If you believe in miracles, clap your hands!
With Superintendent John Deasy under pressure because of the accumulation of his bad decisions, the district just announced that high school graduation rates increased by a stunning 12% in only one year! Clap your hands!
While citizens are demanding Deasy’s resignation, and the city’s elites defend him because he gets results, even if teachers and parents don’t like him, Deasy announced that the graduation rate had soared to an amazing 77% (clap your hands).
Howard Blume writes a cautionary note:
But the good news comes with a substantial caveat. The rate is calculated based on students enrolled in comprehensive high schools, and it leaves out students who transfer to alternative programs — which frequently include those most at risk of dropping out.
For example, Bernstein Senior High in Hollywood had a graduation rate of 62%; Alonzo, the “option” school on the corner of that property, had a graduation rate of 5.2%. Santee Education Complex, south of downtown, had a rate of 68%; Kahlo High School, the alternative campus on its perimeter, had a rate of 10%.
Once the alternative campuses are factored in, L.A. Unified’s rate drops to 67% — much less impressive but still surpassing what the district has accomplished in recent history. The previous year’s rate of 65% also did not include students in such programs.
In the past, graduation rates have been subject to extreme manipulation, although that is less likely under current methods of record-keeping.
“We continue to move closer to our goal,” Deasy said. “The results keep getting better and better.”
The statewide graduation rate is 80% for 2012-13, the most recent year available.
The one thing we have noticed in recent years is that the more data matter, the more data are manipulated to produce the necessary results. That is known as Campbell’s Law.
“The more any quantitative social indicator is used for social decision-making, the more subject it will be to corruption pressures and the more apt it will be to distort and corrupt the social processes it is intended to monitor.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It is all smoke and mirrors. No one should believe anything that comes from the LA Times.
Here is who their Publisher and CEO really is…
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-austin-beutner-los-angeles-times-publisher-20140811-story.html#page=1
….a Wall Street free market insider, and major supporter of the Eli Broad perspective.
Blume’s sleazy report today spoke in glowing terms about graduation rates, and it was only in his final few sentences buried on a back page, that some truth was written. Of course Howard has to report what he is told or he would probably be fired.
Read Annie Gilbertson at KPCC for true reporting.
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Someone did a “Ten Stupidest Things Arne Duncan Said” a while ago.
Perhaps the same thing could be done for L.A. Schools Superintendent John Deasy. Here’s a good start.
Go to Deasy’s interview last month (Sepember 2014) with Tavis Smiley:
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Dr. John Deasy, LAUSD Superintendent | Interviews | Tavis Smiley | PBS
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/tavissmiley/interviews/john-deasy-2/
The quote is at —
03:52 – 04:29
(the CAPITALS and () parentheticals are mine, Jack)
—————————————————–
JOHN DEASY:
“As far as Last-In–and-First-Out, I don’t support that in any fashion whatsoever… uhhmm… in the notion that when you have to make decisions to lay off faculty because of budget cuts—and we know here in California, we’ve been through a horrific situation, uhhh… in terms of lack of money for public education—the decision has to be made solely on the day the person is hired. Well, why don’t we use teacher HEIGHT? I mean, THAT’S objective… uhmm, you can easily determine the highest, the tallest teacher. You wouldn’t do that either. So why (base it on) some day (i.e. start day on the job)?
“You want to be able to make a decision on the contributions teachers make…”
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At this point in the interview, Deasy then deviously dishes out some disinformation and misdirection as he gushes about how wonderful some teachers and their “contribution” is, and and that “honoring” those good teachers’ contribution is the only and real reason he’s out to gut all teachers’ job protections in backing the Vergara decision.
Gee, how nice of him.
Why MUST those evil teacher unions get in his way when all Deasy wants to do is “honor” teachers? What’s WRONG with them? They’re all just corrupt, defenders of a failed status quo putting their own adult self-interest ahead of the children that they’re failing to teach!
Thank God we have John Deasy to take them on!
Deasy fails to mention that it’s NOT just “BAD” teachers’ job protections he’s after, but “ALL” teachers’ job protections.
I was in an audience when Deasy gave a speech at Occidental College a couple years ago, and he said a teacher’s career should not last more than five years, before that teacher moves on to their “real” career. Deasy and his ilk view the veteran teacher—10 years or more—with undisguised contempt, seeing them as lazy, overpaid, and basically worthless. If you went to an LAUSD teacher jail, it looks like an AARP meeting, as the Deasy-ite principals were given a directive to doctor up and trump up false charges against as many veterans as possible—to lower the line of item of salary in the budget, not improve teacher quality. If the Vergara decision stands, they’ll all be instantly fired.
The truth is that Deasy—and more specifically, the moneyed forces backing him—wants to de-professionalize teaching, to make it more like a low-level service job like office temping, fast food, retail, etc., than a profession like law, medicine, engineering, etc. Of course this as being done…
1) to lessen the tax burden on business and ramp up their bottom line profits and the price of their shareholders’ stock;
AND
2) to make education a more profitable industry for privatization—where teachers can be more like Walmart workers with no job protections, little pay, etc.
That’s why Teach For America, and TNTP, and all similar groups get millions and millions of dollars of corporate backing. This fits right in with the long-term plan of the Billionaire Boys Club—Bill Gates, Eli Broad, the Walton family, etc.—to destroy the teaching profession, and privatize public education… taking it from the public commons where it is accountable and transparent to the public via democratically-elected school boards, and put it under the control of private interests who are NOT accountable to the public, not transparent to the public, and who don’t educate all the public—i.e. the most costly and difficult kids to educate… Special Ed, English Language Learners, kids in high poverty, homeless, foster care, etc.
Anyway, getting back to the above quote, Deasy says that a teacher’s length of service should be totally ignored when making personnel or compensation decisions.
THE REASON: basing such decisions on a teacher’s number of years of services is the same as basing it on a teacher’s number of inches in his height.
Really, John? Seriously? You’re in your mid-fifties now, and it’s possible you may soon or eventually need open-heart surgery (or some other high-risk surgery.) Would you prefer to be operated on by a surgeon who’s done it…
2 times before he operates on you?
20 times before he operates on you?
200 times before he operates on you?
2,000 times before he operates on you?
According to you, John, judging that surgeon on the prior number of times he’s successfully performed open-heart surgery is like judging him on the number of inches of his height.
What an asinine analogy. Let’s compare it even further.
INCHES OF HEIGHT: a teacher—or his supervising administrator(s)—has NO control over that, as it is decided in the womb.
YEARS OF TEACHING IN THE CLASSROOM: being able to survive this is totally dependent on the teacher’s innate abilities, persistence, drive to work hard, and his determination to perform the countless and highly-demanding requirements of the job… and survive administrator evalutions, and prove himself / herself over and over to an administrator that they deserve to be on the job—even AFTER being granted tenure.
Bad teachers can and do get justly pushed out all the time… without actually going thru the technical process of termination or “being fired.”. The same goes for high-paid teachers who are unjustly fired, in order to save money.
What must a teacher do during that say, his first year of teaching, or 2 years, or 5, 10, 20, 30, etc., to remain on the job? What are some of the requirements that he must perform, or else, if he fails to do so, will get written up and eventually fired?
Well, let’s examine that.
Principals and other administrators come through our classes all the ding-dong day, folllowed by criticisms, e-mails and / or “conference memos” which demand and get immediate action.
Parents can be equally demanding, as evidenced during the scheduled parent-teacher conferences during the school year, and those unscheduled conferences resulting from a problem the parent demands that the teacher MUST address.
The students’ results on quarterly assessments—and annual standardized tests—in Language and Math are scrutinized to a fair-thee-well.
