A reader responds to someone who lambasted the unions for preventing the firing of bad teachers:
Only poor administrators can’t fire poor teachers. There has never been a union contract anywhere, ever that didn’t allow for a competent principal to remove an incompetent tenured teacher. And it’s even easier to just non-renew a loser before they become tenured. This is the biggest of all the lies told about unionized teachers.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I think people who tell this lie about teacher’s unions fundamentally don’t believe in due process.
I have always said, if there is a bad teacher, there is a bad an administrator..I think administrators should walk in classroom on a regular basis. They should ask a student what he or she is learning. An administrator should also speak to any teacher who is not doing what he or she should be. Since most teachers do their jobs, this conversation wouldn’t take place very often. If you have a bad teacher it isn’t because of tenure. That teacher was always a bad teacher and shouldn’t have stayed in this profession; it isn’t for everyone.
Teachers don’t really have “tenure” like professors. It isn’t any sort of a lifetime guarantee like it is in post-secondary institutions.
I have said this for years. If there are bad teachers it must be because of bad administrators. Almost all teachers are at-will employees for 1-3 years depending on the school district meaning that they can be fired for pretty much anything. And unions only protect due process, not bad teachers. It is so true that if an administrator is competent there should be no excuse for allowing a bad teacher to stay in the classroom. Or being able to just transfer them to another school which doesn’t solve anything. Which is what they do with bad administrators as well – pass them on to be someone else’s problem.
As a union grievance officer in Higher Ed I can say that we only have the right to due process as well. It is even more true in higher ed that the administrators don’t do their jobs in evaluating faculty. A tenured faculty member can certainly be removed for cause . . . but just as in P-12 the administrators don’t do their homework.
I saw this quote (from a Doobie Brothers song!) in a Washington Post political column today. I wasn’t used to reference education…but it does seem to describe what is happening with the public lie about tenure (as noted above) l and the educational reform movement as a whole.
“What a fool believes, no wise man has the power to reason away”
Unions should stop saying “tenure” and start saying “due process”. Public mistakenly believes that tenure means lifetime employment. Mayor Bloomberg used “lifetime employment” to describe tenure. Public understands due process and would be much more supportive in my opinion.
Yes, this is an excellent point, especially since teachers do not have true tenure. Almost all public sector employees have due process rights. Will (mainly female) teachers be the only ones without it?
Question: Though I have older books like ‘The Manufactured Crisis’ on my book shelf, has there been a recent, more broadly-based, academic effort to ennumerate and give an accurate assessment of facts behinds falsehoods? “The Big Lies about American Education: national, academic assessments of common misrepresentations and plain propoganda about American education’ could sell if it did its job, was written in an interesting way, and got broad support. If such a book already exists, please let me know. Jon in Tigard, Oregon
Jon, I am writing that book though not necessarily with that title.
Well, would you hurry up already? I want to read it!
If I didn’t spend so much time on this blog, I would be done!
I can’t wait for it to come out! I can’t wait to meet you at a book appearance and get it signed! I laughed when I read ME’s comment….What would we all do without you?
Yes, Diane, I waste too much time on this blog too seeing as how I have a research project of my own. I can’t wait to write my conclusion this spring. I’m sure your name will appear a time or two.
Let’s hope that reading and writing here is not a waste of time but a place to share ideas and support one another
Diane
The hostile takeover of public education, misleadingly called education reform, is fast approaching – if it hasn’t already reached – critical mass, and has a deep institutional footing in the foundations, political class and among the stenographers who constitute the mainstream media echo chamber.
With that in mind, Upton Sinclair’s quote is apropos: “It’s hard to convince someone of something when their salary depends on not believing it.”
Add to that, the Big Lie and Ronald Reagan’s inadvertent dictum that, “Facts are stupid things” – and they certainly are when you live in a kleptocratic Age of Impunity – and this debate comes into clearer focus.
As a principal who has removed several poor performing teachers in the past few years, I agree with this statement. I also agree that behind every poor teacher is a poor administrator.
I support due process, believing that it is not only a right for employees, but that it also provides me with a structure that holds me accountable as I take action. I view this as a form of protection for myself as a professional.
As accomplished as I’ve become as a principal, I am not immune from mistakes and misjudgments. With someone’s career on the line, I appreciate having a process and a partnership with our union that ensures that we do what’s right not only for children, but employees as well.
