New York, beware. Governor Cuomo and State Board of Regents Merryl Tisch are both very dissatisfied, having learned that only 1% of the state’s teachers were rated ineffective. They assume that if a child gets low scores on the state tests, the teacher must be an ineffective teacher. With the new Common Core tests, the state “proficiency” rate plummeted to only 30%, so the state must be full of “bad” teachers. It doesn’t seem to have occurred to him that the “cut score” or “passing score” on the tests was set absurdly high. Nor do they know that the use of VAM (value-added modeling) has been criticized by the American Statistical Association, the American Education Research Association, and the National Academy of Education.
Now the New York Daily News, owned by billionaire Mortimer Zuckerman (who also owns US News and World Report), has written an editorial calling on legislators to “Listen to Mrs. Tisch.” That is, be prepared to fire up to 10% of teachers every year. No questions asked about where new teachers will come from; no questions about why these new teachers will be better qualified than those who were fired using a dubious method; no questions about the VAM methodology, which is now being challenged in court in New York as arbitrary; no awareness of the extensive research and experience showing that the methodology is unstable and inaccurate. Just fire teachers, do it again and again, and the scores will go up. This is faith-based ideology, not an expression of thoughtfulness not a display of knowledge about teacher evaluation.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Reblogged this on DCGEducator: Doing The Right Thing and commented:
And we aren’t surprised.
And we aren’t surprised at this at all. They had to beat the NY Post to the punch. We are clearly looking at a politically motivated power play supported by funding by Madam Tisch and her top 1% friends. This has nothing to do with better teaching or improved education. What if we fired 10% of the NY News’s editors because obviously 10% of them must be writing below a standard.
The idea is to keep firing 10% of the teachers until all teachers are above average.
When all are deemed “above average” that becomes the average, so no one is exemplary at all. Round and round we go until we destroy the profession once and for all.
Will Karen Magee or Michael Mulgrew write the scathing rebuttal?
Where is Randi in all of this?
Collecting a six figure salary and sipping on a cocktail. I thought you knew.
And sadly, the tests being used to measure student growth and teacher effectiveness are ALL invalid and and corrupt. What a set up. #2015YearoftheStudent
How on earth will this attract better teachers? When anyone who is remotely educated in the subject can see just how subjective and imprecise standardized tests are, and realizes that years of education can be bought and wasted if you work in the wrong school, on top of an already grueling workload, WHY would we get better teachers?
The projections from Hanushek et. al. seem incredibly optimistic based on policies that have never been tried before successfully.
An even more interesting question, is, what is the state’s plan to help these “failing teachers”, many/most who have student loans, from becoming a massive drag on the state’s economy. What does a recently fired unemployed teacher do for a reasonable living? Most are far too old and saddled with family/financial obligations to be retrained at a 4 year college.
I chose this profession based partially on the belief that I could do the work, help children, and build a family. This seems like a nuclear bomb that can blow up in any given year for me and my family. We’ll get cheaper, worse teachers, and cheaper government, and a lot more citizens on food stamps, state health insurance, bankruptcy, and unqualified for other professional work to make up the difference.
They don’t want to attract better teachers. They want to shut public education down so they and their well connected friends can make profits off America’s children. They are using VAM, a baloney “house of cards,” against the teachers. As long a the courts rubber stamp the assault, it will continue. Testing has never improved performance. They would truly have to address the real issues such as funding disparities and poverty. They have no intention of any meaningful change. They are after any remnant job protections teachers have. Next, they will go after tenure laws so they can fire teachers at will.
EXACTLY!
Yes, this is not about rationality; this is simply the rich buying the government to promote their increase in riches. It is sick. It is one of the major downfalls of humans. It is a warning sign of where America is rapidly heading. And it is extremely difficult to fight.
My son is a very intelligent attorney who graduated from Harvard. That said, he still thinks that standardized test scores reflect the effectiveness of the school and the teacher. This seems like common sense to many people and of course the politicians go where they believe the votes are, regardless of the facts.
