I think that by now anybody with a clue agrees that we need to get a lot more serious about k-12 education. And here in Oregon it's pretty damn obvious that we're even worse off than most due to the pathetic level of education funding. The schools haven't got enough money to allow the typical "solutions" and they won't any time soon.
Well, that means that we, as citizens, need to find and implement cheaper ways. Ways that don't require any significant involvement or commitments by schools or teachers. Ways that help kids across class, economic, and talent spectra.
So let's start with basics. Sometimes a good place to start is with something that is both useful and that shows the way to doing things that are more difficult or contentious. Something non-controversial so it will be allowed through the schoolhouse gates and will have minimal opposition from parents and other potential roadblocks.
So let's get started on getting a usable, well-designed, kid-optimized dictionary into the hands of every schoolchild in the state of Oregon.
Speaking as a publisher, I know how much it costs to produce, print, and ship books and I'm telling you that for an order of several thousand or more, we could get dictionaries for under a buck apiece. And I'm betting that done right it should be possible to get printers, paper suppliers, and others to kick in enough to get that down to fifty cents a copy.
But let's start with a budget of a dollar-fifty per copy.
And let's start by choosing one year.
I say choose eight grade. It's right around then that kids start to feel most abandoned and it's about then that they are expected to do a lot more for themselves. They're mature enough to handle "adult formatted" type and have vocabularies large enough to justify something a bit more complex than most of them will have access to.
And beyond that, they're reaching the age that it gets essential that they have beautiful things of their own that are sophisticated enough to help develop the sense of nuance that is so essential to good adult judgement. I love ebooks. I'm very in favor of online content. But for certain things, it's still better to have an actual physical copy. And this is one of those things.
Now, my plate is beyond full, so I don't know when or how I'm going to pull this off. It helps that I'll be dealing with plenty of the relevant people anyway in the course of doing my own work. But piece by piece I intend to proof out text, including some Oregon-specific stuff, put together layouts, and do a small print run, possibly, if I have to, on my own nickel. Then I'm going to give them away to the students of any school I can find that will say "yes".
Except for a couple hundred copies that I will keep around as examples. To show to possible donors. Because I want to see a non-profit up and running, one utterly independent of the government, with a charter and an endowment, whose purpose is to work towards having every student in every school in Oregon, from third grade on, walk into school the first week of the year and get asked if they have a dictionary. And if they say "no", one gets handed to them. No other rules, no other conditions. And twenty percent held in reserve each year to be handed out to the kids who lose theirs during the year.
Of course, I have no objection to copies of this being made available for sale in stores. At, say, six bucks a copy. With half of the profits going straight to the endowment. I'm a big believer in the power of a well-configured endowment and nothing in the recent economic news changes that conviction a bit.
You think that I'm nuts? Work it out. I don't have the time to do the links right now, but go for it, look at how many kids are in school in Oregon in a given year. This is a doable thing. And if it is done right, it lays the groundwork for more ambitious plans. For taking a bit more of the load off of schools and parents. For taking advantage of the wonders of modern manufacturing, design, and pedagogical understanding in ways that schools and governments can't and/or won't.
I don't know about you, but I'm eager to get started.
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