I had many administrators in my career (16 principals total, but then, I was an art teacher). Many of them were smart, nice people but only one of them was an excellent principal and she got rid of 2 teachers with tenure (who unfortunately were abysmal at their job). She worked very hard and paid attention to what was going on in her building. With hindsight I have come to believe that the job of principal requires a certain kind of genius and most folks doing it are just regular human beings. But the thing I also learned from her was that it is very possible to get rid of tenured teachers, it’s just work, as it should be.
Thank you for being out there! I wonder sometimes how some of the ones I have had even became principals! Here is seems a prerequisite is to be a coach or related to someone in central office.
We teachers have seen the dismissal of colleagues who are deemed incompetent. In my small school three teachers have been forced out in the past 7 years. Subjectivity remains an issue: we switched principals during that period. Two of those teachers were given good evaluations by the first principal. I have never had the feeling that I could rest on my laurels: there are more than enough eager young (and cheaper) teachers out there who would love to have my job.
Diane, I’d love to see you debate an expert on this issue in a public forum. Would you consider that?
Who is the expert? What issue are you referring to? Be specific.
The issue is the appropriateness of the current system in place to terminate teachers. The expert would be someone who knows the current system in NYC very well who feels that the system could be improved significantly.
Diane, presumably, would represent the point of view the current system in NYC works reasonably well, i.e. administrators have the appropriate tools to terminate incompetent tenured teachers in a reasonable amount of time and at a reasonable cost (both the financial cost and in educational cost to students).
Ken, I believe that teachers should have due process and should have a hearing before they can be dismissed, that is, if the principal has granted them due process rights.
Note that the highest performing states are those with strong unions: MAss, NJ, CT.
Do we want to be like the right-to-work states?
I would be glad to debate the “education reform” agenda as a whole, not just one piece of it.
Diane
Name the expert.
If the administrator was competent the teacher should not have earned due process rights. What is the expert’s opinion on evaluating and terminating incompetent adminstrators? Or does the termination process only apply to teachers? I think there are many at Tweed who should be terminated. What do we do with them? Focus on the top as well as the bottom while you are at it.
Linda, you have nailed a big problem in NYC. The reformers have pushed out many experienced principals and replaced them with principals who have shallow experience in the classroom or as administrators.
Thanks for the reply Diane! Two thoughts:
1. Even if you believe in due process and a hearing, you might address whether that system of due process and a hearing can be significantly improved. I think you and others frequently oversimplify this issue by treating it a binary fashion (as if the question is either “due process” or “no due process”). Many people believe in due process but think the current system in NYC still takes way too long and costs much too much. To me, it is a question of balance, rather than a binary issue.
2. This issue is so important that I think it would be great to see a debate in which it is focused on exclusively. We might make some progress on the question of whether the current system could be significantly improved.
Any language in the union contract was negotiated by two sides, not imposed by the union. Both management and the union had to agree. If the contract is so onerous, why did Mayor Bloomberg sign on to it?
You seem to be shifting from the appropriateness of the current system to who should be blamed. I’m more concerned as to whether the system can be improved rather than who is to blame for the system’s weaknesses (although both matters are interesting). I am more interested in hearing your thoughts on how the system can be improved. (Although on this issue it seems like you might feel that the system is fine the way it is.)
A union contract involves two parties. The union cannot impose its views on management. It seems reasonable to me to give teachers three years of probationary status before a principal makes a decision about their right to due process. Once that have the right, the principal should present evidence to an impartial arbitrator if she or he wants to fire the teacher. The teacher should have the right to see the evidence and to make her case. The process should be resolved in months, not years. I like the Montgomery County Peer Assistance and Review system, which was cited earlier today. Teachers take responsibility with administrators for ranking peers. They provide a year of support. At that point, the committee of administrators and teachers makes a decision to retain or dismiss. Frankly, I think you make a huge mistake going on he hunt for the “bad” teacher. Most teachers –the overwhelming majority–are hard working, dedicated and doing the best they can in a system they do not control, where there are many problems blamed on them.
Diane
Thanks Diane. I’m not sure why the arbitration process should even take months (why not weeks or even days?), but I agree with you that a system that takes months rather than years would be a big improvement. I’m not sure where we are in NYC at the moment.
