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Parent Information Network (P.I.N.)
P.O. Box 733
Elm Grove, WI 53122

414-821-1873
_________________________________________________________________

OUTCOME BASED EDUCATION

"FIVE YEARS OF CHAOS"

Position Paper Volume 1
By Rev. Wayne C. Sedlak

_________________________________________________________________

FOREWARNING

The subject of this report, OBE (Outcome Based Education), is a
many-faceted, federal "octopus" which carries deadly potential
for an already declining educational system.  It is yet another
classic case of the "cure" being worse than the disease itself.
Future reports will focus upon such topics as the enormous costs
of implementing OBE, the documented failures of such programs
around the country, and the "shadowy" as well as dangerous
origins of this new federal power grab.  This paper will deal
with two glaring errors:  (1) destroying any objective
performance standards (measurable results), (2) opening wide the
door to the outright "brainwashing" of America's children.

In the fall of 1989, the Governors Conference on Education was
held in Wichita, Kansas.  The title of the Conference was
"Schools, Goals and the 1990's".  One would like to think that
such a conference would hold out the promise of "better things
ahead" or, at least, an attempt to ward off a greater crisis
than what the public (government) schools have already brought
upon themselves. Not so!  Not only were the governors told that
there is a crisis in the public sector, but the proposed
"solution", once adopted, would usher in five years of chaos.

What was the proposed "solution"? OBE...which stands for
Outcome Based Education.  As you study the following position
paper, bear in mind the expected result of this proposal.  The
proposal by Dr. Shirley McCune, Senior Director of Mid
Continental Regional Educational Laboratory, stated that  by
implementing such a policy  "the next five years will be the
most chaotic of our lives."  I agree... but for different
reasons.  Unlike her, I am not endorsing this program.  Here's
why.

WHAT IS 'OBE'?

Outcome Based Education has been proposed across the length and
breadth of this country as a means of solving the problem of
children "at risk".  It has been proposed as the answer in
solving the problem of skills deficiencies in our school
children.  It is the proposed solution for meeting the challenge
of U.S. competition in  world markets.  It is the proposed
solution to meeting the needs of labor.  In a nutshell, itis
"the proposed solution".

Lest one be tempted to think this a bit  overstated, OBE is
also the proposed solution to yet another problem: the student
who fails in school.  In other words, OBE promises to produce
100% student success.  Imagine, no student failures!  You might
ask, "how can this be"?  Simple, remove the grading system.  "No
failures" is not simply one of the results of  OBE.  This is the
stated objective.  In the words of Dr. William Spady, one of
this country's major proponents of OBE, children fail in school
"...because we make it (failure) available".  OBE, we are told
by educators, is designed to eliminate failure.  It is this point
which "sells" the program to educators.  This attraction has been
necessitated by the universal cry to do almost anything in order
to solve the crisis which has engulfed the government school
system for three decades.  It should be clearly understood that
the public sector is not the only one targeted for OBE
educational "restructuring".  OBE, as part of the "AMERICA 2000"
program, is being initiated for private schools, home schools,
and private Christian schools through initial testing
procedures.  This is national reform for all children!

So, "what is OBE"?  OBE is a national educational reform
movement.  It has an established criteria for graduation with an
overwhelming emphasis upon each student's social, ethical, and
emotional development.  Yes, you did read thiscorrectly.
Cognitive (i.e. "the three R's") skills are subordinated areas
of educational attention. Traditional skills are to be
de-emphasized by the OBE and, in its place, attention is to be
devoted to attitudes, self-esteem, and other affective
("affective": acting on the feelings or the emotions") learning
behaviors.  Thus, all children will be required to demonstrate
correct attitudes to a wide variety of issues. These
"politically correct" positions involve environmentalism, global
citizenship, collectivism and multi-culturism, which are
determined by the federal  government  through its Department of
Education.   Refusal to adopt the government's views could
result in a denied diploma.  In addition, it has been proposed
that employer inquiries to schools should be mandated so that
the future job opportunities of such students would be
restricted.

