The Hudson Valley Alliance for Public Education issued a statement pledging to increase the number if opt outs next spring, in response to the Board of Regents’ decision to endorse a punitive, test-based teacher evaluation system. In the new system, test scores will count for 50% of a teacher’s evaluation, despite the American Statistical Association’s warning that a teacher accounts for 1-14% of variation in test scores.
Supporters of VAM think that the teachers’ union is pulling the strings and persuading parents to express such views. They think parents are dupes and fools. They are wrong.
Parents understand that when test scores matter so much, teachers will spend more time on test prep and less time on untested subjects. This is educationally unsound, and it hurts their children.
The parents support opt out to protect their children.
Here is the statement of the Hudson Valley Alliance:
“Parents across the Hudson Valley are dismayed by yesterday’s vote by the Board of Regents to adopt teacher evaluation regulations that will double down on high stakes testing and the harmful effects of test-prep driven education. While we applaud the courage of those Regents who voted no, Hudson Valley parents are disappointed with Regent Finn’s failure to protect public school children in our area.
“Under Chancellor Tisch’s leadership, the Regents majority have failed to challenge flawed legislation that harms public school children” said Carol Newman Sharkey, Orange County public school parent. “It is clear that Chancellor Tisch must be removed from her position when her term is up this year.”
“The Regents failed to rise up against the Governor’s tyrannical demands and instead have allowed bad education policies to displace whole child and sound pedagogical practices. They have stood idly by while Cuomo makes a mockery out of public schools putting cronies, political ambition, and charter schools above children” said Tory Lowe, co-founder of Kingston Action for Education and Ulster County public school parent.
“This vote ensures that the opt out movement will continue to grow. Parents seeking to protect their children will not back down or be appeased by false promises of better tests. At the end of the day, you cannot measure teaching and learning with a test score. Until there is real change, parents will continue to reject a corrupt system that destroys authentic teaching and learning” said, Bianca Tanis, New Paltz public school parent.
Since the adoption of the Common Core-aligned assessments, the Regents have voted to limit the number of students entitled to extra support in the form of Academic Intervention Services while simultaneously labeling teachers and students as failures.
“Once again, NYSED seems to talk out of both sides of its mouth. The message that SED continues to spread is that almost 70% of the students in grades 3-8 aren’t “proficient”, but yet schools don’t have to provide AIS (i.e. – “flexibility”) if their level of failure isn’t low enough. Either our children who are scoring ‘1s and 2s’ on the state tests are struggling and they deserve to get the academic support to help them meet the standards, or the standards themselves are inappropriate. They cannot have it both ways” said Tim Farley, Columbia County public school parent.
Stacey Kahn, Ulster County public school parent said “We suggest that Chancellor Tisch and Commissioner stop insulting the intelligence of the public. We will refuse the tests until the Regents majority starts making decisions that put children before politics and corporate sponsors.”
“What took place at the Regents meeting only underscores what parents and educators have known for quite some time – Chancellor Tisch must go. It is critical that parents, educators, and concerned community members turn their eyes towards our state legislators who have the power to amend destructive education law and remove Chancellor Tisch and some of her colleagues as they seek reappointment in the new year. New York students deserve responsible and informed leadership that will ensure an equitable, community-driven, and child-centered education. We will accept nothing less” said Anna Shah, Dutchess County public school parent.
“The 10 NYS Board of Regents members who lacked the courage to vote against Governor Cuomo’s public school privatization agenda have now emboldened parents towards increased activism. Through the use of social media, traditional media and speakers forums parents will continue to inform and educate. They will forge ahead against these harmful policies using their best weapons…involvement in the political process (our eyes will on our legislators) and of course the 500,000 test refusals for Spring 2016,” said Lauren Isaacs Schimko, public school parent, Rockland County educator & Administrator of “Pencils DOWN Rockland County” on Facebook.
HV Alliance for Public education, is a grassroots organization dedicated to advocating for the rights of parents and public school children against harmful testing practices in the Hudson Valley. To join the Alliance or to learn more, please visit us here:
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I applaud these well informed and thoughtful parents. Their advocacy may just bring back a sound education for our children.
AMEN, BL.
Opt Out has been ignored. Now it’ time to Drop Out of public education to save our children from damaging indoctrination to a godless one world order! Private Schools that haven’t implemented Common Core or Home Schooling.
That is exactly what corporate privateers want…for people to get so frustrated, they abandon public ed and it can be called a failure and dismantled altogether….then, there will be no more public school pensions in state budgets, no more teachers unions funding political candidates, and for profit organizations will completely take over the public sector. Don’t buy in.
