Peter Greene regretfully, apologetically disagrees with Susan Ohanian, who recently expressed disappointment that the two national unions did not call on teachers to boycott testing. He says it would do no good because they would be fired and replaced by teachers happy to give tests and have a job. He says, pick your fights with care.
I am not sure I agree with Peter on this one. I agree that if a handful of teachers refused to give the state tests, they would be fired. But if an entire school refused to do it, they would send a loud message and probably no one would be fired. That was the lesson of Garfield High School in Seattle. When the teachers stood together, no one was punished.
Best of all would be if the principal and superintendent led the test boycott and carefully explained that they do not oppose all tests. tests should be used for diagnostic purposes, not for ranking and rating. learning is a process, not a race. School boards should declare that they oppose the deluge of testing that has third graders taking tests that last eight hours, that they oppose standardized tests for children in the k-2 grades, that they oppose the use of standardized tests for high stakes, that they oppose devoting a month of instructional time to testing. It would take extraordinary leadership and integrity and wisdom to stand up to the testing regime that has warped education. What a statement that would be!
Even better would be widespread parent boycotts. No one can fire parents. They have it in their power to pull the plug on this mess. I hope it comes to that.
When the Garfield teachers refused, it was because the test in question had no bearing on student success or evaluation.
It was not a test mandated by the state; it was something the district took on as a questionable act of patronage. Refusing that test had no effect on students.
Sent from my iPhone, with keys way too small for humans.
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Indeed, parent boycotts do seem to be key. Our education system seems to be governed by so many threats, that groups or individual teachers would likely be considered in dereliction of duty. Teachers and principals (at least in TN) would likely boycott tests at their own peril. On a related note, I think that’s really what’s underlying this whole anti-tenure/Cambell Brown movement is to take away tenure protections so that teachers don’t even have a voice; they’re the ones trying to silence us.
Last year, I advised my students to tell their parents of the option to opt out of PARCC pilot tests. The admin kept this knowledge on the “down-low,” so they did not appreciate my telling students about the opt out option. Nevertheless, it was a parental right, and I was within the scope of professional behavior to say as much.
I have been speaking with individual parents about their right to opt out. Every single one of these parents had no idea that they had this right. Some of my colleagues aren’t aware of this option, and the ones that are aware are afraid to speak up.
That’s great! I’ll bet your administration knows better than to cross you too! 🙂
If those administrators are GAGAers and are worth their salt they will put Mercedes in their crosshair.
In Utah, you would have had your license taken away for doing that. All teachers got a lovely email from our state superintendent this spring threatening that very thing. When I contacted the state NEA affiliate, I was told that the superintendent had a right to threaten that. I told them that THEY should fight for us, then, since we can’t. No response. It was even published in the local paper, and not a peep of outrage. The state legislature has been demonizing teachers as “gold diggers and only in it for themselves,” and the public has bought it. I’m getting to the point where I think that I will ALWAYS be threatened as a teacher in this state.
Here’s the article: http://www.standard.net/Education/2014/04/24/25-SAGE-warning.html
Although a whole school strike may seem plausible, my experience is that many teachers do not have a safe way to plan a strike. In Michigan, where I live, we have companies, like Mackinac Center for Public Policy, that are barraging union members through their school email accounts, to try to persuade them to “opt-out” of their union, now that we are a “Right To Work” state. Things are so corrupt, even the way the RTW law was passed, locking out protesters and media, shows how teachers and unions are marginalized. The one bright spot has been the Detroit Free Press and its coverage of the billion dollar industry of our charter schools. I really think the media plays an important role in supporting public education, transparency and ultimately, the confidence of teachers to speak out against grave injustices to themselves and to their students. I have many stories to tell to the right people, otherwise I am silent, just to keep my meager income for my family, in a state with few good opportunities.
In NYC, any strike will cost teachers a penalty under the Taylor Law. However, that shouldn’t stop them from organizing outside of school to let parents know their rights. It seems many NYC parents and teachers do not know parents can opt out. Our own union keeps it a secret and unfortunately not many NYC teachers are following blogs like this one.
The 2 national union leaders have yet to come out strongly against RTTT and Common Core. Just calling for Duncan’s head or putting him “on notice” which was too funny for words, will only result in a Duncan clone taking his place. The union heads could have called on parents to investigate their opt-out options and worked on making it a national campaign.
Agree, some statement that we could post on our Facebook page or anywhere to get the word out. The unions need to take the lead on this. I just can’t understand why taxpayers would want to have teachers giving standardized test for 2 weeks instead of instructing students.
Administrators are on the record stating that a few opting out doesn’t really make a difference. It will take thousands to make a difference. When NCLB was passed there was plenty of discussion about how it would be an impossibility for every student in every US school to be proficient by the year 2014. What we didn’t understand at the time was why the government would set up a mandate that was impossible to reach. The curtain has been pulled and we realize the greater plan to privatize public education.
