PD Article for the week of May 4th, 2009-Six Strategies to Help Young Adolescents at the Tipping Point in Urban Middle School

The six core principles identified by Whitehouse (2009)and his collaborative professsional team have been emphasized regularly throughout my 23 year career. In 1983, the document that emphasized these guiding principles was "A Nation at Risk." Adherence to these principles seems to be the key. I disagree that throwing more money at the problem will help (Whitehouse, p. 21). Since I began my teaching career, money has been spent and spent and spent. Yet, our problems keep growing and growing and growing. Whitehouse is right about there being many dedicated people in the public schools. It is the dedicated who will get the job done and it will not be done based on personal recognition, monetary gain, or professional achievement. It will be done based on the desire to "Do the Right Thing (Huckabee, 2008)."