Education Week - April 17, 2019 - 20

LETTERS to the EDITOR
Schools Need Registered Nurses
To the Editor:
It was disappointing, but not surprising,
to read how many children in this country
attend a school without a full-time,
trained health professional ("1.7 Million
Students Attend Schools With Police But
No Counselors, New Data Show," March 4,
2019). We are well past the point where all a
school nurse does is administer medications
and wait with ill or injured students until
their parents arrive.
Today, school nurses are critical to
students' academic success and their
physical and mental well-being. As the
leading organization representing school
nurses, the National Association of School
Nurses believes that every school in the
country should have at least one registered
school nurse in the building all day, every
day.
The American Civil Liberties Union report
covered in the story focuses on school-based
mental-health providers. NASN applauds
the report for recognizing school nurses on
school-based mental-health teams. School
nurses are critical to the school mentalhealth team as they help address and reduce
the stigma of a behavioral health diagnosis,
decrease fragmentation of care, and remove
barriers to behavioral health services.
Because of their regular access to students,
school nurses are uniquely qualified to
help assess and address the behavioral
and mental-health needs of children of all
ages. Beyond the dearth of counselors and
professionals the ACLU highlights, fewer
than 40 percent of schools meet even the
modest goal of one full-time school nurse.

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www.edweek.org/go/letters
If we are serious about students' success-
that can't just be reading, writing, and
'rithmetic-it has to be a holistic approach
that addresses the physical and mental wellbeing of children as well as their academic
efforts.
Donna Mazyck
Executive Director
National Association of School Nurses
Silver Spring, Md.

What the NCTQ Report Misses
To the Editor:
The article "You're More Likely to Pass
the Bar Than an Elementary Teacher
Licensing Exam" (March 5, 2019) covers "A
Fair Chance," the report from the National
Council on Teacher Quality about how
teacher licensure exams disproportionately
screen out aspiring teachers of color from
the profession. This report, however, ignores
all insights from the most important source:
aspiring teachers of color themselves.
Studies sharing insights from these
aspiring teachers demonstrate there is more
to licensure exams than the report conveys.
In 2006, Christine Bennett and colleagues
found that Black and Latinx students who
perform well on licensure exams have
stronger ethnic identities than those who
struggle on exams. In 2014 and 2015, I found
the exams can become a racially charged
experience related to intelligence, character,
and test preparation for some AfricanAmerican test-takers. All of these insights
come from working directly with aspiring
teachers of color.

Studies of this nature exceed the number
of statistical studies on the topic-the only
kind that "A Fair Chance" uses. The issue
here is not about research methods, however,
but about how this report misrepresents a
delicate topic by overlooking the insights
from people most affected by it. These
studies exist in publications that are
available to NCTQ researchers. How do
we know this? Because NCTQ draws from
other studies in these same databases and
academic search engines.
The report's omission of insight from
aspiring teachers of color directs attention
away from any problems with these exams,
the companies that make and profit from
them, and policies that states set around
them. The point here is not to cast blame.
Complex problems have complex sources.
But by limiting the scope of the issue, NCTQ
would have the public believe the only way
to diversify the teaching profession is for
teacher education programs to wrap their
curricula around these narrow exams.
Emery Petchauer
Associate Professor
Michigan State University
East Lansing, Mich.

It's Not About Teachers
To the Editor:
In the final paragraphs of the
Commentary about teacher strikes' impact
on vulnerable students ("The Overlooked
Consequences of a Teacher Strike," March 6,
2019), the author urges teachers to consider
the consequences of their actions.

In doing so, he misses that it is the
responsibility of the administrators,
boards, and state officials to consider the
consequences of teacher strikes and ensure
that schools are funded and staffed in a way
that reduces this likelihood. The willingness
of teachers to allow those in power to shirk
their responsibilities by picking up the slack
is what has led to the current situation in
U.S. education.
Put the responsibility of ensuring schools
meet the needs of all our children where
it belongs, on those who fund and run the
schools.
Warren Erath
H.S. Science Teacher
Louisville, Ky.

Clarifying Ed-Tech Research
To the Editor:
I was pleased to see our research cited
in the article about key lessons about
education-technology research for educators
("Tech Research: 5 Key Lessons for
Educators," March 13, 2019). I am writing
to clarify our findings, which I worry were
obscured in the article.
The article emphasized software features
that are commonplace in ed tech today-for
example, software that is adaptive and
personalized, provides data to teachers,
gives students computer-generated
feedback, and more. However, our 2010
research on SimCalc did not incorporate
the kinds of features that are typical in edtech marketing today.
SimCalc researchers developed software

Helping Children Succeed
Through Family Engagement
When parents are engaged in their
children's learning, students succeed,
but educators often need support
in engaging with families. Join our
free webinar featuring successful
family engagement models
created by leaders in the field.

Content provided by

guests
* Whitney henderson, navigatorin-chief, ednavigator
* Windy Lopez-AfLitto, vice
president of content and
partnerships, Learning heroes
* eLisAbeth stock, chief
executive officer and cofounder,
powerMyLearning
* heAther Weiss, founder and director,
global family research project
ModerAtor
* hoLLy kurtz, director, education
Week research center

FREE WEbinaR: thursday, april 25, 2019 / 2 to 3 pm Et / www.edweek.org/go/webinar/FamilyEngagement
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Education Week - April 17, 2019

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