Transcript Educational Reforms K-12 in Sultanate of Oman and United

Doing it for,
doing it to
or doing it with?
By:
Earle J Warnica Ed D
Professor of Education
American University of Ras Al Khaimah
United Arab Emirates
“Education reform isn’t
exactly rocket
science: it’s tougher,”

Dr. Mick Randall, in The National,
12/28/09
Overview
 Brief description of reforms in Ministries of
Education of UAE and Oman
 Were they successful?
 What the literature says about making reform
work: what does work?
 Proposed Reform Model
 Conclusion: When are schools “good enough”?
Common Features of Oman and UAE
Reforms:
 both were “top-down” models
 both started with reports by outside
consultants group
 both had a vision: world class education
 both hired foreign advisors to lead reform
 both had strong support from government
Observation by
Presenter
WHY??
Then why did one reform succeed
- while the other did not?
Let’s let the literature help us decide.
Michael Fullan (1988)
“Resistance to reform is a reality to be
recognized and to overcome.”
“Reform often misfires because we fail to learn
from those who disagree with us”.
“Resistance can actually be highly
instructive”.
Judith Zimmerman (2006)
“Resistance is a major factor in reform
failure”
provided research-based strategies to promote
change and steps to overcome resistance:
-
shared decision-making
 professional development
 principals’ modeling
 preparedness for limiting resistance.

Art Costa in
“The School as a Learning Community”
“changing public education is like. . .
moving a cemetery;
after you’ve done all the work,
you still have a cemetery”.
Sergiovanni (2007)
. . . building community must become
the heart of any school reform effort
Hedley Beare (2001)
There is a fixation with the
status quo of education:
“If we remain wedded to the way
education is currently provided
we cannot imagine other ways.
We need some imagination, some fantasy,
some new ways of thinking
– some magic, in fact.”
Roland Barth
“Rarely do outside school remedies work
their way into the fabric of the schools
or into the teachers’ lives,
and more rarely into the classrooms.
Therefore they only offer
a modest hope of influencing
the basic culture of the school”.
Roland Barth
“Too much emphasis has been placed
on reforming schools from the outside
through policies and mandates.
Too little has been paid to how schools
can be shaped from within”.
Stoll and Fink
'Many of our schools are good schools
if only this were 1965'.
‘Are we educating students for our
past or their future?’ (Anon.)
Peter Senge (1994)
“You cannot have a learning organization
without a shared vision.”
“A shared vision provides a compass
to keep learning on course
when stress develops.”
Michael Fullan (1994)
“Neither top-down nor bottom-up
strategies for educational reform work;
What is required is
a more sophisticated blend of the two”.
“What matters most is local motivation,
skill, know-how and commitment””
Kalman R. Hettleman, 2010,
“It’s the Classroom, Stupid
(School Reform Where it Counts most)”.
“education administrators resist change,
protect their turf . . .”,
and mismanage classroom instruction
due to their lack of management skills”
Kalman R. Hettleman, 2010,
“Management reforms must find their way
onto the public radar and into classroom
teaching and learning.
Even the best and brightest teachers must
get more support than they now get.
It’s the classroom, stupid. The future of
school reform won’t succeed otherwise.”
Howard Levin,
Stanford Professor of Economics
“A school isn’t good enough
until it is good enough for our own children.
In fact, it’s not only that it must be
good enough for our own children,
but it must be the dream school we want
for our children”
What can we conclude
from the literature?
 The school is the unit of change.
 The key to successful educational reform is
leadership.
 And leadership is not restricted to principals,
nor is leadership synonymous with
management.
 Successful reforms require leadership by
teachers and by principals.
Applying the Research
to UAE and Oman
 Led by Local Omani educators in MoE
(the public face of the reform was Omani)
 Many Omanis in MoE were sent abroad for
graduate study in education and returned to
senior leadership positions
 Foreign Consultants “advised” and mentored
but decision-making was Omani
“doing it with”
 Oman’s reform was gradual and spread
over several years
 All stakeholders were involved, trained,
and ‘won-over” – teachers, principals,
zone officials, parents, public
• Professional development was
comprehensive, and sustained over
many years
• The vision became their own
• Schools have reformed and continue
to reform
UAE Reforms
 Office of Policy and Planning was
established to lead the reform
– all foreign educators
 Ministry was reorganized by OPP
 Little to no input from senior MoE staff
 After the fact, MoE staff were informed
and expected to “buy in”
UAE Reforms
 Met by “passive resistance” by MoE leaders,
zones, principals, teachers
 Minister received and approved the reforms
 But – most reforms were never implemented
 Reforms were perceived to be “foreign”, and
could not work in UAE
 “Passive resistance’
resistance”!
had
become
“active
One bright spot (a glimmer of hope)
in the UAE reform movement:
Madares Al Ghad (MAG) program
‘Schools of The Future’
has had some success in the approximately
forty project schools and is in the third year
of implementation.
It remains to be seen if the Ministry and
government will expand MAG across the
nation or simply let it die quietly.
A government in a hurry said
“Do it for them”
But locals perceived that
foreigners were there to
“Do it to them”
Implementation did not happen
Implementation never happened
even though new standards
had been developed or adopted
for curriculum, assessment, teachers,
principals, professional
development
Syndrome
It could be argued that in UAE MoE:
“Talking about reforms is
as good as having done them”
in UAE reform?
 New Minister (2009)
 Contracts cancelled for foreign
consultants/advisors
 New reform plans being developed –
virtually the same focus as the
previous
Maybe this time
the reforms will be
implemented?
A Model for Educational Reform
Educational Reform and
Improvement Model
 School-Based with external input
 Bottom-up with Top-down support
The Model
 individual schools within pods of
schools
 teachers and principals as leaders of
the reforms
 MoE Educational Zone in a support
role
The Model
 UAE federal Ministry of Education in
role of setting national standards
and policies
 universities and colleges in
collaborative role with schools and
pods of schools
The school as the
basic unit of change
 Some teachers and principals in graduate study
 Each school adopts its own plans and priorities for
change
 Teachers and principals enrolled in graduate
education programs take the lead in reforming their
own school and contribute to the reforms of the pod
of schools
The school as the
basic unit of change
 Staff professional development (PD) should be
focused at each school or pod of schools; large
scale PD program imposed and delivered from
above have little impact on schools and learning
 Parent and community information and support
Pods of Schools
 Feeder schools, geographic proximity
 Collaboration and support between schools of
the pod – teachers and principals
 Regular meetings to share and learn together
 Joint professional development as needed
Ministry of Education
Education Zone