In Utah, we are not allowed to even tell parents about opting out. I’ve gotten in trouble because I posted opt out information on my OWN Facebook, on my OWN time, and on my OWN computer. The state union has told me that the state superintendent can threaten us like that.
There is something wrong with administration denying the parents access to information about their parental rights. In the IEP process, we had to give parents a long written statement detailing their rights.
TOW,
Your state superintendent has no control over you in exercising your first amendment rights outside of your contracted time. Seems like a classic lawsuit to keep your rights.
I agree with your idea of a testing boycott. The larger and more widespread, the more successful it would be. And when I say tests, I mean tests that lead to the infamous Bill Gates method of “ranking and yanking” teachers and closing schools based on the results of student test scores, while ignoring the ravages of poverty as if poverty doesn’t exist and the challenges of learning disabilities.
What would be even better would be a national walk out where all 3.3+ million teachers called in sick—not an official strike, but where everyday the teachers in a school, district or state would call in sick and the next day another school, district or state would have a sick day—a rolling strike that swept the country by using up sick days. I’m not sure about other teachers, but I was so reluctant to turn my classroom over to a sub that by the time I retired, I had accumulated almost 200 sick days and we only got ten a year in the district where I taught.
I’m sure there wouldn’t be enough subs or TFA recruits to staff the classrooms. Maybe President Obama would call out the military and staff classrooms with armed troops.
In fact, Obama might threaten to throw all of the country’s 3.3 million teachers in prison.
After all, since teachers are lazy and incompetent—unless they are TFA recruits with their five weeks of workshop training and 33 percent retention rate who are conspired the best teachers in the world according to the corporate education reform movement’s PR machine—those lazy and incompetent 3.3 million teachers must be breaking a law that can send them to prison for a few years to force them through fear to fall into line.
To make room for all of the so-called lazy and incompetent teachers who work an average of almost 60 hours a week (I often worked 100 hours a week), Obama could pardon the more than 2-million felons already in prison and sent them through a five hour TFA training program to turn them into experts, and then staff classrooms with the ex felons. He could even pardon Bernie Madoff if he agreed to teach for two years in a school with a poverty rate above 70 percent. Madoff would be in good company next to Michelle Rhee, Arne Duncan, Campbell and all the other frauds who are replacing public teachers and closing public schools.
In fact, let’s put Bill Gates in front of a classroom in a southern school where the poverty rate is higher than 80 percent.
Send somebody to my school so the nobility can have a taste of real life in a high poverty urban school. Let’s see what their take is on the violence, the cursing and the disrespect.
One approach which might be more effective is to point out that the only party that benefits from the tsunami of testing being done are the testing companies.
Those in positions of power in The State of Texas last year executed a contract with Pearson for over a half billion dollars for testing services.
This is an absolute outrage in this state which is pushing Mississippi out of sole ownership of the bottom of the barrel ranking in such vital quality of life indexes as:
teen pregnancies, wellness, literacy, debt delinquencies, executions, percentage and absolute numbers of population incarcerated, nutritional adequacy, medical expenditures in indigent care facilities, obesity, both child and adult.
I submit that the motto of both the Texas Legislature and of Governor Rick Perry is:
PERPETUATION OF THE UNDERCLASS
I totally agree. Time is of essence. We need to fight-back asap. I have started a group in Oregon: AGAHST= Angry Grandparents Against High Stakes Testing. Elders vote, many are raising grandkids, many are on fixed incomes and support using our taxes wisely, as well as many are retired teachers and still care about the profession. I will be meeting with the local school district on August 20th. I am looking at asking him to help me understand why we are losing our computer labs for 6 weeks this school year and disrupting the educational process; to help me understand why we are implementing standards that are not developmentally appropriate for K-3; asking him why, in tight budget times whereby the school year has been cut back to 165 days, we are using our tax dollars to pay for standards that have not been tested and paying for a test that is not valid and will fail a large majority of our kids? Then, I will use this post as my ASK–will you support efforts to boycott the tests etc. Wish us luck!
Have at em and have fun, pauleck47!!!
Don’t be surprised when the person you are meeting with turns their back on you and says they don’t have the time to discuss this matter. And they will pull out the ol, it’s the law we have to do it canard.
Keep after them. Be the flea/mosquito/gnat and don’t give up. And then publicize the responses.
By refusing to take actions that have a high cost attached we are conceding the fight to our enemies. They are counting on our fear and the general cowardice imposed through draconian legislation that favors management over employees and government over the people.
Until we are willing to pay a price, a high price most likely, we will accomplish nothing.