Teachers and their supporters need to find a way to educate the public. I know it’s difficult because I’m having a hard time convincing my own son, but it’s necessary that we find a way.
Then your son believes that if the highly effective teachers of Scarsdale were transferred to Rochester, that they would produce significantly better test scores.
If he really believes this than he is not nearly as intelligent as you think.
Mort Zuckerman and Ted Cruz also graduated from Harvard Law.
Go figure.
I wonder where Zuckerman sends his two children to school. According to Wikipedia he has homes in Manhatten and Aspen. I wonder if they are in public schools and exposed to high-stakes testing, or are they educated privately? If the latter, then how can Zuckerman possibly know if their teachers are effective? Or is the lack of union representation, due process, and a secure retirement the keys to attracting the best and brightest to our profession. That seems to be the logic of Zuckerman, Tisch, Cuomo, Duncan, Obama, et al.
My mantra – two more years, two more years, two more years…
Feel free to use it if it works for you. If not, my sympathies.
Have your son read chapter 1 of ‘What the Public Doesn’t Know About Public Schools’. Chapter 1 reveals the truth about school rankings based on test scores. You and I know that poverty is correlated to achievement. Others do not realize this. The tables in chapter 1 shows this correlation based on test data of Pittsburgh area schools. I wrote this because I have encountered many people who think as your son does. We do need to find a way to educate the public. This is my way. Good Luck!
Your son, like the rest of the general public, is assuming that the tests in question are reasonably challenging and accurate measures of student proficiency. Your son probably cannot conceive of system in which tests were actually designed to produce a 70% failure rate in an effort to support the false narrative that our public schools and teachers are failures. Your son is also assuming that an 8th grade math teacher starts the year with the majority of students having mastered K to 7 math skills.
Ask your son if all attorneys should be ranked based on the approval ratings of lawmakers. Or maybe sunspots are a better metric. I’ve met many ivy league grads who lack common sense and insight. These schools are far too insular and more of a crony club.
Ask your son if he thinks his rating should be based on the success rate of lawyers in a different firm who defend clients he never met.
So tell your son when all are rated highly effective that will become the average and so no one will be. It would make sense that someone who did well on standardized tests believes this but that does not make him wise at all.
This is a frustrating reality I have come across as well. I guess most people first assume the test is a valid instrument.
That’s a great point. I think that the reason for this belief is that there is SOME connection to a teacher’s effectiveness and test scores (e.g., think of a teacher who is not too bright who often plays videos with little learning value and makes everything easy and doesn’t really know how to assess and who has pet projects regardless of whether they teach standards in the curriculum – a type of teacher that used to exist in my district – vs a teacher who has a lot more on the ball). The problem is that the connection is thin and complicated.
An additional note to what I just wrote: Please think of a good analogy for your son, related to the practice of law.
I see this quite often as well. Most parents like standardized tests-they like seeing that score and knowing where their child stands in comparison to other kids. That should transfer over into teacher effectiveness and if you are against this process, then you want to avoid accountability for some reason. The fact that I teach Kindergarten and my students’ scores on a bubble-in multiple choice test will be 30% of my evaluation this year should just be utterly ridiculous to anyone who really thinks about it. But if you are outside the industry, you rarely think about that.
When we first began a merit pay system our local paper ran a search engine where it stated “look up your child’s teacher see whether they are one of the good ones or not”. I know of many people who bought into that and used that information to decide where to put their child the following year. When in reality, it really only shows you who is good at teaching to test.
It’s easy to understand how someone who got into Harvard based on high test scores might view tests as a valid measure of teaching and schools. They see performance on tests as a gauge of their own success.
So, it’s also easy to understand how many of our leaders (who went to Harvard and other elite schools) might share that view.
When test performance is a part of one’s identity, it’s hard to change one’s view about it.
You make a valid point SomeDAM Poet.
Yet I wonder why such intelligent individuals can’t place themselves into other people’s shoes. Surely they must realize they represent the elite and not everyone has the advantages they experience. There should be a requirement for them to volunteer at a soup kitchen or with refugees or mentor inner city minority students to get an idea about the reality of life for those not as fortunate.