Accompanying these analyses are demands to address the needs of those students who are falling behind., and administrative monitoring as to whether we as teachers have done so. (And this is apart from the annual or bi-annual “Stull” evaluation that teachers go through)
Here’s more of what a teacher does:
— detailed report cards;
— lesson planning or all subjects (with a detailed lesson plan book with precisely stated objectives, methodology, etc— present and visible at all times);
— endless, constant grading & gradebook record-keeping that would tax any accountant;
— meticulously decorated and designed walls and bulletin boards ( with graded & finished student work corresponding to California Standards posted both in the classroom and in the hallway, and which must be changed regularly);
— mandated classroom environment with required centers (library, listening center, etc.); constant photocopying / prep for the upcoming lessons);
— I.E.P meetings for certain children with issues (with detailed documentation, writing, pre-planning, and execution of the I.E.P. plan itself);
— after-school “homework” clubs / tutoring that most teachers offer (unpaid and off-the-clock mind you);
— the grading of students’ writing (a very labor-intensive job by itself ) followed by individual one-on-one writing conferences with each student; regular after-school teacher meetings;
— intervening in and counseling regarding bullying, fights, or the often toxic dynamics of cliques; grade-level meetings;
— meetings of the entire faculty;
— after-school professional development meetings;
— the newly-mandated prep for the standardized tests;
— constant intervention with misbehaving children involving phone calls / meetings with parents; home visits;
— unpaid and emotionally-draining social work for children from distressed, impoverished homes with often-horrific personal situations;
— constant organizing and cleaning of the classroom itself;
— planning and executing of on-going projects;
— purchasing out-of-pocket supplies;
— the focused, on-your-feet performance of directed instruction itself; attending to children with special needs; and on and on…
That’s only a PARTIAL list of what we are required to do.
Now according to Deasy, the length of time that a teacher has performed these and other demands SHOULD MEAN NOTHING when making decisions in:
paying that teacher (salary schedule);
or
not firing/continuing to hire that teacher.
Why? Well, because Deasy says that judging by the years on the job doing all this is the same as judging that teacher by the inches of that teachers’ height.
The unbelievable demands they constantly have to meet, and the challenging and trying circumstances in which they work mean nothing to this man—or again, more specifically, the moneyed forces backing him.
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Jack, this is a rather long comment but it is also a clear , comcise summary of the Deasy’s tenure at LAUSD that resonates because you have so astutely itemized a litany of his transgressions and the hypocrisy they reflect while tying them to the reckless , unrelenting assaults teachers and Public education continue to suffer in LA. Deasy is facillitating contracts for big business, local developers, and other well heeled parasites who are eager to join the feeding frenzy facillitated by deregulated plutocrats, white chalk criminals and the entrenched corruption currently corroding our culture . It is an affront to all we hold dear. For these people to demiolish the people’s woll, comprise the future and abuse their positions to milk profit at the expense of poor children and their weary teachers It is one thing for oliarchs , civic leaders and courts to conspire against the community it swore to serve but quite another when the state and feds do more than condone it ,As they cultivate these burdens and condemn anyone who’s dares to confront this injustice, it becomes clear our national leaders are committed to a rotten common core of billionaires and wall street jackals preying on the people they are supposed to serve . And do not mean with a side dish and garnish.
I hope you dont mind, but I posted this entire thing on hemlockontherocks.com.
I think this is worthy of being a post and invite you to contribute to the blog as we have far too few local voices weighing in on this. When they do, there has been consequenxes si I no longer use local teachers’ names unless they have been established first througb their own efforts. We have cine up in court a few times but the judges have yet to see blooging or criticizing LAUSD as reasin for dismissal . It actually backfires more ften than not. One of the few wins in the OAH included Hemlock as evidence a teacher wass unfit but her pists are so compelling they convinced the judge she was anything but . I am proudof her but I am not willing to risk it with so much at stake
I assume you are or were a teacher at LAUSD from the details you have provided and point out that there is a reason for the lack of teachers in mix. As you note , it takes trenendous courage to speak out as Ms, Shankling did for all the reasons you imply and then some .
Lately, more of us do come forward to express frustration, fear and outrage at the incredible injustice and hardship we currently shoulder and see our students suffering as class size becomes more than just lawless in schools that are filthy, neglected and bleak . They are egregious eye sores in the hoods where Deasy says he is “lifting children out of poverty” by making sure they are college ready properly prepared to jpin he workforce ( as walmart wage slave slaves )
If one becomes familiar with the true speak of this brave new world , explicating reformy rhetoric is pretty easy: Most students in LA who choose college will graduate with the burden of student loan debtts and an astounding lack of real opportunities thanks to the capitalists’ escalating assault on labor. The college is now another spurce of income instead of a sacred institution committed to higher learning and an enlightened society. . Moreover we are already erecting abd enabling for profit colleges that are wiilling to exploit students who want an education and a better life as long as the feds will subsuduze these loans . Close to 80 % of then are in default now and the government is shamelessly garnishing SSI checks oeaving too many living below poverty despite their degrees . This aooears to be the fate of most career teachers and it is ugky,
Students who get a job won’t have much more success achieving the American dream than their college boynd peers or their teachers have because even those who can score a union card are looking at shakey employment prospects as the insidious influence of bully billionaires usurps workers they can only so because of iunion complicity , simething we need to understand and contend with if we want to prevail in this class war l
. Last night Mercedes Schnieder posted one of the most important essays I have read on education reform.. And I read far too many to be easily impressed,
Check it out:
I was aware of collusion between Broad and Randi Weingarten for a couple years so I was mildly surpised that an avid and ingenious researcher like MS was unaware of Broad’s stance on teachers’ unions which he has never tried to break or bust or even bash contrary to the assumptions most have made about reform’s agenda . I picked up on that when I was teaching and wiitnessed the witch hunts up close and personal after a broadie was installed at my school . Make no mistake , UTLA declared open season on teachers and facillitated the downfall of some of the finest educators on campus . After decades of unstained service , the accolades and solid Stulls meant nothing . Suddenly these teachers were ineffective, unfit, perverted and beneath contempt. No One was more appalled by teachers and adverse to due process than the reps and officers we turned to for help as these administratoors abused and undermined us until the faculty was fractured by fear and loathing .
Needless to say I was the first to be jailed because I defended my beleaguered calleagues and advocated for our students . I was disgusted by the harassment, misappropriated grants, intimidation , cronyism , and top down tyranny that ultimately destroyed all the progress we had made and our WASC visit documented with high praise. There was only one caveat: our all new administrative staff was clearly not acquainted with the community, campus culture or the school plan they were already crippling with cuts and personal whims that had no bearing on what students needed . Their approach was unlikely to have meaningful impact on AYP gains which we were routinely stupified by in every PD session as the principal ranted in front of a powerpoint presentation that compared our Working poor Latino heavy student body to that in San Marino where affluent white and Asian students are the demographic. He wanted our or 659 to be 800 like theirs that year and we were incredulous . Not to mention demoralized and depressed because our work became so joyless .
The picture of that school loomed on the screen. It was an open campus ,state of the art with lovely landscaping and a lush lawn which smiling white kids sat on as they laughed and talked . My school resembled a prison beneath a heavy cloud of oil refinery smoke , i have worked as a sub in far worse conditions but the longer the Broadie stayed the more it came to resemble them . We had an unusual rapport with the community and worked with it to keep kids in class and out of the gangs which were finally in check thanks to intervention prgrams, dedicated teachers , the arts and a faculty with many former students on staff .all gone now. Naturally many were Latino, African American and other not whites who grew up much like the kids they were teaching. It spoke to the quality of the veteran teachers that inspired them to become teachers abd who they now worked with. It was numinous. I cannot imagine their horror watching them as mentors were driven out , jailed and even sent to early graves by the broadies with UTLA’s boessings.
A lot of them left and so many kids returned to the streets the number of youth killed on the streets in 2011 was astronomical , indeed alarming enough to inspire a task force as the community was reduced to despair .i looked at San Marino online. Even their kunch menue was sublime besude the suwill my students were served . They had class trips, clubs, student court and a college center, class size was was ideal and I susoect no cops were roughing them up or issuing truancy citations to tardy kids as they entered school. None of them were likeky to fall prey to a pipeline to prison because they ditched class or burned kush in bathroom. They di these things and worse but sone of us are more equal than others. This is so for teachers tool working in the hood is a good deed that is severely punished
I can rant and write on these things for days.so oet me curb myself here and cut to the chase
All these ruined lives are on LAUSD AND Deasy’s head to. be sure. Broad and Gates , who turned the school into SLCs in 2008 , are.also culpable . But we keep excusing the union leaders who burned us .
They destroyed veteran teachers( who literally paid their dues ) without hesitation but even now UTLA is reluctant to expose Deasy and demand his removal . While ACP , a TFA Alumn with close ties to Wendy Kopp, is accused of cheating and colluding with Deasy to do so , is being more vocal than that shiftless Judas Warren Fletcher, it is all too clear he is never going to cross Eli Broad or the powerful status quo that will reward him with a political career if he obeys them
Like Randi Weingarten he is going to play it all off like he is the noboe defender of the rank and file as well as public education . He is already alluding to the myth of union busting but it is always very vague and used as an excuse for the union’s conspicuous failure . A good union would offer courses to help teacherrs understand the complexities of a free market free for all inside PE and fight for things that matter. like BOE meetings scheduled when teachers and parents are off work and reasibabke class size . How about remediation and removal of asbestos from classrooms? A good union would have a solid grasp of how many teachers were in the jails, as well as complaints filed with EEOC because 93% of them are iver 40. They would recognize that too many are black and contradict Deasy’s constant slander that depicts them as drug traffickers, sexual predators , purveyors of child porn and prostitutes ours bkames their abhect ignorance in LAUSD which is above the law and refuses to recignize FOIL but come on, how can UTLA NOT have records on this? It is ridiculous .
