Michael Weston of Hillsborough County, Florida, explains what is wrong with teacher evaluation:
“Of course we use the Danielson rubric in Hillsborough County Fl, where it forms one of the three pillars of the Gates funded “Empowering Effective Teachers”. The second pillar is value-added, the third is duplicity / deception.
Quite frankly, whether Charlotte is spelled Charlatan, whether her rubric is valuable or trash, whether her resume is padded…..none of this matters to me. What matters is what it is being used for. Teacher evaluation. Not a good use of money.
Teachers are not the major problem in education. The major problem in education is quite simple, well researched and accepted by everyone except Michelle Rhee.
The problem is the income gap.
The income gap causes an achievement gap.
The achievement gap causes efforts to close it.
The efforts to close it are misguided, destructive and tainted by greed and politics.
The pain, effort and treasure spent on teacher evaluation will produce miniscule returns, if any. The higher likelihood is that teacher evaluation schemes will have a negative net effect. The morale issues are huge and have yet to be quantified.
Most unfortunately, here is where the third pillar, duplicity / deception comes in to play. These schemes are “doomed to succeed”. Why? Because the big money behind them demands they succeed. How easy is it for the Gates Foundation to publish its own results. Very easy. How many School Districts will admit to having poisoned the well of education?”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
OP-ED | A Window Into the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Dystopia
by Sarah Darer Littman | Jun 13, 2013
In 1948, sociologist Robert K.Merton coined the phrase “Self-Fulfilling Prophecy.”
“The self-fulfilling prophecy is, in the beginning, a false definition of the situation evoking a new behavior which makes the original false conception come ‘true.’ The specious validity of the self-fulfilling prophecy perpetuates a reign of error. For the prophet will cite the actual course of events as proof that he was right from the very beginning,” Merton wrote.
A database engineer friend helped me realize this phrase described the work of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in education reform during a discussion of the information I’d received under a Freedom of Information Act request regarding the foundation’s $5 million grant to the city of Hartford last December.
Here’s how it works: Mr. and Mrs. Gates have a dangerous combination of billions of dollars and strong ideas about how to reform public schools, despite having no background in education and sending their own children to private school. Their foundation commissions research to prove their ideas are correct. Based on research the Gates Foundation pays for, it makes grants to implement their ideas. In the grant documentation, the Foundation specifies: “The Compact City Partner . . . agree(s) to participate in research and information gathering efforts with the Center for Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) at the University of Washington, which is currently engaged with the foundation to support the project.”
Read full post here:
http://www.ctnewsjunkie.com/ctnj.php/archives/entry/a_window_into_the_bill_and_melinda_gates_foundation_dystopia/
Thanks for sharing that Linda. For those willing to do the research, it takes very little time to uncover the absence of science in the Gates “studies”. As the piece you linked states, the results are never peer-reviewed; alarm bells for anyone trained in the sciences. There is never a clearly stated experimental design. In fact, with close reading one finds the design is created after the data is collected; always proving the hypothesis.
I recently suffered through the Gates MET report. You could hear the data screaming in agony as it was stretched and twisted to meet the study conclusions.
Thanks for the link. Wow, everyone should read that one.
I agree with Michael Weston and Linda. Throw it in the trashcan.
Teaching is an art. It is practically impossible for observers to evaluate an artist – some may love the performance and product, others may not.
The important things for teachers are that they have a plan that addresses a wide variety of learners, they carry out that plan to the best of their abilities while maintaining a positive learning environment, they assess their students for learning using a variety of methods, and they communicate those results to all interested parties.
No standardized tests either. They measure nothing and pervert the teaching and learning process.
That’s a rubric that could be what, maybe five standards long with no “elements”? Would be better than any I’ve seen.
If teaching really is an “art,” what kind of art is it?
Does it, um, have to be a particular kind of art to be a valid art in your eyes? Does it matter what kind of art it is?
Maybe it depends more on how one defines “art” than it does on what *kind* of art it is.