According to NYSUT in addition to making tests shorter, they will be taking a look at the growth score on VAM. Frankly, I wouldn’t trust what Elia or Cuomo say. I think they are trying to give the illusion of appeasing parents so they will allow their children to take the test. Since we know that VAM is a bunch of nonsense, the governor has the power to tweak and play to achieve his desired outcomes. I would urge parents to continue to opt out as the governor still has the power to wreak havoc on the schools, teachers and students. http://www.nysut.org/news/2015/september/nysut-keeps-up-the-pressure-as-regents-call-for-law-overhaul
Basic facts we need to have in the very front of our consciousness over this school year:
– if opt out numbers are lower than ’14-’15: victory for Cuomo/Tisch/Elia/etc….and don’t think for a second they won’t explode with rhetoric about it.
-if opt out numbers remain the same for this school year, as they were for ’14-’15: victory for Cuomo/Tisch/Elia/reformers, again with rhetorical explosion of said victory.
-if opt out numbers for this school year are limited to single digit growth over last year: victory for Cuomo/Tisch/Elia/reformers. They will loudly say their efforts agains opt out limited its growth and they will sharpen up further for next year.
-if opt out sees SIGNIFICANT growth this school year (20-100% growth): opt out will remain the only significant and viable force on the field and will remain relevant to keep pushing for the next school year.
We have to be clear here. In the above possible outcomes, 3 of the 4 are absolute awful options for our side and only 1 allows the fight to continue apace. That we are in such a position, no matter how likely that 4th possibility is, is a real indictment of our (organized teachers) handling of the reform movement over the last decade or so.
If opt out is our front line, then it MUST live up this year to its claims. While I do believe that it probably will, I must say that as teachers this is the problem with allowing opt out to shoulder the entire burden of fighting the reform movement. We are heavily beaten if opt out looses its force and potency. It is sad that opt out doesnt have a co-equal partner in the fight with NYSUT. Parents fighting for teachers is a wonderful, strong, and enormously sad statement about the deep irrelevancy that was THE PATH CHOSEN by union leadership.
Lets be clear that this year is essential for our side with opt out.
I attend a forum with Vice Chancellor Bottar after the vote. He was apologetic and claimed that he had no power and had to follow the law. I reminded him he had a choice and the law also required teacher and principal evaluation be based on research, sound science, and expert study, not the political folly that it currently is based on. He fully acknowledged that test scores should be no more than 15-20% (still invalid and ridiculous, but juxtaposed against 50% seems almost reasonable) He also acknowledged out of the thousands of e-mail he received that none of them urged him to vote this capricious folly of an evaluation system into law. Basically no one from legislators to regents are listening or have the fortitude to stand up against this nonsense. Teachers and administrators got fooled once by agreeing to this sham. This doubles down on a failed policy. None of the things he offered to mitigate the damage will stop inplementation of this bad idea. If districts don’t comply, they lose their state aid increase. Basically extortion. If everyone says no to this sham, it would end. Say no if you are a Teacher Association President or an Administrators Association President and don’t sign away the teaching profession and control of your public school.
From NYS gov:
“Regents meet once a month in Albany, New York to SET education policy for the state.”
Vice Chancellor Bottar needs to resign his position if he feels this way.
1 to 14 per cent. Reference?
Many thanks,
Robert I Rhodes, Ph.D. Chairman, Preserve Rampo
Robert Rhodes,
Read 8-page statement on VAM by American Statistical Assiciation:
Click to access asa_vam_statement.pdf
It is only a guaranteed amount of time before legislation is passed to penalize parents big time if they opt their child out. This is sad on both ends, but it is the reality. The state can pass most any legisaiton it wants, and the only way to reverse bad laws will be the court system.
It is sad and terrifying that it has come down to this, and from what I have read, the new APPR system mandates that districts fire teachers who, for two years in a row, have had scores of “ineffective”. It used to be an option to fire, but is now a mandate.
Teachers can only use a review or appeals process if they can make claims that districts acted fraudulently in their handling of the evaluation system. This is a very difficult thing to prove because it’s essentially like saying an administrator deliberately rated a teacher one way when in actuality, the adminsitator wanted to give a higher rating (I am referring to the observation process in this instance), but was directed or pressured to do otherwise because of other politics and agendas. What is said behind closed doors will never reach that teacher’s ears short of clandestinely placed, high tech surveillance devices, which are probably illegal to begin with and not feasible to get a hold of and implement.
As for test scores, there is no readily achiveable “fraud” to prove; the numbers are the numbers. To prove that the design of the tests and the utilization of scores is rigged or gravely flawed is something that is now being controverted in the Lederman case in NY.