This union let RiFs get replaced by interns which is illegal and refused to defend every singie teacher I know of , and there are easily 100 involved with Hemlock, legal efforts and civil rights complaints we had to file ourselves with PERB, DFEH, ACLU and EEOC the only agency that has taken us seriously or even responded despite the sheer magnatude of Deasy’s purges.
Closing teacher jail was likely a reaction to that investigation and an effort to divide and conguer the activism taking root in the 6 dungeons Deasy had operating in two hour shifts by the time media finally began to report a more unbiased account of how LAUSD was handling a sudden glut of teacher misconduct cases . That all began a year or two before the Miramonte Scandal that should have seen Deasy ‘s career crash and birn given his reckless endangerment of Berndt’s victims, failure to report him to CTC as well as parents . His , felonious interferance with the investigation and outrageous lies to the public were not punished . None of this was ever addressed by UTLA and I witnessed the officers deliberate deception when housed MES teachers held a press conference UTLA had no intention of holding .
I am the reason it went down un spite of them and currently work with unionists who have rejected these kinds of antics as they accept that UTLA is not about teachers or public education . I wish I could sing their praises here but to name them is to doom them though a couple are pretty visable and vociferous . They tell me they fear the power slate more than Deasy .
I Know Diane defends RANDI and buys into the union busting paradigm but Schneider, her most brilliant mentee makes short work of this. Read it . I think all of you should because the sooner we all have our BEARINGS the sooner we will find solidarity and bring these swine down .
I love the smell of revolutionary bacon in the morning,
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Try to imagine L.A. Police Chief Beck saying:
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L.A. Police Chief Beck:
“As far as Last-In–and-First-Out, I don’t support that in any fashion whatsoever… uhhmm… where the decision on pay or continuing to hire that police officer has to be made solely on the day a police officer is hired. Well, why don’t we use police officer HEIGHT? I mean, THAT’S objective… uhmm, you can easily determine the highest, the tallest police officer. You wouldn’t do that either. So why base police officer pay or personnel decisions based on their start day on the job?”
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Or a Fire Chief, or a leader in any branch of the U.S. armed forces… dumping on those who chose to make teaching, or fire fighting, or the military a career instead of a short-time gig, before they move on to—as Deasy puts it—their “real” career.
The morale would plummet.
Deasy says that he would prefer a system where a teacher’s career lasts five years max. Well, 50% of public school teachers ALREADY quit within five years. As far as career change teachers—those coming from other professions, that’s 50% after TWO years, and 75% after five years.
Deasy—-and the moneyed forces directing him—-want to make it so that 100% of teachers quit withing five years…. that’s “public school” teachers, not the private schools where so many corporate reform billionaires send their own kids.
How many 2-years-and-out Teach for America corps members teach at Bill Gates’ kids’ private school up in Seattle? Or Michelle Rhee/Tim Huffman’s kids at Harpeth Hall in Tennessee? Or Obama’s kids at Sidwell Friends in D.C.? Or Rahm Emanuel’s kids at the Chicago Lab School?
When I talk to those career change teachers—who came from aerospace, or accounting, or entertainment, or from wherever—I hear something along the lines of… “I had no idea that this job was so hard, so demanding, so grueling, so full of stress, so time-consuming… yadda-yadda-yadda… ”
The ones who don’t wash out in five years or less, the ones who stay on longer—longer than Deasy’s preferred five years—are the survivors, the dedicated ones, the creme-de-la-creme, and as such, deserve a system of due process, and a pay system with step increases—where commensurately higher pay comes with a commensurate increase in years of the experience that more and more years on the job brings.
No doubt about it, teachers get better the longer they are on the job—it’s totally counter-intuitive and defies common sense to think otherwise. Their instincts on how to handle the myriad of situations that arise—both academic and non-academic—become second-nature. Through trial and error and repeated practice, they improve in their ability in how to teach specific concepts—i.e. the dreaded “rounding” lesson in Math for the little ones, up to Calculus for the high schoolers. The constant ongoing evaluation from administrators—both formal and informal—sharpen all of their skills.
In short, they’re professionals, and should be treated with the respect that professionals deservce, and not have their years of experience equated to inches in their height, and essentially told that those years MEAN NOTHING. What a slap in the face!
If the idea that teachers improve with experience were not so, the websites of the expensive private schools would not tout the decades of teaching experience that their staff brings to the job.
Deasy taught two years at a military school back in the 1980’s. That’s the sum of his own experience, so perhaps he’s intimidated by those with decades of experience… as well as carrying out his corporate masters’ marching orders in targeting veteran teachers.
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Here’s some video showing how LAUSD Superintendent John Deasy “honors” his LAUSD teaching staff:
LAUSD Substitute Teacher Patrena Shankling’s job required her to follow the lesson plans that the permanent teacher—for whom she was subbing—left for her. Indeed, failing to do so would lead to her being written up and fired, a fact that Superintendent Deasy ignored when Ms. Shankling later pointed it out to him.
Superintendent Deasy came in unannounced while Ms. Shenkling was doing what was required of her and following the plan. Superintendent Deasy did not announce himself, or who who he was, of what he wanted. She couldn’t recognize him from Adam… so after he was verbally abusing her and upsetting her students for a while, she did what she or any teacher—permanent or sub—was allowed to do as the head of the classroom with any stranger who wanders in to the room and starts raving like an a—hole:
She asked him to leave.
Public humiliation is barred by the UTLA contract. No administrator—not even the Superintendent—can reprimand someone in front of students, staff, parents, and/or whomever, and a grievance can be filed against that person, which, if upheld, will remain permanently in that person’s file as a formal admonishment.
(Since Ms. Shenkling was fired that same day—unlike permanent teachers like myself, subs can be fired at will—she no longer had any standing to file such a grievance. Speaking at this Board meeting was her only recourse at this point.)
That’s why then-UTLA-president Warren Fletcher (who subbed for about half of his 30 year teaching career, by the way) brought up Ms. Shankling, a fellow substitute, to recount her story at this public and televised Board meeting.
One other subtlety that needs mentioning.
At the time of Ms. Shankling’s testimony, Superintendent Deasy was engaging in a smear campaign against Dr. Richard Vladovic, the LAUSD Board president, and also a former teacher/administrator who was an opponent of Superintendent Deasy and much of what Deasy—and Deasy’s corporate backers—wanted Superintendent Deasy to execute.
Initially, Superintendent Deasy heard Vladovic was likely going to be voted in as the next LAUSD Board President—due to the results of spring 2013 elections where Monica Ratliff and Steve Zimmer defeated their corporate reform-allied opponents.
Upon learning of Vladovic’s imminent ascendancy to the LAUSD Board Presidency, Superintendent Deasy threatened to resign (Deasy does that a lot, by the way… though strangely, he never follows through). This signaled Superintendent Deasy’s corporate backers to pressure the Board not to vote in Vladovic as president.
When this fake resignation threat ploy and resulting pressure failed, Deasy leaked confidential documents of investigations of Vladovic for Vladovic’s alleged verbal abusive treatment of his staff, and another for sexual harassment of other staff. These occurred years earlier, and the investigations had were shown to be without merit, and thus, should have remained sealed.
Here’s the kicker: the woman—then and now—making the accusations was Deasy’s current personal secretary… a fact that leaked out.
Pure coincidence?
Anyway, this slime job failed as well, and the Board voted Vladovic in as president.
Here’s the deal—the ones beating the drum loudest that Vladovic was an abusive harasser and unfit to be Board president—were Deasy’s two allies on the Board, corporate reform stooges Tamar Galatzan and Monica Garcia. In doing so, these two are ostensibly standing up for the rights of employees to be free from workplace abuse, and for those victims to be able to speak up for themselves after they’ve been abused.
Well, when a vote comes where these two will decide whether Ms. Shankling will be allowed to speak up FOR HERSELF, about the abuse she suffered AT THE HANDS OF DEASY, and the chair Vladovic asks…
at 02:45
“All opposed?”