I know for a fact YOU are not an expert. Talk to some terminated teachers, and they will tell you the TRUTH, NOT a pack of think tank LIES.
Or talk to those teachers who have been run out of a school before the abusive administrator could “fire” them (with the complicit help of the “union” who advises the teacher to seek employment elsewhere.) So much for those “union” thugs who keep crappy teachers in their jobs.
I mentioned once before about teachers taking responsibility for themselves and they would know best how to help another teacher who may be struggling. We have to help each other and our value is worth helping to keep and not throw away as the states want to. Helping a teacher with mentors and assistance would be wonderful. Here we have the intensive assistance program, which is really just focused harassment! They tell you how bad you are, this usually happens to good teachers who advocate for their students and the profession and get in trouble. Then they assign an administrator or secondary supervisor who hasn’t taught in many many years to mentor you. If they harass you just right you give up and quit. Some survive, but after that experience you are never the same. I survived and am wary and paranoid-because they REALLY are out to get rid of good teachers who cause trouble. We have no due process. We have jokes for so called unions. Kirsh, Unless you have seen what they do to good teachers who fight an insane system, you have no idea how much damage a bad administrator can do in a very short time. The problem isn’t getting rid of “bad” teachers, it’s keeping the good ones.
With a loud-mouthed bully governor like Chris Christie, there is no debate. Unions are bad unless they shut up and spout the pro reform message. He has used his bully pulpit and his easy access to the media, such as Fox News and NJ 101.5 FM, etc., to rail, on an almost daily basis, against teacher unions; he constantly demonizes the NJEA and portrays it as being selfish, greedy, uncaring and for the status quo. I have never heard him bash and degrade the police or fire fighter unions but maybe I missed it. There is no missing his absolute total nuclear war against the NJEA. He constantly spouts the lie that the head of the NJEA has a salary of $500,000; it’s actually $300,000 which is a lot of money but it’s not tax payer money, it’s private money from teachers. NJ has very highly rated schools and always scores in the top tier of schools in the US and is first in graduation rates. You would never know that from Christie’s constant demeaning of NJ schools, the unions and yes, even the teachers. Jersey Jazzman documents the insulting (and inaccurate) comments that Christie has made against teachers.
Yes, and his ridiculous speechifying at the RNC! Nothing but a bully,is
Christie. Every time I go to New Jersey (2-3 times per year), it never fails that I read about some idiotic Christie activities in The Star-Ledger.
BTW, Joe, can you (or anyone else) tell me who funded that piece of propaganda–“The Cartel”–a few years back? Thank you!
Oh, a wonderful educational expert to debate Diane would be the mayor of NYC (sarcasm alert). Why is there even a “debate” about unions and the need for the same? It’s a manufactured debate from the anti-union folks. There is huge corporate money out there that would desperately love to destroy unions for all time in this country. There is a billionaires’ boys club aganist unions and the mainstream media is an echo chamber for these people. It’s amazing, the same people who want to privatize the schools are against unions, are also against Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid or anything that helps ordinary Americans.
Funny on Labor Day weekend to engage in debate about whether unions have a right to exist and to protect their members against capricious dismissal.
The fact is you don’t have to be a “poor teacher” to be fired in public education. Your teaching “performance” may have NOTHING to do with being sacked. Often a teacher is sacked because of age or job longevity or as a result of trumped-up charges, or in an attempt to cover up for a principal’s or other administrator’s screw-up. I get tired of people who spew about teacher firings who don’t know what they are talking about. Including some, sad to say, who ARE teachers.
And by the way, administrators are held to NO accountability AT ALL. If they screw up, they get moved to other principal jobs or to make-work jobs in the central office.
In an interesting exchange with LG, he argued against my suggestion of peer evaluation and argued that administrators should have the sole power of teacher evaluation. Dr. Ravitch argues that peer evaluation as done in Montgomary county at least, works well. Where would you stand on this issue?
With Ravitch, as none of the teachers with whom I taught at my old school would have pulled the BS that the administrator attempted on me.
That is so true. There are many teachers who end up being fired or have to move schools just because an administrator doesn’t like them. I have been bullied and harassed by an administrator – multiple teachers at our school were. The school where he was before he did the same thing. And the school after? Same thing. Then guess what? He got a promotion to central admin. Sure he has little interaction with schools anymore directly, lots of work and little power, but he got a PROMOTION.
