Governor Andrew Cuomo said in his State of the State message today that he wants teacher evaluations to be based 50% test scores, 50% observation. Any teacher “ineffective” in raising test scores will be found no better than “developing” regardless of observation scores. Any teacher rated ineffective two years in a row may be fired.
“According to a book outlining Cuomo’s policy and budget speech on Wednesday, the governor will propose a “simplified and standardized” evaluation system that rates teachers 50 percent on state test scores (or a comparable measure of student growth for teachers in subjects that are not tested) and 50 percent on observations.
“Rather than being locally negotiated, the “scoring bands” for both components would be set at the state level under the proposal, and if a teacher is rated “ineffective” on either portion, he or she may not get a score higher than “developing” overall. (The ratings are assigned on a scale of “ineffective,” “developing,” “effective” and “highly effective.” Two consecutive “ineffective” ratings could be grounds for termination.)
“Cuomo’s plan calls for at least two observations, one of which would be conducted by an “independent observer,” which could be a principal or administrator from within or outside the school district, a SUNY or CUNY professor or “trained independent evaluator” from a list to be provided by the State Education Department.”
Cuomo’s staff evidently did not read the American Statistical Association statement on value-added models. It says:
As I wrote in an earlier post,
“Most VAM studies find that teachers account for about 1% to 14% of the variability in test scores, and that the majority of opportunities for quality improvement are found in the system-level conditions. Ranking teachers by their VAM scores can have unintended consequences that reduce quality.” The ASA points out: “This is not saying that teachers have little effect on students, but that variation among teachers accounts for a small part of the variation in scores. The majority of the variation in test scores is attributable to factors outside of the teacher’s control such as student and family background, poverty, curriculum, and unmeasured influences.”
“As many education researchers have explained–including a joint statement by the American Educational Research Association and the National Academy of Education– the VAM ratings of those who teach children with disabilities and English language learners will be low, because these children have greater learning challenges than their peers, as will the ratings of those who teach gifted students, because the latter group has already reached a ceiling. Those two groups, like the ASA agreed that test scores are affected by many factors besides the teacher, not only the family, but the school’s leadership, its resources, class size, curriculum, as well as the student’s motivation, attendance, and health. Yet the Obama administration and most of our states are holding teachers alone accountable for student test scores.
“The ASA warns that the current heavy reliance on VAMs for high-stakes testing and their simplistic interpretation may have negative effects on the quality of education. There will surely be unintended consequences, such as a diminishment in the number of people willing to become teachers in an environment where “quality” is so crudely measured. There will assuredly be more teaching to the test.. With the Obama administration’s demand for VAM, “more classroom time might be spent on test preparation and on specific content from the test at the exclusion of content that may lead to better long-term learning gains or motivation for students. Certain schools may be hard to staff if there is a perception that it is harder for teachers to achieve good VAM scores when working in them. Over-reliance on VAM scores may foster a competitive environment, discouraging collaboration and efforts to improve the educational system as a whole.”
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Why does he hate teachers so much? His own mother was one! These ideas, if implemented, MUST be challenged in court. Before that, though, teachers, parents, students and supervisors must unite and also contact elected officials to combat such lunacy. By the way, who will replace all the fired, incompetent teachers? It is definitely time for ths ACLU to get involved NOW.
Shelley,,
It is time for teachers and principals to stand up and make noise.
From one of your blog posts Monday . . .
“Courage is an inner resolution to go forward despite obstacles;
Cowardice is submissive surrender to circumstances.
Courage breeds creativity; Cowardice represses fear and is mastered by it.
Cowardice asks the question, is it safe?
Expediency ask the question, is it politic?
Vanity asks the question, is it popular?
But conscience ask the question, is it right? And there comes a time when we must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because it is right.”
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Diane, I agree.
I am hoping Randi will support us in making that noise. I think she enormous potential to help. But it is up to all of us.
What can we do Dianne?
Too many teachers are afraid to speak out. Something must be done about this.
On the Recent Education Week Quality Counts Report Card New York was ranked number 9. It appears that public education is strong and working in NY. What is the justification for changing the teacher evaluation system?
To accelerate the privatization of it, to bust unions and destroy collective bargaining rights, to reduce and take away pensions, and to get rid of veteran, experience, more expensive teachers.
What is there to understand in terms of “justification”?
Political agendas over what is best for New York public school students. It is most definitely time for teachers to find their voice.
If you believe that the EWQC report card has any validity whatsoever in its rankings I’ve got some great ocean front property over at Lake of the Ozarks in Central MO. Great prices, call now! Operators standing by!!
Duane–Your point taken. My point is historically New York has an excellent public school system. It is time to use history to fight back. The latest data I happened to see was the QCRC.
Refuse to give the tests. Enlist parents to opt out.
Bill AND Melinda Gates are parties to this assault on public education as well.
What will it take to wake up educators and start a resistance?
Free speech rights.
Maybe he doesn’t hate teachers; maybe he just loves, so much, campaign contributions and power.
There are no First Ammendment rights for teachers.
He really isn’t thinking about the students and clearly has other motives at play. We started out with 50% weight of test scores in our district and after one year of using that model it was reduced to 30% of our evaluation. There was a lawsuit filed by some teachers and they lowered the amount, although they stress that was not the cause. Oh, and I teach Kindergarten.
Cuomo’s proposal is perfectly balanced – equal parts ignorance and arrogance.
(Jamie Vollmer – “The Blueberry Story”)
http://www.jamievollmer.com/blueberries.html
He hates us because we are no longer a dependable source of political support.