Even if we could do the impossible and get enough parents to agree to a testing boycott it would accomplish little with the corporate-captured legislatures and education departments. They would simply pass legislation that would make opting out illegal or attach a fine that would be prohibitive to poor and working class parents to coerce them out of acting in their children’s best interests, much as the hideous Taylor law makes collective bargaining impossible due to the fines and jail time they visit on unions.
We are not fighting on the old fields and the old rules of war no longer apply. There is no respect, no morality, and no fear of reprisal in the reformist army. There is only a single-minded desire to conquer and win at all costs and the people who become collateral damage, including teachers, students, and schools are incidental to their winning.
When people begin to suffer in large numbers they will rise up and fight but right now everyone is too afraid and too timid to do anything risky or effective, it seems. I hope I survive long enough to see the defense because right now I don’t think I will be around by the time anything real and substantial happens.
I suggest replacing “everyone” with “many”. You are right about “When people begin to suffering in large numbers, they will rise up and fight”, and I suspect that fight will see cities burning and the streets drenched in blood.
It won’t take much of a spark to start the fire just as the Rodney King beating by LA police officers launched riots in Los Angeles that saw 53 people killed and more than 2,000 injured ending only when the U.S. military was called in and martial law declared.
That riot caused 53 deaths, 2,383 injuries, more than 7,000 fires, damage to 3,100 businesses, and nearly $1 billion in financial losses. Smaller riots occurred in other cities such as San Francisco, Las Vegas in neighboring Nevada and as far east as Atlanta, Georgia.
I think that the riots we will see as a result of the fake education reform movement against the public schools that is ignoring the causes of poverty will be much bigger.
Everybody I know is looking for an exit strategy.
Refusing to give the test because you believe it is being used to harm students, teachers and schools and subsequently being fired for it would certainly be newsworthy.
Not necessarily. A few years ago a teacher in my district was fired because he employed Work to Rule, and refused to conduct IEP meetings outside of contract time. The union refused to support him, because the contract says we must conduct “other duties as assigned.” You’d think it would have started an uproar. It warranted ONE total article in the little local newspaper, and that was it. Just recently a teacher in a neighboring district was fired for refusing to grade the essay portion of a district benchmark test. It wasn’t even picked up in the local news except for one guy who writes a commentator article. The comments were horrible towards teachers. See, folks, that’s what you get when your state allows demonization of teachers for 30 years. That is what Utah has done, and it now works. The public sees teachers as a menace. We are “ahead” of most of you other states in this, and this is where it’s gotten us. And I just got my class lists. I will have 280 students this next year (8th and 9th grade social studies)!!! No one makes a peep.
Reformers have the considerable power of a corrupted government behind them. The best way to fight testing is remind parents and local communities THEY are the government. Until parents understand what is happening, teachers need to continue to try and educate the public.
Intimidation is precisely the intent of the Obma/Duncan/Gates et al committment to distruptive innovation, turnaround transformations. restructuring teaching into a private-for-profit enterprise with employees stripped of all rights.
Yes, intimidation is their biggest weapons in addition to controlling most of the traditional media and flooding the news with propaganda.
But intimidation is difficult when teachers have a layer of due process protection called— for want of a better name—-tenure, which explains the real reason why the corporate education reformers who manufactured this so called fake crises in Pub-Ed want to get rid of tenure.
Then the next step would be to strip retired teachers, who don’t worry about being fired, of their benefits so they end up in poverty and/or homeless—and voiceless.
The agenda is to CRUSH all opposing opinions and voices.
More cowardly lion unionism. Pick your fights carefully indeed. Reminds me of the pablum Dick Ianuzzi was spewing when he took his act on the road for a townhall tour of NY. We do ourseves no good dying on the barricades he said repeatedly. The post modern corporate friendly, member dismissive union leadership we see today chooses their fights so carefully there never are any fights. Just endless concessions, blather, rhetoric and strategic photo ops like getting “arrested” in Philly and bloviating by bullhorn in the Adirondacks. A bunch of sound and fury signifying nothing. Oh and by the way, Dick Ianuzzi didn’t die on the barricades but he was replaced eventually after getting a little irascible and starting to act like a real union guy. He was put out to pasture by Weingarten’s hand picked successor and stooge at UFT, Mike Mulgrew. Teachers need to act outside their unions the same way unions need to stop donating to Democrats. The “leadership” is invested in many things but the well being of teachers fails to make the list.
I agree that parents are key. The problem is, in a primarily low income suburban school, it has been difficult to get parents in the building for just about anything. Music programs- the band and chorus parents come. Parent conferences- the parents of the best students show. ( I had a conference day last year where I met with only 7 parents). A well publicized “positive parenting ” seminar (dinner provided)- ONE parent showed. PTA meetings- usually the officers only are present.