I think it is very likely that scores will adversly impact teachers far more than observations because the incidence of administrator fraud is highly probable to be extremely low. Fraud only works against administrators and is really not in their interest. Any administrator worth their salt and who is witness to excellent teaching will want to retain that teacher, whether young, old, new, or veteran. Still, the new APPR system will destabilize school districts and create revolving doors. It will inevitably lower costs from a management and taxpayer perspective, but it will also severely jeopardize and compromise high quality teaching and learning from an instructional view.
As hard as this all is, one thing is guaranteed: The fight is anything but over, and most of it will be generated by parents, and not teachers and their unions.
It’s very sad, but it’s also bursting with hope, as new generations of Americans are starting to awaken from their shopping, refined sugar, and cable TV slumbers, all to find themselves as alert, conscious, civic participants.
With all its horrors, I think this is an exciting era.
Penalize parents??? How? They are stupid but not that stupid unless they want a huge revolt
The legislation is on its way . . .
Fasten your seatbelts.
Robert,
You are quite correct regarding the latest, harshest APPR. It’s ability to expeditiously end a teacher’s career is profound and fairly well shored up in the law. It pursues its purpose of removing organized teachers quite efficiently and the much talked about “appeals process” has nothing to do with the test score side of things….just the observation parts. It’s a neutered and meaningless appeals project designed to create the look of responsible thinking.
The new APPR is the absolute realization of the existential threat to our profession that has been in process for some time. It is also a testament and probably final statement in the history of NYSUT.
NYSUT is no longer a force politically on the battlefield against reform. They no longer can protect teachers in any meaningful way. They have not produced a useful, original thought in our defense in years. The only question that remains of any real meaning for membership is how to stop having our biweekly dues sent to NYSUT. This is not snark. I mean it clearly and earnestly. It is money going to prop up a corpse. When will voices become louder on this?
I acknowledge everything you are saying, and I could not agree with you more . . . . Tenure is but nominal.
It basically allows a ridiculous formula to circumvent a teacher’s due process rights. Let’s hope the Lederman’s case shows that the formula is neither transparent nor understandable, which, I believe, were two requirements under NYS law for teacher evaluation. If that happens, maybe the unions can move to a class action suit. We’ll have to wait and see.
It’s time for a class action lawsuit. Tisch has publicly called these tests a snapshot. To me, a snapshot tells a small part of any story. So now, why are these test counting as 50% of a teachers rating? There have been countless errors and every statistic company has called these evaluations unreliable at best. In addition, it’s time for the entire state of educators to visit Albany on a weekday along with parents. As an educator, I’m willing to take an unpaid days or days until changes are made.
That is some long snapshot!
While the idea of taking things to the courts has an air of finally getting a reasonable hearing, hope, justice, etc., I must say that as things go, the courts are not a de facto ally of ours, nor are they capable of peering through the politics of Ed reform. As a rule, courts/judges swim in the same political tidal pools as the people and cases they hear. This is of course not a new revelation.
In terms of the history of judges/courts and the Ed reform movement, they are more likely to come out on the side of education reformers than they are our side. The successful co-opting of the language and rhetoric of the civil rights movement by the Ed reform crowd, their substantial corporate money, and their strong adherents on the right and left (another huge success of the reform movement) make their success in courtrooms quite probable.
On this front I would tentatively and weakly suggest that the upcoming Liederman (sc?) ruling will most likely be, at best, a let-down for our side. If it doesn’t come out fully against us (and NYSED’s much vaunted weakness on this case in no way suggests an outcome) it will most likely be very narrow, allowing and enabling further, smarter, and sharper anti-teacher APPR’s. So, look for the narrowness of a decision there…..and narrow for us is still a loss.
It all comes back to a point I’ve been trying to make for quite some time: if we are ever to get ahead of this fight, if ever we are to gain the advantage in this fight, it will only come in a collective space of clarity and honesty. What that means is a renewed relationship to honesty and the truth. The essential component of that is dispensing with the constant, pathological, child-like, fear-based, crutch of looking for a savior. Looking for the courts to save us, the US attorney to save us, academic papers to save us, politicians to save us, parents to save us, etc etc etc. will only lead to us continuing to ignore our real issues, fight with our arms bound, and have a confused, disjointed, sloppy rhetoric. We will continue to lose if we continue to look to others to step in and do what we need to do. If public education is to survive (and really, it may not…this is something we need to clearly apprehend and understand in our minds) only the practitioners of said education can save it. Parents can help….as they must. But it is our institution to save. Or not.
The reform movement, and its rampant successes thus far, exists because we as organized educators have allowed it. We must begin to own this.