He hates us because we didn’t support him in his re-election campaign.
He hates us because teachers are a convenient target these days, ie it’s fashionable and easy to attack teachers instead of attacking, say, poverty.
He hates us because we are intelligent people, and he resents dealing with people who are his intellectual betters.
He hates us because we don’t fight back en masse…we just put our heads down and focus on our kids because that’s what we love most if all – ignoring the winds of war whistling outside our classrooms. Like many bullies, his bloodlust gets raised by what he sees as weakness.
He hates us because he can do so without suffering any consequences, at the polls, financially. In fact, he hates us because it raises his political stature among those who support him financially.
He hates us because it makes him feel strong and powerful.
Feel free to add more…
Well said!
“Like many bullies, his bloodlust gets raised by what he sees as weakness.”
This^^about all “reformers”.
He hates us because he was bought.
People whom you never would have expected to have gotten bought:
George Parker – ex-Washington D.C. Teachers Union Pres. & one-time Michelle Rhee adversary— BOUGHT
Davis Guggenheim – progressive / liberal Oscar-winning film maker, son of a progressive / liberal Oscar-winning film makers – BOUGHT
Antonio Villaraigosa – progressive / liberal politicial, first Latino mayor of Los Angeles in 150 years – BOUGHT
… the list goes on.
The privatizers / charterizers / union busters just keep buying people, people who give up all their morals and principles out of unrelieved greed.
50% is what we have in Colorado. Notice the great difference it has made – NOT. Diane, you are right, though. It is time for teachers and principals to stand up, make noise, and fight!
” or a comparable measure of student growth for teachers in subjects that are not tested.”
The only “comparable measure ” out there is the dreaded SLO process and variants about which I have written on this blog, and elsewhere. This “comparable measure” is sort-of explained in 41 pages of absurd pseudo-scientific and oh-so-objective language at https://www.engageny.org/sites/default/files/resource/attachments/slo-guidance.pdf
SLOs are no less idiotic and damaging to teachers than VAM. There is no research to support any claim to validity or reliability for SLOs. That is not just my opinion. It comes from a recent federally funded review of literature.
The NY template for an SLO is almost a carbon copy of that sold to Denver in 1999 and marketed since then nationwide, aided by USDE grants to PR firms who know they have been hired to “sell” this method to reluctant administrators and teachers.
This SLO process is the equivalent of VAM for a majority of teachers, up to 67%, who teach subjects for which there are not statewide tests. SLOs and VAM end in stack ratings with cut-off scores for the final and highoy reductive HEDI ratings.
Standardizing cut off scores for SLOs has become routine at the district level, not to my knowledge at the state level. If you have an interest in learning about the absence of research to support the use of SLOs, or how this process has been marketed, and why it is so easily ignored amid the outrage about VAM, ask for a pdf of my not-yet published paper: The Marketing of Student Learning Objectives (SLOs): 1999-2014 request via chapmanLH@aol.com
Can we judge him by 50% for new jobs and lower incarceration rates.
He should install revolving doors on every school in preparation for the high degree of teacher turnover that will ensue. He should put extra revolving doors on Title I schools.
This short sighted thinking and failure to recognize the distribution curve that accompanies every measurable phenomenon qualifies him and his advisors for reality therapy.
I dunno, I think a revolving door could be pretty dangerous – it couldn’t handle the mass exodus and people might get crushed. Besides, who would want back in? Better to just tear out the front walls of all the schools and make way for the stampede.
He is a disgrace to his late father.
I think the biggest result of this madness is that no one will want to go into this battered profession. It is already happening. I used to get at least 4 student teachers/field experience teachers per year. I have not gotten a single one in the past 2 years. The last student teacher I got 2 years ago told me that the university was seriously thinking of discontinuing the education department all together. They were having trouble making a class. Unbelievable.
Everything, I think, is going the way the deformers’ want. I would never allow my 2 children to enter this toxic environment of teaching. You are not going to see young people take the chance on this sad profession. As the older teachers leave, there will be fewer and fewer replacements.
You stand to make as much if not more working in private sector and you will probably receive far more acknowledgment and respect, even with all the politics that come with any job And you wont’ be lied about in the media.
The more I read about Cuomo and the Democrats in New York, the more I feel lucky right now to be teaching in Pennsylvania where we just elected a Democratic Governor, Tom Wolf, who is making resources for schools, not teacher evaluation, his priority, and who has just appointed a former Philadelphia public school teacher and PFT member to be his education secretary,as well as a new Secretary of Labor who has been leading the campaign for a fair funding formula for the Pennsylvania schools.
What is wrong with Democrats like Cuomo who think and act like conservative Republicans? The same thing that is wrong with a President who says in his SOTU address that unions must be strengthened, and a few sentences later lauds a trade bill which will send even more American manufacturing jobs to Asia. Wall Street has captured most of the players in both major parties and owns the legislatures and courts, and IMHO teachers and their unions have to abandon the strategy of deal making and move their support to real progressive third party candidates, like Zephyr Teachout, who can be a wake-up call for the phony neoliberals who call themselves Democrats.
CAN he do this unilaterally with just Meryl Tisch’s help?
Does this require a legislative move on his part? What is the likelihood of it passing the legislature? And is there a part of this that’s intended to be a “grand bargain” where he’ll lower some of his outrageous demands so long as we give him enough rope to hang us with?