Until you’ve experienced it, you just don’t understand the true disparity between the haves and have nots.
Ellen T Klock
And, of course, the cut scores were set BEFORE any child put pencil to bubble — further proof that teachers — and kids — don’t stand a real chance…. If my daughter’s teacher were to preset a 70% failure rate on a teacher-created test, and 70% of my child’s class did indeed fail that teacher-created test (be it the weekly spelling test, math test, science test, etc.), the parents would be up in arms, and rightly so. BUT, given the fact that the teacher had designed the test, and had immediate access to the students’ answers, the teacher would immediately have to, and be able to, review and recalibrate his/her lessons and/or teaching. And, of course, the parents would have immediate recourse. NONE of that is possible with the standardized tests currently administered across NYS.
As if this will discourage teachers from teaching only to the test…NOT!
NY if you want your children to learn more than how to take a test then stand up for your rights, right now! As we here in the midwest know, as NY leads, we follow and this is not a path I want to take. So please stand up for your children and their right to a well balanced education NOW!
thank you….the midwest
Actually I think that it is hate-based ideology.
I really think that there is a large portion of the public that enjoys hating teachers. I really do. I think that it feeds some sort of warped, smug, ugly part of many Americans right now.
Maybe they got fired and they blame teachers, wrongly, for having jobs when they don’t. Maybe they have never gotten over weird authority issues and teachers are a scapegoat for that. Maybe for some that one bad teacher, is their excuse to hate a whole cadre ( personally, I had one bad teacher, and I was “at-risk” but I have enough critical thinking skills, understanding of fairness, and a sense of personal responsibility that I don’t pin my shortcomings on the at 7th grade experience…)
You see it on the web, in the news, and on some of the comments here from the trollers. I am just seeing such a rampant amount of teacher bashing from people who I used to respect. I think that these people love trashing teachers who work harder than they do for our kids. It is sick and very sad.
Case in point. I just had an internet exchange with a “friend”. I say this with quotations, because given her comments about education, I think that I have understood her in a whole new way, and I don’t feel like we can connect anymore.
It started off with me correcting her about her sympathetic views to the Broad Superintendent in our school district, and her love of a local columnist in the paper, who continually bashes teachers, and defends the bid-rigging, teacher bashing rhetoric of this sup, and questions the concern of the teachers who push back. When I alerted her to her misconceptions and her belief that it is the “complaining teachers” that “can’t get kids to read” that are the problem, there was just a complete lack of reality.
At the time, I was literally staring at a desk of over 100 essays that I was correcting for the second time after the rewrite. I sent her a picture of my desk with a note, stating that, unless she or this sup were starting at the same pile of work that I was staring at, or in the classroom actively teaching 6 periods a day, then they truly were not in the trenches, and in the position to point fingers. I stated that most of my kids speak Spanish at home, come from poverty, come from homes with parents who have often not even finished high school, and expecting my kids to read as perfectly as a native speaking child, from a well funded home, with educated parents who are highly involved with his education, is a pipe dream. Unless we provide the small class sizes, the universal pre-k, the wrap around services, there is just no way that every one of these kids is going to measure up to “John Middle Class White Doe”.
I guess that I am just hitting a wall. Sorry for the rant. But my final point is; this woman, is actually a liberal. She is anti guns, she is ant-ALEC ( she even gave a speech about ALEC at our local Democrat meeting). And yet she is completely ignorant about education. How else to understand this, but to think that, in some ways, teachers are scapegoats for many Americans?
It is definitely hate based. The general public is envious of our pensions and our unions. It is human nature that misery loves company. When we lose our pensions and due process the citizenry that toils, if they have jobs, in industries which have eliminated pensions and sent jobs overseas will be happy to welcome us to their club.