The truth of the public school workplace:
http://neatoday.org/2012/05/16/bullying-of-teachers-pervasive-in-many-schools/
Read the comments.
Khirsh,
You still haven’t named the expert or what your plan is for incompetent administrators and there are plenty of them. Step it up!
Whether he was aware of it or not, Ken Hirsch’s question betrayed his bias: Diane, the defender of due process, was invited to debate an “expert.”
The clear implication is that only opponents of tenure and due process are experts, and presumably those who support it are uninformed or dupes of the teacher’s unions.
He has avoided the question and he hasn’t been back to answer it. What is his position anyway? What role does he perform? That would be interesting to know. Another TFA education “expert”? No shortage of those fools, that’s for sure!
I too, agree with the saying of if there is a poor teacher than there is a poor administrator. In my brief career (7yrs) I have witnessed several teachers who have verbally abused students, become vindictive, and report students for alleged or minor infractions, undergrade, discriminate against special ed students, and on a few occasions have heard of teachers who have caused physical confrontations (like a teacher who put a kid’s hat in a locker and then slammed the door on his arm when he went to get it) Of course, the student who had prior minor infractions for his behavior, was discounted. Adminstration who knows of the teacher’s volitilty still did nothing. And the kid’s parent is from another county where teachers regularly hit kids so the student’s greviance had no audience. Think him and all the students who witness items like these believe in the learning process.
Events like these occur not too infrequently in the urban school district where I work (and I was a union rep so these are just not isolated incidents), but I have encountered adminstrators who refuse to do anything about such items for a myraid of reasons such as fear having too many incidences and being labelled an dangerous/impact school or because the teacher has a passing rate of 90+ on their classes regent’s scores. Or the administrator is friends with such teachers, or maybe the administrator is just plain stoopid!
Now items of these seem rare to some but in an urban poor district where there is not much oversight unless its directed at student achievement, these occur too much, once is one time too many in my eyes. AND teachers who speak about it too much, are setting themselves up to be castigated & ostracized,( the new evaluations also assist adminstrators in getting rid of these meddlesome priests). I hang on, but again I say to myself before the year starts, that this year I won’t give a crap about the kids and just do my job & fly under the radar until I can get enough years to retire. I have heard similar oaths taken by my fellow educators.
Anyway I know this seems more like a rant and off topic but in keeping with the current dis-accountability its all Diane’s & the commentators’ fault since you all invoke such passion & feelings in me with your words and commentary.
I wonder why strong and reasonable principals are so rare? I am really fortunate with mine, but she is close to retirement. Maybe the skills for the job are so vastly different that it is hard to find them within one person?
I believe that teachers who are struggling should be supported through improvement plans that created through a team effort that includes those teachers. It should be clear what the teacher should be doing to improve, and what the administrators should be doing to support the teacher’s success. Overwhelmed teachers should be able to safely ask for and receive assistance without jeopardizing their careers. Sound improvement plans should be put into effect with the idea that the end desire is for the teacher to stay, and not just a bunch of hoops for that teacher to go through in a long slow and agonizingly stressful death march to being pushed out or fired. After a predetermined and reasonable amount of time has passed, and there have been check-ins along the way with both sides, and with positive effort and results, the teacher should be able to graduate from the improvement plan without having been on one permanently scarring their records. Supporting struggling teachers seems far more desirable than having them leave midyear through whatever means, and subjecting their students to a series of substitutes.
I have a few thoughts about why good principals are so rare. For one thing, many don’t understand what teachers do, because most of them I know taught for 3 years and then went into administration, before they ever got really good at the craft. Also, most of them have no experience managing anyone but children (cause they’ve never done anything in their adult lives but teach). So they treat their staffs like children, which never fails to produce an unmotivated staff. Another problem is that principals aren’t really free to focus on education–there is too much else going on. I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve sat in a principal’s office trying to get permission to try some new innovation I’ve learned about while his eyes glaze over in bewilderment, having no idea what I’m even talking about. There are great principals out there; One just retired in my building. But even they are hampered by the fact that they cannot possibly meaningfully assess the performance of the hundreds of staff members that they are in charge of, without some kind of help. And that is not the fault of the teacher’s union.
