This article was published last year. It was written by Marc Epstein, a social studies teacher and dean at Jamaica High School. Marc has a Ph.D. in Japanese naval history. Since he wrote this article, the New York City Department of Education closed Jamaica High School but a court stayed the closing. The city has already placed small schools in the historic building.
Archives for the month of: August, 2012
Josh Greenman of the New York Daily News writes today that President Obama has been terrific on education reform issues: he has challenged teachers’ unions, pushed for merit pay, encouraged the expansion of charter schools, and used billions of dollars in stimulus funds (via Race to the Top) to promote an agenda that either President Bush would envy. In its editorials, the Daily News has stridently defended charters, testing, and accountability, and has led the charge against the teachers’ union. The billionaire owner of the Daily News, Mort Zuckerman, is on the board of the Broad Foundation, which avidly promotes school closings and privatization.
So imagine Josh’s disappointment that the President is now kowtowing to those teachers unions and saying that more money will solve the problems. He writes, “So count me disappointed that Obama is campaigning for reelection with education rhetoric that is ripped right out of a dusty old Democratic Party playbook.” Wow. A Democratic President actually sounding like a Democrat on education.
Josh wonders why the President doesn’t stick up for his strong testing-and-accountabiilty and school choice agenda. Why doesn’t he boldly admit that his program is not all that different from Romney’s? (There are two big issues where they differ: Romney supports vouchers, Obama doesn’t; Obama wants to help students with their crushing student loans, Romney doesn’t.) UPDATE: (One other major difference: Romney thinks anyone should be allowed to teach, without any certification or standards, and you can bet that he will continue the Republican assault on teachers’ unions.)
Josh implies that the President is reaching out to teachers and their unions and supporters of public education because–guess what?–it is an election year. With a few more eloquent speeches, maybe he can persuade them that his agenda has some resemblance to the traditional Democratic view that schools should have adequate resources, that teachers have a right to bargain collectively, that the federal government has a responsibility to promote equity (not competition), and that school choice is the rightwing plan to privatize the public schools.
Well, it is good to hear the rhetoric. That’s a change. We can always hope that he means it. But that, of course, would mean ditching Race to the Top and all that absurd rightwing rhetoric about how schools can fix poverty, all by themselves.
A new study published in London concludes that students perform better in school–both academically and in their behavior–when teachers focus on learning rather than on test scores, results, and competition.
Children’s attitudes and behaviour improve – along with their results — when teachers and schools are more concerned about helping them learn than pushing them to gain particular exam scores, Watkins found. Such points have been recognised by Ofsted reports on successful schools, and also mirror the evidence on achievement in other fields such as sports and business.
Never-the-less, evidence suggests that the “goal climate” in classrooms becomes increasingly performance-oriented as children get older, and that this continues to disadvantage the groups of children who have always struggled to achieve in school.
Watkins says schools have two challenges:
• To recognise that passing tests is not the goal of education, but a by-product of effective learning.
• To recognise that even when we want pupils to do their best in tests, pressure and performance orientation will not achieve it.
He concludes “If there’s one new thing we need in our school system right now, it’s a well-developed focus on learning. And if the coalition government is serious about its wish to close the gap between high performers and low performers then a focus on learning will make a significant contribution. Learning is for life, not for league tables.”
Kenneth Bernstein recently retired as a social studies teacher. He is Nationally Board Certified. He blogs at The Daily Kos and elsewhere about education and other topics. He wrote for this blog in response to the discussion about tenure:
Tenure is nothing more than a guarantee of due process in disciplinary matters
It seems to me the people who complain about tenure for public school teachers have somewhat dictatorial powers. They are similar to those who complain that police and prosecutors are hamstrung by having to follow the provisions of the Bill of Rights when going after those accused of crimes.
We have a system of laws that provide for due process precisely because our Founders recognized that there must be some controls on those exercising power, ostensibly in the name of We, the People of the United States. They also recognized the danger of a mob mentality, which is why our system removed from being subject to simple majority rule things like our ability to worship or not worship in the religious sect of our choice, how we speak out politically, the ability of the press to act as our eyes and ears, and our ability to gather and organize for political and other purposes. These are all rights guaranteed in the First Amendment.
We have over the years expanded the Constitutional protections given people because of other kinds of discrimination we saw happening. Thus the 14th Amendment requires the equal protection of the laws.
“Tenure” for public school teachers does not prevent teachers from being dismissed for good cause, provided that administrators do their jobs properly. That would start with properly screening those who are hired, properly supervising them before they earn tenure, and documenting any incidents that might warrant disciplinary action after tenure is earned.
Remember, the disciplinary procedures are subject to state and federal laws where applicable, and the actual procedures are usually the result of negotiations between the school system administration/school board and the union on behalf of the teachers. That is, the procedures have been agreed to by both sides. That is a contractual agreement, requiring both sides to abide by the provisions thereof. Since the Dartmouth College case, contracts are generally accepted to be sacrosanct so long as they are not for illegal acts.
