Leading Tools for PTAs & PTOs

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I deal with more PTAs and PTOs than most people. Being a pretty hard core software geek, one of things I love is seeing the different ways these groups use technology to make their lives easier – probably with varying degrees of success.

All of the software I’ve observed is web based, and seems to solve one, of three, broad problems. The first problem is that of simply creating and maintaining a website for the PTA. The second is that of making it easier for parents to buy and pay for things. Lastly, there are tools to help coordinate volunteers.

Don’t take the categories too seriously. Many of these cross over. Just Between Friends, for example, allows for payments.

After-School Registration Software

Comprehensive

Website Tools

Directory Tools

Payment Tools

Volunteer Tools

Other

      • Cvent – Used for enrichment planning used by big companies, too.
      • Enrichment Matters – Closed garden after school activities in a box.
      • Form Site – forms and payments
      • School Chase (www.schoolchase.com) – my own offering that I’m hoping to bring online pretty soon.

 

Bridges Between DC & MI

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If you like bridges, like I do, you can enjoy a few that I encountered  driving between DC and Michigan.

Makinac Bridge

Enjoy,

JJ

Embedly Powered

via YouTube

You can also see a nice full-resolution version here.

The Family Edu-Vacation

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Here are the short highlights: “His third-grader son wanted to go to Dubai to see Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world. ” & “Rohrer would love to start a movement to take school kids to visit local engineering, science, and technology companies and structures after school or on weekends.”

You can see the original article here:

Thanks Eva for writing the the article!

The Largely Hidden Demand for Science and Engineering Activities

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Build-at-home remote control subs

Today our family visited the truly awesome USA Science and Engineering Festival at the Mt. Vernon Convention Center in Washington. There were overwhelming amounts of exhibitors and shows and the place was absolutely packed. The exhibitors included everyone from companies like Lockheed Martin to elementary schools to college-level engineering and science departments. It was terrific to see so many people of all ages, shapes and colors “geeking out” (and I do mean that in the nicest, most complimentary way) on science and engineering.

Perhaps even more impressive than an event with enough exhibits to fill an entire convention hall was the number of people who were visiting. This free event must have drawn half of the populations of the DC metro area (okay, maybe that’s a slight exaggeration but the place was absolutely packed!). Of course, the fact that Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage of TV’s MythBusters were on the program was a draw, for sure, but even during their performance, the rest of the exhibits were still absolutely teaming with people.

I’ve been thinking a lot about how naturally kids take to science when it’s presented in a child-friendly way. You don’t have to be a math geek or have a mechanical mind to appreciate how cool it is to, for example, watch plants grow differently if they’re kept in a cupboard vs. on a windowsill. (I did this experiment with our 4-year-old a few weeks ago and she woke up every morning so excited to check the progress of her plants.) And yet, it seems like as kids get older, science becomes more of a chore and they spend their free time playing sports and video games. And don’t get me wrong – sports are great (and even some video games are pretty good for kids), but sometimes I feel like we as parents aren’t doing enough to encourage a balance between these activities and ones that will build the skills kids will need to succeed as adults in the mid-21st century.

JJ and our daughter after having eaten bugs

Rocket engine from Space X, the first commercial rocketB

Robot snake

 

 

LEGO T-Shirt Ideas

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I’ve been working on some T-Shirt ideas.  Right now, I’m thinking that I might be able to sell the shirts as a way to raise money for The Ascendly Institute.  If the volume is high enough then I can get the shirts for about $10 bucks each, so if I sell a few shirts at say $20, then it would be enough to sponsor a disadvantaged student.  For now though, I won’t have enough volume to reach those prices and I’m mainly hoping to figure out if any of the shirts are cool enough for people to buy and to learn whether or not  enough people buy them to make it worthwhile.  I hope to have things sorted out before BrickFair this summer.

When in doubt, add more bricks!

It's only tall... if it touches the ceiling!

I really like this one, mainly because one of our first projects is to build a structure that reaches the ceiling.

This engineer plays well with bricks!

This one reminds me that I’m not a good drawer.

The Atlantic Monthly Article about Finland Mainly Leaves Me with More Questions

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So, in case you didn’t hear, Finland keeps scoring at the top of PISA tests for education. It’s a big deal. Their kids don’t study like crazy. They don’t test like crazy. Their teachers are highly unionized. They are experiencing an expanding, yet equally well educated, immigrant community. They also have teachers that, on average, are paid less than U.S. teachers. The Atlantic Monthly just ran a piece, that mainly claims their key to success is their lack of private schools and lack of private universities. While the purely public hypothesis gives me food for thought, I don’t beleive it can be that simple.

I encourage you to read the article, it’s good fun with a mostly intelligent discussion in the comment section.

I’ll wait.

Letcombe /Foter

You can skip to the end if you actually read the article.

Ok, here are the highlights from the article:

  • All their schools are public, but the U.S. doesn’t want to talk about this contrast.
  • Finland reformed its school system some time ago by focusing upon equal access for all students – their high PISA scores were a surprise to them.
  • Although Finland is very homogoneous, 4.7% vs. the US’s 12%, are foreign born. Finland’s immigrants tend to congregate in a concentrated area, but they haven’t seen much change in variation between the finish schools, despite their recently doubling of immigrant population. So Finland is apparently educating their new immigrants just as effectively as their native citizens.

The Finnish results contrast with Norway, which has very similiar demographic and georgraphic makeup to Finland, but it has pursued a more U.S. like educational policy with more competition and more focus upon testing. Norway’s results were less than stellar.

Leo-setä /Foter

The article concludes with

Finland’s experience shows that it is possible to achieve excellence by focusing not on competition, but on cooperation, and not on choice, but on equity.

and

The problem facing education in America isn’t the ethnic diversity of the population but the economic inequality of society, and this is precisely the problem that Finnish education reform addressed.

I’m left with a few outstanding questions:

  • I’ve learned, from other sources, that the average US teacher is paid more than the average Finnish teacher, but I would like to know if US teachers are paid equally well for their respective regions. For example, a teacher in NYC, or in DC, can be paid significantly more than their North Dakota counterpart, or their Finnish counterpart, but be still be paid badly for their region. Also, statistically, the large number of teachers in NYC will make it seem like teaching is a lucrative profession if you are looking at it through a mid-westerner’s low-cost-of-living lens of the world. I’m trying to determine if our teachers, when compared to Finland’s teachers, are underpaid. Maybe standard-of-living is a better metric? I feel like I don’t have enough data to have an informed perpective.
  • Several commenters suggested Finaland’s culture of raising their kids to be independant and self-reliant was crucial to their success. One person suggested it would be reasonable to send a 14 year old on a 3 – 4 hour train ride, on their own, to visit grandparants. Is there any data, or at least anecdotal evidence, that this translates well to academic achievement? It makes sense, but is it true?
  • One poster claimed many U.S. school districts spend 20% of their budget on special-needs children, implying that this significantly undermined the educational process for the remaining children. Is that number remotaly accurate? Is it significantly different than other systems with similiar demographics? What about other expenses, like athletics? We know the U.S. spends a lot on education, but is that whole number a bad proxy?
  • I have read, but can no longer find, articles that claimed that the US actually doesn’t have an education problem once you controlled for 1st and 2nd generation immigrant status. Is it true?
Leo-setä /Foter

In a future post, I’ll try to post updates as I find the answers to some of these question.

Sidebar – Did you know?
Finland is not considered a Scandanavian country – it’s Nordic.