Dave,
You’ve stated my thoughts about the “problem” of the vast majority of administrators not being “master” teachers (one needs a minimum of 10 years teaching before I would consider one a master teacher) and not having any supervisory experience outside of a classroom/school setting (other than maybe some summer part time employment). As one who started teaching at 38 and who held supervisory positions in the non-schooling world and as one in his 19th year of public school teaching, including being department chair, chair of a “school improvement committee” when those were in vogue, I can attest to the phenomena of which you write.
I find it very difficult to be mandated to do things in my teaching by some young inexperienced administrator who has been mandated to institute said “programs”-“Edmodo” being the new one this year-without even getting my input as to how it will affect my classes. They know who butters their bread and it ain’t us peon teachers.
It seems to me that school governance has taken many steps backwards from the more collaborative and collegial ways before the big push for “educational leaders” (think of Dr. Evil putting the quotes in the air with his hands) that occurred at the beginning of this century. Now, the “educational leaders” many times are nothing more than bullying non-thinking educrats who wouldn’t know collaboration if it bit them in their arse. “Do what I say or else” is their mantra.
I am praying I can make it that far! 19 years! Good to know you are out there too. I entered teaching at 45! Have been teaching 10 years and so far the first few weeks of school have seemed like 10 years. We just found out White wants us to give the ACT to 8-11th graders this year! Wish my Dr. Evil Finger Quotes “Union” would just say no! Or even better, that the teachers could just say no.
In my state, it takes four years to obtain the right to due process, which should be more than enough time for any administrator to evaluate a teacher. It’s great for districts that control their staff costs with it. You can get get four years out of an experienced teacher (since “tenure” doesn’t transfer from one district to another). I was let go after three years. The district had credited me with three years when they hired me, froze salaries my second year, and RIFed me the first two before bringing me back. There were several good, experienced teachers who were let go at four years. They can’t say they are not recommending us for rehire because of money because it looks bad. You are pretty safe first and second year (if the federal and state funding come through) because they can RIF you. Most everyone is called back. Third and fourth year teachers take the hit.
“Pants on fire” liars are particularly abhorrent. We’re not talking about “little white” liars who are trying to protect someone from being hurt by brutal honesty. We’re talking about full throttle grow-the-nose liars who want to terminate people’s livelihoods, based on false accusations, who want to destroy people’s lives. These are lies that are told with the very intention of making others look bad, while trying to make themselves look better. That’s the “reform” approach.
These kinds of lies are particularly egregious today, when leaders regularly demand “transparency” and “accountability”, but they repeatedly violate these expectations themselves. We really need to find a way to prevent them from having the power to set standards that are only for other people.
Teachers definitely need tenure (preferably called “due process” or “just cause”) protection against arbitrary discharge by biased principals or salary-based discharge by cost-saving administrators.
However, if — as we definitely should — give teachers due process protection, then we should implement reforms that make it likely that truly poorly-performing teachers will be discharged.
Relying on the principal alone is bad policy. Absent due process (or even with due process, absent a union to fund the due process challenge), relying on the principal will result in many good teachers being discharged for arbitrary/invalid reasons. With due process and unions, relying on the principal will result in many poorly-performing teachers being retained — because the principal simply does not have the managerial resources (particularly time) to document poor performance.
In virtually all large organizations employing many professional employees, the professional employees have first-line supervisors who are themselves professionals and who have daily professional contact with the employees. These first-line supervisors have the time, expertise, and personal incentive to document good/poor performance. And, there is usually another first-line supervisor and/or a manager who has at least some professional contact with the employee, so there is an inherent check on that first-line supervisor’s evaluations.
By contrast, in the schools, the teachers do not have a first-line supervisor; instead, they have a manager (the principal). The teacher/principal ratio is usually at least 25:1, sometimes 50:1; by contrast, in other professional organizations, the employee/supervisor ratio is usually in the 4:1 to 10:1 range. A principal simply does not have enough time (or daily professional contact) with a teacher to adequately evaluate the teacher. Also, a principal often lacks subject matter expertise to evaluate a teacher, particularly in the secondary grades. And, unlike other professional organizations, there is no other supervisor or manager with significant professional contact with a teacher to act as a check on an incorrect principal evaluation. Finally, unlike the first-line supervisors in other professional organizations, the principal is rarely held responsible for the quality of any given teacher’s work product. Therefore, a principal has little personal incentive to train a junior teacher or to fairly evaluate a teacher.