There is a certain mindset that does not like to have to deal with people who can legally exercise power against them. Unfortunately, we are seeing too many people in public life with this kind of mindset. Some wish to impose their religious values upon the rest of us, through law if possible, despite the restrictions of the First Amendment. Others wish to criminalize behavior they find offensive. Still others wish to tilt the legal system totally in the direction of those with monetary wealth, without requiring those of wealth to contribute to the society which made the accumulation and continuation of that wealth possible.
Teachers unions are an easy target. And if they can be broken, what is left of unionization in this country will be in serious jeopardy. That will affect all Americans economically: states with unions have higher incomes, and oh by the way their schools tend to perform better.
I may now be retired from the classroom, at least for now, but I not only believed in the importance of teachers unions, I served as the lead building rep for the teachers in my building, a school with a national reputation for excellence, precisely because I believe unions are necessary for economic and educational equity.
Peter DeWitt is an elementary school principal in upstate New York who blogs for Education Week.
Whatever he writes is grounded in deep experience and respect for students, parents, and teachers.
Peter is especially concerned with the social and emotional well-being of his students.
That puts him out of the mainstream today, where the only thing that matters is test scores.
He sees the big issues from the perspective of how they affect students.
He cares too much about kids to command the attention of the powers that be.
That says a lot about where we are today.
We are fortunate to have someone with his wisdom regularly speaking out about the issues.
Imagine that this new manager–with unprecedented power to determine the future of the district–has worked as a consultant to the big charter school in the district.
Imagine that the district pays one-third of its budget to that same charter school.
Imagine that the very wealthy owner of the charter school collects $16 million a year in “management fees” from the charter school budget.
Imagine that this same businessman who owns the charter and collects $16 million a year is also the single biggest contributor to the governor.
What, you can’t imagine such a thing could happen?
Neither could I.
It’s too improbable, too outrageous.
Why the national press would be all over this story, wouldn’t they?
Imagine that.
Here you can see a rare event: a trifecta of school reform rhetoric.
A spokesman for Jeb Bush’s organization writing an article praising the “parent trigger” in Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post, espousing the principles of the rightwing ALEC.
This is a splendid demonstration of how the rightwing carefully uses progressive terminology to promote its agenda.
And by the way, the 1925 Supreme Court decision that this guy writes about had nothing to do with publicly funded school choice or a parent trigger. It came about because far-right groups in Oregon pushed through a law and a referendum that threatened to close down private and parochial schools. The rhetoric from the far-right then was that all American children should attend public schools, not any others. The law was challenged by the Society of Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary, whose school was at risk of closure. The Supreme Court upheld the right of parents to send their children to a nonpublic school. Nothing was said or implied about public funding for nonpublic schools or about the current rightwing assertion that parents should have the right to seize control of their public school and hand it to a private corporation. Connecting this court decision with the parent trigger is a wild stretch.
A good article in today’s New York Daily News by Michael Brick, who recalls going to an integrated public school in Austin, Texas.
Brick compares his own experience in Austin with New York City’s complete abandonment of integration today.
An interesting reflection on where we are heading as a society.
Anyone who questions the slow–now rapid–advance of the charter school industry, anyone who wonders whether our nation is in process of developing (or re-creating) a dual school system, will sooner or later get the KIPP question: Doesn’t KIPP prove definitively that poverty doesn’t matter? Doesn’t KIPP prove that charter schools are superior to public schools? Doesn’t KIPP prove that any child, no matter what their circumstances, can excel?
I admit that I have not waded into this debate because I acknowledge that some charters get excellent results, some get abysmal results, but on average, charters do NOT get better results than public schools. (Results, in this case, meaning test scores, which seem to be the only thing that matters in these discussions.)
When I visited Houston in the fall of 2010 to lecture at Rice, KIPP and TFA were my hosts. Michael Feinberg gave me a tour of his leading school, which looked like any public school, and introduced me to his top staff at lunch. We had a down-home visit and I like Michael. When I gave my lecture, I chastised KIPP for encouraging the public perception that all charter schools are better than all public schools and for failing to denounce the growing numbers of incompetent, corrupt, and inept charter schools. I talked about the oft-heard complaint that KIPP cherry picks its students and has high attrition, which KIPP denies. I challenged KIPP to take over an entire inner city school district that was willing and show what it could do when no one was excluded.
Needless to say, KIPP has not taken my advice and continues to expand its brand from district to district, with only a few schools in each district.
A recent article by Gerald Coles reviews the research about KIPP and notes that KIPP has a rapid-response to any questioning of its accomplishments, which KIPP says are now well documented. Coles points out that the research KIPP relies on was funded by corporations and foundations that have previously given KIPP millions of dollars. He calls it the “KIPP-funders’ funded research.” And he asks this question:
Can there be any bias in research bankrolled by the corporate contributors of the very company whose product the researchers were expected to validate? We are all familiar with the long history of industry-supported research, such as that of tobacco, drug, auto, and coal companies, all conducted by credentialed researchers, all of whom invariably produced findings that supposedly confirmed the value and safety of the products they were paid to investigate. This research on KIPP schools can be described in various ways, but “independent” surely has to take at least second place to “KIPP-funders funded research.”
