By Terri Pinney

Abysmal. This was the word uttered several times at a recent education summit, as a panel of experts talked about the state of education in America. Florida Sen. Maria Sachs, D-Delray Beach, led the session of more than 500 people at Lynn University in Boca Raton.

It was evident by the applause (or moaning) from the audience that there's a pervasive sense of frustration with how we're teaching our children and what we're doing in our schools.

The keynote speaker, nationally recognized education historian and former Assistant Secretary of Education Diane Ravitch, questioned why billions of dollars are slated to be spent on methods to improve the system when the methods are unproven. She said that these are corporate reforms and not school reforms and that data supporting them do not warrant implementation.

Rather than waste taxpayers' money on unknown policies that could do more harm than good to public education, Ravitch stated the focus should be on real issues behind the problem in American classrooms: student poverty and poor health, language barriers, building a quality teaching force and parent education programs.

Ravitch played an instrumental role in developing No Child Left Behind legislation in 2001, but now criticizes the idea of schools competing against each other for funding. Accountability should be designed to improve education, not stigmatize children. Being able to guess what the correct answers are on a standardized test is not a valuable life skill. She also cited how several national studies determined that school choice vouchers and charter schools do not generally lead to better academic performances for students.

This flew in the face of other panelists who purported their successes. Joseph Bernadel of Toussaint L'Ouverture School said some charter schools are a valuable option that meets the special needs of its special students.

Peter Cunningham, assistant U.S. secretary of education, pointed out that what we are doing in schools is not working, because U.S. students rank academically way below students in other countries, particularly in science and mathematics. Therefore, new mandates espousing higher standards of learning are essential. Relying completely on standardized test results is no longer advocated, but measuring teacher effectiveness through some assessment outcomes is necessary to raise student performance.

The audience winced when Barney Bishop, Associated Industries of Florida, reported how employers find that many Florida high school graduates lack basic skills for a job. Some can't complete a job application, much less read, write or do basic math.

Members of teachers unions were among the majority present at the summit. Robert Dow, Palm Beach County Classroom Teachers Association president, got them riled up when he claimed that some charter school owners are in it to milk the system for more tax money. And when he retorted, How is excellence in education supposed to take place without any teacher input? members in the auditorium stood up and cheered.

I left the assembly concerned that the quagmire of education reform is just that an extremely difficult predicament. Everybody has their solutions on what should be done to improve the system. The critics blame the teachers and the teachers blame the politicians.

In the heat of the argument, however, we often forget the effects this has on the children burdened by the complexities of it all. Dialogue about the future of education is good, but it's been going on for decades.