The Issues Carousel. The Journey to Vermont Act 77: Flexible Pathways and Dual Enrollment

• In Event: Student-Centered Learning, Critical Civic Engagement: Can They Form a K–16 Education Continuum?

Abstract

Baldridge (1975) reminds us that change comes slowly and with many impediments. He suggests that over time, issues arise, linger then die. This is an “issue carousel - issues have a way of always coming around again. Decisions do not last long because pressure from outside groups, from clients, and from other professionals push the same or similar issues full circle. Decisions are not made as much as they are pinnned down temporarily” (Julius, Baldridge, & Pfeffer, 1999, p. 115). In his analysis of change in educational organizations, Baldridge (1975) suggest that studying the historical roots of a social system is “too often omitted in organizational analysis” (Baldridge, Managing change in educational organizations, 1975, p. 429).

The objective of this study is to review the historical roots of Vermont Act 77; what gave rise to such a “revolutionary” concept of education as “student-centered” learning – revolutionary because for decades beginning in the early 1900s, the “tradition” in the American education system was, “… public schools, because of the nature of their pattern of organization, support, and control, were especially vulnerable and responded quickly to the strongest social forces. In this period … the most powerful force was industrialism – the application of mechanical power to the production of goods – and along with that the economic philosophy of the free enterprise, capitalistic system under which industrialism developed in America” (Callahan, 1962, p. 1). The education community embraced the notion that schools should produce “average” or “above average” students for the benefit of factory production – “efficient education.” “[C]lass-room management may be looked upon as a ‘business’ problem” (Bagley, 1910, p. 2), and regimented, uniformity was the insidious business model for many years.

This paper explores the conditions that were symptomatic of the problem in Vermont causing policy makers to enact Act 77. Kingdon (2003) frames issues in the context of an agenda – “the list of subjects or problems to which governmental officials and people outside of government closely associated with those officials are paying some serious attention at any given time” (Kingdon, 2003, p. 3). Act 77 was a “public policy initiative: 
(1) to encourage and support the creativity of school districts as they develop and expand high-quality educational experiences that are an integral part of secondary education in the evolving 21st Century classroom; 
(2) to promote opportunities for Vermont students to achieve postsecondary readiness through high-quality educational experiences that acknowledge individual goals, learning styles, and abilities; and
(3) to increase the rates of secondary school completion and postsecondary continuation in
Vermont” (State of Vermont Agency of Education, 2014, p. 1).

There was a Vermont Supreme Court decision Brigham v. State, 166 Vt. 246 (1997), a twelve-year decline in K-12 public school enrollment, economic factors, all combining to influence decision-makers. Dual enrollment was an integral element of the Act (Secretary of Education, 2017), making colleges and universities important stakeholders. This paper offers insights for those pursuing “revolutionary” education policies in other communities.

Author

• Leland S McGee, University of Pennsylvania