I think one of the questions is if he will be able to push this through in the budgetary process, as was done with the APPR changes a few years ago. Something of a workaround to getting this kind of stuff implemented…
He cannot act unilaterally. In his SOTS address he offered additional funding for education if the NY legislature agreed to adopt his proposals. Reverse extortion from a megalomaniac.
Yes, and that is the loophole the UFT/NYSUT will use to excuse their passivity/collaboration in the face of all this
This means WAR and I know Cuomo thinks he will win, but guess what, he will not win.
As a teacher in NY State, I appreciate that sentiment. But I think in order for us to really resist and fight this, if we in fact do resist and fight (it’s as yet an open question…NYSUT is not the A-squad), we need to do it from a place of honesty.
He may win.
In fact from the vantage of right now, he is likely to win.
That is the place we need to work from. A deeply realistic and honest place, free from phrases and platitudes. Part of the problem with the complacency that has helped us to get to this deeply dreadful place, has been the widespread use of phrases and lazy thinking like: “everything in education is a pendulum.” Nope. Not this time. Cuomo and the privatizers may have gotten the dagger most of the way into our collective chests while we were babbling to ourselves about the pendulum and seats at the table.
We may not win this.
Lets just start there.
The truth shall set you free . . . . .always.
I love it when people speak from the ground instead of the clouds. A lot of trouble could be avoided in the first place if it was more common.
Cuomo will win this. The Silver indictment is part of the package. Cuomo is taking a page from the Christie playbook.
When the federal investigators start looking under rocks in NY, there is no telling where it will end.
How sad that schools are required to implement anti-bullying programs, another unfunded mandate of course, and yet the biggest bullying problem they now face is actually our own Governor!
If you were in a room with Cuomo and a cobra you should keep your eye on Cuomo…
He is using public education as his stepping stone to bigger and better things. By supporting charters he garners a lot of corporate support which he needs to move on. One of my favorite comments in his speech was that he would stop charters from creaming off the best students and would conversely make them take special ed, Esl, and difficult students. He did not say they would have to graduate them. Charters do not have the services for challenged students so they have a good excuse to return them to public rolls.
Cami Anderson made the same claims with her One Newark Sham.
And our supposed strongest union leaders, Michael Mulgrew, Randi Weingarten, and the new NYSUT leadership will nary put up a fight. Even though they have the financial resources and their union-dues-paying-members manpower at their disposal.
Let’s see how THEY lead during this attack on the profession. So far, it’s been nothing but tweets.
Does anyone know if the 50% proposal applies only to Common Core aligned math and ELA subjects? Does it include HS regents teachers? What about teachers that do not teach state tested subjects? Does it require districts to dismiss teachers or just allow them to? School boards across the state will be disenfranchised as well. Can’t imagine that this will withstand the legal challenges sure to follow.
They will do what Florida did and assess you by reading scores or school wide scores. In Florida, teachers were even evaluated by scores of students whom they didn’t even teach and a judge ruled that it was legal. We are now living in the twilight zone people both literally and figuratively speaking.
FLERP just posted some details. Teachers in non-tested (state) subjects will now have 50% of APPR based on local SLO (growth) scores. Cuomo’s plan also reduces principal input from the current 60% down to only 15% of the overall score. He is alienating every single stakeholder with this madness. Teachers, students, parents, administrators, and local school boards should be outraged. Call your legislators and let your voices be heard if this plan is pushed through, Cuomo will single handedly wreck what not too long ago was considered on of the finest public education systems in the country. This has nothing to do with improving instruction or learning. Cuomo has not one shred of evidence that any of his ideas will work, because such evidence does not exist. This is political payback, pure and simple. His vindictive and spiteful nature may destroy 150 years of educational progress and excellence. Karen Magee called this “war” – and it is. Can’t wait to see where our general leads us.
NY,
Do you see any potential for mass firings?
Correction:
“non-tested” subjects are those that have NO state test attached. State test subjects include: math grades 3 to 10; ELA grades 3 to 8 and 11; science grades 4, 8, and 9 to 12, Regents only, Social Studies grades 9, 10, and 11. Regents only. All other teachers will use local tests and SLO growth targets. The difficulty of Common Core tests is a huge disadvantage to those teachers. Writing local tests can be a huge advantage and easily gamed. Heck of a job Andy.
NJT
It isn’t clear if districts will be required to dismiss ineffective teachers or if they will have a choice. if there are indeed mass firings, the joke will be on Cuomo and Tisch because there will be no mass hirings to follow. Cuomo hopes to get rid of 10% of what he views as ineffective teachers. Where will he find 50,000 replacements that are a significant improvement?
NY Teacher, there won’t be any more local “SLO” scores. It will be 50% on just one test.
Yes. And let’s not forget that Cuomo is famous for going back on his word, so anything can happen.
NY,
There is no requirement that the replacements be well trained. My district is replacing highly qualified teachers with TFA, teachers certified in other areas and subs. Scores in most renew schools are stagnant, or have declined.
It does include the Regents exams. The teachers who teach untested subjects will be evaluated on tests that they don’t teach to. For example, art teachers will be evaluated on English Regents scores.
Are you sure? What is your source because I have received contradictory information.
This is from Cuomo’s book which spells out all the details. Credit to FLERP.
113. Reform Teacher Ratings
Currently, we allocate 20 percent of the score to the state-test/student growth measure; 20 percent to a local measure that inflates scores and leads to unnecessary testing; and 60 percent to qualitative measures of effectiveness (including observations and artifacts) that are not standard across districts and are entirely manipulable. The Governor proposes that the teacher evaluation system be simplified and standardized. Instead of two student growth measures, we will have one. We will eliminate the local measure. Fifty percent of the score will be based on state tests, or, in the case of teachers in non-tested grades or subjects, a student growth measure that measures one year of academic growth.
