I hope Norm Scott, retired New York City teacher, blogger,
and videographer, will forgive me for posting this hilarious
satire, rather than merely putting up a link. The unwritten rule of
the blogosphere is that you post the link so the other person, who
wrote it, gets traffic. Please
open this link and give Norm the traffic he deserves. You
will enjoy his site, which reflects his wisdom and wit. This is
what he wrote: “NY Times to Adopt TFA Model: Will Fire all
Reporters With More than 2 Years Experience” “Strong newspapers can
withstand the turnover of their reporters,” declared the Times on
its editorial page. “Experienced reporters grow tired and less
effective.” New reporters will undergo two and a half weeks of
training before being sent to locations like Syria and Egypt. An
extra week of training will be required to cover the White House.
“Novice reporters will receive constant feedback from their bureau
chiefs,” said the editorial. “Reporters with the lowest 20% of
readership of their articles will be terminated.” The Times will
adopt the “two claps and a sizzle” celebratory chant for reporters
whose stories go viral. The Times is actively searching for a 27
year old with at least 3 years on the job to run the
paper.
George Wood is superintendent of Federal Hocking School District and an articulate supporter of public education in a state where public education is under siege by the governor and legislature. How can schools function in an atmosphere of constant turmoil and interference by politicians? Here are his thoughts about the state’s new report card for schools:
A perspective on the State’s new report card by Dr. George Wood, Executive Director of The Forum for Education and Democracy
Below is a statement regarding the State’s new report card released by Dr. George Wood. Dr. Wood is the Superintendent of Federal Hocking School District and the Executive Director of The Forum for Education and Democracy. His perspective is worth a read.
Ohio E & A
Response to New State Report Card
George Wood, Superintendent, Federal Hocking Local Schools
August 23, 2013
With the release of the new state school report cards we are again being led down a dead-end road. There is no evidence that the way the state reports on student achievement, or school performance, primarily by using standardized test scores, helps children learn or our teachers teach. The ‘new’ report card simply continues this attempt to grade our schools with tools that are not up to the job.
In the Federal Hocking District we are pleased that our schools received an “A” on the one measure that really matters-graduation rate. Our schools have one of the highest graduation rates in Ohio, and we have some of the highest standards for graduation in the state (including requiring that graduates earn more credits than the state minimum, pass all state tests, and produce a senior project and a graduation portfolio). It should also be noted that among those students that graduated in 2013, and were FHHS students for four years, 87% of them are going on to higher education having been admitted to Ohio University, Marietta College, Middlebury College, New York University, and Ohio State.
Unfortunately, most of the new state report card is based upon the standardized tests students take. These tests have never been shown to have a positive effect on students after they leave school; be it in college, the workplace, or the military. While they are one measure that helps us identify some strengths and weaknesses in our program, they should not be the sole measure of the success of our children.
Further, the new report card continues a history of Ohio constantly changing the rules and standards for schools without sound reason or research to make such changes. Over the past two decades we have had a myriad of state programs and mandates on testing, teacher evaluation, and curriculum. In fact, by my count, in the past eighteen years Ohio has instituted, dropped, changed, and added over three dozen mandated standardized tests at virtually all grade levels. As the new report card is issued schools are grappling with a new mandated curriculum (known as The Common Core), a new teacher evaluation system (the Ohio Teacher Evaluation System), soon to be released new high school end-of-course tests, the Third Grade Reading Guarantee, and new health and safety regulations.
The constant changing of the rules almost seems to be designed to make our schools look bad. All over Ohio schools that have had positive report cards in the past saw their scores tumble. One of our schools went from being rated “Effective” by the state last year to having an “F” grade in achievement-how is that possible?
It should also be noted that these new programs are more of the ‘unfunded mandates’ for which the State is so well known. There are no additional dollars directly provided to districts to implement these mandates (you can apply for grants, but even if you do not get one you still have to carry out the work). For most districts, such as ours, the current state budget has continued the trend of reduced or flat funding. We have now seen in the past two decades more than half a dozen school funding plans and have yet to see any of them carry out the Ohio State Supreme Court’s order to fix school funding.
