Acronymophobia
The fear of any bureaucracy developing so many acronyms they negate any potential for growth or effectiveness (see education).
Many people believe the military has cornered the market on acronyms. Granted there are many, and among those are several that have become part of everyday language and immediately recognizable and some that would only be familiar to those that have served or who read military history. MP (military police), KP (kitchen patrol), SNAFU, (situation normal; all fouled up), MIA (missing in action), SITREP (situation report), ELINT (electronic intelligence), COMSUBPAC and COMSUBLANT (commander, submarine force Pacific and Atlantic, respectively); you get the idea. Education has, in recent years, challenged the accepted military supremacy and, in the view of many observers, taken the lead and left the generals in charge of military jargon staring blankly at their respective IFF (identification friend or foe) transponders and wondering exactly when their acronymic superiority was FUBAR (fouled up beyond all recognition) and replaced by educational initiatives (REI).
Several years ago, I visited a local high school that had been searching fruitlessly, like most schools, for the One True Thing in education that made a difference in teaching and learning. The principal told me of the Christmas Tree theory where a series of superintendents and curriculum directors focused on administrating excellence by added this program and that program and this solution and that new idea that were all supposed to guarantee increased student achievement and higher test scores and perfect attendance for all and fewer discipline issues and lead us to the holy educational Grail of High Achievement for All. That goal is another problem in itself and spoke volumes about the lack of vision and the immediate acceptance of whatever “program of the week” happened to be promoted by the last vendor that bought someone dinner and was, as a result, inflicted upon teachers as quickly as possible. While system administrators sat around and waited on teachers to produce, they were invited to yet another dinner where they learned of another canned program guaranteed to achieve results...it became a vicious cycle. There were committees for every initiative and training for every plan and all succeeded primarily in spending an enormous amount of teachers’ time and exorbitant amounts of money on programs that seemed only to enrich the vendors and frustrate teachers and students. Teachers observed they met so often and attended so many “training opportunities” they didn’t have time to do what they really needed and wanted desperately to do - teach. It’s as if searching for solutions through prepackaged programs became the focus rather than giving teachers the tools and opportunities and the freedom to teach they desperately needed to succeed. The focus of the system had become initiatives rather than teaching, and it was evident they had lost their focus on what was important in education. It seemed the administrators of that particular system had been educated far beyond their intelligence, and, like so many others, did not have the courage to allow the teachers they hired to actually do what they were hired to do; to teach.
I have developed a theory that a given system grows over time to the point where its function, regardless of its stated purpose, becomes 1) perpetuation of the bureaucracy through an insistence on conformity rather than innovation and 2) the continual development and persistent use of acronyms. I believe the combination of these may be stated mathematically;
the effectiveness of any organization is inversely proportional to the development and accepted use of acronyms in daily conversations; I further hypothesize that by the time any bureaucracy reaches the point where the number of acronyms reaches a level commensurate with the number of bureaucrats employed, that organization has grown beyond the point of any effectiveness whatsoever in its’ stated mission: To wit:
(You may sing or follow the meter of (as if there was any doubt about this one) The Alphabet Song.)
NCLB, AYP,
SRSA, CLIP,
ESEA, IEP,
IDEA, 504,
RTTT, SLO,
LEA, GTOI.
CRCT, SEA,
EOCT, RLIS,
GHSGT, HR,
GSSA, TAPP,
BETA, LEM,
RESA, ESL,
GADOE, PM,
LEP, CRCT-M,
TOTY, BOE,
GNETS, HiQ,
SSI, SPED,
HOPE, ISP,
SAT, CCGPS,
ACT, NAEP,
CFMT, FBO,
TANF,FTE,
SBOE, RFM,
EHYC, SWP,
GEPA, DJJ,
GAORS, DEI,
SACS, SWP,
GAPSS, CC,
GLRS, ETC,
GOSA, QBE,
ARRA, LEA,
GAEL, SIP,
TEM, GASSP,
GHSWT, SS,
CO, IT, CPS,
AEP, LDS,
USED, ELA,
CON-APP,
REAP, GSBA,
SOP, DECA,
FFA, GAMSP,
PTO, DODS,
GAE, PTA,
PAGE, CTAE,
COP, GOSA,
QBE, GAESP,
GHP, CLASS,
AP, GAPSC,
RIF, MACE,
NHS, MOE,
IB, GPS, MEP
SES, AEP,
RTI, MACE,
QZAB, ESPLOST,
SACS-CASI,
RST, PLU,
SIS, GSP,
PES, SFN,
TAN, CAO,
SPLOST
CCSS, GOSA
CCRPI,
GSEX,
If you can identify more than half of these, you may be an educator. I rest my case, and Lord help us all.