The remaining 50 percent of the score will be allocated to observations and shall include at least two. At least one observation must be conducted by an independent observer to be selected from among the following options: 1) a principal or other trained administrator from within or outside the school district; or 2) a trained independent evaluator from a list of entities with a demonstrated record of effectiveness and expertise in this area, as developed by the SED commissioner; or 3) an appointed faculty member at a State University of New York or a City University of New York school of education. Thirty-five percent of the score must be allocated to this impartial observation; the remaining fifteen percent may be allocated to an observation by a school administrator.”
“On evaluations, Cuomo wants to see the current formula — 20 percent based on state testing, 20 percent on a local standard, and 60 percent based on qualitative measures such as classroom observation — swapped out for a system that gives equal measure to state testing (or, in certain cases, some other standard that measures work over an academic year) and 50 percent based on at least two observations performed by an administrator, an independent evaluator or an appointed faculty member at a SUNY or CUNY school of education.”
http://blog.timesunion.com/capitol/archives/227895/in-speech-cuomo-pitches-tough-education-reforms/
In my school, art, music, business & physical education teachers are already being evaluated on the English Regents scores.
What else can they be evaluated on if there is no local assessment?
His proposal eliminates the local score for state tested teachers (math, ELA, science, and Regents). According to the policy details, “in the case of teachers in non-tested grades or subjects, a student growth measure that measures one year of academic growth.” This will involve SLOs/growth targets. Cuomo’s proposal eliminates all 700 of the APPR plans that were locally negotiated.
Right. I didn’t look at it like that. My feeling is that the non-tested subject teachers will get stuck being evaluated on the state tests anyway, including Regents. Of course, I can’t know that for sure, but his purpose is to make sure that teachers have no control over their scores. I just can’t see him agreeing to what will amount to local assessments for some of us.
I agree. Details are somewhat confusing. Still may questions unanswered. For example, will districts be forced to dismiss teachers rated ineffective? Wait until principals find out that their formal evaluation will only be worth 15% of total APPR score. School boards are losing their local control as well. Cuomo OWNS this MESS!
I see he is getting his cues from Floriduh!
The union does nothing. They can’t do anything. Both political parties have thrown the unions (and teachers) under the bus. History is cyclical. I just had a great conversation with a former teacher who now works at a big box store. Another former teacher is digging graves- literally. Dark times! On a more positive note, American TV is going through a Renaissance right now. I spend my nights watching “True Detective” or “The Killing”. So many great shows, so many ways to escape our Dystopian reality. If you can separate yourself from all of this intellectually (which is hard), it is strangely fascinating to see how quickly America collapses. You can’t change it, so sit back, drink Sam Adams, ponder our dark future, and watch good, dark TV. It helps.
The Unions are accepting money from both sides. They are playing the game two ways and all the while teachers continue to reward them with their hard earned money.
Are you sarcastic or are you for real?
If the latter, your thinking is very very sad, and I feel badly for you and wish there were something I or others could do to help you get out of such a rut.
Don’t feel bad for me I should be the one feeling bad for you. I never gave those pathetic excuses for a Union (NEA, AFT) a penny of my hard earned money. If I’m gonna have merit pay forced upon me then I will implement merit pay on the non producing Union. Put up or shut up! When the best solution my Union can offer to address the destruction of Public Education involves wearing a blue shirt to display how blue educators feel that’s all I need to know to reinforce the obvious fact that those cronies at the Union are only interested in themselves and their cushy positions. Where is Weingarten? Where are the other Union leaders? Crickets chirping. So save your pity for someone who needs it! I got out and am currently top of my class in my Physician Assistant Program so I’ll pass on that help of yours you are so eager disperse.
I think it’s wonderful that you entered into a PA program and are reinventing your career. More power to you!
PA sounds like a good move, though brace yourself if the Reformers and hedge funds turn their full gaze to medicine. That’s another big chunk of GDP. Doctors are starting to feel the same negative forces teachers have experienced. High med school debt, technology replacing humans, metrics, VAM, and money going to administrators and shareholders rather than front line physicians – all sound familiar? If anything, corporatization has a head start in medicine. To date, doctors collectively took action by threatening to refuse treating patients or leave. But that’s where you and other medical professionals may come in for the Reformers – neutralize the bargaining power of doctors. Free markets and all. . The likely outcome is a few, concierge doctors and hospitals for the rich, and a second tiered medical system for the rest of us.
But given you are not jumping out of the pan into the fire, I suspect you’ll find the same forces attacking teachers for personal gain will exist in any profession. There is a growing distiction between an elite ruling class and the rest of the 99.9%. But good luck. I’d join you but I’ve given local colleges too much of my money already and it is instead time to focus on the next generation.
Good for you Real One. I wish I had an out.
The Real One,
While I congratulate you on bailing out of the classroom while you had the chance, and wish you the best, what makes you think that the same forces seeking to privatize the schools and subjugate labor are not at work in health care? If anything, the forces of privatization are much further along in that industry than in education, as is the substitution of technology for human beings.
I hope you are able to successfully jump from ice floe to ice floe without falling into the water and drowning, but the reality is that there’s no place to hide, and at some point you’ll have to stand your ground and fight.
We all won’t be able to afford Sam Adams much longer at this rate….I”m learning to brew my own. Micro brewery here I come!!!