How, and I am sincerely asking, do we get low income parents into the building? How do we assist them in advocating for their children?
The Chicago Teachers Union did a good job reaching out to parents and the community, maybe they can give the rest of us pointers.
Also, I had a discussion with my high school daughter about opting out of the PARCC field testing. She wanted to take the tests.
I agree with Peter Greene, in all things we need to pick our battles.
As long as we have the attitude that we ‘pick our battles carefully’ we are doomed to fail because of the selfish nature of our citizens in this country.
As it is now, teachers in NY, CA, IL, etc. don’t care to wage a battle for those of us who live and teach in Right to Work states because they still enjoy a modicum of union protection.
We are nearly at the end-game as far as total destruction of the teaching profession and public school existence here in the South and many Right to Work states aren’t far behind us.
You didn’t hear a peep about that at the AFT or NEA ‘national’ conventions though.
We will be collateral damage, the foot soldiers who die first on the battlefield soon to be forgotten.
I’ve been told more than once “You should just move somewhere else.” Except I have connections here that I don’t want to sever and I can’t afford to move anyway.
My brothers and sisters in the union have forgotten about us and tend to just ignore us or shake their heads.
That’s why we will never ‘win’ the battle against the reformists and they know it and we know it. I will, however keep fighting right up to the bitter end, even without the support of those who can’t be bothered because they aren’t directly impacted. Yet.
That was my experience teaching at a low-income high school, too. In addition, parents are a finite and transient resource. Once their children have moved on, they are no longer invested in the school or district.
Support a higher minimum wage, then maybe your low-income parents won’t have to work two or three jobs and can come to school meetings.
Another problem with a national movement may be that Smarter Balanced hasn’t been administered yet. In California we only gave half of the test last spring, and we aren’t getting any results from it. So it’s hard for people to see what it’s going to do. I can talk about the time involved, I can talk about the insanity of putting students on a curve when we are supposedly testing for competency, but I can only speculate about the results.
I hope it causes an outcry, because the TEN HOURS of testing students had to endure this year with Utah’s new CC testing warranted nary a peep. It was barely mentioned in the news, and I have not had a SINGLE PARENT complain to me about it.
Sometimes you must go on their turf to gain involvement. Find a local coffee house in the neighborhood, or a library or nonprofit organization, to host an event. People show up, if it’s in their area and not across the town.
Also, remember this – Minority children attend church, much more frequently than white kids. Get together black and hispanic pastors to speak out about it. It has to driven from the pulpit to make it a reality.
I can’t, John. I would lose my license if I “suggest or encourage” opting out to parents. All teachers in Utah have been told this.
The problem with Greene’s “logic” is that “going along to get along” doesn’t get anything accomplished in our society. People who have made a difference for the better in this country are willing to take risks, even risk their lives, for the greater good. Teachers have long been too passive because of the fear of being fired by administrators. However, that is a different issue.
So I guess I should just fall on my sword, refuse to give the tests, get fired, and have NO MEDIA support or information? When you can’t get the word out, then the sacrifice means NOTHING.
Threatened–Do you have any support from colleagues? What about anyone in higher education or education certification programs? What about the unions?
I’m in a Right to Work state. There is a union, but it’s toothless. I have gone to them several times and asked to help fight this. No response. In fact, they sent out an email recently asking us to comment to SUPPORT the CC. Some help. My colleagues agree with me for the most part, but they just sit back and let me do the “political stuff.” I hadn’t thought about education colleges. I may put out some feelers there.
Threatened –Can you reach out to retired teachers to help you? Certainly someone would be willing to step forward.
I just heard some good news. Becky Pringle from reform state PA was just elected VP of the NEA. She understands what we are facing. Here is a quote from her:”From the botched implementation of the Common Core State Standards to toxic tests that are hurting our students, there are many challenges facing public education,” said Pringle, a native of Philadelphia. ” Maybe you can reach out to her for some advise.
I agree about the power of retired colleagues’ ability to help us.
A recently retired principal just wrote a scathing letter to our local paper which was, surprisingly, published.
This paper had been nothing but a cheerleader for our new Broad-trained, non-eduator superintendent and his wholesale firing of over 200 longtime district employees.
The chaos is beginning to leak out and this principal’s letter really got the public’s attention.
For the 1st time I can remember the Facebook comments (which is the commenting system our local paper uses — so current teachers don’t comment out of fear of reprisal) was overwhelmingly positive about the letter and concerned about the disturbing facts she shared about our current reformist direction. Several retired teachers and fired employees popped up and confirmed the worst of what she said.
It gave me some much-needed hope.
People are starting to ask a lot of questions and with a board election coming up there is a great deal of promising going on by the candidates to clean up this mess.
