Teachers in some of Louisiana’s best schools are getting low ratings. Because their students already have high scores, the teachers are not getting high value-added scores, and many of he state’s best teachers will be rated ineffective. A teacher rated ineffective two years in a row may be fired.
Test scores count for 50% of every teacher’s evaluation.
State Commissioner of Education John White defends the state’s harsh system, even though it appears set to remove excellent teachers from top schools.
How long will it take before the people who launched this inaccurate, unreliable, invalid way of evaluating teachers acknowledge their error? Will they ever admit they were wrong or will they just continue ruining the lives of children and teachers? How long until the public throws them all out and tells them to find another line of work?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I came to the conclusion many years ago that you cannot under estimate the stupidity of some people.
To think that something like determining how “effective” a teacher is can be based on test scores is absolutely ludicrous but people have bought into it from elected officials with their hands out for cash to folks who believe what they hear without thinking it through.
And the worst part of all of this is that students and our teachers are suffering the most.
I do believe that finally people are figuring out that this is not working and the tide will turn.
Dora
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Dora, I would sadly argue that it IS working. The goal has never been to improve schools. The goal is to gut teacher unions and end their political involvement which always works counter to the goals of ALEC and the plutocrats and to make all school funding available to the profit seekers instead of the small percentage they used to get for books, materials, and supplies.
There is no other “easy market” left for them to exploit once they gutted real estate and medicine. Education is the highest or second highest budget item in all 50 states. Teacher salaries and pensions are the highest cost to schools so that’s where they must go to get their money. Get rid of professional teachers and increase your profit margin exponentially.
People must learn and understand this. It isn’t stupidity; VAM is a carefully thought-out strategy being employed exactly as intended. It is working better than they expected. In Florida it went into effect the same year they made the test much more difficult, ensuring that the scores would go down and teachers would be rated poorly. The governor of Florida said, at his inauguration, that his goal was to end the monopoly of public schools in this state for good. He’s making great headway, as is Jindal in LA.
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Sadly, this is true. Where money is concerned there are no stops. The folks with the money have run out of targets and land to exploit and schools are the next “territory” to vanquish. Public concerns be damned. Welcome to Swayn Rand country.
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I understand that Brian. I was referring to the folks who pick up the banner of ed reform without understanding the ramifications of their actions.
In Washington State I see parents hear the mantra of privatization without questioning what it means. It’s quite frustrating sometimes. You try to get through to them and it’s like they drank the Kool Aid and it’s too late.
On the other side of the coin though, most people get it when provided with the facts so I march on.
Dora
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When I took over as Superintendent in an affluent high achieving NE district nine years ago the fiscal conservatives in town waved a report that “proved” our district was profligate in its spending because it wasn’t getting as much for its money as nearby districts. The proof? You guessed it: our kids weren’t showing as much growth as those in nearby towns on the standardized tests that were in place at that time. Fortunately in our community I was able to explain the statistical reality that our kids never COULD show as much growth. Because they were starting at the 97th percentile, the most they could ever “grow” was 3 percent while our neighboring districts who scores in the 60th percentile could grow 40 percent. To the best of my knowledge there are NO tests in ANY state that provide the headroom to measure the changes in performance of high achieving students. What happened in LA won’t stay in LA.
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A colleague in Florida told me that if a teacher’s class has perfect behavior and the administrator doesn’t observe how he or she would take care of a student who doesn’t demonstrate perfect behavior, the teacher is graded down according to the Dr. Marzano tool used. Can this really be true?
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I have often wondered who Charlotte Danielson is and why she was thought to know how to evaluate teachers. The state of La thinks and speaks of her as guru of evaluation. There was very little info on her bio but I found this article from NJ written a little while back.
http://www.njsba.org/school-leader/janfeb12.html#danielson
She is mostly a formally trained economist with a degree in Chinese History? How much experience can she have in a classroom when it says she worked in an elementary school in the article but her bio says she taught all grades?
Even she states in her article that she did not intend for her evaluation to be used in the way it is. She sounds very intelligent but the state of La put a whole different spin on her.
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But she allows it to be used and makes money from it. So I don’t buy her trite excuse.
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Somewhat off topic, but related, I just got an email from my best friend from high school who is a 20 year teacher and, until last year, always rated very highly:
“Last year I got blasted in my evaluations at school and that pain has never gone away. Now this year, while the principal is off my back, he’s on every teacher’s back instead. The state says every teacher has to be evaluated every year. And not like in the old days, but 2 full periods and 3 half periods. Poor principals! As though they don’t have other principal-things to do. Rich and Randy (the new JH) are doing well. They’ve seen everyone once for a short and they’re half-way through their longs. My first eval brought 7 greens and 2 yellows, or something like that, leaving me on pins and needles whether anyone else is seeing any “needs improvement” yellows. I know of at least 2 that got all greens. Until last year, I never would have thought I’d be so nervous to see my boss in my room.