Ms. Galatzan and Ms. Garcia then thrust their hands up without blinking an eye. Apparently, their principles in support victims of harassment don’t extend to victims of Superintendent Deasy.
(For reference in the video, Vladovic the chair, is dead center. Superintendant Deasy is to Vladovic’s immediate right. Just to the right of Deasy are his corporate reform allies, Ms. Garcia and Ms. Galatzan. Watch as these twi thrust their hands up at 02:46 in opposition to Ms. Shankling being allowed an extension to speak.)
For Ms. Shankling to confront Deasy right to Deasy’s face required a lot of courage, as this is a very scary, intimidating person, with that reputation preceeding him. (Ask anyone who works in LAUSD’s Beaudry Building, its downtown headquarters.)
Also, Vladovic, citing a time constraint a moment earlier, is not going to allow Ms. Shankling to speak more than 3 minutes, but asks to see if anyone will make a motion to allow her an extension.
at: 02:30
Instantly, Monica Ratliff—the teacher on leave to serve on the Board, and who had just left the classroom three months earlier to serve on the Board—quickly says, “Ill make a motion. I want to hear the story.”
(Ratliff barely won her election by about 1,000 votes out of 80,000… even though she had only $44,000 to spend, and her corporate-reform-allied opponent spent $3 million that he got from his backers… Thank God for democracy, as her opponent, had he won, would have been under strict orders from his corporate masters not to say what Ms. Ratliff said and did in this circumstance.)
The late Marguerite LaMotte—this opponent of corporate reform passed away just a month after this meeting—seconds the motion.
LaMotte further points out that, throughout the meeting, countless astroturf / corporate reform spokespersons were allowed to speak on behalf of keeping Deasy… and allowed to go beyond the 3-minute limit for speakers, so those Board members sympathetic to Ms. Shankling should think it fair that Ms. Shankling be allowed the same opportunity.
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The L.A. Times even covered the incident with Ms. Shankling and Superintendent Deasy:
http://articles.latimes.com/2012/apr/10/local/la-me-0410-banks-20120410
In the article, Shankling is described as:
————————-
“One of the teachers she’s subbed for wrote a letter of support that reads like a report card: “Ms. Shankling is … conscientious, committed, competent … punctual, well-groomed … an excellent record-keeper who understands the importance of accuracy.”
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Here’s more (NOTE… when prompted, Deasy doesn’t apologize in the least, or even acknowledge that his abusive behavior violates LAUSD’S Code of Conduct against public humiliation):
———————
“If Deasy thinks the exercise shortchanges students, ‘he could have asked me to step outside to talk about it,’ (Ms. Shankling) said. “The problem was not the assignment. The problem was his behavior.
” ‘He’s a bully, to walk in there and disrespect a teacher the way he did. It’s so easy for him to talk about what students don’t have. A lot of what they don’t have is respect.’ ”
“Deasy’s not apologizing for his reaction. His frustration had reached the boiling point:
” ‘I’m sitting with students who have not dropped out, who have not quit, who are the most likely to go to college. And I’m watching them copying rules that were handed to them into a notebook. I struggle with that. I struggle with it a lot.’
” ‘We have a shortened school year, and so many [other] issues,’ he said. ‘This is not the way we want to use the time for students. Teaching the conventions of writing might have been a better use of their time in class.’ ”
—————————-
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Watching and listening to Shankling’s testimony strikes a chord:
01:45 – 04:53
————————————
PATRENA SHANKLING:
“Before I could respond to his question, he began with what amounted a tirade of statements, including that ‘the assignment was a total waste of instructional time!’
“He said that ‘the assignment was disrespectful to our students!’ and that ‘I should be ashamed to give such an assignment to these students!’
“He was extremely agitated. and I felt that it was very important to de-escalate the situation, not escalate it. We were in a classroom with students. I was trying to calm him. It seemed everything I said to calm him was just escalating the situation, and this was in front of the students.
“In addition, I was really trying to understand how and why this was happening. I mean, it made no sense at all.
“… ”
“… it kept going on and on. This was ridiculous. I then reminded him that I was sub teacher, and that I was following the actual teacher’s instructions.
“He abruptly interrupted, scolding me even louder than he had before, stating that “it did not matter that I was a substitute teacher!”, nor that “the teacher had left this assignment!”
“He resumed the tirade, re-stating that “this was a total waste of instructional time!”” that I was “disrespecting students!”, that “the students must be respected!”, that I should “be ashamed as a teacher to give such an assignment to seniors!”
“At some point, he asked “Why aren’t the students doing actual work?”
“He immediately followed this question with the statement that “we had wasted two days of instruction!” This was the second day of class.
“At this point, I recognized that explaining the purpose of this assignment AGAIN was NOT going to get through to him, again was not going to get through to him, and that any further attempt to de-escalate the situation was futile… ”
AND ON IT GOES…
————————
ANY person who has EVER been in an abusive relationship (with an abusive spouse, parent, boyfriend, etc.)—or in close proximity to an abuser in full tirade, as either the victim or a bystander—knows and can recall EXACTLY the scenario Ms. Shankling is describing.
This is textbook abusive, controlling, vicious behavior. It’s sick.
As with an abusive husband, the bullying abuser has no desire whatsoever for the victim to achieve her goal of “de-escalating the situation.”
Where’s the fun in THAT?
That would prevent the abuser from getting off on the abuse and control the bully that enjoys meting out so much.
Also, in invoking the feeling of “shame”… “You should be ashamed of yourself!”… is one of the abuser’s favorite tools in his arsenal. It pushes the victim’s “Guilt Button”. It’s what’s called and “thought-stopping cliche” or “thought-terminating cliche,” to mentally pummel the victim into submission.
As to Ms. Shankling’s attempts to calm Deasy… well, survivors of abusive people know that nothing will calm an abuser who’s “in the zone”, so to speak. They have a need to inflict emotional pain that must be satisfied, and they will cease abusing until it is.
Deasy must go.
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Deasy wasted a couple of weeks of instruction via the inept implementation of the new attendance program… He should fire himself for that.
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Addendum…you can see here that Beutner is closely connected not only with Tony Villagraigosa who, as former Mayor of LA, pushed for closing public schools “rapidly,” in favor of charters, but who also raised multi millions of dollars to support only charter school advocates as potential school board members. His candidates, financed by the out of state and local billionaires such as Broad, Bloomberg, and Murdoch, so far have all failed.
Let’s hope that the BoE follows the good sense of the electorate and fires Deasy now.
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For your convenience, here’s the text of the two
the two union presidents’ letter TO THE 7
LAUSD SCHOOL BOARD MEMBERS,
expressing their outrage over Deasy’s
defiance of the Board’s directive:
(those union presidents are then-President
of the UTLA teachers’ union Warren Fletcher,
and his equivalent for administrators/principals/
asst. principals, Judy Perez, President,
Associated Administrators of Los Angeles”
(AALA)
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
“July 10, 2013
“Honorable Richard Vladovic,
—President, LAUSD Board of Education
“Honorable Marguerite LaMotte,
—Board Member, District 1
“Honorable Monica Garcia,
—Board Member, District 2
“Honorable Tamar Galatzan,
—Board Member, District 3
“Honorable Steve Zimmer,
—Board Member, District 4
“Honorable Bennett Kayser,
—Board Member, District 5
“Honorable Monica Ratliff,
—Board Member, District 6
“Dear Board Members:
“We are writing on behalf of the members of our two
organizations: United Teachers Los Angeles, which
represents the 36,000 classroom teachers and health
and human services professionals of LAUSD, and
Associated Administrators of Los Angeles, exclusive
representative for over 2,300 certificated and
classified administrators within the District.
“We wish to raise a concern about recent statements
by Superintendent John Deasy, related to his
obligation to abide by the policy positions and
directives of the Board of Education.
“On June 20, the ‘LA School Report,’ published a
story entitled, ‘Defiant Deasy Says He’ll Push
Targeted Spending Plan Anyway.’ In that article
Mr. Deasy clearly indicates that it is his intention
to circumvent the Board vote on use of new state
LCFF monies.
“Specifically, Mr. Deasy is quoted as stating that,
” ‘The Board voted down the directive. . . ,’ referring
to Ms. Galatzan’s recent local spending resolution,
” ‘[But] they can’t stop me from doing it; we’re doing
it anyway.’ ”
“To date, we have not been able to locate
any report that Mr. Deasy has disavowed these
public statements, nor has he indicated that he was
misquoted.
