and now gathering all info here.
guys..we need your expertise/wisdom/insight…
please. and thank you kindly.
1. what we’re seeking specifically is a list of or info on uni’s that currently accept alternative means for admission, ie: eportfolios, etc.
2. and then i guess too, is #1 even a good question.
what’s going through our minds just now:
many people are doing cool things in ed.
most people are afraid to.
it appears their fears are mostly related to risk involved in changing course. (which we believe is a greater risk, no?)
so say – we have a means for all (true nclb) to be successful in life.
and we want to convince people to give it a go. seems (at least in our brains right now) that accountability/acceptance/validation measures are the big roadblocks. top questions that usually dampen the energy of the cool things happening in ed:
1) what about the mandated standardized tests (that drives a lot of hours in the day)
2) what about college admissions (that drives a lot of our standardized tests)
i’m currently reading the personalized highschool – where they showcase about 8 schools doing accountability via eportfolio.
i listened to Gary Stager last night talk about working with the maine youth center project – he said this:
these kids tried to keep journals, eportfolios, but these kids were deeply damaged.. so decided – every morning make a to do list.. at end of day take a picture of what you did and that’s your documentation.
he used the term detox – yeah.. detox
the documentation interfered with that they wanted to do – the meaningful stuff
kids were keeping secret portfolios – if it was their idea it was ok – Gary said his mantra is – less us more them
first quarter in the lab we did a round-about way to bypass grades. more like a check in. i wanted them to have space to self-construct.
because of some of their revelations, we are asking each one in the lab to find/clear one person to give them their grade 2nd quarter. (we have to have grades – one reason we’re going for a connected adjacency next year.)
seems accountability is not only what is keeping people from moving forward but it is the one thing that is watering down potential.
could it be so simple as a daily to do list? how do we convince college admissions to buy in to alternative measures? is that a good focus of our energy now?
i know a group at our local uni that i join weekly talks about how they can’t run a class like they want because by the time the kids get there – they need so many rules to get things done. this need for rules/instructions we think is a by-product of the standardized tests and college admissions process.
what do you, dear friends, think/know/believe?…
what i'm hearing (thank you everyone):
eportfolios
- william and mary - home school requirements
- A Harvard University (MA) admissions officer said most of their home-educated students "have done very well. They usually are very motivated in what they do." Results of the SAT and SAT II, an essay, an interview, and a letter of recommendation are the main requirements for home-educated applicants. "[Transcripts are] irrelevant because a transcript is basically a comparison to other students in the school."
wow - read through the hsdla - above
esp under a positive college experience
- washington college
- the new global student
- Goddard College
- Hampshire College
- Marlboro College
- Antioch Universities
- Brown University
- Prescott College
- Naropa University
- College of the Atlantic
- Sterling College
- Goddard College is a progressive, independent college located in Central Vermont.
I came to Goddard’s EDU program with 32 years in public schools and with three graduate degrees. What I can say is that the final product (undergraduate’s senior study or graduate student’s thesis) of many of our students is equal to or exceeds the work I did for my doctoral thesis at Harvard’s GSE. We are a learning community that takes our passions and challenges seriously, on an individual and collective level.
teach creativity - via chad and kirsten
http://classroots.org/feed/
hacking the academy - via chad
University of Oregon has an open application process for homeschoolers. Prescott College, and Naropa University are both private schools that offer clear alternate pathways but not sure if they are explicitly portfolio based.
via Scott Nine at idea
p2pu
for innovation to occur - colleges need a big push
anya at wec10
latest from Lyndy total transcript
via Wounded by School, Kirsten Olson, Stanford and other major uni's are now actively seeking out home/un-schooled students because of their inquisitive and self-directed style.
Melissa Techman (@mtechman) suggested looking at William & Mary’s home-schooler admissions page. Susan Carter Morgan (@scmorgan) recommended Washington College in Maryland; her niece attended after learning in a Sudbury high school.
Maybe your students could check into their favorite colleges’ home-schooling admissions requirements and work with those colleges to develop their own materials? Maybe they could also contact Sudbury and Free schools to ask how students at those schools apply to college? For example, this FAQ page from the Brooklyn Free School explains how its students create transcripts and choose which tests to take, if any.
Sounds like all of this might make for a great inquiry project.
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