I’m just trying to get a handle on a phrase that is often advanced as an honorative. Sculpture is an art. What kind of art is it? It makes objects out of marble, clay, bronze. Clear enough. Paining is an art. What kind of art is it? It makes art out of canvas and color and line. Clear enough. Music is an art. What kind of art is it? It makes compositions out of sound and time (rhythm, tone). clear enough. What if we say, as we genuflect, “Teaching is an art,” is that just empty verbiage, like so much else in education talk, or does it really MEAN something. If teaching is an art, and the teacher is the artist, then what does the teacher “make” when she practices her art, and of what is the the made thing made? Is it a kind of “performance art”? I’m trying to clarify for myself. I may be invited to do some mentoring of new teachers next year (Oh, God! The worst person in the world for that!) and I’d just like to know what I’m talking about. I don’t like b***s*** any more than Buzzetti, Swaker, and Nathan do. So, if anyone here actually KNOWS what is meant, help me out, and if you don’t want to help me out, at least have some pity on my potential mentees to preserved them meaninglessness in my dragon rants. We’ve heard recently that some principals and superintendents have said “Live in level 3. Visit 4 from time to time.” Thus I ask in the spirit of pure inquiry, “What kind of art is teaching?” Or is that phrase just pious equine excrement used to say “teaching is so mysterious we can’t even define it. It just IS. You’ll know it when you see it.” If teaching is a craft even, we still need to know what kind of craft it is. What is made by the craftsman teacher? Some craftsmen make chairs out of wood. Others know how to weld steel. Even a chef is making something. What does a teacher make? If we knew we could compare it to what we imagine might be an ideal teacher/craftsman’s product. There is the possibility, of course, that the phrase “we honor teaching as an art” is just meaningless and we through it in just as a way of saying, “teaching is very important.” So, finally, what kind of craft or art is teaching?
This is an interesting question and one I have reflected on now and then. I think teaching for many may start out as a craft, ie, you are being directed by others, imitating, being directed by others sometimes, focusing on the product rather than the process, etc. But for others, or maybe after years of experience and practice, it becomes artful, ie, creative, expressive, open-ended. Like many things, if the teacher loves what s/he is doing, it certainly is likely to become more and more artful work s/he does.
Duh, the art of teaching!
A friend of mine is the principal violinist of a symphony orchestra. Excellent player and has been for a very long time. He had always defined himself as a craftsman rather than an artist…and not meant it in any kind of derogatory way. His training had taught him to read and interpret the musical masterpieces to an extremely high level of professionalism. He enjoyed it and made a very good living.
He started to view himself as an “artist” when he learned how to free himself through improvisation. To play off of others in the moment. He’s writing, as well. Despite his high degree of technique and interpretive abilities, he never felt complete until he was able to play in the moment and truly create as opposed to recreate.
That’s how I see the teacher as an artist. It’s not easy to be able to master the skills of teaching. There are so many variables. But that domain is still a skill…and not in a bad way, either. They are very necessary skills.
The “art” comes in when the teacher is able to understand the different needs and learning styles of individual kids in the class. To be able to address those needs creatively and then fuse them with those of the class as a whole. Beyond the script. Like writing your own song. We always base those writings on what we’ve learned from others and then add our own voice.
Then to be able to improvise, on a minute to minute / day by day / month by month basis (both during planning and teaching) in order to maintain interest and get the essential and underlying points across. To use humor when necessary. To step outside of the script because, say, there’s a very loud thunderstorm raging outside and that’s taking center stage at the moment.
That’s my interpretation of teaching as an art form. YMMV. And my main concern is that the regimentation that we’re seeing in the educational world, today, is stifling and will continue to stifle that art form.
I like the analogy of teaching with the violinist. Your friend shows great humility in calling his reproduction of a score craftsmanship, and being unwilling to call himself an artist until using his mastered technique, he can interact and respond in the moment to other living in the musical “space” he is in. What then, for a teacher is equivalent to the score, the music, which the craftsman violinist plays? There are lesson plans. Is the craft then first, being able to follow a ‘script’ a ‘lesson plan.’ Perhaps a teacher is one who crafts lessons. Some lessons will be dull. Some competent. Some brilliant. When I ask what kind of art teaching is, do we concur that what the teacher makes is a “lesson”? What then, is a lesson?
Yes, teaching is a performance art. Teaching involves engaging, captivating and moving an audience. Great teaching is like every other great piece of art –painting, sculpture, architecture, music, literature, film, plays, opera, etc.– whose primary power lies in its ability to a shine light behind the rocks and the stars, on the hidden corners of being-here. It lifts people and lands them not where it found them, but somewhere further down, in foreign territory that paradoxically feels like coming home.
I agree with all you say. But I still wonder what kind of “art” teaching is. I agree it moves its audience, lifts from where one is and sets you down further on. But what is the means by which it does that? What is the made thing that is analogous to a painting, sculpture, ballet, opera, symphony. What is it that the teacher performs?
HU,
These are not a flippant questions (not that I would ever do so, eh!) but: Why does something have to be “made”? Does that “something made” have to be a physical object? Or can we “make” something that is not physical? We say that we “make love” with (I prefer with and not “to”) someone. Is that “making something”?