The ideal answer to the problem of poorly-performing teachers is to create first-line teacher supervisors. Unfortunately, that’s too expensive (and too revolutionary). A feasible answer is to use a peer-review approach in which expert senior teachers (outside the principal’s selection/control) work closely with teachers who are possibly performing poorly, 2) provide training and evaluation, and 3) recommend retention/discharge to a committee (senior teachers, principals) that makes the final decision.
This approach, in effect, provides first-line supervision, but only for a limited time period and only for those teachers most likely to require first-line supervision. Montgomery County, MD (a large suburban system outside Washington, DC) has used this model (called “PAR”) for 10 years with excellent results — many teachers discharged or resigned-in-lieu-of-review, few challenges to the discharges, union supports the system, teachers retain due-process protection, teachers protected from arbitrary principal action, and no high-stakes-testing.
The Montgomery County School District is very impressive. With nearly 150,000 students and a budget of around 2.2 billion dollars, it has the resources and scale to do many things that are not feasible in school districts in my state (There are a total of 450,500 students in the 308 school districts in my state). Do you think this could be used in much smaller and less wealthy school districts?
I hope we hear from teachers who live in Montgomery County.
I am willing to bet that a system of PAR is less costly and more positive (team-building) than the methods you now use in your state.
Certainly some modifications would be required to use it in my state. The consulting teacher position used in the PAR system in Montgomery County Schools could not be implemented in most school district in my state as they could not afford to have full time consulting teachers in every field.
Thank you for this compelling comment. You bring up important points: yes, due process is essential. No, principals do not have the time (usually) to supervise teachers and document poor performance (or good performance, for that matter).
A peer-review approach makes great sense. I see only a few caveats:
First, if it’s a peer review team (as opposed to an indiviual mentor), it would have to ensure that all members are heard and all concerns addressed. It’s all too easy to slip into erroneous group consensus.
Second, the mentors’ criteria should allow for a range of teaching methods. A teacher should not be faulted for using method/model X if it is appropriate to the topic and the students. What matters is that it make sense for the lesson and that she execute it well.
Third, the principal should maintain regular contact with the teacher and the mentors, making suggestions when necessary.
Fourth, as you suggest, this should be reserved for novice teachers and teachers who might be performing poorly. Other teachers should be given more autonomy. Peers might observe them to give informal feedback and to inform their own teaching, but not to evaluate them.
This is part of a larger movement to eliminate unions so as to increase profit. Truths or evidence is not necessary to the “reform” movement . As noted, Texas is even trying to eliminate critical thinking. Thank you Diane for educating us about what is happening so that we can slow down the direction which the “reformers” want to take public education.
Happy Labor Day Red!
Sent from my iPad
I taught for 34 years in what was considered a good, rural school district. Good, but could have been so very much better than it was. By far, the most important person in any school is the Principal. When you have Principals who assigned new teachers to the most difficult schedules (lowest-level classes, changing rooms every period, etc., etc.) you are NOT a good administrator. What private company would do this and still be successful?? Phantom visitations to evaluate teachers, leaving the room on a visitation because there is a lab going on and saying “I’ll come back when you are teaching”. How about having a science department budget for equipment and supplies that does not increase one dollar over a 25 year period? A Principal who, when he was a gym teacher, used to open his office door, kick out some balls, tell the class to pick up sides, and go on reading his paper. Then there is the constantly reported lie that because of unions, bad teachers cannot be fired. If there is a bad teacher in your school, then you have a BAD administrator!!
I wouldn’t trust “an expert” either. But I can tell you that a teacher has a limited time to file a grievance and that grievance has to be heard within a time-line that does not take months unless it goes to arbitration. That’s probably has more to do with the number of cases.
But let’s talk due process: When teachers take students on a trip and return for lunch, the teacher and students have a right to their lunch periods. Yet some principals tried to take that away making the students eat lunch in the classroom. They also tried to take away the teacher’s prep. Trips are not a day at the beach. Teachers have to learn the material before going. And many museums, botanical gardens, environmental centers, etc. require teachers to attend a workshop after school before the schedule trip. Then there is the added pressure of making sure everyone came prepared, and keeping an eye on each and every student. After the trip we have to prepare the follow-up lesson.