It might be wise to reflect upon the idea of "chaos" again.
OBE advocates insist that there is currently too much emphasis
placed upon traditional skills ("three R's") learning.  Reducing
such an emphasis by 40%-50% and replacing it with the enforced
OBE  program is on the agenda.  So, we will "solve" the current
skills crisis in educational illiteracy by reducing its time and
emphasis... and that on a national scale!

IMPLEMENTING "CHAOS"

This system will be implemented through a thorough  assessment
(testing) program.  The student will be given "pre-tests" to
determine information on his/her current attitudes on a wide
variety of subjects (which would very often reflect the opinions
of their parents, especially when dealing with elementary
testing).  Afterwards, "learning nuggets" will be served up to
them to instruct them as to the correct responses to the issues
presented.   Then the assessment tests will test to see if they
understand the correct  responses.  So far, this procedure still
falls within the parameters of past methodology (waiving for a
moment considerations of the nature of the material itself).
However, what happens next is a virtual "revolution" in
educational approach.

If the student fails to give the appropriate responses to the
questions, he is then REMEDIATED.   That simply means that he
will be given further "learningnuggets" on the same type of
issue and re-tested until he learns to give the correct
response.   He will be refused graduation to the next learning
level until he gives the correct response through remediation
testing (called "reassessment").  In short, he must give the
"correct" state mandated answer.  This answer may often involve
a problem of conscience or conflict with positions espoused in
the home and church.

One example is illustrative of the questions which have shown
up in testing programs already implemented by CFAT (Carnegie
Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching), a major endorsement
authority of OBE.  Note the wording of the following question:

There is a secret club at school called the Midnight Artists.
They go out late at night and paint funny sayings and pictures
on buildings.  A student is asked to join the club.  In this
situation, I would join the club when I knew:

    (a) my best friend asked me to join

    (b) the most popular students were in the club

    (c) my parents would ground me if they found out I joined

The one assumption which must be noted is that the child would
join the club.  Rejection of the club is not a legitimate
choice.  What makes matters worse is that each of the responses
has a pre-determined correct answer to which the student must
agree.  For choices (a) and (b), the state-desired correct
answer is "yes".  For choice (c), the state-desired correct
answer is "no".  If a student does not answer correctly, he
cannot advance.  He must be  "remediated", i.e., he goes through
the "learning-testing" loop again and again until he "gets it".
That is how the promoters of this program expect to gain 100%
"learning success" (sic).   In any other context this would
simply be called what it really is..."brainwashing".  Isn't it
comforting to be assured by US Secretary of Education Lamar
Alexander that on a national scale "...one way or another we
will have the first phase tests by 1993-94"?

Along with such a danger, there is yet another built-in problem
which, quite literally, could generate real chaos for our
society in the area of criminal behavior.  This letter to the
editor  appeared in U. S. News and World Report, April 15, 1985,
being written by a boy who had murdered his mother.  He writes:

I am the boy who killed his mother.  I need to write for two
reasons: One, as part of this "culture" I feel I can relate;
and, two, to set the record straight about my case.

I disagree with people who say that parents are to blame.  It
was not my mom's fault that I was the way I was, and it
certainly wasn't her fault that I murdered her.  The article
says that my mother "ignored me until the pressure blew me up."
This was the impression I gave to people involved in my case.
It is not true.  I received no unfair treatment, nor did I
have to go through anything  that other kids don'tgo through as
part of growing up...

The real problem was how I chose to deal with what did happen.
I am not saying that things don't happen to cause kids to do
things.  In my situation, I am the only one to be blamed for
what I did and for the immense pain I caused people.  I really
need to make that clear.  I lied in the beginning due to my own
selfishness.  I lied so that I would not have to honestly look
at who I was and what I had done.