Yet while state funding goes down or is static, their attempt at controlling our schools goes on. At Federal Hocking the state provides around 52% of our budget, but through the new state reporting system and the new state mandates they are attempting to control 100% of our agenda.
While we will use the new state report card as one measure of our work, we will not rely upon it as a sole or even the best measure of what we are doing. In fact, it would be short sighted for us to focus solely on test preparation, as it would have a negative effect upon our children limiting the range of educational experiences we offer them in our schools.
Our agenda will be driven by a set of progressive operating principles put together by our staff and approved by our school board in the true spirit of local control. Experience tells us that the state will, in the blink of an eye, change the rules we face again and again. (In fact, as I write this the rules for the testing of high school students for graduation are so unclear they are not even posted on the Ohio Department of Education web site.) In order not to keep trying to dance to the tune played in Columbus we will focus on what is best for our kids. We may not get the best grades on the state report card, and we may be singled out for additional scrutiny by the state. But we will continue to keep our focus on the most important standard of all, providing our families with the schools and classrooms that move our children on to graduation and a productive life after school.
In response to a
post about a teacher’s last day of teaching first grade,
this retired teacher wrote the following: I read this
while sitting on the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard and soon was
sobbing uncontrollably. My husband returned from the deck, saw me
reading on my phone and asked if someone died. It’s been one year
since I retired after 34 years of teaching. Last Day’s letter
rekindled all the powerful mixed emotions I felt on my last day-
tremendous relief that I could leave just before the CC and its
testing arrived in full force, and heartache at leaving my middle
schoolers and the magic that happened in the classroom. And there
is grieving and loss. So, yes, I told my husband- something is
dying. Teachers and students connected in the joy and intensity of
learning together will be a dying art if the scripted, robotic
factories take over. Like First Day, I’m now retired but still a
teacher. My new job is to fight against the
machines.
Mark Naison is one of the founders of BAT, the Badass Teachers Association. He says that what is happening to public education today is nothing less than a coup d’état, a stealthy takeover of public education by elites who know little or nothing about education. Some do it for the power; some for greed; some for ideology. Whatever their reason, it is time to resist.
Naison writes:
“There Has Been an Education Coup D’Etat In the US- Time to Organize Resistance”
“When a country has suffered a Coup D’Etat, as Chile did in the 1970’s, or a foreign invasion, as France did during the start of World War II, it takes a while for the population to figure out how to resist. Some collaborate, some passively conform, some pretend compliance and grimly go about their business, some move into active resistance, even at the risk of their lives
“While it would be foolish to pretend that what has happened to education in the US in the last ten years has had the same life threatening consequences, it does have many of the elements of a Coup D’Etat. A well financed and highly motivated elite with little or no background in teaching or school administration has seized control of Education Policy in the US, excluding teachers and parents voices, and has imposed a grim test regimen on the nation’s public schools that has driven joy and creativity out of our classrooms and made teachers hate their jobs. The Common Core Standards, imposed with lightning speed across the country through bribery and intimidation is but the latest example of how School Reformers borrow the ethos and strategy of dictators to impose their policies. Teachers, parents, and students who have had no chance to discuss the standards, much less see them in operation before deciding whether to support them, are presented with a fate d’accompli and told they are undermining national progress if they dare to ask questions, and if they are teachers or principals, told that opposition can cost them their jobs
“Well, despite the intimidation, a resistance has emerged, composed of parent opt out groups, anti- testing and anti-Common Core Coalitions, and this group, the Badass Teachers Association. With Common Core now part of professional development for teachers in most school districts, it is time to help the resistance spread. Just letting teachers know there is a group like BATS which thinks current policies are crazy is an important step. We now have a one page document in the files that you can print out and distribute to colleagues.