I agree. The anti-teacher movement has roots in anti-intellectualism. When people do not understand, they fill in the gaps with mysticism and belief. For evangelicals, it is a rejection of thought and reason. Science is bad and seen as godless evil. For tea party radicals, the indictment of government as a problem rather than a solution means extending this view to teachers and even democracy, itself. For business, the goal is not great teachers, but cheap teachers. Education is not an investment, but a line item cost. For neo-liberals, it is an elitist view that teachers are inferior and the root cause of social problems.
There is also the fact that almost everybody has spent 12 – 13 years in a classroom setting. That experience falsely gives them the sense that they know all about teaching and education.
I’ve been told that, directly to my face by an upset parent. I asked him if he felt students are the consumers of education. He agreed. I then asked him if, as a consumer of his iPhone, he knows how to build one, how it works, how the programming functions, why the rare earths that are used in its manufacture are essential to its function…
I then drove home the point that the consumers (and their parents) certainly have a place at the table, but their experience is vastly different than that of the producer/manufacturer/seller. Two different experiences of the same events.
Silence. Then he said he saw my point, and apologized for his prior vehemence.
This dynamic is key, I believe, to understanding why so many people feel they know all about education. We collectively have shared in a similar experience, and we rely on those experiences to inform our thoughts and opinions.
And sometimes rely on them too much.
Be rest assured the 10% of fired teachers will be on the higher end of the pay scale initially and later it will be the “newbies”. All in the service of eliminating career teachers and pension obligations.
I am sure this is the motive. How many white collar people around age 50 were furloughed during the Great Recession? The main reason was so they could off load any pension responsibilities to them. These same grey haired folks were the same ones still looking for work two years later.
All most none were furloughed, reason being they were fired. Look at unemployment figures during the Great Recession. Teachers were furloughed, others were fired. Some were fired at age 30, 40, 50 and 60. At will employment means just that.
I believe that teachers are seen as replacable resources. Once they are deemed too expensive to keep or they begin to question the status quo, they can be replaced by a cheaper model. The idea behind these reforms are not the quality of education for the student, it is the propagation of money and power outside the field.
Dana Goldstein, author of “The Teacher Wars,” argues that the United States has entered a full-blown moral panic over the caricature of “the vampiric ineffective tenured teacher who sucks tax dollars into her bloated pension and health care plans, without much regard for the children under her care.”
This moral panic–the last real ones were over “welfare queens” stealing food stamps and before that actual or suspected members of the Communist Party–requires policy makers and the media to focus on a single group of people (teachers) as emblems of a large, complex social problem (socioeconomic inequality and educational achievement gaps). The media repeats, ad nauseam, anecdotes about the most despicable examples of this type of person so that the focus on the “worst of the worst” comes finally to misrepresent the true scale and character of what may be a genuine problem.
Teachers of America, awake. You are at the epicenter of a moral panic. Moral panics are very hard to stop once they have been activated by the folks whose interests they serve.
Unless you and your representatives, the very unions who are selling you out to education reformistas in New York State and across the country, find a way to stop, or even slow down, the rising crest of this moral panic you will find yourselves the cause for the breakdown in the fiber of American society, even as the students and the parents of your students continue to bring you some version of a “red apple” because they love what you do every day.
If we cannot make effective linkages with our students and parents we will be washed away by the moral panic that serves many purposes but certainly not the purpose of good education in our schools by trained professionals who change the lives of their students every day.
Teachers across America need to realize that when New York teachers “catch a cold, all the nation’s teachers will be sneezing.”
MIndful of the fact that this blog attracts new viewers, I am going to repeat something that bears repeating over and over again:
You can’t fire your way to excellence.
I forget where I first saw that sage bit of wisdom but it flows directly from what W. Edwards Deming called “management by fear.”
It is an essential part of the burn-and-churn of “creative disruption” of the self-styled “education reform” movement, directly supported and fed by high-stakes standardized tests and its conjoined twins, VAM and CCSS.
Note: only to be applied to the vast majority aka OTHER PEOPLE’S CHILDREN. For THEIR OWN CHILDREN—Sidwell Friends and Delbarton School and Lakeside School and the like.
