Kenneth Zeichner is Boeing Professor of Teacher Education at the University of Washington in Seattle. He recently reviewed five alternate routes into teaching. Here is a question-and-answer session with him about his study.
The study is here.
He said:
My examination of the research on the five programs (The Relay Graduate School of Education, Match Teacher Residency, High Tech High’s Internship, iTeach and TEACH-NOW) concludes that there is no credible evidence that supports the claims of success that are made about them, and that the continued expansion of these programs is driven by ideology rather than by empirical evidence of success.
He added:
First of all, in the U.S. we have very serious problems of an inequitable distribution of teachers and inequitable access to a high-quality education, which enables students to interact with knowledge in authentic and meaningful ways. Students living in communities highly impacted by poverty are disproportionately taught by uncertified teachers, inexperienced teachers and by teachers teaching outside of their field. Most of the teachers who graduate from independent programs teach students who live in communities that are highly impacted by poverty.
I found that two of the five programs that I studied (Relay Graduate School of Education and Match Teacher Residency) contribute to the inequitable distribution of professionally prepared teachers and to the stratification of schools according to the social class and racial composition of the student body. These two programs prepare teachers to use highly controlling pedagogical and classroom management techniques, “a pedagogy of poverty,” that are primarily used in schools serving students of color whose communities are severely impacted by poverty. Meanwhile, students in more economically advantaged areas have greater access to professionally trained and experienced teachers, less punitive and controlling management practices, and to broader and richer curriculum and teaching practices. The teaching, curriculum and management practices learned by the teachers in these two independent programs are based on a restricted definition of teaching and learning and would not be acceptable in more economically advantaged communities.
In a sense, the expansion of independent teacher education programs like Relay and Match is furthering the building of a second-class system of education for children living in poverty while middle class children continue to be taught by professionally prepared teachers and have more access to a genuine education that aims for much more than just raising standardized test scores.
Absolutely.
I will have to read the entire study but, as I read your post, I am reminded of Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow. In her book, she discusses how the “system” keeps evolving new ways to systematize racism after the old ways become legally sanctioned. The first was slavery which gave way to legalized segregation which gave way to our current criminal justice system. As we, as a nation, shine the light of justice on the horrible injustices occurring with police killings of innocent black men and mass incarceration and hopefully stare it down, I can’t help but wonder if the system is moving again, reformulating, reworking, hardening, and re-entrenching systems of inequity and racism through these school and teacher ed “reforms” when I read work like Zeichner’s.
I don’t think most parents are aware how influential charter school leaders are. How much they impact every public school in the country due to what I consider really privileged and often exclusive access to lawmakers.
This:
“These two programs prepare teachers to use highly controlling pedagogical and classroom management techniques, “a pedagogy of poverty,” that are primarily used in schools serving students of color whose communities are severely impacted by poverty.”
isn’t just about “charter schools” (although public schools are rarely mentioned in ed reform). There’s a public school district close to mine with about 50% lower income children, so about the same percentage as mine. They have a “reform” superintendent and they use all of the methods used in “no excuses” charters. People aren’t familiar with this-they don’t know where it comes from- but all of you would immediately recognize it.
It’s really gone much beyond “charter schools”. In my opinion, that’s because lawmakers don’t listen to anyone outside “the movement”. “Movement” ed reformers have out-sized influence at the federal and state level.
Policymakers are afraid to bite the hand that feeds them. The charter lobby has lots of money and power behind it. That is why I think the only hope of derailing the monetization of our children is to use the race card. We need to unearth the social injustice of privatization.
It’s really gone much beyond “charter schools”.
The invocations of (fill in the blank) clash with reality (outcomes),
yet they are continued by the shepherds as though it wasn’t an
illusion.
Reality is ignored in favor of sustaining mythical functions by
cherry-picking results (test scores) to articulate the function.
Enter: We and we alone, know the way…
Reblogged this on DelawareFirstState and commented:
Relay has a campus in Delaware.
The whole “faux” aspect of “reform” should be challenged as a violation of civil rights. Profiteering companies provide faux public schools, with faux teachers trained in faux schools of education to provide second class education for children of color. Then, the spin doctors call this innovation. This is a nefarious form of segregation. Many states have already determined that charters are not public schools. Why should poor minority students be funneled into a fake “public” school and treated differently from their more affluent white peers? It is time for African Americans to start filing lawsuits to fight this social injustice. In my opinion, this is the civil rights issue of our time!
