The October 2014 Phi Delta Kappan/Gallup Poll says the following about what the public thinks about teachers. The big news here, in my view, is the dramatic shift in public opinion from favoring to opposing the use of standardized test scores to evaluate teachers. Only 1% was undecided on this question. Those favoring such a policy dropped from 61% to 38%. The public, if this poll is right, understands that value-added measurement is not working and is hurting the teachers in their community’s public schools. The bad news for Teach for America is that the public wants well-prepared, highly-trained teachers in their schools, not inexperienced young college graduates who have not passed through rigorous preparation and screening.
Only 38% of Americans favor using student performance on standardized tests to evaluate teachers, with parents even less supportive (31%). [My comment: Only two years ago, 52% approved using test scores to evaluate teachers; this is a big change in public opinion. The 61% who oppose using student performance on standardized test has increased from 47% in 2012.]
Of three reasons proposed for evaluating a teacher’s performance in the classroom, 77% of Americans said helping teachers improve their ability to teach is a very important reason for evaluating them. But fewer Americans (65%)
said documenting ineffectiveness that can lead to dismissal is a very important reason to evaluate their performance, and 46% said using teacher performance to determine salaries and bonuses is very important.
More than 70% of Americans said new teachers should spend at least a year practice teaching under the guidance of a certified teacher before assuming responsibility for their own classrooms.
More than 80% of Americans said teachers should pass board certification in addition to being licensed to practice, similar to professions like medicine and law.
60% of Americans said entrance requirements into teacher preparation programs should be more rigorous.
64% of public school parents have trust and confidence in the men and women who are teaching children in the public schools, but this percentage declined from 72% in 2013.
57% of Americans would like their child to take up teaching in the public schools as a career. This proportion was lower than when the question was last asked in 2005, when 62% supported teaching as a profession for their child.
I think people bash TFA for mnay good, strong reasons.
But I think TFA would be extrememly valuable if they restructured their approach by doing ONE thing:
Distribute TFA graduates to schools to ASSIST the teacher, aid, and work UNDER the teacher as a mentor. GIve the TFA 3 years to get their masters in education as they work side by side with the teacher.
I would LOVE a Harvard grad or someone from Yale reading with my kids every day AFTER I were to train them to teach certain skills under my supervision.
Other than this model, TFA is not only useless; it’s counterproductive and destructive.
Clarification:
” . .. UNDER the teacher as a mentor” . . . Meaning with the TEACHER as the mentor and the TFA person as the intern.
I want to be clear about that.
No. ALL candidates for being a teacher should go through traditional channels. There is NO real shortage of qualified teachers. There is no reason for TFA to exist except to undercut the professional teacher workforce.
One thing that should be done is remove TFA from AmeriCorps and take away the student awards and stipends.
I agree. A lot of teaching is a craft based on a theoretical foundation that students receive while at university. We know that the TFA kids are bright, but there is a lot more to teaching than just being smart. Even plumbers, electricians, and carpenters have an apprenticeship program lasting several years. Can we expect less of those to whom we entrust America’s children? One of the worst teachers my son ever had was a midlife career changing chemistry teacher. The man had worked as a chemist for over twenty years. His certification was “waived,” since he had a PhD. He was clueless how to run labs, manage the classroom, and assess appropriately. I think he left the following year, and my son and his cohort learned very little chemistry that year.
Being from Harvard or Yale doesn’t guarantee brains. Nobody is going to work as a teacher aide or assistant and be a college graduate unless the market is extremely tight for teachers.
Clarification:
” . .. UNDER the teacher as a mentor” . . . Meaning with the TEACHER as the mentor and the TFA person as the intern.
I want to be clear about that.
The decline in public trust in teachers isn’t as alarming considering people’s trust in government is very low. Plus the constant drumbeat of “schools are failing” and demonization of teachers in the media does have an effect. You can easily find voters saying “I hate teachers” but “I like my teacher”.
In Ohio, we now have our first major district strike in years. At first, the superintendent and school board of Reynoldsburg took away health insurance, trying to pit older teachers with families against younger, single teachers. This affront was framed as freedom for lifestyle choices. Then, the board bought into the VAM fiasco wanting to base advancement and hiring on test scores and drive-by evaluations. In the latest negotiation, the board added poison pills to the offer which was rejected. The board forced the strike, hoping public opinion goes against teachers and trying to leverage the anti-teacher rhetoric of the governor and Republican legislators.. The first day of the strike has reports of fights with police called in, kids running in the halls, subs sleeping in class, kids walking out, parents pulling their kids concerned about safety. There is a picture of one of these “highly qualified” Huffmaster subs giving the middle finger to the teachers. Classy. The strike is now about class sizes and high teacher turnover, but the board refuses to negotiate in good faith.