Perhaps teaching as art is “making” connections with the students in multiple ways so that they #1 have the desire to learn the subject, #2 learn new different ways of learning and #3 the students learn more about how they learn (in pedagogical terms meta-cognitive skills).
Perhaps it is “making” connections so that the student learns to value learning for learning sake and not for an extrinsic reason, i.e., a grade.
Personally, as a master upholsterer I like the craft aspect but that is working with inanimate objects whereas teaching as a craft drifts into the art realm because it is about “making” human connections towards the end of having a student better themselves through acquiring various types of knowledge.
Hope that makes sense!
That’s a lot like asking what the “made thing” of Improv is.
It’s a combination of solid preparation, talent, adaptability, etc. –a strong knowledge base in content, pedagogy and child development, lesson planning and room arrangement, belief in one’s abilities, faith in audience participation, effective use of props, et al. The artful teacher is readily capable of spontaneously tapping into such available resources and cleverly adapting to the unforeseen. The concrete “things” are lesson plans, the actual performances themselves and any student made products.
Yes, Duane, It makes a lot of sense to me! The hunt for the “made thing” seems to trivialize complex processes and is also likely to overlook and discount whatever is not concrete, including abstract concepts and relationship-based teaching and learning.
Well…every composer has written his or her share of stinkers. I’d say the same is true of any teacher.
If art is the organization of chaos, then, for me, the “lesson” is what the teacher comes up with, using the materials at hand, in order to convey the message (teaching point, objective, goal, etc). As you said: some are dull, some exciting, many in between. Not everyone’s going to be a Bach or Ellington (or Hendrix, for that matter).
Great simple explanation gitapik: Art is the organization of chaos. But some artists might argue that “Art is chaos itself” don’t you think?
Sure, Duane…but that’s being created by another source. And it’s art of a different magnitude. What artists are trying to emulate or interpret. We’re the audience in that instance.
I think that an artist is one who can take that chaos and do something with it. The degree of effectiveness can vary according to technique, inspiration, genius, timing…any number of things. And that effectiveness can sometimes be judged by the audience’s response. Certainly in the case of teaching.
There are LOTS of arguments about art and the audience response. Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring” created a riot at the debut. Now it’s recognized genius.
“For those willing to do the research, it takes very little time to uncover the absence of science in the Gates “studies”. As the piece you linked states, the results are never peer-reviewed; alarm bells for anyone trained in the sciences. There is never a clearly stated experimental design. In fact, with close reading one finds the design is created after the data is collected; always proving the hypothesis.” Amen.
Not only that, but the “reports” are produced by researchers funded by Gates to produce the results desired by Gates often in academic “institutes” or departments established with money from Gates or Eli Broad or Walmart (Walmart????!!!) and stamped with the rubric of Harvard purchased with money from Gates and Eli Broad — money given so that these billionaire robber barons can avoid their ethical duty to pay a fair share of taxes like regular, law abiding citizens have to do. Why don’t these malevolent traitors contribute to their country instead of trying to tear it down?
To answer your last question: for those who accept the monies, none, as they know who butters their bread. Vanity thy name is bought off administrators!
There are some excellent teachers who are going to leave the profession. And I’m not just speaking of those with 25 years service. I’ve spoken with a few, at different schools. Everyone is on the same page.
Unfortunately, I believe that this plays into the “reformers” hands. More schools will fail. More charter schools will take their places.
This isn’t education. The people who are perpetuating these changes don’t understand education.
It seems to me that the biggest problem in education is not poverty but that we keep trying to solve its problems from outside the system–imposing what we believe is the great panacea. If you don’t work organically and evolutionarily from within, meeting real specific problems with effective, continually-improving solutions, the solutions are not likely to fit, make sense, be accepted, etc. The resources and principles we develop and discover if we take this more realistic approach will be helpful elsewhere, so such work could have important applications.
“It seems to me that the biggest problem in education is not poverty”
Are you a TFAer? Do you work for Students Last (oops I meant 1st)?
Yes, the biggest problem is poverty, not only in the lives of way too many students but also poverty of equitably distributed adequate funding so that all students can have a quality public school education experience!
All things being equal and if teachers in a school are practising consistent good methods/pedagogies, I could see how teachers may not be the major problem. However, in situations where the teachers are not up to the mark, surely that would be a primary cause for poor delivery of education regardless of the circumstances and demographics of the students?
Don’t get me wrong – teaching can and should be practiced and improved. My point is that teachers are not the BIG problem. We are not a mid-sized problem. Some of us are a small problem. The BIG problem is what we are doing about the “achievement gap”. I quote “achievement gap” because it is really an income gap. Neither gap is the problem.
The BIG problem is:
*Dumbing down the curriculum so everyone can succeed.