It is clear that the boy once successfully used behavioral,
"needs"-oriented "lingo" to work emotive appeal on his own
behalf in order to justify criminal behavior of a violent type.
He had learned to use it to attempt to fool society so as to
avoid condemnation.  He had learned to blame his parents for his
sins knowing that to be the current rage in our society.
Self-justification, parental blame-shifting and
"needs"-orientation all worked hand-in-hand to obviate blame.
Interestingly enough, OBE education emphasizes self-justifying
affective teaching goals in order to meet the needs of "children
at-risk". With this in mind, it might be well to remember the
results of  the Yochelson/Samenow report which studied the
attitudes of over 200 criminals for a 15-year period.  According
to Yochelson, "...the criminals made fools of us...They...
exploited us for their own purposes...They became criminals with
insight into their past, but criminals nonetheless...insight gave         then more
material to excuse their behavior."

The study demonstrated that criminals, like the boy who murdered
his mother, have no problem using affective behavioral
arguments.  In addition, those who did so, used them
successfully enough to justify their behavior and attitudes AND
fool professional psychological researchers. The question which
must now be asked is, will greater doses of self-esteem, and
other affective curriculum at all grade levels produce
self-justifying children, who will see nothing wrong with
certain behaviorisms which THEY will choose?  They will have
learned the behavioral "lingo" well enough to fool professionals
such as teachers, police, judges, and lawyers ...not to mention
their parents.

The OBE curriculum shows little tolerance for parental input
and values  It programs children through test questions in order
to shift them away from apparently ill-equipped parental
authority.  Instead, they are encouraged toward collective
authorities such as public opinion, peer groups, government,
etc.  In fact, Lamar Alexander has praised  schools for
"breaking the mold " of business-as-usual. Many of these schools
have organized students in classrooms into "families", stressing
team planning.  The school is frequently referenced as the new
"family" of each student.  Do note: OBE planners, such as Lamar
Alexander, are pushing to have yourchild in their "family" from
birth to graduation, 12 hours per day (6 A.M.-6 P.M.), 5 days
per week, 12 months per year.  That's a lot of "chaos".

OBE CHAOS: PAST AND FUTURE

The OBE approach has been tried elsewhere.   After a decade of
trying to make it work, the Oregon Education Association
convinced the legislature to end the program. Schools were
overwhelmed by the enormous record-keeping and testing.
Instruction was almost entirely lost.

The system was complicated with staff trying to implement
"hundreds and hundreds of these individual competencies", said
Bob Stalick, superintendent of public schools in Albany, Oregon.
In early childhood education, one set of the learner outcomes
stressed competency concerning "diversity of family situations"
including "same-sex" and "communal" groupings. Fortunately, such
a program was deemed no longer necessary and abandoned as a
failure.  Ten years of failure.

The term "overwhelming" does not just apply to the complexity
of program implementation, record-keeping and use.  Chicago, one
of the first districts in the nation to embrace OBE, ended its
program after it cost the city an additional $7.5 million
dollars in just five years!  Many critics of OBE point to such
costs.  These costs could double or triple property tax
assessments just to finance OBE.  Chicago paid the price for its
program in dollars...and student performance.  Authorities and
parents were alarmed at the number of  students who were found
to be falling behind on standardized tests.  Top dollar was paid
by Chicago to implement a system which caused student
performance to drop!

OBE and its kindred predecessors have been rejected in Oregon,
Montana, Tennessee, Michigan, and New Mexico.  Parental outrage
is currently being expressed all across the country.  Challenges
to the program are underway in Missouri, Colorado, and
California.  Parents who had successfully kept Pennsylvania from
adopting the program in the past just lost a desperate battle to
keep it out.  So, the battle rages across the length and breadth
of this land for the minds and well-being of our children.

CONCLUSION:

American education needs OBE as much as individuals need
strychnine!  Parents, once fully informed, will oppose this
attempt to "mold" their children's values contrary to their own.
Taxpayers will bemoan the enormous tax increases. The business
sector will decry the scarcity of skilled labor.  "Stay tuned"
as we shine the spotlight on the origins, promoters, funding
sources and failures of this new, federal, NATIONAL REFORM.

_________________________________________________________________

If you would like more information, or additional position
papers on OBE, please write or call:

Parent Information Network (P.I.N.)
P.O. Box 733
Elm Grove, WI 53122

414-821-1873
_________________________________________________________________

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