I agree with you Math Vale but Doctors and Medical professionals are not an easy and gullible a group to manipulate and control like teachers. I have seen Doctors with huge signs in their offices that read No Obamacare Accepted. However, your assumptions about the infiltration of the elite and the reformers into the fields of medicine is correct. However, I did some research before deciding on my on my next career choice and to do that I began to think like the reformers themselves. I asked myself what jobs in medicine can be outsourced; which cannot? What areas in medicine is the reimbursement rate for services more guaranteed? What areas allow for autonomy in regards to opening a separate practice independent from the tentacles of government? Remember a PA is a broad title the job varies immensely depending on the setting and specialization. I opted for a specialized PA known as an Anesthesiologist Assistant. They are not allowed to practice in every state (due to the nursing Union); at least somebody has an effective Union. Nevertheless, AA’s are highly sought after and there are only a handful of schools in the Country that offer the program so it is not becoming too saturated. The jobs pay in the range of 120K upwards and reach close to 200K. It’s a sad reality but the elite have so much power and control that no career job or business is safe from their meddling influences. I can only hope for the best. In regards to your other point, I wouldn’t have changed careers either if I was burdened with high student debt. I had my student loans forgiven for teaching Math in a Title 1 school for over a decade and I am extremely grateful for that.
We did this in Ohio from the same playbook all these Reformers read. Through the magic of the Ohio political process, the clown show that is legislative education committees negotiated a 42.5% test score weighting. But, hey, the decimal point looks impressive.
I love how this VERY scientific number can be bid up or down:
“Do I hear 45? 45! Sold!”
I mean come on. This isn’t science.
Actually it was simple, pre-Common(senseless) Core math:
50% was originally required via budget bill. A lovely, freshman Republican state senator sponsored a bill to reduce it to 35%. Compromised reached at midpoint of 42.5%.
SLOs, by the way, are locally written and locally scored and locally reported out – lots of room for manipulation to produce ‘great’ data. As a middle school ELA teacher, give me SLOs any day.
The only VAM weighting that is justified for teacher evaluation by real science is 0%
VAM is basically a random number generator — junk science upon which people like Raj Chetty base their careers.
Only in economics could one get prizes and cement a career as a “distinguished scholar” based on such crap. And that is precisely why so many real scientists simply laugh when economists call themselves “scientists”
Mathiness!
Here lies the greatest and most honorable profession of all…
Broken by politicos who do not care about the children they are supposedly “saving”
Good luck getting anyone decent to teach in NY again! One, I don’t think anyone should go into teaching and two, if you do, definitely don’t get a job in NY!!! So, by the logic of the 50/50 rule, in about 3 years you shouldn’t bother moving to NY with your family because you will have a lot of brand new TFA’r teaching your kids, and in another 5 years you might as well move your company out of NY. As an employer you would be able to hire any decent employees because who would live there if they couldn’t count on a decent education for their children. And they can’t really think the rich and their private school will support the town…even private school need middle class teachers and their families to teach there. When did all these governors get together and declare themselves barons, to do with the people and their plots of land as they will?
And yet Cuomo continues to try to lure companies to leave Illinois with his advertisements promising no property or state taxes for 10 years if they move their jobs to New York state.
Cuomo apparently wants to starve public education even more.
This bully will take down a great state.
Why would anyone want to become a teacher in NYS under Cuomo’s plan? I hope this finally awakens the sleeping giant.. all 600,000 NYSUT members.
It’s even worse in Florida where you basically make 40K for your entire career.
Let’s make some political noise, let your voices be heard. Here are the directories for the NYS senate and assembly:
NY Assembly
http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/
NY Senate
http://www.nysenate.gov/senators
Note also, Diane, that there is to “credit” for professional duties–work for the school as a whole, mentoring, leadership, writing and speaking professionally, community work, etc.
Cuomo’s agenda however has nothing to do with improving teaching as a profession or children’s learning–but getting rid of unions. Or so it appears.
Lets make some noise. Here are the directories for NYS senate and assembly. Let your voice be heard. Let’s stop this madman in his tracks.
NY Senate
http://www.nysenate.gov/senators
NY Assembly
http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/
They are blaming all the ills of society on teachers, making us the scapegoats!
VAM: The Scarlet Letter
oops! Wrong video. Here’s VAM: The Scarlet Letter
I’ve seen this guy before. We need more like him congrats on standing up and speaking out with enthusiasm and passion without sugar coating the obvious and blatant attacks on the profession of teaching.
Yes, Andy has guts! The last I heard he was sent to a VAM retraining facility in Florida. I don’t know how he got out. He must have been released early.
“For FY2014-2015, the governor proposed a total increase in education aid of $807 million. That figure includes the first batch of expanded pre-k funding. Overall, it is a disappointment to local school districts.”
I was afraid politicians would do this, fund pre-k out of what would have been K-12 funds and call it an increase in “education aid”.
I wonder how many states will “fund” pre-k by cutting or denying increased funding to existing public schools. We probably won’t know for years if it turns out to be a net gain or just shifting funding and moving categories.
People are very gullible. They’ll say that class sizes are too big year after year, and get met with the reply that the money just isn’t there, and then they’ll fall all over themselves with joy the second they hear a proposal to spend a billion dollars a year on pre-K. Then they’ll remember class sizes are too large, and they’ll be told that there just isn’t enough money for that, especially since pre-K’s costing a billion dollars a year . . . .