Lily Eskelsen is the new president of NEA. That hasn’t helped Utah one bit. She has never, to my knowledge, come to help Utah teachers. Perhaps during the voucher fight in 2006, but I’m not sure even then, has she stood up for teachers.
In reference to Chris in Florida maybe we need to start a grass root movement of retired teachers–they could be Warrior Teachers. Once organized— if a teacher or staff needs the assistance of Warrior Teachers to come to your state and get information to parents–in exchange you provide them a room for them stay. I know this sounds crazy but these are the crazy times! Someone can start a facebook page for retired Warrior Teachers to join.
Always Learning, I LOVE your idea! I am going to see what I can put together. When 2 of my colleagues retired at the end of the last school year in June I made them both promise to advocate for us after they got settled into their new routines and they both agreed.
I think there is great potential here. I know the retirees elected the anti-militantcy Unity Caucus in NYC and NYSUT but I believe we can talk to them and convince them that we need their voices to help us save the schools.
Chris–This is great, glad you’re on it. Keep us updated on this blog when you get things organized. I definitely want to be a Teacher Warrior when I retire! Like Diane alluded to in an earlier post it is going to take an extreme act of courage to stand up to the testing regime. It may even take an act of disobedience by refusing to administer the tests that harm students, teachers and schools. This is not unlike a women years ago who refused to give up her seat on the bus. Yes, it may take thousands of Rosa’s right now!
Here in NY state they like to tell us we need to get a seat at the table.NYSUT spent $10,000 on a table at Andrew Cuomo’s birthday party where Billy Joel played.I think they enjoyed themselves. Randi Weingarten likes people like Bill Gates and Rupert Murdoch at her table. Meanwhile classroom teachers are getting it from all sides.We need to clean house.
And that doesn’t even buy you a seat at the table. It just buys you your own table.
This speaks to the nature of teachers,the type of person who settles for a lower salary in return for job security and some modest benefits. Teachers for the most part by their very nature are averse to risk taking and confrontation. Asking them to stand up for themselves and fight can be an insidiously fruitless task.
Have you seen this, possibly from 2012 but I am new to the game, from Ze’ve Wurman, wherein he states that teachers and unions will embrace common core?
“Moreover, there are organizations that have reasons to work for lower and less-demand- ing standards, specifically teachers unions and professional teacher organizations. While they may not admit it, they have a vested interest in lowering the accountabil- ity bar for their members. With Common Core, they have a single target to aim for, rather than 50 distributed ones. So give it some time and, as sunset follows sunrise, we will see even those mediocre standards being made less demanding. This will be done in the name of “critical thinking” and “21st- century” skills, and in faraway Washington D.C., well beyond the reach of parents and most states and employers.”
In its entirety, can be found here: http://www.math.jhu.edu/~wsw/ED/ednext_20123_Forum.pdf
Does he still believe that teachers and unions are lazy???????? Or, has he come to realize that teachers and unions didn’t have a choice in this, and when the teachers realized how bad the standards were, they spoke volumes against it, and were then targeted for dismissal?
I have to agree with the author that this move just wouldn’t make sense. For us, if a student does not take the test it counts against us-it’s a failed score. We had one school who went to the home of a student to bring them to school the day of their testing. The student didn’t attend school that day because the family had been in an car accident the night before. We go out of our way to make sure everyone takes the test. If students were to opt out or we opt out of giving the test (I don’t understand how that would work anyway,they would just have someone else administer it)-it would tank our school rating, which means a loss of funds, not to mention our own test score-based evaluations would drop.
Texas Teacher, the idea, as I understand it, is to starve the data beast and force the hand of the reformists.
If everyone or even many people opt out then that will create a crisis that will need to be respond to and dealt with publicly and with lots of media coverage, which they don’t want to do at any cost.
What would happen if every school in a district or state was declared failing because of lack of data?
What would happen if all or even most teachers are declared ineffective and fired?
What would parents do and how would they and the public react if all or most students were declared failures and denied promotion or graduation due to lack of test data?
The hope is that by blocking the production of that data the systems that use that data will be brought to a halt and then . . . no one knows.
I don’t personally see this as a viable strategy because it would require a level of uniformity of action and unanimity of support that no cause (with the exception of a tragedy like 9/11, a just war, like WWII or a political assassination) has ever produced previously in the history of our country.
I hope I’m wrong but I don’t see a realistic way of bringing enough parents from all the disparate communities and backgrounds together on this but I would like to see it happen nonetheless.
I have been opting my son out of testing for the past four years (he is in 7th grade now). Ofcourse teachers, administrators and other parents have scoffed at our actions and I have not been blind to the futility of our efforts, but I refuse to allow my kids to participate in the harmful charade of testing.