“The Superintendent is an employee of the District,
and is legally required to operate ‘under the
control of the Board.’ The California courts have
recognized that a Superintendent does not
‘exercise independent powers’ (Main vs.
Claremont, Unified School District, 161
CalApp 2d189, 204).
“As the presidents of two organizations charged
with representing and bargaining for a large
proportion of District employees, we do not
expect that Mr. Deasy’s statements and policy
positions will always align with those of our
respective organizations.
“However, as both District employees and as
taxpayers, we do expect that the
Superintendent will, at all times, discharge his
duties in a manner that is consistent with his
role as the District’s chief executive officer.
Statements and conduct to the contrary can
only erode public confidence in the Board
and the District.
“California law clearly places both the power
and the responsibility for ultimate leadership
of the District in the hands of its elected
governing board. Regardless of Mr. Deasy’s
motives or intentions, no district, and no
community, is served when this democratic
authority is undermined.
“Please contact either of us if you have any
questions. We are thankful for your time and
attention to this matter.
“Respectfully,
“Warren Fletcher
President,
United Teachers Los Angeles
“Judith Perez
President,
Associated Administrators of Los Angeles”
————————————–
————————————–
Did this letter have any impact on Deasy’s
defiant refusal to lower class size?
Nope… it never happened to this day.
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Oh… and here’s the earlier L.A. SCHOOL
REPORT article that includes the
comments from Deasy about defying
the board (and includes Deasy’s
asinine “hire every human being on
the West Coast” line:
http://laschoolreport.com/defiant-deasy-says-hell-continue-to-push-local-spending-plan/
————————————————
“Defiant Deasy Says He’ll Push
Targeted Spending Plan Anyway
“Posted on June 20, 2013 1:28 pm
“by Hillel Aron
“During Tuesday’s seemingly endless meeting, the LAUSD School Board postponed Board member Tamar Galatzan’s resolution to have new State education funds flow to schools with large numbers of low-income and English language learning students and approved Board member Bennett Kayser’s resolution calling for the district to hire more staff across the board.
“The votes seemed like a loss for LAUSD Superintendent John Deasy, who had floated the idea of having new funding flow where it was needed most (along the lines of the Galatzan resolution) and had opposed the idea of hiring more staff.
“But on Wednesday a defiant Deasy told LA School Report that his plan for future spending will include the spirit of Galatzan’s resolution anyway:
“ ‘The Board voted down the directive to have me come and do it,’ said Deasy, referring to Galatzan’s local spending resolution. ‘ [But] they can’t stop me from doing it; we’re doing it anyway. If they had voted to prevent me from doing it… well they didn’t think of that.’
“The Superintendent explained that the future spending plan the Board ordered him to produce will comply with the Board-passed Kayser resolution regarding staffing (or as Deasy derisively called it, a ‘directive to hire every human being on the West Coast’ ) but will also include some form of the local spending plan he and Galaztan have been advocating.
————————————————
There’s a great COMMENT from Robert Skeels
accompanying and BELOW this article:
—————————————————–
ROBERT SKEELS:
“Once again this Superintendent proves he values profits over pupils. Rather than address the abjectly overflowing class sizes that have students sitting on the floor and windowsills, Deasy chooses to direct funds to Rupert Murdoch’s DIBBELS®, Laurene Powell Jobs’ iPads, and John Fallon’s textbooks. Students need access to books and the world of literature, not distracting toys designed for playing Angry Birds.
“Deasy was already shunting Title I and Title III funds to corporate profits, and LCFF essentially gives him a blank check to stuff more money into the pockets of the people that put him in power. Meanwhile LAUSD students are denied an education that would provide them the critical thinking skills to change a sick world that would allow a former Gates Foundation executive to run an urban school district.”
—————————
… followed up by another great comment
from one “Chance LaRue”:
—————————————
CHANCE LaRUE:
“This is all true, Mr. Skeels, but Deasy wants to destroy LAUSD. This is his agenda, because Gates, Broad, Walton and the rest of these greed corporate thugs have more than trillion dollar signs .in their eyes as they commandeer public education. They see a next generation of compliant consumers and wage slaves. Everything these people do is about enriching themselves. They sport black holes, where their souls ought to be.”
Reply
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Campbell’s Law indeed! When graduation rates become part of the high-stakes school rankings, everyone will graduate. When go on to college rates are measured, everyone will go on. Pretty soon college will become the new middle school. And then we get criticized because standards are lowered?
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That’s true, here in California we call it social promotion. Everyone thinks it stops middle school but in reality it doesn’t. Bureaucracies like to maintain themselves. When job survival depends on students test score improvement, students test scores will improve. Look at some of those test scores and wonder how some of them jumped 30-100% in a year. Campbell’s Law
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I mean the test scores of the schools jumping 30-100%, not individual students.
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At this point does it matter what any of the “reporters” report on Deasy? Isn’t the cat pretty much out of the bag? The question I have is, CAN the BOE get rid of him? If so, why are they taking so long?
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Fear of the corporate money. Alienating it could jeopardize their political ambitions.
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How can they even get reliable student data?! The new Student Information database is garbage in garbage out. We can’t even get rosters, parent contact information or student grades in the new system.
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Indeed an excellent point but it is possible to access records from ISIS and likely they. Got the data at the end of the school year to meet the deadlines at CDE. I do agree that the timing is off. Usuall Norm day is October but the early start throw everything off. What a waste for the kids too. I really believe Deasy has been destroying the records with MiSIS on purpose. Why use the system after it npmangked the Prince George data and ultimately ended his tenure with that district. Is it just me or does anyone else wonder how he has seemingly repeated this process at LAUSD. Is it possible he uses MiSIS when he realizes it is time to get out to wipe away evidence of misappropriated funds, ADA fraud, etc? I mean the number of students is wild one day it’s 600 k another it’s 650. In the BOE miniputes it is considerably less. Like 535k and I am unclear about how many of these students are adult Ed , charter school or in continuation classes. Are the making twice as much from half as many. Just the iPads make a huge difference in cost, Nevermind free lunch, ADA, etc.
Meanwhile there is a rumor those decreasing enrollment stats may cost 5500 Teacgers their jobs. If this is true why does Deasy keep recruiting interns? The district just finished building the first of 3 apt complexes for them to live in . So they can build huge rental property, museums. A clinic and a bevy of new schools to keep civic leaders and local contractors happy but they cannot afford custodians , full time nurses, PSW, librarians, veteran teachers, adequate school site office staff or maintainence . DTLA offices can hire tons of unnecessary overpaid staff and their $100 k a year assistants have their own assistants who probably fetch sushi after they drop off dry cleaning . All new stuff even though word is Deasy has his staff lunches catered more often than not. Must be nice $350k , housing allowance, driver and car, golden parachute and the BOE busy revising his contract to include a buyout clause besides,
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The fox has been caught in the henhouse with feathers and bones in his mouth, chickens are missing, and the security camera caught him in the act.
This is in very close to real time. Not the years later revelations of the typical 100% charter graduation rates—when the numbers finally emerge that the 9th grade cohorts had shrunk by 30% or 40% or more by the time of 12th grade graduations. This is not the way after-the-fact reporting about the “disappeared” students in Texas—you know, the “test suppressors” who were told not to report on test days so the average scores would go up. Re metrics, this is not the casually foolish factoid like Bill Gates’ claim that 98% of teachers get a perfunctory “satisfactory” on their evals.
Darrell Huff of HOW TO LIE WITH STATISTICS (1954) would be oh-so-disappointed at Superintendent John Deasy’s clumsy attempts to massage and torture numbers and stats. *Or maybe he would be glad to see that people have read his little book and caught on to accountabully tricks.”
From the article linked by the owner of this blog, Deasy “hailed ‘a historic high.’” Except when you take 77% and make it 67%, then a 12% increase becomes a 2% increase.
Think I’m exaggerating? From the article: “The district’s graduation rate of 77% for the 2013-14 school year was 12 percentage points better than last year, the largest one-year increase under a tracking system that dates from the 2006-07 school year.” Immediately following is the assertion that “[t]he improvement is especially impressive because ongoing statistical gains typically become more difficult to sustain and surpass year after year.”
But the numerical house of cards now collapses:
[start quote]
But the good news comes with a substantial caveat. The rate is calculated based on students enrolled in comprehensive high schools, and it leaves out students who transfer to alternative programs — which frequently include those most at risk of dropping out.