This is from the NYTimes this evening:
“Fewer than 1 percent of the state’s teachers were rated ineffective in the most recent evaluations, while only about a third of the state’s students in grades 3 through 8 were proficient in math and language arts.”
They’re using the Common Core test failure rate to justify teacher sanctions. That’s exactly what teachers were afraid would happen, and exactly what teachers were assured wouldn’t happen.
Come on. They know the test is much more difficult. We’re now going to say 66% of US students are failing? It’s grossly unfair to the STUDENTS who took the test and were assured they wouldn’t be labeled, never mind the teachers.
I knew they’d go nuts over these test results and use them like a club, but I thought there would be SOME restraint, at least initially.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/22/opinion/gov-cuomo-takes-on-education.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=c-column-top-span-region®ion=c-column-top-span-region&WT.nav=c-column-top-span-region
Yes, although at the same time, the Times, Cuomo, and anyone else who cared to could have used the results of any prior standardized state tests to make the same argument. (That is, one percent would have looked like a very small number compared to a “failure” rate of 20 percent, or 30 percent, etc.
As for who’s to say that 66% of students are “failing” based on standardized test results, that’s exactly what people (including our host) did for years based on the NAEP tests.
Let’s make some noise. Here are the directories for the NYS senate and assembly. It’s time to stop this madman in his tracks.
NY Senate
http://www.nysenate.gov/senators
NY Assembly
http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/
Here are the directories for the NYS senate and assembly. Time to make our voices heard.
NY Senate
http://www.nysenate.gov/senators
NY Assembly
http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/
I am officially freaked out by this. I couldn’t imagine things in New York ever getting this bad. What a fool I was.
Here are the directories for the NY Senate and Assembly. Make your voices heard.
NY Senate
http://www.nysenate.gov/senators
NY Assembly
http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/
We need the UFT to get Pat Lynchified.We need someone with a big, brash mouth to stand up for this profession now or we and it is history in New York State. No one will try to become a teacher, and the rest will be too miserable and beaten down to work until they are fired anyway. If this goes through, there will be a massive shortfall of teachers in a few years.
You can hear NYSUT president Karen Magee tee off on Cuomo here: http://www.wcny.org/cpr012315/ (the 2nd interview). Though she gets snarky and pointed, I’d have hoped she’d have had more facts at her disposal to use rapid fire to make arguments people connect to.
I agree NY teachers need assertive leaders to step up, but being “brash” for it’s own sake pulls us into Cuomo’s game of personality politics.
The facts, figures, data and research speak for itself – the evaluations are a sham, have already failed, and now he wants to literally double down. We need to be teacherly, like Diane Ravitch, Carol Burris, or Zephyr Teachout and lay out the facts so NY taxpaying voters, and particularly public school parents, see how things are screwed, how it hurts their kids, and how education works best. They will connect to that message.
Funding for state grads to become teachers for 5 years…if they can stay effective long enough to avoid being fired.
This is just one step shy of taking teachers licenses. It just opens the door to getting rid of older teachers.
This will be a civil suit a few years in the making when it is shown most fired teachers happen to be older and/or higher on the pay scale.
Unfortunately we will suffer and maybe our kids will reap rewards from that inevitable lawsuit.
Funding for state grads to become teachers for 5 years…if they can stay effective long enough to avoid being fired.
This is just one step shy of taking teachers licenses. It just opens the door to getting rid of older teachers.
This will be a civil suit a few years in the making when it is shown most fired teachers happen to be older and/or higher on the pay scale.
Unfortunately we will suffer and maybe our kids will reap rewards from that inevitable lawsuit.
The United States has been very lucky to have some great leaders during critical moments in our history….. Lincoln and FDR, for example. And, of course, sometimes those great leaders step up from seemingly nowhere to become heroes….Rosa Parks comes immediately to mind.
It seems clear that the United States is at a turning point now, not just in regards to our schools but in determining what kind of society we want to be in this rapidly changing, high tech world.
Andrew Cuomo is a little man -in every sense of the word. And, he’s using one of the oldest tricks in the political playbook -scapegoating. He is ignoble and self-loathing. I imagine that in his heart of hearts he must silently dread that he is not worthy of leading all of us. So he hates and attacks and harms even our children, ripping apart one of the most important institutions in our democracy. But actually, I pity Andrew Cuomo. For he has missed one of the most valuable lessons that our children learn in school, a lesson brought home to them by the caring teachers they see every day.
Dr. Martin Luther King summed up that lesson the best when he said, “Love is the only force capable of turning an enemy into a friend.”
We’ve already seen some great people rise to the occasion and show real leadership in protecting our children, our public schools, our country -Diane Ravitch, Carol Burris and Leonie Haimson, just to name a few. Their wisdom and courage is inspiring. It is these leaders who are speaking to the “better angels of our nature”.
I don’t know who else is going to step up. It could be one of our elected officials, a parent, union members or a group of high school students? Maybe 30 years from now we’ll all look back and say, yes, it’s so clear now. How come we didn’t see that coming.
Whoever it is, wherever that place may be, I want to be there with them. I really want to be THERE.
John,
Regarding your observation that:
“It seems clear that the United States is at a turning point now, not just in regards to our schools but in determining what kind of society we want to be in this rapidly changing, high tech world.” . . .
Leon Wiesel Tierjan wrote an interesting essay -“Among the Disrupted” (New York Times Book Review 1/18/15) that speaks to your concern.
