Academic excellence and our children's future

Are you thoughtful and demanding of education? I assume that parents who choose a Wornick education think deeply about education and academic excellence. We sacrifice both time and money to give our children a valuable inheritance – an educational foundation that prepares them to succeed and lead as adults. Imagine if you had access to the priorities of the hiring managers from Google, Cisco, Apple, Johnson & Johnson, US Army and more as well as admissions officers from top medical, law and business school to be certain your child was getting the education they'd need to compete in the marketplace as an adult.

Dr. Tony Wagner did that research and synthesized his findings in his book, The Global Achievement Gap, which is a must read for anybody who cares about K-12 education. And if you are joining one of our focus groups on academic excellence, it’s almost a requirement. Remember – the first focus group is this Monday (Click here to RSVP for October 4th from 7:00PM - 9:00PM). It will be stimulating and exciting.

If you buy it through this link, Wornick receives a commission from Amazon (buy all your Amazon books this way and help our school!) 

Tony spoke at the inaugural Common Ground 2010-2011 last night and Dr. Gereboff and I had breakfast with him Tuesday morning.

Tony interviewed business and civic leaders around the world to ascertain what skills and attributes they needed from their workforce. His research demonstrates that US educational policy in the last 25 years is not generating a competitive citizenry that can grow the US economy in the 21^st century. His book highlights the seven survival skills for success in the 21^st century and the schools and programs innovating to ensure their graduates have at least the 4Cs and potentially the Seven Survival Skills.

According to all the leaders he interviewed, the 4 most critical survival skills are:

• Critical thinking and problem solving – evidenced by students who ask really good questions
• Collaboration – evidenced by students working together and leading by influence
• Creativity, curiosity and imagination – the ability to develop many different possibilities, quickly
• Communication – both oral and written communication

Dr. Gereboff and Tony have no doubt that K-8 education can develop these four critical survival skills in our students. Dr. Gereboff and our entire faculty committed this year to developing the assessments that enable us to track progress on these survival skills. They are committed to accountability in education – by measuring what matters and tracking our students’ and school’s progress.

It’s reasonable as you think about Academic Excellence to think about content literacy. In order to demonstrate mastery of any of these survival skills, students must be literate in facts – but no high school or college professor complains about students’ lack of content knowledge.  They know that students (and workers) today can access content in real-time from their laptop, iPad, phone. They report that students cannot write, organize their work, manage their time or set up study groups.

The remaining three survival skills are agility and adaptability, accessing and analyzing information, intiative and entrepreneurism. These are also visible elements of a Wornick education – I know I saw these skills being developed in 3^rd grade and already plenty visible in 4^th grade.

The seven survival skills are built upon a solid social, emotional and ethical foundation. Qualities such as empathy, integrity, kindness, self-motivation and personal excellence are critical. Wornick instills these values and educates our children on our people’s development of these.

How do you define academic excellence?  How do you measure attainment of it? Do the seven survival skills resonate with you? Should Wornick be known as the school where children learn them? If you enjoy thinking about these questions, please come to one of the strategic planning focus groups.

Click here to RSVP for October 4th from 7:00PM - 9:00PM

Click here to RSVP for October 19th from 7:00PM - 9:00PM