Area educators met at Baker University Center Ballroom Monday to view Gov. Ted Strickland's speech on K-12 education reform via video feed and to make their own suggestions for strengthening a hobbling system.
Broadcasted from Marietta College, the discussion was the ninth in a series of 12 in which Strickland shares his six principles for education reform while looking to the audience and viewers at home to submit their own concerns.
You know that every parent
certainly every student every teacher every business person
every tax payer
in fact every Ohioan has something very important at stake when we discuss education in Ohio
Strickland said.
Ohio needs to recognize what is wrong with the current state of education before it can effectively present ideas for an improved system, he said.
I would begin by pointing out the fact that there are educational practices that we are pursuing in Ohio and in our country today that quiet frankly were created centuries ago when we were a fully agrarian society
Strickland said.
The governor urged citizens to think boldly and to shift their focus from what has been done to what could be done to improve Ohio schools.
I want us to look at the canvas as if it is a blank canvas and we're asking what is the very best thing we can create here
said Strickland.
He kicked off the conversation by acknowledging that it's impossible to see into the future with total clarity.
Some of the highest demanded jobs today require skills and are in career fields that simply did not exist as recently as 20 years ago
Strickland said.
The discussion also centered on what employers want out of graduates.
I make the distinction between going to school to learning what to think verses going to school and learning how to think
said Jerry Jurgensen, CEO of Nationwide.
Although Strickland's goal with the open forums is to discuss new ideas rather than funding, money is still on the minds of some Ohio educators.
Many teachers have had innovative ideas for a while now but lack the money to make those changes possible, said Tom Gibbs, superintendent of Warren Local School District.
The attendees then broke off into groups to bring together ideas and come up with three main goals that would best serve in reforming Ohio's education system.
A group headed by John D. Costanzo, superintendent of the Athens-Meigs Educational Service Center, offered some of their opinions on the best ways to go about achieving Gov. Strickland's goals.
Compare Vinton County and Meigs County to Upper Arlington
said Janis Tysko, a second grade teacher at Morrison Elementary School in Athens. Somehow the equality needs to be better.
Noriko Kantake, a post-doctoral fellow who was representing the Southeastern Ohio chapter of the Autism Society of America, agreed with the problems presented by institutional inequity.
Regional disparity data shows us again and again how poorly Southeastern residents are served