And exactly why I call the strutting arrogant self-selected heavy hitters of “education reform” and their pompous “thought leaders”—
Edubullies.
Trust me, I am being too kind.
😎
Of course it does. Where oh where can anyone find truth in media these days?
The sad part is that when they increase the firing of teachers exponentially and there are shortages, they will already have strategized how to fix that (they are doing this right now via internet learning). Don’t forget Gates once said that a good teacher could teach large numbers of students. So is it far afield that this could be the scenario in the not so distant future??? Picture an enormous smart board in an enormous lecture hall filled with 500 first graders (all the first grade students in one town congregated together) and unskilled employees paid to walk the aisles to make sure they stay on task. One teacher can teach all the first grade classes in the nation under this system (and at the same time of day in each of the time zones). The only actual professional employees that need be present in the school might be a school nurse, a custodian, a principal and a technology person to correct computer issues. The publishing and technology industries will continue to profit enormously – the only losers will be higher education schools as there will be so little demand for teachers. Oh wait, but higher ed education departments will already have been decimated by the “new grading” policy attached to funding that Obama and Duncan want to pass. Perhaps they will create Broad University to teach those far and few getting education degrees. What a horrific scenario.. but is it so far removed from future reality?
Why anyone listens to Gates is beyond me. Oops…$$$$$ talks.
In the classroom we are encouraged to use evidence-based methods and strategies, tailored to individual student needs i.e. differentiation. Therefore, doesn’t it seem to follow that teacher evaluations should be evidence based methods, tailored to individual teachers and their expertise.
Okay, so what I say is we need a war room, virtual or otherwise with a map of the US and detailing out the struggle against VAM, charters, and high stakes testing.
The beatings will continue until morale improves.
As a New York State teacher in my 11th year, I can only say one simple thing: it’s over. My career will fade out in the next few years. NYSUT can’t combat this, or won’t….or won’t be able to do it. I’ve yelled and screamed at Local and NYSUT people. I’ve written letters. Made calls. Voted for Teachout. Etc The narratives are all essentially lost. (Yes, lost.) The question for teachers here in NY is, sadly, no longer what if and how to combat it, it is what’s next. What can we do for the next thing. Being a teacher in NY with a sustainable income is not going to last. I refuse to go out by continuing to teach and get paid less and less, and getting my pension decimated, only to be inevitably 3020a’d for being ineffective. No. So maybe we need to start a forum or blog or site about job searches and second careers for former teachers. That may be the most productive thing to do here in NY. Very somber I know, but I’m sorry, nobody can point to anything that is hopeful here. NYSUT is not up to this. Parents won’t be the saviors. Sad times and ultimately very scary times here in NY.
If anyone has anything that is concrete hopeful (that’s not vague, blurry, motivational poster-like) , I’d love to hear it.
Teachers in NY really need to think about what’s next career-wise because we are watching this one die. Right now.
I’m in agreement. Teachers should not have to battle the challenges of the classroom, the impositions of administrations, and feel totally destabilized daily. For there being so few “ineffective” teachers that need to be removed to make the remainder shine, they focus awfully little on what those who believe they are effective experience.
This teacher from Great Neck who filed the lawsuit is prime example number 1 – VAM is arbitrary – and how does imposing it lead to “great” teachers? Nevermind that it may drive great teachers away who are currently teaching because it is a vicious yearly gamble.
What can I do after teaching?
There are many things you can do. You can all real estate, become a lawyer, open a business, really there are any number of things you can do.
I am not being facetious. I have completely changed careers twice in my adult life, and I can understand the sense of hopelessness one feels when the job/career you’ve been doing for so long is gone.
After the grief fades you can find a new path. I know, I’ve done it. It is hard, it is excruciating, it makes you feel so dumb.
But you can do it. I did it 12 years ago when I became a teacher, after careers in geological consulting and health and safety. And if my current career ends, I’ll do it again. And again if I have to.