…[Personal stuff relating to how she’s so exhausted from working so many hours and being so nervous]….
So what the heck do normal people do who teach and have a family? Or even just work a demanding job (like teaching has become) without parents to mooch off of? I keep thinking if only I could cut back my hours in exchange for a cut in pay. Of course, I’m just glad to have a job. Even if the rest of my evaluations were horrible (and hopefully they won’t be) I’d still have a job next year. You have to be ineffective for 2 years before they can fire you. I’m still hoping to land an “effective” this year but I don’t know. Our Ag teacher said that at Lakeland School, all vocational teachers got rated “needs improvement” last year, just because of the way the evaluations are written to favor the desk classrooms. I keep hoping when politicians change things will ease up on schools, so no use listing (again!) all the ways the state and national expectations are crazy.”
It’s such a shame. I’ve never seen her in action in the classroom, but I know her well enough to know she’s a good teacher. But she’s changed radically in the past year from being very happy and confident to being almost a shell of herself. She’s Mennonite, and a large part of their religion is not only non-violence, but non-anger – you’re supposed to look at everything that happens to you as coming from God and you’re supposed to look for the meaning in it and humble yourself. That’s a shame too because I think she could use a heavy dose of anger about now.
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She teaches in Indiana, btw. I’ve implored her to vote if for no other reason than to vote against Tony Bennett, but “geting involved in politics” (which includes voting) is also against her religion.
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“How long will it take before the people who launched this inaccurate, unreliable, invalid way of evaluating teachers acknowledge their error? Will they ever admit they were wrong or will they just continue ruining the lives of children and teachers?”
The answer to both questions, I’m afraid are: never and no. The reformyists live in an impenetrable bubble. After TN ledge and edu-comissioner TfAer Kevin Huffman launched the TEAM evaluation last year, the legislature was flooded with valid complaints from educators that TEAM was a simple checklist of behaviors that could not capture the complexity of teaching and the 1-5 scoring metric of said checklist resulted in a forced bell curve. Michale Winerip wrote a NYTimes article featuring the TN fiasco and the problems with the TEAM metric. So how did our ed-commissioner respond?
This year the TN state dept retrained evaluators with these words of wisdom:
The TEAM evaluation is NOT a checklist.
The TEAM metric is not a forced bell curve.
ZERO evaluation of TEAM metrics and scoring criteria. ZERO credence given to the merits of arguments against its misuse.
Last night I watched Bill Maher try to convince 2 right wing political consultants (hacks, if you will) with one fact that countered an argument they were making about something said at the presidential debate. Maher spent the entire show trying to get one of them to admit they were wrong and never succeeded. Both doubled down on their positions when the evidence was presented in black and white.
How does one counter such stubborn ignorance when facts and evidence don’t matter?
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How sad how are they ever going to replace good, effective teacher if they are fired due to this “crazy” evaluation system.
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They intend to replace them with virtual school teachers. These operators usually earn aboutthe same amount per student as states pay now brick and mortor operations now. Once they have chased out all the decent teachers, many school districts will have no other options – even though every study I have ever seen shows virtual schools door a significantly poorer job educating students than brick and mortor schools. However, the profit potential and payout for a virtual school operator is enormous. We have several virtual K-12 schools operating in the state now, and the enrollment has been growing exponentially over the past few years. You would think virtual kindergarten would have to be a joke, but the reality is not at all funny.
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They’re going to replace teachers the way they have already been replacing certified librarians and other specialists in much of Washington state: by having one “lead teacher” write lesson plans and then having paras do the teaching of classes. It’s all about the mighty $ – not “good, effective teachers”.
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Well, I got my value-added scores last year for my kids. I can honestly say I was hurt by my value-added score. My evaluations showed that I was effective in the classroom, yet my students’ test scores left room for improvement. The value-added model has me seriously reconsidering being in the education field.
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I received high scores and have found myself still without a job for the third time since returning to New Orleans in 2011. Unemployed again after two months, again, got evaluation in the mail the other day. It was good. Charter took over and I went home.
What eval had to do with it? . I know I’m a darn good teacher. The whole thing has sucked the
life and drive out of me, and many of my colleagues. No one asks teachers what they been through. It’s really sad. Yeah, I’m saying it! It all sucks!
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In the city I live in many of the high performing schools have received very low grades for this very reason. It’s ridiculous.
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I’m told there be an interesting video on some LDOE/accountability shenanigans airing this Friday the 26th on LPB “Louisiana the State We’re In” from 7 to 7:30. http://beta.lpb.org/index.php?swi/ It is related to this article: http://thelensnola.org/2012/10/17/moseley-explores-shadow-schools/ I hope you enjoy the piece if you get a chance to watch it. I will post it on my blog when the permanent link is posted.
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