Agreement with the reform model, plans;
support to each pod and school within the pod
to implement
Relaxation of some existing policies and
procedures to allow/encourage innovation
Changed role of supervisors to be supporters of
reform, not inspectors and maintainers of
status quo
Ministry of Education UAE
Professional development
as requested by the schools/pods
and within the MoE professional
development standards
Ministry of Education UAE
 Nation-wide standards for curriculum,
assessment, examination reform,
professional development, standards for
teachers
 Nation-wide professional development
as required for the implementation of
the various MoE standards
Ministry of Education UAE
 Support for education zones and
schools/pods reforms through relaxation
of existing policies and procedures
 Financial incentives and support for zone
and local reforms
Universities and Colleges

Faculty members involved in each pod of
schools: team-work, collaboration, advising,
modeling

PD assistance when requested

Graduate programs (M Ed) for teachers and
principals

Grad program learnings put into practice in
schools
So - What can the MoE do?
MoE
- Trapped with “in the box”
thinking (not “outside the box”).
- There are so many educational “boxes”:
textbooks, teaching methods, examinations, traditional
supervisors (promoting practices of the last century),
poorly educated teachers, old rules, policies, procedures
and ways of thinking, virtually guaranteeing that
nothing will change.
MoE
 An education ministry needs education!
 Senior leadership, department directors
and key personnel are desperately in
need of graduate study in education.
 Accept and support a new model of
reform
How will we know when education
reform in UAE becomes a reality?

When Ministry leadership, educators
and parents at all levels deem that they
will send their own children to
government schools.

Until that happens, the schools are
neither “dream schools” nor “good
enough!