging city-state economies in the Czech Republic, such as the great cities of Prague and Most, has far-reaching ramifications beyond the violation of World Health Organization sulphur dioxide standards, including the decimation of vast forest areas beyond the urban frontier.
The disposal of urban and industrial solid, hazardous and sewage wastes in Hong Kong and Manila and from urban centers on Taiwan and Macao has extensive water quality and fisheries impacts in surrounding rivers, bays and seas.
Unless we help resolve the problems of cities, we cannot hope to resolve the natural resource and environmental problems of the countryside. It is that simple.
And it is something that environmentalists have appreciated for decades, although I admit that our attention has admittedly been directed to other, more seemingly immediate (and readily understood) battles.
Stating as Mr. Anderson has, that environmentalists "tend to favor a non-urban, low-density vision of the future," does a great disservice to all but the most narrow of reasoned environmental leadership.
Such a vision neither recognizes the reality of the world situation (which most rational environmentalists do), nor accurately describes environmentally effective solutions to the problem of dispersed and land-expansive urban populations.
Real solutions to the environmental devastation of sprawl encompass precisely opposite visions: compact and fairly dense, but clean, efficient and urbane population centers -- cities, towns and villages surrounded by a conserved countryside of farm and forest.
I don't think the World Bank's newly announced initiative is a "salvo" in any war -- except, perhaps auspiciously, a war to reclaim the health and welfare of cities and thus, inherently, of nature itself.
Lee R. Epstein
Annapolis
The writer directs the Lands Program of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation.
Christmas Spirit
We must stop singing "Joy to the World," "Oh Holy Night," "Peace on Earth," "Hark the Herald Angels," and so on.
After all, these denote the real meaning of Christmas, which is neither politically correct nor socially acceptable by today's enlightened standards.
We must say "happy holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas." In this manner, we get rid of the whole, nasty, Christian overtone.
We must keep it sterile and hollow, so that we can celebrate without a conscience and without meaning.
We must find other things to celebrate as a replacement and justify this celebration with something that has no Christian implications.
We must not offend anyone by sharing Christmas' true meaning, that even our forefathers and founding fathers based a nation on and held in reverence.
After all, these are modern times, and we are so much wiser than those who precede us.
Let us not be bothered or burdened by knowledge of whose birthday it celebrates and the horrible things his birth represents.
The mere mention of these things anywhere is an obvious attempt at Christian indoctrination.
However, other groups may freely discuss their beliefs and display meaningful representations of these beliefs without the degree of hostility accorded to the Christian community.
Since when is the mention of a precious gift a crime? Since we have stopped believing or caring about that which has everlasting value and honor; self-actualization and therapy have replaced God and his teachings.
Christians will always share, not force, their knowledge and understanding of this great gift with those who choose to know its meaning, for the spirit of Christmas is the spirit of Christ.
Unfortunately, many alleged and professing Christians are indeed hypocrites and infrequently reflect the spirit of Christmas or Christ. Will you let such people keep you from your gift? Don't use them as an excuse, for we are ultimately responsible for our choices.
We will cherish Christmas' true meaning, for Christ is always with us, with or without the world's permission . . .
George Harrison
Bel Air
Take My Car
In response to Barbara Johnson's Dec.14 letter about the enhanced vehicle emissions inspection and maintenance program that is due to go into effect on Jan. 1, I am tired of people belly-aching about handing their precious car to an attendant to check for air pollution control problems.
Every time we drive our car into a Jiffy Lube or other type of automotive store to have our car tuned, they do exactly the same thing as the enhanced inspection and maintenance mechanic will do, and probably with less training.
One of the reasons Maryland decided to go with a program that is not carried out by our local repair facilities is so that we will not have the mechanics taking advantage of us by saying our cars failed and have to have hundreds of dollars in repairs completed at their station.
As for Ms. Johnson's insensitive remarks about the people with lung disease who have caused their disability because of smoking, and that she will gladly accept the 11 days of bad air, I want to point out that there are 60,000 children with asthma in our state who, while spending many hours outdoors in the summertime, have severe asthma attacks from high ozone days and the many other summer days that are not declared "high."
I hope our new governor-elect, Parris N. Glendening, will see that this program is a small price for citizens to pay for protecting our health.
I want the children of our great state to grow up with cleaner air than we have now. If that means that I have to let my car be tested, and fixed if necessary, then I will gladly do it.
Shelley Buckingham
Towson
@
Emissions Tests
So, Gov. William Donald Schaefer is going to do us a favor by exempting certain vehicles from the auto-emission testing program. Sorry, it doesn't wash.
Somebody doesn't understand the problem. I do not want some clown playing with my car in the emissions test.
I don't care about the cost of the test, I care about letting somebody I don't know behind the wheel of my car.
I absolutely refuse to allow my car to be subjected to this type of testing. You would do us a service if you will tell us how to refuse this testing and what that will cost.
I would rather pay a fee than let some cretin take control of my car.
Emily Johnson
Westminster
Business Handouts
Regarding your recent article (Dec. 11) and editorial (Dec. 13) taking the Baltimore Development Corp. to task for failure to serve up government benefits quick enough to suit corporate Baltimore, I see failure at a different level. Why should successful corporations such as Waverly Inc. and Alex. Brown Inc. expect and be given government handouts in the first place?
In an age when the need for government entitlement programs is being re-examined at the national level, it is time for government at all levels to stop competing to subsidize corporate America.
If government would concentrate on providing basic services competently and efficiently, then perhaps corporations would stop complaining and looking for handouts in the first place.
Patrick D. Hanley
Sparks
Medical Firing
The controversy surrounding the termination of Dr. Sam Ritter and Dr. Rebecca Snider from the Johns Hopkins University medical faculty (news article, Dec. 12) is not surprising.
During recruitment, it is typical that mutually agreeable, explicit expectations and benchmarks of success are established.
Their termination and the subsequent lawsuit indicates that there is now lack of agreement about those expectations and benchmarks. Dr. Amnon Rosenthal's comment that the Hopkins service had languished for the last decade is unfortunate. The Hopkins has produced major advances in the clinical practice and the basic science of cardiovascular disease.
Two Hopkins faculty moved to leadership positions at other important academic medical centers.
Hopkins has some of the best cardiac surgical results of the programs in the Middle Atlantic region, and they compare favorably to the best programs in the country.
Finally, Dr. Snider's academic record and Dr. Ritter's lecture skills have been and will continue to be admired.
They will continue to be respected for their accomplishments and will undoubtedly find positions of leadership in our field.
Kenneth G. Zahka, M.D.
Cleveland
The writer, a former Johns Hopkins faculty member, is director of pediatric cardiology at Rainbow Babies & Childrens Hospital, Cleveland.