Reblogged this on Mark's Text Terminal and commented:
Here’s a post from Diane Ravitch’s Blog on alternative routes to teacher certification, which addresses a professional and pedagogical concern at Mark’s Text Terminal. I entered teaching through one of these programs, the New York City Teaching Fellowship, which was abysmal. I’ve spent the last ten years remediating the shortcomings of my experience in this program, which earned me a M.S. in special education from a diploma mill in the New York City metropolitan area.
What a surprise! I entered the profession through the New York City Teaching Fellows Program, which was abysmal. For the past ten years, I have worked to remedy the numerous deficits with which it left me as an educator.
Our “no excuses” district is interesting because Ohio has a form of limited open enrollment. Talking to parents it sounds like the kids who “make excuses” leave and go to an adjoining district but I don’t know that other than anecdotally.
It wouldn’t surprise me at all if ed reformers in this state were completely ignoring systemic effects of what appears an isolated ‘choice” to fashion that district along the lines of a no excuses charter system, because they always ignore how any of their “choices” affect larger communities.
It’s bewildering to me. So many highly educated people and they’re blissfully unaware that they don’t act in isolation.
It seems blindingly obvious to me that “choice” has repercussions for those who had no part in the “choice” but this seems to escape ed reformers.
Chiara, as usual, you are right on. Reformers never think of the repercussions on the children in public schools, who are the overwhelming majority of students. To reformers, they don’t exist or if they do, they are collateral damage. Why do we need to have a dual school system?
“Reform” has legitimized a disinvestment in the common good. Many states with leaders favoring privatization keep slashing school budgets trying to hasten public school failure. This is wrong on so many levels. Public education should not be a “poor relative” of any state, especially when about ninety per cent of the students attend.
“Savage Inequalities” all over again.
In the nonfiction book by Dana Goldstein, “The Teacher Wars”, there’s a chapter that compares results between teacher training programs based mostly on teacher retention, and TFA had the worst results while urban residencies was the best.
https://www.amazon.com/Teacher-Wars-Americas-Embattled-Profession/dp/0345803620
One facet brought to the TEACHERS ARE BAD blame game has come from a particular subset of reformers who argue that while wealthy kids can “handle” an educational system where a few teachers are not up to par, poor kids must have “only” excellent teachers. This type of reasoning has led many (Bill Gates and wife, Arne Duncan, for example) to go viciously after teachers in lowest-income schools — to the point where now, in 2016, they have harassed and dismissed SO many educators that the looming teacher shortage desperately shuttles NON-TEACHERS into these same-said classrooms.
Nonteachers like TFA are not pension liabilities. They are here today and gone tomorrow.
EXACTLY.
Zeichner, in Seattle, sees on a daily basis, how little regard Washington’s rich, have for the common good. Among other examples, it’s reflected in Seattle’s traffic congestion. The colony of Washington allows the income of men like Gates to be untaxed, while it shifts the expense of common goods, onto consumers. It puts the burden of “factors of production” costs (which disproportionately benefit the rich), onto the shoulders of the poor and middle class. Then, Washington compounds the problem with a flat (regressive)property tax limit of 1%, on palaces, like those of Gates.
Washington is not a state. And, its name dishonors an American hero.
Larry Robbins (on the boards of KIPP and Relay), prior to establishing his own fund, was a partner in Omega Advisors. CNBC reported, yesterday, “The SEC filed insider trading charges against Leon Cooperman and his firm, Omega Advisors.” Cooperman and Michael Milken are on the board of Invest for Kids, a charity that has given money to charter schools and other organizations.
“middle class children continue to be taught by professionally prepared teachers and have more access to a genuine education that aims for much more than just raising standardized test scores.”
Those middle class kids are predominantly white and suburban. When you closely examine one of the primary methods implemented for raising test scores at no excuses charter schools, which is euphemistically called “excellence training” by Success Academy, it becomes glaringly obvious that this is really obedience training for children in historically marginalized low income groups, in order to get them to comply and do whatever they are told without question.
That is what teacher imposters are trained to do in these fake teacher ed schools. Personally, I think it’s this racist plan to systematically control and manipulate helpless children from minority groups, in highly segregated charters, by those who have been deemed to be their betters that is truly the civil rights issue of our time.
I agree. These separate an unequal charters that increase segregation should not be able to use public funds for their social engineering experiment.