For example, Bernstein Senior High in Hollywood had a graduation rate of 62%; Alonzo, the “option” school on the corner of that property, had a graduation rate of 5.2%. Santee Education Complex, south of downtown, had a rate of 68%; Kahlo High School, the alternative campus on its perimeter, had a rate of 10%.
Once the alternative campuses are factored in, L.A. Unified’s rate drops to 67% — much less impressive but still surpassing what the district has accomplished in recent history. The previous year’s rate of 65% also did not include students in such programs.
[end quote]
So it’s an “historic high” when 2% becomes 12% through redefinition of terms that shamelessly favor the biggest educrat currently under fire in the self-proclaimed “education reform” firmament. How about an “historic high” of shameless self-aggrandizement that leaves this PhD with 9 credits with more egg on his face than “Dr.” Steve Perry and “Dr.” Terence Carter. *Aside: since when does “comes with a substantial caveat” substitute for the more accurate phrase “is eviscerated with a mountain of facts and logic that undermines the entire assertion and turns it on its head”?*
And this is the very person that the LATIMES editorial board just lauded in the highest terms [the “historic” highest terms?]:
“It is certainly true that the board has failed to give Deasy enough credit for his key role. Deasy’s passion for serving disadvantaged students of color, and his ability to act on that passion, are the most important measures of his value. L.A. Unified’s students are doing better on a wide range of measurements.”
Link: http://www.latimes.com/opinion/editorials/la-ed-deasy-lausd-20141003-story.html
[Access the editorial via the above link for the most astonishing contortions in logic and good sense in their zeal to defend Superintendent Deasy against any and all critics.]
In other words, he’s doing better on a key metric like graduation rates because he redefined the category in order to exclude the “stat suppressors.” You know, only including those students that “count” towards propping up his record of incompetence and failure, or to provide an English-to-English translation of those others have termed “uneducables” [Rahm Emanuel] and “non-strivers” [Michael J Petrilli]—
A huge chunk of the most disadvantaged students! The ones that he allegedly has such a passion for and whose work on their behalf supposedly redeems all his other failures like, you know, $1 billion+ iPad fiasco and MISIS info system morass and morally indefensible firing of Ms. Patrena Shankling and the drumbeat of frenetic failure goes on and on and on…
The entire “education reform” business plan [which employs worst business practices] that masquerades as an education model was eviscerated decades ago by W. Edwards Deming.
From THE ESSENTIAL DEMING (2013, p. 55) re numerical goals and making them look successfully completed on paper with numbers, he pointedly asks: “What about the cost? What about the loss? Anybody can achieve almost anything by distortion and faking, redefinition of terms, running up costs.”
Literally, over 30 years ago, the “Father of Quality” described Deasy and his cohort of Broad Academy peers.
A simple proposition. How about putting someone in a position of responsibility like, say, Superintendent of LAUSD, that will accept responsible for conducting himself/herself with dignity and honor that models the very highest standards of competency and honesty?
Is that too much to ask?
😒
Please excuse the very long posting.
😎
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Of course its not too much to ask and that is what we are asking our elected BOE, the PUBLIC BOE, to represent our interests, the LAUSD community, and get rid of this lying, cheating, stealing corporate errand boy and reclaim our public school district.
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LOL It went up 7 points in a few days. Newton said it was a historical 69 % as I recall then it leaps anither 8 or so points for the last pro Deasy editorial . It is also interesting that Deasy had that big ASTRO turf with all the desks blocking traffic a few months ago to reflect how many kids did NOT graduate
It seems like he needed the stats to be high then to galvanize support for how he wants to use LCFF. Now he needs the stats low to look good. It is well known that they leave out students who graduate in late summer after completing a missing class as well as any child that stops comng even though many just enroll elsewhere. The request for transcripts should be considered in these numbers. Also teacgers are pressured to not issue fs or fail students. This means many students graduate without being able to read well or do basic math. Many kids in my class were so far behind in credits they had no prayer of graduating . I knew these kids were bright but bored. I urged them to take the GED as soon as they were exiled to the occupational center . Those who did passed and a few started classes in the two year colleges before their peers had completed finals . Also the CAHSPEEis frowned upon but I sent kids to take that when I knew they were spinning their wheels at school because there is so much time in remediation, I got in trouble for this too. All LAUSD cares about is ADA funding and looking good, which is a joke.
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Regarding pre/post testing to measure gain in conceptual understanding on Concept Inventories http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concept_inventory, economist Bill Goffe asked: “. . . . do any physicists use their students’ Force Concept Inventory (FCI) results when on the job market?”
As far as I know, the answer is (thankfully) “NO.” If pre/post testing were to be used for high-stakes summative purposes, then Campbell’s and Dunkenfeld’s Laws would probably rear their ugly heads so as to distort and corrupt the testing.
Dukenfield’s Law http://bit.ly/bsRokM: “If a thing is worth
winning, it’s worth cheating for.”
Campbell’s Law http://bit.ly/hMsyUr: “The more any quantitative
social indicator is used for social decision making, the more subject it will be to corruption pressures and the more apt it will be to distort and corrupt the social processes it is intended to monitor.”
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“In this galaxy, there’s a mathematical probability of three million earth-type planets…and in all the universe, three million million galaxies like this one. And in all of that, and perhaps more, only one of each of us. Don’t destroy the one named Deasy.” The LA Times editorial Board.
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I like how Campbell’s law has morphed into a catchall insanity defense for educators who cheat.
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Unfortunately, Tim, Campbell’s Law is an accurate description of the lengths that people will go to to meet unreasonable production targets set by authorities. Read Soviet history to see Campbell’s Law in action. Then read Yong Zhao’s wonderful new book about Chinese education and the endemic cheating and gaming the system by parents and students. It is called “Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Dragon? Why China Has the Best (and the Worst) Education System.”
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Campbell’s Law is not just about cheating. It explains that when the measurement becomes high-stakes, the process being measured is corrupted. For example, because test scores are now so consequential, people confuse high test scores with better education.
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dianeravitch: if you would permit me to add…
Campbell’s Law: explanation, not exculpation.
😎
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Define “cheat”. Businesses game the system all the time for competitive advantage. Those that play the best game are promoted. So seems we are now in fact running the schools like a business.
The gaming of edumetrics is well underway. Need to raise test scores? Teach test tricks, target only test content, try to populate your classroom/school with test taking stars. Need to raise that VAM? Cut your losses and focus only on kids with the best test taking potential. Need better graduation rates? Pass ’em through at all costs and play with the numbers.
Teachers didn’t make the rules. When Reformers set up a system that guarantees failure for good teachers, the choices are “cheat” or teach. I am chosing the latter, to teach, but in our state, that is a career ending decision. I am trying to help as many kids as I can knowing the anti-teacher fever in our state and in our leaders means I am VAM’d into a new career.
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And the cheater is Deasy, right Tim?
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Deasy and anyone else who actively cheats or, in Duane Swacker’s parlance, goes along to get along. There’s doing the right thing (for kids, just to make that perfectly clear), and then there’s not.
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And–lest we forget (& WE never do, but THEY refuse to acknowledge the truth)–the tests, themselves are deeply flawed, NOT “standardized” (because they are neither valid nor reliable). And, Duane, if you have time (one more time!) kindly supply us with your Wilson spiel (for all of Diane’s new readers).
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Thanks for the prompt rbmtk!!
Putting it up now before making biscuits and gravy and then going out fishing today. I’m the “head cook” for a fish fry next weekend and we still need some fish. Hopefully they’ll decide to jump on the line today.
And whether it’s graduation rates, test scores, or any other “metric” from the HIGH Church of Testology careful definition of what makes up the “measurement” is of utmost importance. One would think that some thing as supposedly simple as “graduation rate” would be pretty cut and dried, straightforward, but as we see here that it isn’t.
I agree with Wittgenstein’s thought “the limit of my vocabulary is the limit of my imagination” and most folks’ lack of knowledge of the epistemological* and ontological** terms and consequences of practices not being grounded in sound reasoning, i.e., epistemological and ontological soundness, cannot “imagine” the teaching and learning process void of the vaunted educational standards and standardized testing. To begin to understand that “soundness” and the necessity of that “soundness” read and comprehend Wilson’s never refuted nor rebutted “Educational Standards and the Problem of Error” found at: http://epaa.asu.edu/ojs/article/view/577/700
Brief outline of Wilson’s “Educational Standards and the Problem of Error” and some comments of mine. (updated 6/24/13 per Wilson email)
1. A description of a quality can only be partially quantified. Quantity is almost always a very small aspect of quality. It is illogical to judge/assess a whole category only by a part of the whole. The assessment is, by definition, lacking in the sense that “assessments are always of multidimensional qualities. To quantify them as unidimensional quantities (numbers or grades) is to perpetuate a fundamental logical error” (per Wilson). The teaching and learning process falls in the logical realm of aesthetics/qualities of human interactions. In attempting to quantify educational standards and standardized testing the descriptive information about said interactions is inadequate, insufficient and inferior to the point of invalidity and unacceptability.
