Jose Banda, the Seattle superintendent of schools, will not discipline the Garfield High School teachers who boycotted the MAP tests as a waste of time and resources. He urged them to resume work as usual. They were heard, he said.
This was a wise decision.
Congratulations to the Garfield teachers for your courage and unity!
For a full copy of Superintendent Banda’s statement, and a critical assessment of the story, see the report here.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
On the other hand, it’s not really a win. The test was still administered and the superintendent said those teachers boycotting were not actually insubordinate because the district did not actually assign them test proctoring duties leaving those to para-educators and administrators. Basically, the superintendent shrugged off their protest as nothing more than a grab for attention. While I totally agree that this is a start and the fact that they made national news is terrific, the district media statement purposefully makes the teachers seem petty since they had no responsibilities for this test anyway.
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Shannon, the win was that they suffered no punishment.
But you are right about this: the Superintendent in Seattle said the machine goes forward, grinding on without a brain, in automatic pilot.
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Yes he saves face. I hate where he says next time lets do this in a way that doesn’t hurt children!!!!
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Well, if he didn’t want to hurt the children he would be suspending all mandated testing and test prep. Won’t hold my breath as he knows who butters his bread.
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Amen, Duane, to your first sentence. But–as to your last–who knows? Since he took the high road and did NOT punish the teachers, perhaps, given time, he will decide to become one of Diane’s education heroes (as I’d commented on one of her Atlanta cheating scandal posts yesterday) and say no to all the testing.
Someone in his position has to.
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Diane is right, this is a win. The authorities were held at bay by a spontaneous, self-organized teacher boycott from below which defied the demands of the higher-ups, and the teachers got away with it, compelling the Supt. to back off. This is one example of the power of solidarity—teachers outnumber Supts. and State Comm’s and billionaires. The degenerate schl system they want can only function with the cooperation or compliance of teachers, students, and parents. Withhold compliance, things can change for the better.
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In Ohio our “governor” is all about breaking the teachers’ unions. So much for solidarity and support from “below”. This is why they want to break the unions. They don’t care what teachers think. It is frightening at best. Of all the professions that are available, the service professions are full of people who are willing to sacrifice their time, money, and energy for other people. But, no matter what they do, it is never “enough”. We’d rather pay as little as possible for a service because we view them as our inferiors. If and until our society realizes that they should appreciate those who teach them, save their lives, help them, we will continue down this very negative path. I am sad.
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What would happen if every single teacher in New York City refused to administer the state assessments in April with the support of parents? Would this mayor fire 70,000 teachers? Probably yes. But he would be very hard pressed to find 70,000 TFA neophytes on short notice.
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Coming from the perspective of doing what is best for students, requiring the “low” kids to still take it is counterintuitive with respect to losing valuable teaching/learning time to meaningless testing. The kids who can least afford any lost learning time are the very ones who will most likely lose learning time to take the tests 3 times a year. These people just dont get it.
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Sabotage!
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