Allow me to be devil’advocate here. This conversation seems to be between education professionals who are reading studies. As a classroom teacher, I have a different view. As former products of American education, many of those I have talked to over the past 50 years or so have emphasized the strict discipline they saw leaving and ruining schools during their lifetimes. Obviously their stories were anecdotal.
My wife’s uncle recall a boy in Mitchell, NE skipping school and going to the Platte River to fish. The Principal, whose nickname was “Bull” waded into the river in a three piece suit, gave the boy a good thrashing, and carried him back to school. The point with which I was being assailed was that life was tough I the 1930s in rural Nebraska, the people,responded with toughness.
The same argument came from a guy raised on the wrong side of Miami in a class discussion in an education class. All this stuff we are getting in this class is hooey, kids raised tough have to be treated tough. I would never have made it out of the tough without tough teachers, went his argument
I must confess that I cannot bully anyone into submission for their own good, if indeed that is what it takes. It is not me. But some kids respond to nothing short of an almost fascist authoritarianism in the classroom. I have seen it work in all kinds of ways.
If by teacher education, we mean providing an in depth look at things that are succeeding in education, I am on board. But if we mean providing methods at only work if the students are already ready to learn, we are doing the new teacher no favor.
I agree that some children will respond to harsh, disciplinary, military boot camp methods, but who decides who those “some kids” are, and what happens when the wrong kid is placed in anEva Moskowitz/KIPP educational gulag environment who doesn’t fit and is destroyed in the process?
After all, look what it did to Donald Trump when he was kicked out of his expensive, private school because he was a discipline problem, and was sent off to a military boarding school. The final product as an adult is a narcissist, serial liar, fraud, and psychopathic bully.
Another branch of the totally unaccredited and this misleadingly-named “Relay Graduate School of Education (Relay G.S.E.).” just opened up shop in Denver, and many folks there aren’t happy about it.
http://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/co/2016/09/13/new-teacher-training-favored-by-charters-comes-to-denver-as-critics-sound-off/#.V-a2N4X3X-W
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
CHALKBEAT:
“But Ken Zeichner, a professor at the University of Washington’s College of Education, argues that (a student’s high test score) is not enough. In the brief released last week, he writes that test scores are ‘a limited measure of success’ — and one relied upon too heavily by Teacher Prep 2.0 programs. Such programs, he argues, focus on preparing teachers to teach ‘other people’s children,’ meaning those living in high-poverty neighborhoods.
“ ‘From my perspective, by only looking at test scores, we’re creating a second-class education for poor children in this country that (is) just about test scores,’ Zeichner said in an interview.
“Instead, he writes that teacher preparation programs, including university-based programs, should be judged by a mix of factors, including standardized test scores and how their graduates increase students’ social and emotional skills, creativity and problem-solving abilities.
” … ”
“One by one, the prospective teachers spent a minute delivering instructions — praising obedient students and correcting those off task — at breakneck pace. It’s a classroom management style used in many charter schools and increasingly in traditional district schools too.
“Some, including Zeichner, have criticized the style, which they say is primarily used in schools that serve poor students of color, as ‘highly controlling.’ Teachers who use it expect students to sit up straight, listen and ‘track’ whomever is speaking with their eyes.
” (Relay’ G.S.E.’s) Hostetter said she doesn’t understand that criticism (of Relay G.S.E.’s pedagogy and practices).
“’ It’s pretty straightforward,’ she said.”
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
However, it’s in the Comments section of the above Chalkbeat article that things get most interesting:
Someone (whom I now call “Relay G.S.E.Proponent”) in the Comments section kind of deviated from the usual school privatization script, a script that states that ,,,
PARTY LINE: “Relay G.S.E. is meant for ALL students of EVERY socio-economic and ethnic background, and NOT, as some have accused, merely something that is inflicted solely on poor people of color, and thus, in a discriminatory fashion.”
In contrast to that party line, “Relay G.S.E. Proponent” admits that yeah, Relay IS JUST for poor black and brown folks, and here’s WHY.
This predictably infuriated other commenters, including the outspoken Jeanne Kaplan.
When challenged, he or she deleted everything that he or she posted (with quote remnants present in the Comments responding to him or her. Again, I’m calling this poster “Relay G.S.E. Proponent” as her or she deleted her on-line handle all with his/her posts.)