2. A major epistemological mistake is that we attach, with great importance, the “score” of the student, not only onto the student but also, by extension, the teacher, school and district. Any description of a testing event is only a description of an interaction, that of the student and the testing device at a given time and place. The only correct logical thing that we can attempt to do is to describe that interaction (how accurately or not is a whole other story). That description cannot, by logical thought, be “assigned/attached” to the student as it cannot be a description of the student but the interaction. And this error is probably one of the most egregious “errors” that occur with standardized testing (and even the “grading” of students by a teacher).
3. Wilson identifies four “frames of reference” each with distinct assumptions (epistemological basis) about the assessment process from which the “assessor” views the interactions of the teaching and learning process: the Judge (think college professor who “knows” the students capabilities and grades them accordingly), the General Frame-think standardized testing that claims to have a “scientific” basis, the Specific Frame-think of learning by objective like computer based learning, getting a correct answer before moving on to the next screen, and the Responsive Frame-think of an apprenticeship in a trade or a medical residency program where the learner interacts with the “teacher” with constant feedback. Each category has its own sources of error and more error in the process is caused when the assessor confuses and conflates the categories.
4. Wilson elucidates the notion of “error”: “Error is predicated on a notion of perfection; to allocate error is to imply what is without error; to know error it is necessary to determine what is true. And what is true is determined by what we define as true, theoretically by the assumptions of our epistemology, practically by the events and non-events, the discourses and silences, the world of surfaces and their interactions and interpretations; in short, the practices that permeate the field. . . Error is the uncertainty dimension of the statement; error is the band within which chaos reigns, in which anything can happen. Error comprises all of those eventful circumstances which make the assessment statement less than perfectly precise, the measure less than perfectly accurate, the rank order less than perfectly stable, the standard and its measurement less than absolute, and the communication of its truth less than impeccable.”
In other word all the logical errors involved in the process render any conclusions invalid.
5. The test makers/psychometricians, through all sorts of mathematical machinations attempt to “prove” that these tests (based on standards) are valid-errorless or supposedly at least with minimal error [they aren’t]. Wilson turns the concept of validity on its head and focuses on just how invalid the machinations and the test and results are. He is an advocate for the test taker not the test maker. In doing so he identifies thirteen sources of “error”, any one of which renders the test making/giving/disseminating of results invalid. And a basic logical premise is that once something is shown to be invalid it is just that, invalid, and no amount of “fudging” by the psychometricians/test makers can alleviate that invalidity.
6. Having shown the invalidity, and therefore the unreliability, of the whole process Wilson concludes, rightly so, that any result/information gleaned from the process is “vain and illusory”. In other words start with an invalidity, end with an invalidity (except by sheer chance every once in a while, like a blind and anosmic squirrel who finds the occasional acorn, a result may be “true”) or to put in more mundane terms crap in-crap out.
7. And so what does this all mean? I’ll let Wilson have the second to last word: “So what does a test measure in our world? It measures what the person with the power to pay for the test says it measures. And the person who sets the test will name the test what the person who pays for the test wants the test to be named.”
In other words it attempts to measure “’something’ and we can specify some of the ‘errors’ in that ‘something’ but still don’t know [precisely] what the ‘something’ is.” The whole process harms many students as the social rewards for some are not available to others who “don’t make the grade (sic)” Should American public education have the function of sorting and separating students so that some may receive greater benefits than others, especially considering that the sorting and separating devices, educational standards and standardized testing, are so flawed not only in concept but in execution?
My answer is NO!!!!!
One final note with Wilson channeling Foucault and his concept of subjectivization:
“So the mark [grade/test score] becomes part of the story about yourself and with sufficient repetitions becomes true: true because those who know, those in authority, say it is true; true because the society in which you live legitimates this authority; true because your cultural habitus makes it difficult for you to perceive, conceive and integrate those aspects of your experience that contradict the story; true because in acting out your story, which now includes the mark and its meaning, the social truth that created it is confirmed; true because if your mark is high you are consistently rewarded, so that your voice becomes a voice of authority in the power-knowledge discourses that reproduce the structure that helped to produce you; true because if your mark is low your voice becomes muted and confirms your lower position in the social hierarchy; true finally because that success or failure confirms that mark that implicitly predicted the now self evident consequences. And so the circle is complete.”
In other words students “internalize” what those “marks” (grades/test scores) mean, and since the vast majority of the students have not developed the mental skills to counteract what the “authorities” say, they accept as “natural and normal” that “story/description” of them. Although paradoxical in a sense, the “I’m an “A” student” is almost as harmful as “I’m an ‘F’ student” in hindering students becoming independent, critical and free thinkers. And having independent, critical and free thinkers is a threat to the current socio-economic structure of society.
By Duane E. Swacker
*Epistemology (from Greek ἐπιστήμη – epistēmē, meaning “knowledge, understanding”, and λόγος – logos, meaning “study of”) is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature and scope of knowledge[1][2] and is also referred to as “theory of knowledge”. It questions what knowledge is and how it can be acquired, and the extent to which any given subject or entity can be known. (from Wiki)
** Ontology is the philosophical study of the nature of being, becoming, existence, or reality, as well as the basic categories of being and their relations. Traditionally listed as a part of the major branch of philosophy known as metaphysics, ontology deals with questions concerning what entities exist or can be said to exist, and how such entities can be grouped, related within a hierarchy, and subdivided according to similarities and differences. (from Wiki)
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Reblogged this on Jade Southwick.
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If Deasy goes, can Patrena Shankling get her sub job back ? … I don’t know – she seemed like a good sub…
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A TEACHER’S PERSPECTIVE ON
HOW THE I-PADS ACTUALLY
WORKED IN PRACTICE:
Apart from the corruption involved—
conflicts of interests; going thru the
motions of a sham bidding process
when the winner had already been
chosen, etc.—one thing people forget
is that the $1.3 Billion Ipad purchase
was a majorly dumb-ass idea on
so many OTHER levels it’s hard to believe.
First of all, the bond money Deasy
blew on the Ipad debacle was
meant for the construction and
repair of existing BUILDINGS and
related infrastructure. Deasy and his
allies made the looney argument
that the portable hand computers constituted
PART of the building infrastructure…
WTF???!!!
After a stretch like that, even most
pliant gymnast would be on muscle
relaxants for weeks.
Another consideration is that, in practice,
Deasy was warned by teachers (like
the one BELOW) about all the problems
that would crop up in the actual
implementation.
Mind you, these are problems that
played out, and still would have played
out…
1) even if spending a billion-plus dollars of construction
bond money on I-pads was legally allowable (it ain’t)
and
2) even if the entire process was conducted
on the up-and-up, with no corruption
or conflict of interests (it wasn’t).
The whole I-pad purchase was, again,
a majorly dumbass undertaking from
the get-go, and this, again, was pointed
out by UTLA, parents, and community members.
Right now, that same bond money that
was blown in the Ipad fiasco..
… that same money would have gone
to repair… for example…
desperately-needed air-conditioning in the older
LAUSD school buildings. Instead, it went to
I-pads, and this has meant that children are now
sitting in classes that are the equivalent
of ovens… drenched with sweat, unable
to even concentrate… in this brutal
heat wave that we’re enduring this week.
and two weeks ago.
Thanks Dr. Deasy! (while Deasy sits in his
air-conditioned, luxury office on the 24th
floor of LAUSD Admin. building at
3rd and Beaudry downtown as this
plays out.)
Below is a link to an article on a blog
written by LAUSD teacher Martha
Infante—who teaches in South Central.
This is from her own individual blog.
In this blog post, she goes after OTHER aspects
of the Ipad debacle not covered in the
media — the fact that, apart from the
implementation of Pearson’s Common
Core testing, these I-pads were
completely useless.