I have said over and over that my son will NOT take ANY standardized tests in his school. None.
I’ve spoken to a handful of parents about our decision and I state my case clearly and concisely: “Those tests are intentionally designed to “fail” our students, “fail” our teachers, “fail” our principal and “fail” our school and provide the “justification” for a takeover by pro-privatization forces who will then have “proof” that our school is “terrible”, based on the results from these shams called “standardized tests”.
Some may eventually join me. Some may have but they’ve never told me, either because they don’t know me or they consider it no one else’s business.
But too many parents are—like I was—completely ignorant about these tests and they’ve been told that they will be “holding back” their kids IF they don’t take them.
Let’s not give up. Keep pushing. Our day is drawing near. I sincerely believe that. The Privatizers are too greedy, too panicked and too scared to see straight…and now, they’ve gone too far.
It appears that there are several who need to enhance their mastery of the art of developing relationship with the most effective members of the media, most particularly those in investigative reporting.
The more egregious the act, the more newsworthy the piece is to the media.
Present the facts with no varnishing and let the writer run with it. If there is one iota that you are attempting to manipulate the writer, your future messages will be instantly deleting unread.
As they should be.
You’re under the delusion that there still are investigative reporters. Not working for any mainstream outlets there’s not – most “reporters” are mere stenographers. The handful of “investigative” reporters left only report on the small beans, bottom of the totem pole type of stuff – like the “I-Team” in Chicago that broke the story about the state fair commissioners who were getting free beer tickets from their vendors.
I don’t blame the reporters. They’re in the same boat with teachers – there’s only so much their bosses will let them do. When six major corporations control 90% of the nation’s media, looking to the media for help is a fool’s venture.
The Pulitzer Prizes awarded to Jessica Silver-Greenberg of The New York Times and to Paul Kiel of ProPublica suggest that there may be more out there than you have discovered.
Brett Shipp of WFAA-TV the Gannett ABC News affiliate in Dallas, Texas has implemented change via his relentless pursuit of the
egregious and the corrupt. ( Those are not mutually exclusive.)
Investigative journalism is alive and well, although it did suffer some wounds to non-vital organs.
If your perspective is limited to the empire of billionaire without a moral fiber Rupert Murdoch, the functional equivalent of the incumbent owner of the Dallas Cowboys, Jerry Jones, you are quite correct. Investigative journalism is dead there, as the mantra is
“don’t rock the boat!”
Most of my long time friends who reported for the Wall Street Journal have escaped to more professional homes in the troubled print journalism world, thank goodness. It is a true calling.
Sometimes it is beneficial to look into a matter before striking out when a viable solution is offered.
Or, you could just suffer as you test your students into mindlessness.
If there is a valid miscarriage of justice or a clear misuse of learning time and resources, an investigative journalist is one of the most effective means of recourse to right things/
As you say, there is still some outstanding work being done in this form, work that truly may be as good or better than has ever been done in the last 110 or so years. It’s also true that the type of reporting that most people have in mind when they hear the term “investigative journalism” — long-form pieces by major dailies based on months of reporting — is an endangered species, due mainly to the increasingly challenged economics of the news content business. On the plus side, “investigative journalism” can mean (and has meant) many things. We are in the infancy of the next phase of the Document Dump. The photocopier machine brought us the first phase (the Pentagon Papers simply could not have happened in the 1950s). Networked computing is bringing in the new phase. See, e.g., The document dumps of Edward Snowden and Julian Assange. There are huge potential downsides to this trend, but arguably it’s all upside for “investigative journalism.”
The number of investigative reporters has been reduced significantly in the last decade. If there could be found a news organization willing to commit their reduced resources on wasted dollars and lost instructional time, to whom would their reporters speak?
It is a clearly stated policy in my district that NO employee is to speak to the press regarding anything related to our school, district policies, actions, etc.
Perhaps United Airlines might not feel that investigative reporting is dead.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/flights/2014/07/16/birds-poisoned-houston-airport/12744889/
That’s the silliest thing I’ve read here in a long, long time. I’ve cultivated relationships with the local news ‘reporters’ in every city I’ve live and worked in. I’ve appeared in articles above the fold in the New York Times, had quotes published in the Washington Post, and contributed opinion pieces to several local papers and interviews on several local television stations.
The ‘reporters’ are carefully watched and controlled now and what they ‘report’ must support the political leanings of the publishers/owners and the outcomes desired by the corporate owners/advertisers.
Many ‘reporters’ have told me outright that they won’t bother to interview me or other teachers, won’t even look at the smoking gun evidence we have to show them because their editors will never approve of their ‘reporting’ so it is a waste of time.
