I recall many discussions in the rightwing think tanks to which I once belonged about how the schools and the teaching profession would be elevated if we could only judge teachers by the performance of their students and fire the lowest performing teachers every year. I recall asking, “where will the new teachers come from?” My colleagues said there would never be a shortage because there are so many people who prepared to be teachers but never entered the classroom. They would rush to fill the newly available jobs. What they never considered was the possibility that their brilliant theory was wrong. That judging teachers by the test scores of their students was unreliable and invalid; that doing so would drive out many find teachers and make teaching an undesirable profession; would indeed wipe out professionalism itself.
From a comment on the blog:
50% of evaluation based on end of course testing is so demotivating and humiliating that I am definitely getting out of teaching asap. Two years of bad test scores means suspension and potential loss of license. Seventy hour work weeks, failing technology, rotating cast of half my class load with various medical conditions that impede cognitive function. Adaptable, hard working, using differentiated learning and hands on learning/multimodal approaches does not mean jack now. Teachers are not able to control the tests, cannot develop multiple means for students to demonstrate mastery. So half my well meaning students will christmas tree their end of course test and my own family will suffer the consequences when I lose my job. Bleaker future than the past five with consistent pay cuts and benefits cut. Furloughs are a yearly experience now. I am very well educated and a top graduate in my field and hold multiple degrees so the stereotype of the poorly educated teacher without options or abilities does not fit. It doesn’t fit for the majority of teachers I know.
But if I stay in teaching now, I will be an idiot.
This evaluation system is the last straw. I cajoled PTA parents to put pressure on our district to stop this eval system. There are several well respected anchor teachers who are now making tracks to change fields. What a waste. New administration is in love with drill and kill, parents are blinded by smoke and mirrors of test scores as a metric of anything.
Thank you for letting me vent. I am planning on how nice it will be to have sundays off, no longer haul 25lbs of paperwork home, have money in the bank in a different career. No profession gets treated collectively so poorly these days.
I will miss the students but I will not miss being treated like an ignorant fool by thisevaluation nightmare.
What a sad commentary on a profession that I retired from. I am saddened by her statements, but know full well that the current situation is detrimental to teachers and students. Perhaps Professor Ravitch’s book will convince those making the decisions change must take place.
I wish the author of this the best and commend her for holding to her principals.
I concur. I retired. I got tired of perpetually feeling like an ignoramus. Our grade level was unable to collaborate. I was about as pro-active about applying technology and differentiated groups as anyone in the school. But, our level was unable to move as a unit because one person and his personal lap dog wouldn’t do anything collaboratively. The evaluation changes were going to get more frequent, 10 per year, looking for “perfection” in all domains when they happened to walk in the door. (Anyone who has taught knows that meeting the students’ needs isn’t some picture perfect model of pedagogy, but a constantly changing canvas.) In this way, if you have a principal that doesn’t particularly like you, you wind up being victimized by the manipulation of what he/she “didn’t see” evidence of at any particular moment. Ridiculous. No one deserves to be treated as inhumanely as this currently evolving system designates.
I can’t imagine why anyone would WANT to enter the profession at this juncture. And, that is sad. I miss my students. I don’t miss my job.
I, too “retired” from education..albeit to raise my children that I had later in life. This was back in the late ’90s when NCLB was just starting, and I could feel we were about to head down the wrong path. Seemed like a good time to get out. We had gone from a site-controlled school with a policy of transparency and true innovation led by teachers and a very pro-teacher principal…to one of closed doors, deceit, and outright lying, with scripted curricula and one-size-fits-all decrees like “all 8th graders will take algebra”. I have been toying with getting back into things, but it is SO disheartening that I am not sure this is the time. Teaching is all I have ever done, and all I want to do, but becoming a classroom teacher right now is difficult to imagine….I think I may just continue all I can do to support my children’s teachers right now in and out of the class and see how things play out.
I don’t think it is the “right-wing” that is the problem, but the “think tanks” that are the problem. Over the years there are many reforms from the left “think tanks” as well as the right “think tanks” which have hurt education – some inadvertently, some blatant. I just think that there are too many people who have never “done” education in these “think tanks” and they problem solve from the outside. This doesn’t work no matter what political persuasion the organization. My family has been involved in education for years, and we know very few people, right or left, who have supported these current changes. We do not support the NEA for various reasons, but we do support public education. We do support teachers as professionals who deserve to be respected and allowed to do their jobs. We do go against the flow and keep our kids in public schools, even though many around us our homeschooling.
