Hatrick describes the "State of Education" at Chamber of Commerce breakfast

Loudoun County Public Schools Superintendent Edgar B. Hatrick gave his annual “state of education” presentation at a breakfast sponsored by the Loudoun County Chamber of Commerce’s public policy committee at the school administration building in Ashburn today.

Like kids on the first day of school, some candidates for public office, including School Board, sat prominently towards the front of the room. Incumbent Board of Supervisors Chairman Scott York (R) and challenger Tom Bellanca (D) both were there. 

Hatrick read from prepared remarks that accompanied a slide show highlighting LCPS teachers and programs. Only a few questions from the floor departed from the script.

Business owner, mother, and former teacher Bonnie Little asked how the expertise from cutting-edge programs described in Hatrick's slide show is transferred to other teachers.

Hatrick said teachers complete eight in-service days before school starts, the equivalent of "continuing education" in the business world. With almost 5,000 teachers across the system, he said, "We are very purposeful about that."

When Va. Del. Tom Rust (R-86) asked if Hatrick supports giving Standards of Learning tests to middle schoolers earlier in the year, the answer was "yes" because it's a challenge to keep students engaged after testing is finished, Hatrick said. 

"SOL testing is kind of a schizoid thing in Virginia," he said, because the school system cannot make public the results. A group of five schools superintendents -- Hatrick was not among them -- who asked the state of Virginia to move up the tests "weren't saying everyone needs to be tested in the middle of the year," Hatrick said. "They were saying, 'Some kids need to be tested in the middle of the year.'"

After business banker Robert Dupree asked about programs to support children who are home-schooled, Hatrick said the school system is looking at ways to transition from school books to "other devices -- like an iPad -- but not necessarily an iPad," that allow students to learn from a distance.

Algonkian District School Board Candidate Debbie Rose challenged the schools' recent $4 million purchase of interactive white boards (IWB). "Given how much they cost, what was the analysis for keeping them up to date?" she asked.

Hatrick replied that IWBs "are not cutting-edge technology. 

"One on one computing has existed in Virginia for more than a decade," he said.  "We are kind of coming late to that party."

Because not all elementary school classrooms in the county had IWBs, "We had a great inequity going on," Hatrick said. "What we were doing was closing the gap" by "funding the final piece."

The schools "are at a tipping point of deciding what will happen between the print world and the digital world," Hatrick said. "The kids coming into schools today are 'digital natives'" who have been using interactive touch technology all their lives.

Hatrick said "individual learning devices," such as the Apple iPad, save money over the cost of textbooks. "We buy textbooks now just to say we buy them," he said. [Some] "Textbooks that cost almost $100 are out dated by the time we hand them to the kids."

Anticipating one potential argument against the use of digital devices by individual students vs. printed textbooks, "We lose textbooks now, and people have to pay for them," Hatrick said. "The same thing will happen with digital devices.

"In the next 10 years, we are going to see a much more interactive world. Classrooms will no longer be organized in neat rows where everyone faces the front, the teacher does all the talking, and the kids do all the listening." 

Hatrick’s slide presentation is posted under "permanent links" in the center column on the home page at the LCPS web site: 

http://cmsweb1.lcps.org/loudoun/site/default.asp