The only media we can trust now is media we ourselves produce — like this blog. What you suggest, Dormand, was possible pre-9/11. It is no longer possible as we slide ever further into fascism under neoliberal control.
What sort of smoking gun evidence do you have that reporters have told you they won’t look at?
FLERP! My district recently underwent a major budget shortfall scandal which resulted in the resignation of the sitting superintendent, a couple of years of local and state investigations, and all kinds of misery for all involved.
There were teachers and principals trying to shed public light anonymously on these issues as they built up for years but the newspaper wouldn’t touch it until it blew up overnight.
We ended up with a reformists superintendent who swung the axe indiscriminately and got rid of pretty much everyone who knew how to do anything and had any institutional knowledge and so now we are flying blind while the proverbial plane is being built. The budget is balanced but we are in total chaos with extremely low morale and mass confusion.
A hardhitting journalistic expose would’ve prevented a lot of damage and ruined careers/lives had it been written.
It is common knowledge here that the paper in the neighboring county has much more accurate, if rare, reporting (we are not their readership) than our local because of the good old boys networks that connect politics, public service, and money here.
I suggest that one subpopulation of parents who are exceptionally capable and who would be quite interested in an environment of excessive high stakes standardized testing are those in the “creative class”.
These elusive but highly sought after individuals are among the most effective in our society and are quite skilled at defining problems and process improvements.
Their employers will do anything to keep them, as they are capable of rendering competition completely obsolete with one breakthrough innovation.
Many of these are committed on their children having the public school, and they excel at organizing parents to support teachers by removing a portion of the massive excess and uncalled for bureaucratic chores and reporting that many feel that they will use to reform teaching with.
You can read Richard Florida’s book on this incredibly effective subset of population if you are interested.
Chris in Florida-
Might I suggest that you recognize that the mission of the investigative journalists is to bring to their constituency well researched evidence of egregious acts that are an affront to a civilized society.
If you have the attitude that they are there to address a problem that you have, you will be repeatedy ignored by these most conscientious
and professional individuals who follow their calling for little compensation and frequently put their life, liberty and personal property at risk.
Again, if it is not both egregious and capable of being documented, it probably is not newsworthy.
Please respect their professionalism. Those who take the time and care to present first a one page overview, then later a fully documented file on a societal affront are likely to get results.
These people are as overworked as a public defender or a high school counselor, so if they are not able to see at the beginning the overview of a promising piece, they simply do not have the time to dig through tons of minutae.
This is what it takes if you want to be effective at implementing change. I recommend the out-of-print classic by Arnold S. Judson
“A Manager’s Guide to Making Changes.” This is a turgid read, but it shows how to implement change without the use of authority.
In Wilmington, DE, the news media could not care less what teachers have to say, and the last thing they would do is offend the governor, his underlings, and the Department of Education. It’s one strange romance.
Just found out that my district superintendent volunteered to pilot the VAM based Texas Teacher Evaluation system that the association lawyer deemed illegal, for our district.
84% poverty, 38% LEP, I am sure that it will be great this year at my school…
On the subject of how to gain awareness that opting out of testing is an option for parents and the suggestion that working with an investigative reporter to achieve the widest awareness, one commented that investigative journalism is dead.
As proof of its vitality, you might cringe at this investigative report on a Tea Partier using
a support the troops masthead to cover overhead for his right wing PAC organizations just released by ProPublica. This should make your blood boil. Note the compensation paid to the consultant in the piece by the charity.
http://www.propublica.org/article/pro-troop-charity-misleads-donors-while-lining-political-consultants-pocket?utm_source=et&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=dailynewsletter
Chris in Florida–I hope that you/your colleagues will contact retired teachers–you have LOTS of them in FL (many who have fled ILL-Annoy, & they’re not just “snowbirds”–they’ve FLED ILL-Annoy for good!). An excellent blog–& he’s sometimes found as a reference here–Reclaim Reform–written by the inestimable, retired-&-FLED-from_ILL-Annoy– Ken Previti. There’s a whole branch of IL Ed. Assn.-Retired members in his area. So–active Florida teachers–make those connections w/the retired ones–they’re sure to help! &, once again, must throw kudos out to retired teachers in Rockford, IL–the group W.E.E. (Watchdogs for Ethics in Education) did all the due diligence necessary (attending meetings, took notes, transcribed info., talked to reporters, interviewed active teachers, went to board meetings & spoke up, put out information sheets/distributed to the community–spoke truth to power and got RID of Rockford’s hapless, harmful Broad superintendent!) Retired teachers can do it for you! Yes, WE can…we DID…& we WILL!!!!!
In fact, this is not just to Chris in FL–there are LOADS of us all over the US–find us, we’ll find you &, as I said, yes, WE WILL!!!!