“Please discretely hand this out to your colleagues and friends. Most will probably not want to join, but knowing there is a resistance of this size and militancy will give them courage and make them feel empowered to resist covertly, in their own classrooms. And who knows, over time, they may join us
“But the important thing is to spread the word. Let people know that 26,000 teachers across the country have said “enough is enough” to top down Education Reform and are determined to fight back.
“It’s not only our jobs that are at stake, it is our students and our children’s education, and the future of democracy in this country that are on the line.”
In an earlier post, Arthur Goldstein explained the absurd
evaluation scheme adopted at his school, where teachers will be
allocated the score for the whole school if they do not teach a
tested subject. This reader asks the question that Butch Cassidy
asked the Sundance Kid: Who ARE these Guys? Meaning, this is so
crazy, it makes no sense, why are they doing this to us?
This reader wonders too:
“Then Da Vinci was right. “”The supreme misfortune is when theory outstrips performance.” Because depending on some of the choices NYC schools will have to make, good teachers may suffer just because they are in a low performing school while poor teachers may shine because they are in high performing schools. The whole thing sounds like “luck of the draw” to me. It’s either that or we have entered a dystopian novel where the present will suffer only to hopefully let the future try to understand our mistakes. The problem is that real and honest people are involved here. Honest, hard working teachers with mortgages and family. Honest and hard working teachers with rents to pay. Honest and hard working teachers who dreamed of making a difference who now have loans. Honest and hard working teachers with plans to grow a family. Your reply confirms the absolute absurdity of the whole thing. If no one understands it, then how in the world did it come to be? Is everyone who participated in this confusing mess idiots? As a native New Yorker I can only ask: what neighborhoods did these people grow up in? Who raised these people?”
The Texas Education Agency charged that a charter school in Houston misspent $5.3 million in federal funds on cruises, first-class air tickets, and other personal expenses for the owners and managers.
“The report found rampant conflicts of interest and numerous questionable expenses involving Varnett superintendent Annette Cluff and her husband, Alsie Cluff Jr. He’s the school facilities and operations manager and serves on the governing board. The News first wrote about the Cluffs and their charter school in 2010.
“The report found the school reimbursed the Cluffs for $1.5 million worth of questionable charges on their personal credit cards. Among the charges: $132,177 on hotels, cruises and travel packages. First-class and business airline tickets worth $22,544. More than $3,000 on tickets to Broadway, Las Vegas and Disney on Ice shows. And $743 for spa services from a luxury hotel called Mandarin Oriental.
“Beyond their six-figure salaries, the Cluffs made money doing business with the nonprofit school they ran, the report found. The Cluffs own a real-estate company that leases space to one Varnett campus for $1 million a year. The Cluffs own a bus company that provides student transportation, at a cost of $980,000 in 2010. That works out to $12.37 per mile driven — far more than what other charter schools paid, the state report found.”
The school enrolls 1,600 students. It was a private school that converted to charter status in 1998. This year, the legislature passed a law barring nepotism in charter schools but the Cluffs were grandfathered in and unaffected.
It is not clear whether any legal action will be taken.
Michael Paul Goldenberg, a frequent commenter here, has entered the blogosphere on his own by writing for the Chalkface, a site for lively and controversial opinion.
In his first entry, he questions the logic of introducing the Common Core to all grades simultaneously. Doing so, he cogently argues, defeats the purpose of assuring coherence and continuity across the nation.. The child in fifth grade will never be exposed to what was taught in fourth grade.
A sensible rollout would have started in first grade only, then added a grade a year.
But hubris knows no limits.
This is a letter from Arthur Goldstein to his colleagues at Francis Lewis High School in Queens, New York. Arthur is chapter chair of his school, where he teaches English language learners. He also had a terrific blog called NYC Educator.