You are correct. Democrats for Ed Reform or DFER is another group that supports Ed Reform. This is a bipartisan attack on education.
Florida has spent millions of dollars (and more to come) creating a new test-based evaluation system, and districts will have to create several end of course exams for non-tested subjects to comply. Yet, in the past 2 school years with this new system, 95% of the states’ teachers are being rating effective and highly effective. Is this the problem the “reformers” had with the old system? Too many teachers scoring high?
So, what we have is essentially the same results but more money in the pockets of evaluation companies (Marzano, Danielson, etc.) and testing giants (like Pearson).
Don’t worry, Teacher111, if that is your real name. The fun hasn’t even started yet. The “culling” will come when the Common Core ramps up. Whatever silly tests that Florida has now “FCAT or other nonsense” will be replaced with Common Core, and that will be that. If Florida implements Common Core or PARCC, those kids in the South will be destroyed.
With CT’s new teacher evaluation system, the pre- observation form alone takes about 5 hours to fill out. Then you have the pre and post-conferences, plus a write-up to do, three times over the course of a year. I can barely keep up with the demands of the job now. How exactly are we to do all this while still trying to teach and lead a life outside of work? I am close to leaving myself. Part of me is secretly hoping to be labeled ineffective just so that I will be forced to seek other employment, something I have been reluctant to do.
Sorry, Lehrer, that CT has folded. I am in Hillsborough County, FL and we have had exactly what you’re describing for the last 3 years thanks to the Gates Grant. In our 4th year now, most of my colleagues and I have decided to tune it out as long as we get to keep our jobs. Nobody gets the dreaded low rating, “requires action,” anyway. It’s like it’s just a fact now that you have to be willing to feel overworked and demoralized in this profession. I don’t spend five hours filling out the dumb form anymore– the time you spend doesn’t make any difference for your students (and won’t help your rating all that much, either). Since I’m only in this for the kids at this point (my personal pride was eradicated long ago), I might as well spend that five hours improving my instruction in real ways so my students learn better.
I like your attitude! I love working with the kids and can usually keep the bull**** out of my head while I am teaching. Sometimes it gets too me and just wears me down.
Just look at NY state. Thirty percent of students in grades 3-8 “passed” the Pearson tests. Now apply that to high school students. What will happen to students and teachers when only 30 percent of students can GRADUATE? Most teachers will not be effective or highly effective. So teachers will be fired and students will not be “college or career ready.” Waiting for Cuomo to defend that, because he is heartily supporting the Pineapple King saying “change is hard.” How do parents feel about that? How do NY teachers, who are required to have masters’ degrees, feel about that? Maybe Andy and incumbents should harken to their own words: change is hard. Vote out all incumbents.
I always wondered where they would get the new teachers to replace the ones leaving the profession. Every teacher I know is planning on retiring as soon as they hit 30 years or age 62 (NYS retirement system). I wish the new teachers luck. I’d also like to warn them it’s not the educational system you’ve dreamed about. There are rough waters ahead.
I’m glad I went to school in the 60s and 70s when education was at its peak and Regent’s exams weren’t prorated. Most of my children did okay, too, but the Regent’s requirements for graduation led my son to go for a GED instead of walking across the stage for a diploma. (Thanks for nothing Mills). However, I fear for my grandchildren.
Please fix this before it’s too late.
Ellen,
Please consider joining a FaceBook group called BATs (BadAss Teachers), if you have not already. It is a group of teachers, parents, grandparents, anyone concerned about education and wanting to DO something about it. At least look into it. They ARE starting to make a difference, 30,000+ strong, getting media attention and forcing the conversation about education to change.
I feel the same way. I have been teaching for a little over ten years and I have nine years in the NYC public schools. Since I am not in the 25/55 group for retirement I have 20 more years until I turn 62 and have my 30 years in. At this point I feel I should change careers if I still have to put 20 years in. All of the points you eluded to are valid and I feel stuck trying to figure out what to do next. Should I switch careers? I have 4 kids and a mortgage and all of the other things everyone else has to deal with and it’s hard. Do I think I can make it another 20 years doing this? Probably not. I feel pigeonholed with having 2 masters degrees and all the certifications and stuff I worked so hard to achieve. What can I really do other than teach? Where else can I go? Does anyone have any suggestions? I am sure there are a lot of good teachers that are in the same position as I am and we all need some guidance here.
Anthony, with the new leadership in charge of the New York City system, I am hopeful that there will be many changes for the better. Please wait and watch.
Don’t make any rash decisions.