Again, go the COMMENTS section HERE:
http://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/co/2016/09/13/new-teacher-training-favored-by-charters-comes-to-denver-as-critics-sound-off/#.V-E9XIX3WUe
Check out this doozy of a quote that includes Relay G.S.E. Proponent’s claim that Relay G.S.E. pedagogy should only be used in poor communities, but not in wealthy communities — and HOW and WHY that is so …
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
RELAY G.S.E. PROPONENT:
“Kids from less affluent areas are typically raised in a much different household than those in affluent households. Moreover, those kids raised in affluent households in most cases need less teaching and structure and more flexibility.
“If they’re in an affluent family, they likely have educated ‘ parents and are being afforded opportunities in their family life to learn.
“Kids from impoverished areas? Not so much. They need structure in their classroom. They need to be reminded to track and listen to the teacher most likely.
“They (poor black ‘n brown folks) need a different type of teacher.”
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
Oh boy, this got Relay G.S.E. critic “CONCERNED EDUCATOR” riled up:
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
CONCERNED EDUCATOR:
“I want to just point out that, by placing students of low socio-economic status in this light, you have highlighted a very important gap that we are perpetuating by allowing the language of Relay G.S.E. to continue.
“Yes, students who grow in homes with severe trauma need specific psychological structures and interventions in place, because their brains function differently, and have been altered by the toxic stress.
“However, NOT ALL STUDENTS IN POVERTY HAVE GROWN UP IN TOXIC STRESS ENVIRONMENTS. Making this assumption lowers our expectations, and devalues those students. You are making assumptions that devalue children, and Relay perpetuates that. We can value the culture of our students without assuming that culture is negative.
“In addition, assuming that our impoverished children ‘need’ a negative, controlling structure creates prison-like environments, where we do not teach critical thinking skills or self-awareness, but locks children into negative patterns of thought and behavior.
“We also perpetuate the opportunity gap, because we are denying students the opportunity to have the education that wealthy white students have, simply by making the assumption that ‘those students need structure.’
“ALL CHILDREN NEED STRUCTURE. ALL children also deserve the opportunity to have an education that prepares them to excel to their greatest potential, which does not mean treating them like prisoners.
“Relay perpetuates this cycle of creating sub-par education for students, based on the excuse of’ those kids’ (always meaning children in poverty and non-white children) needing more ‘structure’. SOME students with trauma need more specific interventions, but ALL children deserve the chance to be a child.”
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
“RELAY G.S.E. PROPONENT” then incorrectly claims that Relay G.S.E. student teachers are attending Relay G.S.E. “to earn their Master’s Degrees.”
Jeanne Kaplan’s replies that Relay G.S.E. does not award accredited “Master’s Degrees.”
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
JEANNE KAPLAN:
” ‘To earn their master’s degrees…’ ?
“Teachers cannot acquire a Master’s Degree because the ‘Relay Graduate School of Education’ is not a certified Graduate Program.
“The (Relay G.S.E.) ‘degree’ is bogus.
“Students are being taught by unlicensed people.”
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
In a now-deleted comment (which I’m reconstructing via inferences) “RELAY G.S.E. PROPONENT” replies by saying that traditional teaching programs are all failures, according to the data, and that research proves that Relay alone works. Again, from Kaplan’s response, it appears that Relay G.S.E. Proponent then calls Kaplan some names, and insults her.
Jeanne Kaplan ain’t havin’ it.
Kaplan also wantsto know if Relay G.S.E. is paying rent at the public school building where it holds it courses
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
JEANNE KAPLAN:
“Who are you?
“Identify yourself, at least. I could say the same about you. I could also call you names. That is the MO of most ‘debates’ in America today.
“Biased resources. Only you ignore data that shows repeated failure (of Relay G.S.E.’s pedagogy, or of “No Excuses”, high-discipline, highly-regimented charter schools.)
“As for (the claim that) there is no research (that Relay G.S.E. is ineffective) – I beg to differ. I have actually talked to people who have undergone the Relay G.S.E. indoctrination. Some have quit. Many have ended up in great debt.
“I ask again : is Relay G.S.E. paying rent (for the public facilities in Denver that it’s now using)?
“And please don’t take the chicken way out and not identify yourself. Transparency is another trait lost in ‘education reform.’ ”
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
“Relay G.S.E. Proponent” didn’t just “take the chicken way out” and not identify himself / herself.
He / she quickly deleted everything which he/she had earlier posted.
Kind of like Eva with her Success Academy training videos.