This is what he told the staff about the new teacher evaluation system:
Dear colleagues:
Today our Measures of Student Learning Committee met to decide precisely how thoroughly invalid junk science measures will be used to rate teachers in Francis Lewis High School. We had several choices. We based our choices on the information available to us, which was very little.
Our first choice was whether to use goal or growth measures. We were told that goal measures entailed inventing tests or projects. These tests or projects would then be sent to the insane ideologues at the NYC Department of Education who would set goals. The goals could have been different for individual students, which could mean ringing 170 different bells.
Were you to disagree with the goals set by the DOE, you would have the option of submitting reasons and appealing to the principal, who would either deny your appeal or submit your reasons and appeal to the DOE for reconsideration.
Given the tremendous amount of work we have ahead of us this year, we opted for growth models, although we have little or no idea how they will be calculated. For state measures, some were mandated to reflect individual classes of teachers. In those cases, we opted to have department results reflect the local measures. In other words, your department Regents results could be the local measures. This would reflect not only the exams in areas you teach, but those given by your entire department. For example, if you teach algebra, the results in geometry and trigonometry will also be part of your local measures.
We aimed, in general, to make measures as broad as possible. Wherever possible, we tried to avoid competition between teachers and groups of teachers. We do not want teachers to feel they would be hurting themselves by, for example, tutoring students of their colleagues.
If there was a state exam and individual class results were not mandated, your department results were your growth measure. In those cases, we opted to have the local measure be your department results. In this system, if the state measure was also department results, local growth would be measured by the lowest third of your department results. Because there is no logic, rhyme or reason to this system, we were prohibited from using the same standard twice.
If your subject, like music, art, or physical education, does not have a state assessment, your evaluation would be based on schoolwide state tests. Your local evaluation would be based on the lowest third of schoolwide state tests.
We did not have the option of evaluating what teachers actually do, as the geniuses in Albany and DC, many of whom send their children to private schools where this nonsense does not apply, appear to have determined that teachers teach tests rather than students.
We will discuss this further when we meet on Tuesday and Wednesday. I’m afraid I have no more details than these on this system. However, we will revisit it next year, by which time we’ll hopefully have a better idea on what does and does not work in our school.
Let me be clear—I hate this system and virtually everything about it. But as our union leadership had a hand in writing the law imposing this on us, and as John King had carte blanche to impose pretty much whatever reformy nonsense he saw fit, we are stuck with it.
We will make the best of it, and work to bring sanity in education back to our city and state soon. Sadly, that won’t be happening this year.
Best regards,
Arthur
No doubt reacting to the news that New Hersey has selected an inexperienced young man with no obvious qualifications to run the Camden, New Jersey, public schools, EduShyster has concocted a hilarious parody in which she is the one hired for the job.
She acknowledges that she has no experience, has never run a school or a district, and has never set foot in Camden, but she insists that these are precisely the qualities that make her just right for the position.
Being a reformer means you need no experience. You need only high expectations and the right connections.
Jose Vilson is one of New York City’s best teacher
bloggers. In
this post, he notes that Mayor Bloomberg experienced two
major setbacks within a matter of days: First, his education legacy
collapsed along with the new state test scores showing that most
students are “failing.” The Mayor felt compelled to defend the
lower scores, calling them “very good news,” when he should have
been calling foul play. Second, a federal judge said that the
Mayor’s prized policy of allowing police to “stop and frisk” anyone
at any time was unconstitutional, and ordered that the Police
Department must be monitored to see that it carries out stops in a
legal manner, one that is not racially discriminatory. Vilson
brilliantly connects these two seemingly disparate results. He
could not believe that most of his own students had “failed” and he
was suspicious of just how high the bar was raised and whether it
made any sense. Time to stop and frisk the test scores, not young
men who happen to be black or Hispanic and minding their own
business. For a terrific round-up of the best blogs about New York
State’s testing fiasco, read
Larry Ferlazzo’s roundup. Larry is a master cataloguer of
all things education.
Diane Ravitch's blog 