I don’t know if I have a motivational message for you, or not, but I think you should keep your chin up and concentrate on what you do best: TEACH. I remember hitting a wall as a NYS teacher about 40 years ago when we were being bullied and battered. A poor economy had made teachers’ a target; strikes were rampant. My district went on strike and with the Taylor Law( 2 for 1 penalty), I didn’t get paid until March. We used to picket before and after school at a neighboring district. They were crazy times of unrest, but they made me appreciate the career, the students and my colleagues more. I am not saying things are any better today, What I am saying is try to focus on what is important: your spirit, your health, your family and your career. If the tide doesn’t turn, it can’t hurt to browse some brochures for nursing school!
Difference is that there were strikes and a UFT that did fight for teachers. Today the UFT and other teacher unions are doing the bidding of the plutocrats/politicians. In other words teachers our powerless to fight effectively. Changing careers seems like a better option especially if there is another breadwinner in the family. Only a shortage of teachers/recruits made possible by an improving economy will result in an improved working conditions for teachers.
I take nursing classes. A nurse is a helping profession and they teach people to help them stay healthy. Plus, at least for now, nurses are a respected profession.
I love teaching and always think the world of my students and want the best for them, but I’m not going to let someone else decide if I’m employed or not. That said, I hope I can retire as a teacher.
I also notice that reformers are not saying that “education is the civil rights movement of our time”. A quick internet search gave me these two posts that shed light on this change.
http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2014/12/what-is-civil-rights-issue-of-our-time.html
http://educationpost.org/education-civil-rights-issue-time-reformers-cant-ignore-police-killings/#.VKnlfEsjjWe
The editorial in the NY Daily News did not mention “civil rights”. The focus was on scores. The narrative is that scores reveal effectiveness and competence. It would be great if the “numbers” of charters and public schools could be compared. Student free lunch, income, single parent household, homelessness, ELL, Special Education, suspension rates, attrition, acceptance of students in the middle of the school year and in the later grades, teacher-student ratio, nurses, art teachers, librarians, money -how much and how it is spent, of course test scores. There must be more “numbers” to compare. If the NY Daily News wants to focus on numbers, I know that public schools can win on the numbers.
With the way Education policy has been trending for the last two decades teachers have been reduced proverbial hamsters on the wheel. Staying the course will solve nothing until the criminals are rounded up and stopped. If someone wants to change careers I don’t think it’s fair to discourage that individual from doing so especially with what we have been seeing from our so called elected leaders for a while now.
The Real One – some teachers are too vested in their career to change at this point. They’re just hanging in waiting to get enough years to retire. Mid career teachers have a difficult choice to make. Do they wait out this trend or switch to another, less stressful profession? Another option is to teach at a Charter or Private School which isn’t answerable to the government (yet pays less). Those beginning teachers have nothing to lose. Many of them have already decided teaching isn’t for them.
If Cuomo wants to get rid of veteran teachers, he should offer an incentive. They’ll retire in droves.
The problem is replacing all these individuals who are leaving the profession. Perhaps I can home school my grand kids.
This is exactly what I did. Good luck to you and I hope you find a profession that respects and values both your talent and your work.
Cuomo is arrogant and corrupt. Bad combination. Our “ill-legal” system is well at work. This Is calked: $$$$$ & Politics.
Mort should ask for the Gov. And Tish to be recalled if they cannot solve the NY poverty problem by Dec. 31, 2015. 100% of ALL NY’s should earn at least enough to be considered upper middle class by that time. You always fire the coach and assistants when the team performs below expectations. No one has ever fired the players or decided to change sports! These faux intellectuals always love sport analygies or simple solutions which require little real research and thought to properly interpret the findings. Are the billionaires now the Experts in Educational Theory and Practice because they own the media and control the message? If so, we are headed in a direction that may lead to a place they may end up regretting, but they can always blame the public schools. The middle class bailed them out when they were reckless and almost destroyed the world economy and now they are already buying politicians to change the few new laws that were put in place to try to prevent this from happening again. Why are we letting this happen again? More IMPORTANTLY, WHY IS MORT NOT PUBLICLY COMMENTING IN THE PAPER OR HIS MAGAZINE ABOUT THIS ISSUE. WE SHOULD NOT LET THIS HAPPEN AGAIN. STOP BUYING HIS Publications. Stop doing business with those who support his Publications, otherwise you are supporting a repeat of 2007!
