One of the things I love most about my job is that I am often able to talk at length with students. In the past year or so, I have spent time interviewing primary, secondary and tertiary-level students in Panama, Nigeria, Colombia, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Morocco and Vietnam.

Typically, I have been seeking their input on technology plans I’ve been developing for a school or a Ministry of Education. I also ask them to assess the impact of teacher professional development I’ve designed and delivered. Invariably, such discussions touch on teaching, learning, curriculum, technology, school reform, and the nature of learning.

Despite cultural, geographic, economic and demographic variation, there’s often a universality among student views and beliefs around education. Since so many education programs are often conceived, planned, operationalized and evaluated in a top-down manner, without student voice, I offer here a few predominant themes across these conversations (cognizant, of course, that such themes represent the views of students with whom I’ve spoken, not necessarily broader populations or contexts).

For many students, education is aspirational

Education is about fulfilling dreams—to be a football manager, monk, engineer, astronaut, pilot, teacher, business owner, doctor.  Students, many of whom are poor, often arrive at a school with little more than dreams, laying them “at the (school’s) feet,” (1) hoping that an education will confer on them the knowledge, skills, opportunities and dispositions to attain these dreams.

Yet instead of fostering such dreams, many education systems trample them—because of the poor quality of education students receive, because of a dearth of learning resources, because families cannot afford the money needed for tutoring or examinations, because of high-stakes examination systems that are designed so that only the few, versus the many, advance in the education system. This is often the greatest crime of poor education.

For many students, access to quality education is tenuous, even in non-fragile countries

Talking with students in non-fragile, middle-income countries drives home the realization that access to education isn’t just tenuous in the world’s poorest countries. In Panama and Morocco, many boys with whom I spoke feel pressure to quit school and make money (either in legitimate or illicit work). For such boys, going to school has enormous opportunity costs—it prevents them from earning money while offering an education that they view as irrelevant.

In rural Morocco students shared how many of their female classmates, despite strong academic promise, often leave school because their parents want them to marry or because there is no accommodation at the school hostel.

For primary school students in Nigeria, a lack of transportation and frequent teacher strikes imperil access to school. Despite such difficulties, and despite the poor quality of education they receive, a surprising number of students with whom I have spoken this past year still see education and learning as valuable and do not give up on the system, even when the system appears to have given up on them.

Students are aware of what is helpful and not helpful in their own learning

As the daily ”clients” of school and the direct recipients of teaching, students understand education in a way that adults in the education system do not. As such, they often understand what works and doesn’t work in terms of their own learning, and why. When I’ve asked students what would make school more valuable for them, their answers cluster along the following axes.

The first theme concerns school climate. Students with whom I’ve spoken want the adults in the education system to value them and ask for their ideas. Indeed, they want their teachers and principals to care about them. This idea of being cared for and listened to is central to students wanting to remain and succeed in school.

The second focuses on curriculum. Students may not always value the education they receive, but they do value education in general. Though no student with whom I spoke has used the terms, “curriculum reform” or “competency-based learning,” most students have advocated the study of relevant content (English, technology) and want to move beyond memorizing information to acquiring real-world skills that will prepare them for the world of work.

The third theme focuses on instruction, discussed in the next point.

Students understand what good teaching is—whether or not they get it

Most students I have interviewed in the last year or so are educated in systems in which instruction is didactic, uniform, and teacher-centered. Students may have learned to work within that system but they recognize that such teaching does little to foster deep learning.

Indeed, when I have asked students what instructional practices would improve their learning, their views often echo the research on good instruction—instruction that is active, engaging, that promotes collaboration and that focuses on real world tasks.

In Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, from where I’ve just returned, students spoke at length about how teacher adoption of less teacher-centered and more interactive instructional practices improved not just student mastery of content, but their enjoyment of learning, and teacher-student relationships.

We should get in the habit of listening to students

I learned when I was teaching to solicit ideas from my students and I incorporated many of their ideas to improve my own teaching. I’ve found that students, despite sometimes lacking maturity, experience and vocabulary, often pinpoint the most salient issues that can help enhance educational interventions.

As an example, in my work in technology strategic planning in the United States, Lebanon, Panama, Ecuador and Indonesia, I have sought out students and found their ideas around technology to be critical in the design of national strategies. (For one thing, they are not as besotted with technology as the adults and are gimlet eyed in their analysis of its limitations.) My discussions with students over the past year (and in years past) reinforce my belief that we should seek out student views on what works and what doesn’t work as we design interventions that impact them.

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Vast aid complexes have been developed to deal with issues of access to and quality of educational systems. Many of these resulting educational initiatives target students as the ultimate beneficiaries of such efforts. But in our fealty to bureaucracies and their demands for metrics, indicators, reporting and accountability, we often overlook the non-measurable human dimensions of our efforts and the individual aspirations, experiences and vulnerabilities of our intended beneficiaries—students.

Talking with students over the last year has been a reminder to me that our ultimate clients are not donors but students. It’s been a reminder to me that what we do and how we do it—the thoughtfulness, quality and thoroughness of our actions and efforts—impact these young people. And it’s been a reminder to me that as those of us in education guide and instruct young people in their journey through life that we must tread softly for we tread on their dreams (1)

Reference

(1) I’ve stolen brazenly (and clumsily) from W.B. Yeats’ very beautiful Aedh wishes for the cloths of heaven