In Columbus City Schools, 20 schools are now designated for the recently enacted parent trigger law. ODE unilaterally, against the law’s text, picked a “neutral party” to administer the trigger process – none other then the Rhee-ish StudentsFirst organization.
Education is Ohio is a mess.
It comes right from the top.
Amazingly (!), considering what’s going on there, Reynoldsburg is a “model” in ed reform. This is the USDOE, but they are not the only reform group that point to Reynoldsburg:
http://www.ed.gov/highschool
It’s not like they’re hiding it, either. The state that they’re following the reform guidelines of two national lobbying groups:
“The site states the “The rationale [of the report] echoes the reasoning behind Reynoldsburg’s recent teacher contract proposal.” Interesting. So who, exactly, is the organization behind this report?
Let’s take a look at The New Teacher Project’s website to find out…”
http://www.plunderbund.com/2014/08/25/reynoldsburg-school-boards-proposal-direct-from-michelle-rhee-organization/
Do the people in Reynoldsburg know they’re part of a nation ed reform experiment? Because they are. That chaos in their schools? A direct result of lobbyist influence on policy.
Good question. After interacting with parents, I believe they are confused. They desperately want a good education for their children and do not know who or what to believe. The Reformers present a slick, well funded, highly orchestrated marketing campaign. They do a good job and push all the right buttons. Sound bytes and heartstrings rule the day, not reality and reason. Ohio is currently rife with anti-teacher sentiment. Letters to editors demand teachers be “taken down a notch” and supportive parents are union “props”. But perhaps, as the current political leaders continue to push Ohio into third world status, the public will eventually take notice. There is always hope.
So will TFA use this information to better train its “teachers” so it can continue to infiltrate public schools and supply the pipeline of clerks to the charters? It gets to the point that I no longer believe anything positive I read with regard to reform retreats (like less testing) and anything that is anti-teacher is good for TFA and anything that is good for teaching is also … good for TFA.
What is this love affair that people have with ivy league graduates? Does no one realize that there are lots of talented people who did not attend an ivy league school? Why should I love someone from Harvard reading with my kids? Is their Harvardness going to rub off on the kids and make them somehow more talented and capable? That is not to say that there are not ivy league graduates who could become exemplary teachers, but they need the same training as anyone else. As to extended apprenticeships…a four year college degree has become an expensive proposition. On to that we want to tack an added apprenticeship? We are doing an abysmal job of providing mentoring to new teachers. What makes anyone think that the funding for such an endeavor is going to materialize? The public schools are being slowly defunded and yet we talk about making it even more difficult to become a teacher? The evidence points to an existing competent teaching force although one that is shrinking under current policy. I do not see the will to pay teachers on a level with more highly paid professionals. All policy decisions seem to be geared to making education cheap, hence the praise for long suffering martyr-type teachers who are driven with a religious zeal to sacrifice themselves on the altar of submissive servitude “for the children.”
Ivy Leaguers aren’t better, and a lot of them are downright stupid. Most people don’t even bother to apply to those schools in the first place. They prefer to stay closer to home and enroll in colleges more closely attuned to their needs.
Let’s just say that being an Ivy league graduate does not guarantee that an individual will make a good teacher. The Ivies recruit very intelligent students who demonstrate all the foibles of “ordinary” human beings. The education that is offered is nothing to sneeze at, but they are not the only game in town.
I despise TFA and everything it stands for. I despise that its ilk get preferential treatment over certified, qualified, credentialed real teachers who want to be teachers. I cannot believe my government gives millions of dollars in gifts to TFA. I loathe all the perks they get and how our government bends and breaks the rules for TFA. Wendy Kopp should be ashamed of herself every single day of her life. Her legacy is not going to be positive; she’ll forever be known as a scam and a sham who has done more harm than good to the poor kids for whom she claims to be savior and saint. God bless America.
so that explains the recent op-ed piece by tfa founder in USA Today and the Indy Star explaining how all the tfa naysayers are wrong about this research proven program to bring the best and brightest into the deprived classrooms of our poorest communities. Seems she cannot handle the truth.