Again, this is written from the
point-of-view of a the teacher on
the ground giving the actual skinny
on what actually went on with
how the Ipads performed:
Martha offers countless other criticisms:
—students getting robbed while
taking them home (as they have for
much less expensive items)
—With no policies and safeguards
in place, these devices would “disappear”
from schools and find themselves on the
black market. (they have);
—current and former administrators
refused to take responsibility for missing
computer devices”;
—students do not want to use
these devices with only Pearson
software installed on them;
—diversion of bond money that
should have gone for building repairs,
cleaning, resources, and overall
infrastructure, etc.;
—LAUSD greatly overpaid for them;
—each school’s wifi network could not
handle the usage by their entire student body.
Beyond that, there were practical uses
that were prevented by the Person/Common
Core programmed priority that went along
with, and were built in to these devices:
—No opportunity to Skype with schools
around the world,
—no ability to make “Prezis” ( (SaaS
use Ipads for class presentations
using presentation software and storytelling
tool for presenting ideas on a virtual canvas.)
— no general internet access to look stuff up.
—Once testing was over, these devices
were sent back to the district.
—teachers were totally left out of
the decision-making;
MARTHA INFANTE:
“No one asked us, the teachers, and every last prediction came true. When people started asking questions, they were silenced.”
(Regarding one of those being “silenced”, Martha hyperlinks to the times
article “LAUSD has enough yes-men; it needs Stuart Magruder,”
about a parent member of the Bond Oversight committee who voiced objections,
and was canned in Parliamentary maneuver by LAUSD Board Member
Tamar Galatzan… a corporate reformist whose campaign was
bankrolled by Eli Broad and Bill Gates, among others.
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/editorials/la-ed-magruder-20140617-story.html
Martha continues…
MARTHA INFANTE: “Now I start my school year with students sharing cell phones with each other to do research (contrary to popular belief, not all students from poverty have internet access). I research ways to write grants for a class set of kindles, because these are the most affordable and at least they can connect to the worldwide web.
“But worse, I suffer the insult of a Bostonian man telling me that he is more interested and invested in improving the lives of our students than I and thousands of others of educators are and have been.
“I am not content to let this ride out. My students don’t have a voice (yet) and I do. Stay tuned for more blogging this year, and thank you for reading.”
—————————————————-
Here’s the entirety of Martha’s blog article:
http://dontforgetsouthcentral.blogspot.com/2014/08/ipads-are-good-for-students-arent-they.html
Don’t Forget South Central: iPads Are Good For Students, Aren’t They?
————————————————–
————————————————–
“Don’t Forget South Central: iPads Are Good For Students. Aren’t they?
“If you believe technology can replace teachers, then yes. I do not believe it. Let me back up. Hi! My name is Martha Infante and I have been in education for 24 yea…
“As a career classroom teacher, it has been a surreal experience to live trough the transformation of my profession.
“If you believe technology can replace teachers, then yes. I do not believe it.
“Let me back up.
“Hi! My name is Martha Infante and I have been in education for 24 years. I love teaching. I would also love a class set of computers for my students to do research and projects, but our schools have been decimated in recent years with budget cuts and we are only now recovering. In fact, this is what got me started in blogging.
“Why is the iPad issue so controversial? It might be because our Superintendent John Deasy, who sees himself as a champion of civil rights, believes iPads will equalize educational opportunities for students from poverty. Not more teachers, counselors, clean buildings, resources, training…but iPads.
“The Los Angeles Unified School District, however, is paying $768 per device for its students, teachers and administrators, making it one of the nation’s most expensive technology programs.
“After we overpaid for these devices with bond money, they made their appearance in my school for one purpose only: to test children. No opportunity to Skype with schools around the world, no ability to make Prezis, no general internet access to look stuff up. Once testing was over, these devices were sent back to the district.
“What did we give up when choosing these expensive devices? Well, the money that could have gone to infrastructure went to iPads. As a result, schools have ant, roach, and rodent issues, broken classrooms and buildings, and few devices to use for instructional purposes.
“I have a real problem with not involving teachers in the conversation. My main concern was that students would get robbed (and possibly injured) while taking their iPads home. This happens regularly in the neighborhood where I teach, for much less valuable items.
“With no policies and safeguards in place, these devices would “disappear” from schools and find themselves on the black market.
“At Dymally Senior High, “current and former administrators refused to take responsibility for missing computer devices,” the report said.-LA Times
“Students will not want to use these devices with only Pearson software installed on them.
“Was each school’s wifi network enough to handle the usage by their entire student body?
“No one asked us, the teachers, and every last prediction came true. When people started asking questions, they were silenced.
“LAUSD has enough yes-men; it needs Stuart Magruder
“Now I start my school year with students sharing cell phones with each other to do research (contrary to popular belief, not all students from poverty have internet access). I research ways to write grants for a class set of kindles, because these are the most affordable and at least they can connect to the worldwide web.
“But worse, I suffer the insult of a Bostonian man telling me that he is more interested and invested in improving the lives of our students than I and thousands of others of educators are and have been.
“I am not content to let this ride out. My students don’t have a voice (yet) and I do. Stay tuned for more blogging this year, and thank you for reading.”
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There are about 1000 teachers wondering this about their own lost jobs, but it would be unlikely given lausd propensity to deny wrongdoing to the end,
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I have 0 confidence nowadays in the fidelity of these tests to anything meaningful. It places a sticker on education…what that sticker says depends on who’s writing the test.
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M,
See my above comment to rbmtk. Download and read Wilson to understand the COMPLETE INVALIDITY of the standardized testing process.
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Here’s another interesting paragraph in the newspaper article:
“Moreover, the improvement belies the presumption that many of the best students have left the nation’s second-largest school system for independently run charter schools. If that is the case, the district may be doing better overall with the students left behind, according to these figures. This progress also occurred during a period of budget cuts caused by the economic recession.”
Also Glad to see an acknowledgement in this posting that alternative schools are part of this district – for youngsters with whom traditional schools have not succeeded, or for students who have not succeeded in traditional schools.
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I didn’t see this one coming, although I probably should have:
“Duval school district officials recommend that the School Board reject plans for two proposed charter schools seeking to open in Jacksonville in the 2015-16 school year.
One school, the Early Career Academy-Jacksonville, proposed to open in the campus of ITT Technical Institute, a private, for-profit technical college primarily training adults for computer-based careers.”
Rip off for-profit college expanding into the charter sector. They were turned down in Jacksonville but rubber-stamped in another city. I bet this spreads rapidly to OH, MI and PA.
The CFPB seems to be the only federal regulatory entity even attempting to reach for-profit colleges. The for-profits are hugely politically connected on both sides of the aisle, so although Congress has issued blistering reports on for-profit college scams for a decade, no one in DC (outside the CFPB) has done anything to regulate them, nor will they, ever:
“Last month’s CFPB complaint makes similar accusations about ITT Tech. It claims that ITT recruiters encouraged students to take out expensive loans, misrepresented the salaries students might receive upon graduation, and misled them about accreditation and credit transfers. The complaint also alleges that ITT recruiters used aggressive tactics to enroll students and have them take out loans — private ones through a third party, that students “did not want, did not understand, or did not even realize they were getting.”
Why would Florida allow them to rip off high school students? Isn’t it bad enough they’re ripping off high school graduates?
http://www.theverge.com/policy/2014/3/18/5508934/ITT-tech-CFPB-complaint
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This is why no one in DC (outside the CFPB) has or will regulate for profit colleges:
“Anita Dunn, a close friend of President Obama and his former White House communications director, worked with Kaplan University, one of the embattled school networks. Jamie Rubin, a major fund-raising bundler for the president’s re-election campaign, met with administration officials about ATI, a college network based in Dallas, in which Mr. Rubin’s private-equity firm has a stake.
A who’s who of Democratic lobbyists — including Richard A. Gephardt, the former House majority leader; John Breaux, the former Louisiana senator; and Tony Podesta, whose brother, John, ran Mr. Obama’s transition team — were hired to buttonhole officials.
And politically well-connected investors, including Donald E. Graham, chief executive of the Washington Post Company, which owns Kaplan, and John Sperling, founder of the University of Phoenix and a longtime friend of the House minority leader, Nancy Pelosi, made impassioned appeals.
In all, industry advocates met more than two dozen times with White House and Education Department officials, including senior officials like Education Secretary Arne Duncan, records show, even as Mr. Obama has vowed to reduce the “outsize” influence of lobbyists and special interests in Washington.”
Do we really want them running charter high schools so they can now rip off high school students, in addition to the veterans and low income high school graduates they’re currently stealing from?
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