I really liked Peter Greene’s commentary on the fights educators should pick, though
(1) He clearly could have used better quotes to illustrate the ineptness and deceit of teacher union leaders. For example, just last year Weingarten wrote that it was critical for American public education to “align teacher development and evaluation to the Common Core state standards.” And the NEA’s chief policy analyst repeats the nonsense spewed by the corporate “reformers.” She says “Students need the knowledge and skills that will prepare them for…our global economy.”
In fact, before it was scrubbed from the Common Core website, the raison d’etre for the Common Core was global competitiveness. Yet, that’s a straw man, a myth, a sham. The U.S. is competitive internationally, and when it drops in the WEF global competitiveness rankings it’s because of stupid economic decisions, all of which were (and are) supported by corporate “reformers.” They want more of the failed policies that took the nation and the world to the brink of economic disaster; the same policies that have greatly exacerbated income and wealth inequality here and elsewhere.
That the national organizations pledge to promote and protect public education are part and parcel to this nonsense is a disgrace.
(2) Greene neglects to directly point out that many educators –– from teachers and administrators to superintendents and college admissions officials–– believe in and support corporate-style “reform,” sometimes when they don’t even know it. For example, the Common Core is now tied tightly to both the ACT and the SAT (and the PSAT and AP). ACT Inc, and the College Board were not only major players in the development of the Common Core, but too they are among its staunchest advocates and defenders, and they have much to gain from its implementation. They both say all of their products are fully “aligned with the Common Core.
But the ACT and the SAT (and AP) are part of the scam. They just don’t do much for most kids. College enrollment specialists say that their research finds the SAT predicts between 3 and 15 percent of freshman-year college grades, and after that nothing. As one commented, “I might as well measure their shoe size.” The ACT is hardly better. An Ohio study found the ACT has minimal predictive power for college. The authors asked, in amazement, “…why, in the competitive college admissions market, admission officers have not already discovered the shortcomings of the ACT…is not clear. Personal conversations suggest that most admission officers are simply unaware of the difference in predictive validity across the tests.”
Both the College Board and the ACT “sell hundreds of thousands of student profiles” to colleges. And both the ACT and College Board “offer software and consulting services that can be used to set crude wealth and test-score cutoffs, to target or eliminate students before they apply” The result is that colleges use these resources to give financial aid to those who need it least. The very sad – and mostly secret – fact is that “students are rejected on the basis of income…enrollment managers say the practice is far more prevalent than most schools let on.”
Parents have to be educated. So do school board members – (a school board chair once told me that there was no connection between the PSAT and the SAT). The national PTA has supported Common Core, and states and school districts across the country are boarding the phony STEM bandwagon. Seriously, its an utter madhouse.
So, (1) it’d be nice and dandy and direly important if the AFT and NEA “leaders” got some gumption, consulted research, common sense, and critical thought, and came out strongly opposed to the Common Core and all it represents, and (2) it’s way past time for educators to wise up and start advocating for public schooling built on the basic truth in a democratic republic that “the care of each part is inseparable from the care of the whole.”
We have quite a long way to travel.
* pledged…
With respect to the many who posted citing difficulty in getting the messages out that testing is overdone in many, if not most, public schooling systems in the US, and that parents in many systems can “opt out” of testing for their students, please note that
only apathy and lethargyu are preventing you from making the message available globally.
wordpress.org offers you zero capital cost and zero operating cost, regardless of whether your readership is one ( you can always count on your Mother! ) or 13.2 million.
If you are on the payroll of a public school system, logic suggests that your name should not be on the masthead.
I will guarantee you that there are concerned citizens readily available who are either retirees, parents of the “creative class” ilk dedicated to continuous improvement, or an underemployed journalist eager to get back into the saddle and follow his/her passion.
Take some time to organize and to clarify your mission. Get consensus on this and map out a plan for involvement and exactly what it is you seek to achieve with your publication.
Make it clear that any postings that are vulgar, rude or condescending will be deleted or
the nuts will take over your publication and most will cease reading it.
This is empowerment in its purest form. We have the First Amendment. Make sure that it is used to do what is right.
People get used to anything. The less you think about your oppression, the more your tolerance for it grows. After a while, people just think oppression is the normal state of things. But to become free, you have to be acutely aware of being a slave.”
― Assata Shakur,
No one rules,…………….if no one obeys.
Another way to bring to the attention of parents in states in which opting out of tests is an option is to send an email to the editorial page editor of your local paper, providing links to all of the applicable rulings enabling parents that choice.
You have to simplify the due diligence of researching a topic is it is not already part of their priority list to do pieces on.
For an example of a compelling editorial, for which a friend supplied links to data to support graphic illustrations:
http://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/editorials/20140725-editorial-the-time-has-come-to-better-fund-our-dallas-libraries.ece