Mort is looking at the world through corporate colored glasses. IThe condition is a type of myopia that allows business people to think they are experts in education when they really are “edubullies.”
Thanks for this, Ms. Ravitch. We are facing difficult times, with the assault on public education and on teachers (and more generally on public institutions and public sector workers) being carried out not only by Republicans, but also by Democrats, at the city, state and federal levels. Here in NY City, we got a bit of reprieve from the election of De Blasio, who is a great improvement on his predecessor, but we are stuck, in Albany, with arrogant Andrew (very different in mindset from his father, Mario, who just passed) and those who are his backers, and with heiresses like Ms. Tisch and her ilk at the helm of the State Regents.
Then we have the media, again cutting across party lines, which have played an essential role in the brainwashing of the public. Sadly, the leadership of our teachers’ unions have been characteristically lacking in backbone in this battle, typically yielding, buying into and supporting the narrative and playing, at best, a very weak defense, instead of having taken the initiative, long ago, to illuminate and so begin to set right what had long truly gone wrong in much of the K-12 education field, the problems being mainly socio-economic in origin, aggravated, in districts beset by these problems, of traditional, common sense educational concerns in favor of other things that were distractions at best.
Without playing offense, this war cannot be won. I hope it is not too late.
“by the neglect of traditional, common sense educational concerns”
“VAM VAM again”
If at first you don’t succeed,
VAM VAM again
If at first you fail to weed
VAM VAM again
If at first the teachers win
VAM VAM again
Give the wheel another spin
VAM VAM again
From the editorial:
” . . . that has protected from termination thousands of teachers, from those who engage in intimate conduct with students to those who can’t write a lesson plan to save their lives.”
Gotta get rid of all those goddamned pedophiles “who engage in intimate conduct with students” that are being protected by union thugs. Right-there’s just thousands and thousands of those types of teachers, of course not that VAM would be able to identify them but obviously they’re out there.
What a piece of shit jab at all the excellent humans who make up the teacher’s ranks.
For whomever wrote the editorial–GFY & ESAD.
I like your attitude. We need more teachers like yourself. However, we are flooded with types that think that wearing a pin or making a phone call will get us anywhere. Teachers are being bullied left and right and we continue to resort to these mickey mouse tactics. I’m not advocating violence as someone in another thread insinuated. However, it is time to get a little more bold with the criminals. Enough is enough!
This must be the new emphasis Mario Cuomo has mentioned towards the New York State Retirement System. If ten percent of the teachers are culled each year, there will be no one left to collect a pension.
And good luck finding “victims” to serve in the inner city schools, unless they are sadists into that torture stuff.
I’ve looked into my crystal ball and see massive teacher retirements coming in the next few years followed by a massive exodus of students applying for teaching certificates. That’s if there are any graduates from NYS high schools who qualify for college (now that only 30% will pass and the GED is set up for additional failure).
Soup kitchens anyone!
Ellen T Klock
There will be no more teachers to collect it but there will be a banker or investor there to steal it from its deserving owner.
Reblogged this on Dolphin.
Mortimer Zuckerman represents just one more case of the wealthy trying to rule by fiat: “If I will it so, it will be done.” It never occurs to them that for all their schemes, schools are almost always a mirror of their communities’ socio-economics – the single greatest factor in test scores.
At least Bill Gates recently admitted to similar hubris after sinking a billion into third world medical care – with little result. Though this is clearly a noble cause, four times Gates admitted to his “naivete” about the roots of poor health – lack of food, water and infrastructure. Duh.
Now let’s see if he comes to any realizations about the real problems underlying American Education, namely socio-economic – and the irrelevance of his approach that leads to test and torture. My calendar says tomorrow is Epiphany.
“Knaivete’ ”
A wealthy knaive
With knaivete’
Naught but slave
To Gatesly way