The ready school: ensuring schools are prepared for the children and families who are counting on them
Author: School Administrator

In recent years, as various agencies have stressed standards, assessment and accountability in schools, more and more attention has been given to getting students ready for the tests or the instruction.

For an extreme if wrong-headed indicator of the concern for readiness, consider a December 2004 article in The New York Times. The article described the Time Tracker, a multicolored, flashing-lights device that signals when a defined time period has elapsed and/or how much time is left before a period ends. It was a popular Christmas "toy" for parents concerned about getting their young children "ready" for timed tests in school.

This story reflects what most people consider when they think about readiness--that it is something the child possesses or doesn't. (It also reflects the absurd power people currently ascribe to tests.)

Recent Concept

A more appropriate and humane approach to readiness considers not only how ready the child is for the school, but also how ready the school is for the child. The implicit idea of the Ready School has probably been around as long as the idea of school itself. Administrators and teachers get their schools ready for the start of the year. The explicit, and increasingly important, concept of the Ready School is more recent.

It grew out of President George H.W. Bush's 1989 Education Summit in Charlottesville, Va., with the National Governors Association, then headed by Gov. William Clinton of Arkansas. That meeting produced the National Education Goals and the appointment of a National Education Goals Panel consisting of eight governors, four congressional representatives, four state legislators and two members of the Bush administration.