“Aside from issues of life and death, there is no more urgent task for American intellectuals and writers than to think critically about the salience, even the tyranny, of technology in individual and collective life. All revolutions exaggerate, and the digital revolution is no different. We are still in the middle of the great transformation, but it is not too early to begin to expose the exaggerations, and to sort out the continuities from the discontinuities. The burden of proof falls on the revolutionaries, and their success in the marketplace is not sufficient proof. Presumptions of obsolescence, which are often nothing more than the marketing techniques of corporate behemoths, need to be scrupulously examined. ”
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/18/books/review/among-the-disrupted.html?ref=review&_r=0
Save your pity for those who deserve it.
I took a quick look at the article just now. It does look interesting. Thanks. I’ll have to read more of it when I can slow down.
You know, my experience with bullies is that they rarely experience self-loathing. They are self-absorbed, and confident of their superiority and power over others. They enjoy bullying others because it feeds their ego, because it validates their superiority. and because they find it’s fun.
I do not pity those whose sociopathic tendencies cause them to act in this way, even if they can’t stop themselves from acting in this manner.
I certainly don’t pity Cuomo. I pity the people he bullies, the people he sees as enemies and works tirelessly to attack.
So, with all due respect, I suggest you direct your pity towards his victims and in general, the citizens of New York State.
Maybe pity isn’t the right word. I don’t know. You could be correct.
All I know is that I really hate Andrew Cuomo. And, that concerns me. You know that whole idea of “you become what you hate”? I certainly don’t want to be like him. He seems like a very angry, hateful man.
I used the quote from Martin Luther King for a very real reason. Though, that ideal certainly ain’t easy for me!
I posted three comments agreeing that no teacher will want to work anymore for a system like he proposes. But mine of my comments showed up.
?
None
They are very cavalier believing anyone will want to teach anymore down the road.
Said goodbye told an old dear friend on her death bed yesterday. She still reads Diane’s column when grace allows. Someone brought up Andrew Coumo’s plan in conversation. This dear old woman smiled and said: “IF Andy stepped on a bathroom scale tomorrow and it read 589 pounds, he’d wonder what he ate for dinner!
Brilliant.
Love you my friend. You have lived well, given much, and inspired many. You will be missed. Go in peace.
Sheldon Silver to be arrested today on federal corruption charges. Is Andy next?
http://www.nytimes.com/
Just a hunch: Cuomo’s education proposals are what they are because he knew full well that Shelly was going to be arrested and he wasn’t.
This is a huge blow to the teachers unions.
“. . . Shelly was going to be arrested and he wasn’t.”
You never know.
“Flerp, is that a threat against Andrew Cuomo?”
–J. Percoco
Given the fact that Bharara has studiously avoided indicting any of the Big Boys at the major banks for systemic fraud in the lead-up to the financial crisis, instead giving the public a sideshow of going after chump change inside traders, I think Tim’s take on things is likely the right one.
With Silver’s scalp in hand, Bharara will now tell the public to move along, and that there’s nothing more to see here. There’s too much money to be had by swallowing up K-12 budgets and spitting out teachers, and Cuomo has been anointed to be The One who tries to smash and grab it all for his Overclass patrons.
That would be wonderful news! He already has the mug for a mug shot.
I have a high stakes test for Cuomo and he will be given an evaluation for the same scoring systems as the teachers of NY State. What will he be evaluated on??? Let’s see…
1- public teacher evaluation scores
2- poverty rate
3- His personal score on the 8th grade common core PARCC test
One “ineffective” will be bad news for him… two and he IS OUT.
Is it possible the Governor has a brain tumor?
I hope NYSUT proposes some alternative method of boosting achievement using that amount of money instead of just finding fault with all of the gov’s plans and asking for the money with no strings attached. Maybe longer school day, maybe curriculum coaches or stipends for master teachers that mentor others? Summer classes in low income schools to combat summer learning loss? Paraprofessionals to assist the teacher in every k-8 classroom? Funded before or after school homework programs?
When they don’t acknowledge that there is any issue, nor propose alternatives, they lose because people see the issues and seek leadership from somewhere. Teachers’ voices are missing from the debate because they aren’t proposing alternatives. NYSUT’s response to Cuomo/Tisch memos is “all of your ideas are bad, trust teachers, and give us more money.” Would you invest in that? NYSUT (or some alternative professional association that speaks for NY teachers) needs to propose workable plans or become worthless or purely adversarial in the eyes of non-teacher New Yorkers.
Overseas, unions work cooperatively to achieve organizational results. Here, they solely represent teachers. Either they need to change or some additional professional organization is needed that gives teachers a voice in improving outcomes. Then maybe we’d get some real positive change for the benefit of students instead of what we’ve been getting.
I think most people would support more money for public education if they believed it would lead to better outcomes.
This is a bit off topic, but I’m curious about what most commenters here think about something like this: https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10153008803124320&fref=nf. Do you think it’s hokey? Or that it already exists? Honestly not sure and curious.
Thanks.
Are SUNY and CUNY professors aware they are being volunteered for teacher evaluation duties?
SUNY professors are already bought and paid for. Cuomo believes they will do as they are told.
So much for local control and decision making. He’ll be a fine neo-liberal/fascist candidate for 2020: If he doesn’t crash and burn first.
50% of the same thing, or 20% of 5% is dead wrong. Test scores, the way they are used today is ridiculous. Of course schools and teachers must monitor academic achievement to assure students are progressing. This cannot be done with a test from afar. However, with whole child assessment coupled with a small pre and post test, results confirmed by progress in the classroom will provide information that will help teachers develop a plan for students that works.
