K12 Schools Must Fill Need For Digital Media Skills
There is a new urgency to teach digital media literacy as a study finds students are taking online information for granted
Last year, when the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC) put Rockland High School in Massachusetts on probation—largely because of its outdated science labs—it didn’t surprise Principal Stephen Sangster.
“The labs hadn’t really been touched since their construction. Some go back to 1959 and the rest to 1972,” Sangster explains. “They were in tough shape. Individual student work areas were worn. Doors would fall off. Occasionally we had to call a plumber to make sure the gas and the water worked safely. It was all in our self-evaluation, and we knew there was a problem across the state.”
Besides Rockland, just south of Boston, five other Massachusetts high schools also found themselves on probation from NEASC, which is responsible for renewing their accreditation (Rockland’s comes due in 2011). And a whopping two-thirds of the almost 100 schools seeking state construction funds over the past year cited aging science labs as a primary target.
LaMoine Motz, a former president of the National Science Teachers Association who has studied the declining state of many school science labs, says Massachusetts is hardly alone in its concerns. “We have a lot of old school buildings in the United States, and science labs feel their age more keenly than other classrooms,” he observes, adding that everything from cabinetry to ventilation systems are showing wear and tear. “A lot of teachers are telling me that their science facilities are in bad need of repair, from leaky faucets to gas jets that don’t work.”
“It’s very common for schools to shut off the gas rather than fix it,” adds Pamela Gray-Bennett, the director of NEASC’s commission on public secondary schools. But Gray-Bennett and others concerned with school science labs also insist that times are changing—propelled by rising state and national science standards and a greater push for the funding to bring those labs into the 21st century.
“There was a time when computer technology was taking up the money, but there’s been a major push for science labs,” says Lowell Shira, the assistant superintendent for business services for the San Lorenzo (Calif.) Unified School District, which opened nine new high school labs this fall and is building six more. “There’s been a lot of activity here in northern California in the past five years.”
Gray-Bennett points out that the evolution of today’s science standards has also meant expanding available laboratory space, both to promote inquiry learning and to leave no science student behind. “What good science instruction was 40 to 50 years ago is not the same as good science instruction now, and there were different expectations of which students were expected to take science,” she notes. “When all students are pushed to achieve at a higher level, they need to have access to science labs.”
The added emphasis also comes in the form of federal mandates under the No Child Left Behind law, which in the 2007-2008 year began requiring states to administer standards-based assessments to students in science in addition to reading and math. The science test results are not being counted as a factor in whether schools make adequate yearly progress under the law, but educators say that schools will be motivated to perform well because the scores will be made public.
“The real world is made up of science, and how we behave in and manage our environment—from natural resources to rainforests—is critical,” adds Motz, who directs science education for Oakland County (Mich.) Schools and consults nationally on designing modern science labs. “So we’re trying to design labs that will invite all kids into science.”
With that goal in mind, Motz recently co-authored a revision of the NSTA Guide to Planning School Science Facilities. “The guide really tries to fix the image that science is an area where students do a lab just once in a while,” he explains. “A lot of people felt, ‘Science isn’t important in our curriculum, so why should we improve our lab?’ That attitude is changing.”
Paying the Price
Change doesn’t come cheaply, though. Depending on the region of the country and whether you’re renovating an existing science lab or building a new one, construction costs can reach $150 to $200 per square foot, according to Motz and other experts, an especially daunting proposition, considering that NSTA recommends 1,440 square feet for a lab serving 24 students. Adding laboratory furniture and cabinets can cost another $25,000 to $60,000 per room.
"We have a lot of old school buildings in the United States, and science labs feel their age more keenly than other classrooms." -LaMoine Motz, director of science education, Oakland County (Mich.) Schools