*Increasing rigor so everyone will be challenged.
*Testing kids until they cry. This is the name of holding accountable those who do not make them excel.
*Punishing schools and teachers who cannot magically make the “achievement gap” go away – in spite of all the excellent support being provided.
*Teaching the test to avoid punishment (teachers) or to amass treasure (administrators).
*Re-writing the textbooks so there are more balloons, insets, practice tests, pictures and web links than information.
*Encouraging EDUIndustry to create the next magic curriculum to sell us.
*Encouraging the notion of failing schools so as to sell them off (read give away) to for-profit institutions.
*Eliminating the arts in favor of STEM.
The list goes on.
What should we be doing. Easy. First, do no harm. Stop all of the above.
Next – get to work on the income gap. How? Graduate employable kids. We have to abandon the notion of one-size-fits-all education. We must abandon the requirement that all kids be prepared for college. We have to place kids in educational settings where they can succeed. For some that means AP Physics. For some that means Creative Writing. For others that may mean auto shop. For some it is carpentry.
99 times out of 100, you will not succeed in taking a high school freshman (a 16 year old freshman), with fourth grade math skills, and get that kid into AP Physics. It seems like 100 times out of 100, that is our goal however. Most of these kids drop out; never to pay a dime of income-tax in their often short lives.
We must redefine high school, and what we intend to do with kids for four years of their lives. College is grand; we must provide a high quality path; one where 50% of kids do not require remediation. Trades are grand; a graduate with a career in masonry will earn a good living; provide for his children; and provide a a greater respect for education. His son may go into trades, or may choose the college route. They are both available because mom and dad will not allow him to be left behind in fourth grade. This family WILL have a college graduate someday.
Just not tomorrow.
That is the piece we refuse to accept, That it will not be tomorrow. Instead, we seek the Holy Grail, the silver bullet, the magic elixir, SOMEONE TO BLAME!
The achievement gap will be closed with the income gap. It will take generations, because there is no silver bullet. The BIG problem with education is that as long as we are hunting the Holy Grail, we have yet to begin the real work.
Well said
It seems that there has to be some way to show taxpayers that their money is being well spent. When I google “teacher accountability model” there seems to be all kinds of models developed and tried…and I see the problems with high-stakes testing, but the lack of good models means that others create models that may not make sense – and do more harm than good.
Hence, “its the poor” just doesn’t work for taxpayers. Taxpayers know there are schools that fail. It seems those must be identified and changed, right? Taxpayers don’t like paying for poor performance…and “its the poor” excuses are hard to sell.
Also – can i ask (sorry if this isn’t the place for a tangent), is it understood that the old teaching model of 25 kids in a 3rd grade math classroom, based on age, but with many kids above grade level and bored, and many below grade level and lost…is a bad teaching model?
What makes you think we’re still working that model, Tom? There have been different means of addressing the different skill levels in classrooms, in place for decades. I know I’ve used a few of them as have the schools that I teach in.
If a teacher isn’t using them, he or she can be taught how or the school can be shown different models on how to address the situation. This shouldn’t require a short “prove yourself or your gone” to the school period of time.
As to, “…it’s the poor” being a lame excuse: just what would you suggest we make up in order to take it’s place?
Darn… hit ‘post’ too quickly!
…and that if it is necessary to help a school and its teachers improve, then relevant and meaningful evaluation would help develop improvement.
Call teaching what you will–art, craft, ect. . . Teaching is difficult. Not only must you have an enormous depth of content knowledge, of which I had plenty upon graduation from college, but you must also know how to present the materials, assess the content, manage a classroom, be nurse, counselor, and disciplinarian. You must be caring but strict. And all of these things must be done in balance. I will admit that these things were more difficult to master. Twenty years in there are days when I’ve feel like I need to start over from scratch. I object to someone splitting hairs over how we define what we do; most days it defies being limited to a definition. I also object to the supporters of TFEers as the answer to educational woes. With two years experience, I was just getting started. Often I reflect back on those early years and hope my students benefited from my class even though I wasn’t as knowledgeable as I am now. Teaching is an important, varied field which takes much experience to master if mastering is even possible. We strive everyday to do the best for our students.
I agree with all of what you say, Trish. If our digression, above, regarding the art, craft, or whatever of teaching offended you, then I apologize. I thought of if as a nice ice breaker. I’ve gotten tired of the name calling. It felt good to find a common ground for respectful communication.
I, too, have been teaching for 20 years. Most days it does defy being limited to a definition. We know what’s going on here. It’s been growing since my first day on the job. It’s monstrous. Some of it is borderline if not downright illegal and unconstitutional. And it’s backed up by the President of the United States.