Contemplating criteria for science education reform: The case of the Olympia school district

School Science and Mathematics, Nov 1998 by Tippins, Deborah, Weiseman, Katherine, Nichols, Sharon E

As sellers of a "product," SCC members used a variety of approaches to market their curriculum information. Calvin, a middle school teacher and advocate of the integrated science approach to teaching, used a direct, motivational approach in his attempts to sell teachers at his school on the curriculum decisions endorsed by the middle school teacher representatives on the SCC:

Change is in the wind...and you're gonna like it!..."Reform!" has been the rallying cry for science education in recent years. Leading the charge in this movement is the AAAS [American Advancement for the Association of Science]. Now the reform movement is taking root in Olympia District! The most significant moment for middle school science came on Thursday, June 22. It was on that day that all the middle-level teachers on the committee voted unanimously to convert to an integrated approach to science. This means dumping the traditional "layer cake" approach in which general science is taught at sixth, life science at seventh, and earth science at eighth grade...It is broke, and it does need to be fixed! (Calvin, reflective letter)

Mary, using a less direct marketing approach, requested support from teachers at her school. She wrote the following in her summer reflective letter using a memorandum format:

To: K-5 Teachers

Concerning: Adventures of the Science Dream Team For the past school year Heather, Polly and I have been involved in an adventure-planning exciting changes in science curriculum and teaching for our school and all other schools in Olympia. We just spent an intensive, but enjoyable week in a science curriculum workshop at Northeast School. In talking with teachers from the district over the past year, it is apparent that we have, as a school district, let down our students in science at the elementary level. We are looking forward to talking and working with you, when school begins, to get your ideas, suggestions, opinions, etc., as we continue the revision process this coming year. We will keep you posted on the Dream Team's progress. (Mary, reflective letter)

While teachers varied with respect to their roles as buyers or sellers in the transactions of the marketplace, they shared a common understanding of the "goods" or "products" that are central to the science education reform initiative. "Goods" in this reform marketplace included those which SCC members named and discussed in their letters of reflection and interviews: "work on the philosophy and vision statement for science education in Olympia School District," putting the "curriculum-on-the-wall," and "the process of adopting a new science textbook." Queenie described the development of a curriculum product in her summer 1995 reflective letter to faculty at her school:

Once we had in mind what we felt was necessary to provide a dynamic, effective science program, we were ready to begin seeing how our Olympia curriculum fit the Georgia Framework of Learning in Science. [Olympia] objectives were colorcoded by grade level on the Big Ideas, Habits of Mind, and Vehicles of Understanding charts so we could see which objectives were one, two, or three dimensional. These charts also made it easy to see where gaps in our curriculum occurred. From these charts our band [grades 3-5] discussed the possibility of switching certain units so they'd be more developmentally appropriate.