We need to change our optics on this. We are not the victims of the reform movement. We have allowed it to steam roll through our society and culture. We complain about how every other group in society should see it for what it is, should have done something to stop it, should be aghast at how this precious institution is being taken by corporate power…..but we are the ones who occupy the actual space of public education. It was ours to defend.
We need to begin with some honesty…
And what action do you propose?
….as stated, honesty is itself an action at this point. Following that I deeply believe that our first and only real effective action would be to take back NYSUT. And no, not waiting until the next meaningless election. I would recommend action at the local level whereas membership forces their local leadership to end the payment of the largest part of our dues to NYSUT. This would be a bold meaningful step. It would dislodge leadership. I am not clear at all on the legal stuff required here. Failing that, how about a petition where we somehow gain a huge amount of membership signatures stating that they have no confidence in leadership and insist on new elections? I do know that democratic action is still possible. Our first action needs to be reclaiming our voice. Are the above thoughts pie-in-the-sky….sure. But they are not nearly as ridiculous and un-doable as say taking over public education was to folks a couple decades ago.
Valid points.. My district stopped sending money to nysut 3 years ago… We use the funds for our own political action endeavors…I’m not sure a petition could overtake nysuts current leadership legally…I think the current crisis is beyond phone calls, letters, petitions etc… major action is required and it will take massive amounts of people on the same page
Reformers would love a dismantling of nysut
If the SCOTUS rules that one does not have to pay any union dues beyond direct collective bargaining or that one does not have to join a closed shop, it will be the end of unions. In a way, at least for the teachers’ unions, there is some rhyme and reason to this because they simply don’t fight any more and don’t produce. They don’t even show resistance to any reasonable or robust extent. Why should teachers pay Randi Weingarten’s salary, all to have her kiss and schmooze with Eli Broad, accept money from Bill Gates, and negotiate for merit pay in Newark.
All cows paying dues to the slaughterhouse as they are waiting in line to get there . . .
Moo . . . . . . . .
MYSTERIOUS MOTIVATION: Regent watchers for years have seen Tisch, Tilles and others make statements that are rational and admit the many flaws in the standardized testing regime. But then when they vote, they rubber stamp a governor we all know is funded by privatizers.
What we don’t know is HOW the hedgefunders are motivating Regents to vote against their own public statements. Perhaps we need an investigation. Roger Tilles for example has been publishing articles since 2010 describing the harm of the testing, but voted for it again this week. Tisch has said she regrets tying the rollout of testing to evaluations, and expressed concern for disabled kids who are forced to test. Her explanation to vote for APPR is ponderous – she said she has a duty to uphold the statute. Why have a Board of Regents at all then?
So HOW do the reformer get the Regents to comply? For Tisch, a billionaire heiress herself, it’s easy to see why she acts in concert with the anti-democracy elites, she is of their ilk. But for Tilles and the others it would seem there is some arm twisting or other incentive.
Everyone knows the way it works, a plum job or board position with a hefty paycheck awaits those who perform for the privatizers. As long as nothing quid pro quo is spoken aloud, it’s all legal. But NYS officials are notoriously sloppy, so hearings or investigations could perhaps uncover the mysterious reasons Regents vote against their own beliefs.
I thought Tilles was very wealthy also. Was not the Tilles Center near C.W. Post College named after his family?
Tilles has an agenda…he intends on replacing Tisch as chancellor… I’m sure there is a money trail or promise somewhere… I’m sad that my young children are the pawns in this corrupt state
It’s also not just about clear financially-based motivation. It’s also about narrative. Few people want their professional lives to be void of meaning. I’d argue that this is true for those on the board of regents. They all want to feel in some way central and connected to the broad currents of their time, and as regents they probably want to feel like real movers and agents of change. By voting for measures associated with the reform movement they are choosing a narrative steeped in the language of social reform, the language of the civil rights movement, and at bottom a language of social change. Obviously these narratives are all strategically positioned to cover some of the most egregious and crass capitalist-corporatist privatization efforts ever, but that is beside the point.
The only narrative we offer is a confused narrative of seeming stasis and vague reference to democracy. We are of course right, but the fact is we have failed at providing a narrative by which those with political power can feel that they are participating in the reform and change that all of us want to be part of. Again, the reasons for our failure lie in our side’s inability to confront our own issues etc which I struggled to articulate elsewhere. Being right isn’t enough. The reform movement has been successful in crafting their side as “reform.” All the academic papers demonstrating our side being right is nothing compared to a simple appealing narrative. We forget this to our detriment.
NYSTEACHER, you are RIGHT on the mark!!!!!
Perfectly put . . . . I’m a fan.