Why isn’t there more public-private collaboration?

Definitively, I can’t say much about the success of my problem-based learning this year. Mainly because I’m still trying to figure out what the heck I’m doing.

Because of my ineptitude with the PBL structure I’ve adopted, naturally, I am seeking out others that are doing a better job than me with it.

Enter: private schools.

Or are they called independent schools? Or prep schools? Boarding schools anyone? I’m  confused on what to call them — I think it depends on the individual school, though. Either way, in my brief experiences with problem-based learning, it seems like these schools tend to use problem-based learning (or at least how I understand it) more than their public school counterparts. It helps that they usually have much smaller classes.

For this reason, I’ve been exposed to private schools in ways that I have never been before. This exposure has inspired me to get out of my classroom.

In October, I made the hike to New Hampshire and visited Phillips Exeter Academy. Then last week I squeaked out a visit to Horace Mann. The takeaways from each were awesome and unique. But as a public school teacher planning and making these visits all on my own, I couldn’t help but think about the generally nonexistent collaboration that exists between public and private school teachers. Maybe I live in a bubble, but in all my years of teaching (besides my recent experiences), I’ve never actually collaborated locally with a private school math teacher.

I do have a tendency to isolate myself, so I’ll own it. At the same time, there have never been deliberate, organized attempts by my bosses (or my bosses’ bosses) to help me learn from the private sector (or have them learn from me). And that’s a shame because there’s so much to learn from each other. Besides, I don’t care what anyone says, the public and private worlds aren’t really all that different. Math is math. Kids are kids.

Through all my complaining, I don’t want to discount online communities like MTBoS that help teachers from every school type learn from one another. Through it, I’ve connected with folks spearheading great PBL work like Carmel Schettino, Joseph Mellor, and Johnothon Sauer — all of whom I’m indebted to for helping me create and iterate my PBL classroom. That said, all of our interactions have been online.

There’s an annual Twitter Math Camp (free) in the summer that I’ve attended twice. There’s also NCTM conferences (not free) that I’ve never attended. NCTM may be regional, but neither one of these is truly local. The MfA Summer Think that helped plan last year is only for MfA public school teachers.

The closest thing locally I can think of that allows public-private collaboration is Twitter Math Camp NYC, which is local, free, and open to all. I have been once. But even TMCNYC isn’t deliberate about connecting public-private teachers. If it happens at the conference, it’ll be coincidental.

I don’t think things will change much. Most teachers, like me, live in our worlds — public or private. With the day-to-day grind that teaching requires, it is really hard to physically get out of our own classrooms.

But I’m not going to give up. I can dream. It’s fun visiting private schools and classrooms, and enlightening! And to speak to the individual, there are folks like Sam Shah and Michael Pershan who both teach at private schools (I think) and who are two of most thoughtful teachers I know. Best yet, they both teach here in NYC. I wish I could visit their classrooms. Maybe I should ask?

bp