The district will spend $689,000 over three years to fund training using Stephen R. Covey’s “ 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.”
The program’s seven habits are designed to make students and employees more successful through personal development and leadership training.
The district has already spent $306,090 for Covey training for 2013.
How many tutors and work-study students would the $1 million approved for training, materials and intellectual property rights restore to serve our students in the English labs and writing center?
English lab hours were cut by two-thirds and the writing center lost all but two tutors.
How can students become better writers and critical thinkers without sufficient labs to help them master foundation skills?
Employees will be trained first, and students will be taught a similar course using “7 Habits of Highly Effective College Students” as soon as next fall in student development.
The current course, SDEV 0170, Student Development, uses “On Course” by Skip Downing to teach college success skills, so why does the district need another program?
During a phone interview, Darryl Nettles, associate director for student success at Northwest Vista College, told The Ranger the lessons of the “7 Habits” program are common sense. He believes in the program and is a “7 Habits”trainer, but if the lessons are common sense, why change the curriculum?
Students need course content, critical thinking and reading skills, and study and research techniques. “7 Habits” doesn’t improve those.
You cannot seek higher grades, higher retention and higher graduation rates without providing the support required to achieve them.
Merriam-Webster defines common sense as “sound and prudent judgment based on a simple perception of the situation or facts.”
It seems district administrators and trustees could stand a dose of common sense. Our employees and students already have a pretty strong grasp on the situation.