What other profession tells their employees they can’t take lunch or their contractual break? We consider ourselves lucky if our bladder doesn’t act up during class time because teachers are not allowed to have human functions.
It’s when principals start making decisions based on what they are feeling at that particular moment or that particular teacher that show poor judgment.
or make them to get back at a teacher who dared disagree or demanded respect or stood up for the teacher who made a mistake but is a great teacher and shouldn’t have his or her entire value judged on a single mistake.
All this talk about finding the “bad teachers” and the argument that our teacher evaluation systems are broken because we don’t fire enough teachers. I find that line of reasoning highly questionable given the fact that 50% of our teachers leave after the first 5 years anyways (it’s even higher in the urban schools). Why try to find the bad teachers when a large majority of them leave anyways?
Discussions of teacher quality and “bad teachers” are moot right now. We need to find a way to keep teachers before we worry about which ones are good and bad. Finland’s teacher attrition rates are minimal with Helsinki topping out at about 12% in the first 5 years. Most other parts of Finland have even lower teacher attrition rates.
In the U.S., in terms of teacher quality, beggars can’t be choosers, so as I tell people, put up or shut up.
Agreed. This narrative is cynical, wrong, prevents action on real problems.
Diane
Here’s an interesting point about firing teachers – tenured or non-tenured – in terms of unions and arguments about tenure:
“Most advocates of abolishing tenure point to the low percentage of teachers who lose their jobs for poor performance. For example, the most widely cited study, the National Center for Education Statistics’ 2007-08 School and Staffing Survey (NCES 2009), found that the standardized percentage of tenured teachers terminated for poor performance was 1.4%. What’s often ignored is that the same survey reported that the corresponding figure for nonrenewal of nontenured teachers for poor performance was .7%. If tenure were the reason we can’t fire bad teachers, then why is the rate half for nontenured teachers, who lack this supposedly ironclad protection?.”
From Zirkle (2010) in Kappan.
If administrators were doing their job and giving due process only to well-qualified teachers, the dismissal rate for tenured teachers would be far lower.
Diane
I am disappointed by this posting as it is the “Big Lie” about a “Big Lie.” For many years this has been a typical union talking point that the reason bad teachers were not fired was simply lazy and incompetent administrators. I have come to rely on your determination, integrity and honest interpretation of research to hold everyone accountable for their policies which affect children. Of late I am seeing an over-reaction to attacks on our profession and public schools as the the more vocal individuals assume seemingly no responsibility or self reflection for the sad state of affairs in public education. I have been privileged over the course of my career as teacher and administrator to know a host of wonderful, dedicated teachers and administrators who in moments of candor and self reflection acknowledge a wider scope of blame regarding the retention of bad teachers. Incredible amounts of time, endless hearings, wasted resources, overly restrictive contract provisions and yes even some unethical behavior on the part of union leaders coupled with minimal prospects for success have discouraged even the most capable administrators. The teacher union’s culture of resistance (Elmore,2011) has done as much to protect bad teachers as any weakness in the administrative ranks. The number of teacher dismissals for cause especially in New York City do not add up to a generation of lazy and incompetent administrators. These are the same old lame excuses that have caused us to lose control of our own profession, threatened the future of public education and given our destiny over to the hucksters and impostors who claim to care about children. See Brad Jupp’s chapter in Elmore’s, I Used to Think…And Now I Think, for what I think is a more helpful discussion of a positive union role for the future as well as a more thoughtful explanation of teacher accountability.
The biggest lie of all is that “bad teachers” are the primary reason for poor student achievement.
It is important to understand that we live today in a context where there is a major push to strip teachers of all job protections and to eliminate collective bargaining. This will accelerate as the drive to privatize education picks up speed.
Certainly the unions should not be reflexively defensive, should not defend every job protection, but neither should they roll over for those who would destroy the teaching profession and replace veterans with inexpensive new college graduates. That will save money but not improve education.
The question is which is more important: cutting costs or improving education?
If it is the latter, we need to recruit and honor experienced administrators and teachers, and they need to work together in the best interests of the children.
I need a teacher who has been bullied and mistreated by their principal