In the words of Dr. Angela Dye, “we must reimagine achievement”. Achievement is not simply a test, or information gathered by the student. It also includes how that information is processed by the student and actually used. 1st class achievement is whole child achievement.
Assessment is only as good as the information gathered and it’s application to the education of the child. Once this happens we can look at the complex issue of how to use it to assess teachers and schools on an even playing field.
www,wholechildreform.com
OMG, the politicians have lost their minds in order to find the money.
STRIKE
Let me get this straight.. A student makes a decision not to pay attention, do homework or study, parents won’t return calls home and I am ineffective and lose my job?!
Nice.. And this is incentive for who to come on in and really teach…? Oh you know, someone that will clearly come and go (like a revolving door), someone that kids and society will have even less respect for.. And you think the behavior problems, let alone grades are going to somehow rebound and snap back into shape from this?
– WOW –
Just for goggles I guess, where was all this attention to detail when hedge funds, corporations and robo-signing banks had a field day with Two Hundred Trillion dollars (?!), off shored ALL our jobs, broke the global economy and no one (no one) is held to account at all? All of the sudden it’s open season on who then now??? Teachers???! Seriously?!
Look! A squirrel! I think its a teacher squirrel too! Why that little..
Oh… There’s gonna be — Trouble —
If you think for one NY minute, that this is isolated or that whatever YOU do isn’t going to be cheapened and diminished should this come to pass, you are in for big surprises… This is gonna be one hell of a fight boy! Like it or not… It’s gonna come right down to preserving The American Way, from the line teachers are going to hold (as if we have nothing else to do), to skool this ilk.
Go ahead bash a Union… You can’t outsource and offshore Teachers.. That leaves only a coup from within, leaving temps and disposable replacements for upshot start up private for profit education contractor agencies to fill the void and “Fix” Education, just like customer service is “fixed” now by a “Chuck” in India…
Damn this nonsense to hell then, first its Science that is “Evil”, because the inconvenient unbiased objective facts of many ‘things’ from “Science” do not support much of Food, water and Medicine, environment and Energy practices and therefore would affect profits for companies or industries … and now it’s Teacher’s! Well well well… This will not end well and it isn’t a small little deal either.
We were ‘Looking for Superman’ a little while ago… Your gonna see a whole lot of Superman and Super Woman (in Teachers) really soon.
So then he must be doing the same thing for physicians? Doctor’s salaries are fifty percent based on whether your patient is cured. What? Is that not fair out of the doctors total control? Hmm.
Here’s what’s INEFFECTIVE about the plan to me:
It doesn’t matter if you have 15 kids or 35.
It doesn’t matter if your students had any books read to them before Kindergarten.
It doesn’t matter if their parents have them do homework or ensure a good night’s sleep.
It doesn’t matter if assessment cut scores are so high that no nation has ever achieved excellent results with expectations that high.
It doesn’t matter if the district provides high quality professional development for the faculty.
It doesn’t matter if the classroom has enough books, not to mention desks, for all the students.
It doesn’t matter how many students learn to be kind, helpful, attentive, resilient or respectful.
It doesn’t matter how many phenomenal pieces of literature or symphonies or theories the teacher has shared with the class.
It doesn’t matter how many children learned the values of voting and debate.
It doesn’t matter if the child or parents value education and care about classroom success.
It doesn’t matter if the state cuts school district budgets so much that dozens or hundreds of faculty members have been let go and programs have been cut to the bare bones.
Teachers should be rated based on how students perform on a test for a few days each year.
What intelligent person would start a career in a profession like that?
Who will be the teachers of tomorrow?
Simply put: idiot
So let me see if I have this right: some guy from a British company makes a test for all American public school classrooms which is exceeding hard to pass and has little to nothing to do with our curriculum or true pedagogy; that is 50% of our “grade.” Then a complete stranger will observe us for another 25%. Yeah, that sounds about right…
Meant “exceedingly.”
I have been a teacher and school counselor for 40 years. It is very often the case that the most challenging students are placed in the classrooms of the most gifted teachers. This system would negatively impact both our best teachers and therefore students. This is the one of the least-educated plans I have ever heard of. Higher college standards, increased pay, and quality mentoring is the answer. A new plan such as this is just rediculous. Who but politicians can even come up with this idea?
Linda, I think they know exactly what they are doing. They are gutting our profession of teaching. I do not recognize my profession anymore. I have worked on paperwork the entire weekend…endless paperwork….answering tons of required questions which have nothing to do with grading my students’ papers and preparing Monday’s lessons. I stay late in my classroom every evening. All I do is pretest and give practice PARCC “tasks” (their new word) over and over again. I have no time to teach anymore, but I find myself with a challenging new curriculum which is way too hard for my students.
I am beyond exhausted….I am near the end of my career (2 more years), but I find myself dead on my feet most days. I still try very, very hard to be a good teacher and be there for my students…..but, anyone who observes me closely would feel very sorry for me. I know my family does. The dark circles under my eyes never go away now.
I have 4 students this year who are emotionally disturbed. Adding these students to my regular classroom…events pop up where they are upset, need lots of extra time from me…Their test scores will be on my evaluation…..and I’ve done the best I can.
The results of all these toxic policies and working teachers to beyond exhaustion…is that no young people will go into this profession. “De-professionalizing” teaching and making teachers feel like they are inferior beings is their first step in taking over public education. They are doing a fine job of that. Taking hope away from a profession is so sad. That is why I’ve named myself “Sad Teacher.” Watching how they have gutted my profession these past 30 years is beyond sad.