By nature, many educators are problem-solvers. This is normally a great asset, however, when we identify problems and create solutions that seem to have limited success, it can be incredibly frustrating! My wondering this week is how often this may be a function of mis-identifying the actual problem and mis-applying the solution rather than there not being an actual solution.
Similar to how in the medical field we can treat symptoms or causes rather than underlying conditions, we often do the same in teaching. As an example, many schools identify a problem with attendance in that students are missing class time. This is a symptom of a problem, rather than a cause (though granted poor attendance can in turn cause additional issues such as poor academic performance). The cause of why they are missing class could be that they do not find class engaging, they do not see a value in it, etc. In light of this, the competing interest of doing something else wins out over being on time for class.
An activity that can be useful are the 5 Whys (Gamestorming, Grey, Brown & Macanufo 2010 p.141-143) where you examine a problem and keep digging deeper into it. When answering the questions it is a good practice to examine evidence rather than make guesses. Some of this evidence can be found by digging deep into what students really think and feel and looking at research on the topic. Here is an example of how the exploration might go (please note this is not intentionally reflective of any educator's classroom nor as these the 'correct' answers to the question, it is simply meant to highlight the activity):
Q. Why aren’t students doing well in my class?
A. Because they miss a lot of class time
Q. Why do they miss class time?
A. It’s not viewed as important
Q. Why don’t they feel it is important?
A. It is not engaging and they feel they can learn it on their own
Q. Why isn’t it engaging?
A. It has no relevance to their daily lives.
Q. Why do they feel it has no relevance?
A. Because it may only move their grade a point or two in either direction.
If this was an exploration of our 5 Whys, we could see that one of the ways we could work on the attendance issue, is to create learning environments where the lessons are meaningful and engaging to our students, in this way, they may feel they are missing out on the experience if they are absent and start coming. Trying to solve the attendance issue by issuing incentives or punitive measures is going to have limited success since even if we can make them come (which is unlikely with carrot and stick methods), we will still battle the root cause of them being disengaged and not learning while they are there.
This of course was just an example and not a solution to attendance concerns (though I firmly believe that engagement and attendance are linked). To really solve this problem, or other problems like it, you would be best served to expand your team to include a variety of voice and ideas at the table so you can fully delve into the issue. You may even want to include those students for whom attendance is a concern, because it would be incredibly difficult to get all the needed information to solve the problem without involving them in the process since they will have many of the answers. Coupled with this you will want to develop your team's skills around critical thinking and problem solving. For adults brushing up on their Collaborative Inquiry skills would be incredibly valuable as well since it can be a powerful tool when tackling complex issues.
To be clear this isn’t about blaming teachers, administrators, students, parents or schools when it comes to the mismatch of problems and solutions. I firmly believe blame is a waste of time since it does not add to a solution nor does it help positively motivate the team. Instead, it is about trying to find solutions that are within our sphere of control (or at least influence) and doing what we can to address them. I also have no doubt that you can find many more examples of problems in schools that you are trying to solve. The take-away from this is the importance of doing a deep dive into the topic and fully exploring the root causes rather than simply tackling symptoms as that is rarely a winning strategy.