Coles’ review of the research–both that conducted by the funders’ funding and that of independent researchers–is worth reading.
Whenever anyone says that KIPP schools spend more than neighborhood public schools, KIPP adamantly denies it. Coles reasonably asks how the many tens of millions raised by KIPP were spent if not on its schools.
Behind the back and forth about the research is a larger question. What is KIPP really trying to prove? Do they want the world to believe that poverty, homelessness, disabilities, extreme family circumstances, squalid living conditions have no effect on children’s readiness to learn? Doesn’t KIPP imply that schools can achieve 100% proficiency if they act like KIPP?
If that is the lesson they want to teach, then I reiterate my challenge of two years ago: KIPP should find an impoverished district that is so desperate that it is willing to put all its students into KIPP’s care. Take them all: the children with disabilities, the children who don’t speak English, the children who are homeless, the children just released from the juvenile justice system, the children who are angry and apathetic, and everyone else. No dumping. No selection. No cherry picking.
Show us what you can do. Take them all.
LG responds to another reader who suggested that eliminating unions and tenure was “part of the solution” to reinventing education:
“I can tell you that eliminating teacher unions is part of the solution, not THE solution. Self-interest groups have to lay down their swords. There are so many structural changes we need to make to our public education system. Lifetime tenure and ‘last-in, first out’ policies are only pieces of the puzzle.”
You still have not responded to the request made in another post for just what exactly the unions are doing that is bad for public education. Instead, you are spewing the same “unions are bad” stuff with no evidence of how.
Let’s shed a little light on the misinformation in your comments.
Lifetime tenure does not mean “lifetime job.” School districts have the power to bring tenure charges up on ANY tenured teacher and prove such charges are with merit. At that point, districts can and do terminate tenured teachers’ contracts. The power is with the school districts–if they do not prove that their charges are valid, then that is on them, not the unions.
The unions only protect the tenured employee’s right to a hearing on the matter. This is actually a good thing for the schools because it gives teachers a chance to speak up for themselves without fear of being fired for frivolous reasons. It provides some validity to termination instead of allowing districts to terminate teachers’ contracts for political reasons.
Tenure also grants a teacher academic freedom: “…the freedom of teachers…to teach, study, and pursue knowledge and research without unreasonable interference or restriction from law, institutional regulations, or public pressure. Its basic elements include the freedom of teachers to inquire into any subject that evokes their intellectual concern; to present their findings to their students, colleagues, and others; to publish their data and conclusions without control or censorship; and to teach in the manner they consider professionally appropriate.” (Fromhttp://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/2591/academic-freedom)
Tenure is good for the schools because it encourages a dedicated staff of individuals to stay in a particular district. In the private sector, the instances of “job-hopping” (at least in a decent economy) are much greater as employees are always trying to get better-paying positions. You are aware that teachers cannot transfer tenure rights from district to district in order to get better compensation packages, right? Some districts will grant a new hire a few years against the salary schedule for “some” experience, but tenure has to be re-earned every time a teacher switches to a new district. It does not behoove teachers to go “job-hopping” since they always have to earn tenure again and again.
Non-tenured teachers live in fear that they will be fired because the principal doesn’t like their personalities or the way they part their hair. Tenured teachers have more incentive to stay with their districts. Therefore, you get a staff of teachers who invest in the school district and community. They have a vested interest in the district since they are teaching in it over the long haul.
“Last in, first out” is not a perfect system, but without it, public schools would be filled with novice teachers since districts will seek to cut expenses by firing those at the top of the salary guide. Districts notoriously hire private contractors to do large work projects on their public buildings using a practice known as “going with the lowest bidder.” For those who believe that cutting expenses in a teaching staff is a good thing, it is important to know that the most experienced teachers are the ones who mentor the novices and even those in the middle of their careers. Experienced teachers know the community and have a stake in the success of the community.
Anyone who knows anything about seniority in the private sector knows that those with the most experience in the company tend to be the people who have the most vested interest in the company. They have the most to gain and the most to lose if the company does or does not do well. Education is not exactly the same, but if you strip LIFO from the public schools, what would behoove teachers to take these jobs in the first place or to engage in professional development that brings them to a better understanding of the jobs they continually do?
Without LIFO, the experienced professionals will just move on thus making a very transient teaching staff with very little vested interest in the community. Eventually you will no longer have an experienced staff since experienced teachers would just be “terminated like expired food” in order to bring in a “fresher” and cheaper workforce. That is what stripping away LIFO will do. How is that better for the schools? If districts do not have a requirement for keeping experienced staff members first, the districts will invariably take the lowest bidder in education staff. Do you seriously want to leave public education to novice teachers?
Tenure protects a community from a transient and completely novice teaching staff. If the community invests in its teachers, the teachers will invest in the community. When people are valued, they are more likely to do their best work compared to when they do not feel valued.
What you are proposing devalues teachers, and that is never good for public education.
Diane Ravitch's blog 