This is a historic moment. Teachers have walked out in West Virginia, Oklahoma, and Kentucky.
Today they walk out in Arizona and Colorado.
There will be more.
Huffington Post invited me to explain the reasons for this mass rebellion here.
I referred to the work of Bruce Baker and the Education Law Center about school funding, comparing the states. And I referred to the work of the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities about the failure of many states to fund schools since the recesssion of 2008.
The bottom line: do we care about our children, our future, our society?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/04/25/602859780/teacher-walkouts-a-state-by-state-guide
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education.
Thank you! I am so envious of the clarity of your writing.
To all, fyi:
Below is a link to brief article in AEON about “metric fixation” in large organizations and institutions. Though the writer, who is a professor at Catholic University of America in D.C., does not discuss what good can come from using metrics in some situations, he does suggest how an institutionalized over-dependence on metrics can “backfire” by inspiring shifts in both motivations and goals and by stifling the very innovation that such organizations otherwise claim to desire and support. He uses high-test EDUCATION as an example.
I have copied a brief paragraph (below the link) from the article describing “metric fixation.” FYI,
Catherine Blanche King
https://aeon.co/ideas/against-metrics-how-measuring-performance-by-numbers-backfires?utm_source=Aeon+Newsletter&utm_campaign=381c8f9d73-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_04_23&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_411a82e59d-381c8f9d73-70395829
Snip from article: “The key components of metric fixation are the belief that it is possible – and desirable – to replace professional judgment (acquired through personal experience and talent) with numerical indicators of comparative performance based upon standardised data (metrics); and that the best way to motivate people within these organisations is by attaching rewards and penalties to their measured performance.”
Good article, Catherine. I plan to send it to my metric loving school board, especially since there appear to be some cracks in the love affair with data on their part. I think perhaps the community is beginning to realize the limiting nature of dependence on test scores and the reduction of goals to “measurable” surrogates.
CBK,I have missed you!
Hello Diane, and so glad to hear from you. I’ve missed my daily readings on this and several other blogs for having been away to Oklahoma on family business. FYI: teacher stuff is not suffering from being ignored on the news THERE; and then I spilled coffee on my laptop keyboard. My sister who lives there is. . . well . . . not computer savvy, so I was out of commission for a good while. I’m back now and am catching up on all the good news. Keep up the good work! CBK
Thanks for that link Catherine! Good read.
I sent this article to a couple of people who live in Idaho, including my brother. I probably won’t be liked very well for standing up for teachers. Good grief. I went to public schools in Boise.
Is this something to be proud of…spending ‘the least’ in the country on education?
“New York spent the most per pupil in 2015; Idaho spent the least, “
All of the numbers I have seen have Utah spending far less than Idaho per pupil. I guess it seems “higher” because the funding is “spread out.” But Utah’s class sizes have risen dramatically, because Utah’s youth population is rising fast, and the state hasn’t often funded adequately for the growth in student populations.
Further, the state went to a flat tax in about 2007, and allowed universities to take from the Uniform School Fund, which used to be just for K-12. It is estimated that Utah public schools lose around $1 B a year from those changes.
Five years ago, I had a teacher load of 225 students. I now have 280 students. We barely fit in my portable classroom–I’ve had to remove most of my storage and furniture in order to fit everyone in there, and even then, it’s a tight squeeze.
And my 9th grade AP class (AP!) is scheduled to have at least 40 students next year.
Utah is headed for a cliff.
The state has an annual population growth rate of 2%, with school population growth rate about the same. If sustained, the school population will increase by roughly 50% in 20 years
Assuming class sizes do not get even bigger (a big if, I know), Utah will have to increase its teacher population by roughly the same %, adding about 15k teachers.
If salary and benefits cost $100k per teacher, that will add about $1.5 billion to the education budget.
Where is that money going to come from?
Maybe Utah officials plan on putting all those school age kids on work study? Or maybe they will just increase the class sizes by 50%, so your AP class will then have 60 students?
Insane.
But hey, this is Utah state officials we are talking about, so no real surprise – at least to not to anyone who is familiar with their particular brand of genius. These are the type of people who gave $5 million of state money to Cold Fusion research before they even knew what it was and long before the claims had been independengly scientifically verified (which they never were)
One positive: Utah can’t go any lower in the per pupil spending rank, unless Puerto Rico becomes a state. Of course, there is always an outside chance that Ethiopia will become a state, in which case Utah might (might) no longer be dead last in the ranking.
It will be wonderful if North Carolina goes next. Their public school students have really gotten screwed.
Throw the bums out. Elect all new people in state government. This batch isn’t getting their work done.
We ARE next!
800 teachers in Durham, NC alone have submitted personal leave requests for May 16th
https://www.wral.com/650-durham-teachers-take-off-may-16-request-school-be-canceled-to-demand-better-conditions/17513948/
… and our numbers are rising rapidly! We had 630 yesterday. NC educators, students, families, and community supporters will be marching and rallying together as a state at the capital that day.
Our Durham school board and district admin are considering whether they will even be able to keep the schools open that day… and they are vocalizing their support for our efforts!
We are learning from our fellow educators who have led/are leading the way before us (ex. we are creating plans to make sure our students are fed, our custodial staff get paid, AP exams will be made up, etc.)
So who’s next after NC?
You should post article here. HuffPo is a horrible employer and deserves no page views.
Agreed
Their idea of “employing” people is to have them write for free.
And Arianna Huffington became very rich from such slave labor.
I hope at the very least, Diane got paid for her article.
I think $315 million ( the price paid for Huffington Post to Arianna and her business partner) would be a fair payment., don’t you?
I am going to be paid $125. That will cover the cost of a meal with my grandkids in a local restaurant a couple of nights ago. My five year old grandson ordered a slice of pizza and scraped off all the cheese. Three of us actually had a meal.
$315 million was the price paid to all the “investors”.
Arianna herself may “only” have made tens of millions off the deal. Not much.
But hey, even $10 million to Diane would probably be fair.
That may well be the most Huff post has ever paid for any article.
“And Arianna Huffington became very from such slave labor.”
She was already quite riich, but apparently that wasn’t enough.
In fact, even the wealth generated by Huffington Post wasn’t enough for her, since she’s on the Board of Uber, which is busy creating even more debt slaves/minimum wage workers.
Arianna Uber Alles
Aryana Uber Alles?
A friend who is still teaching sent me this e-mail this morning:
“My District makes my job harder than it should be. Every year they come up with new policies that make my job harder; that is what I meant by pacing myself. If it continues to get worse, then I will retire sooner.”
He plans to retire in 7-years but if it continues to get worse, he will leave in five.
“The bottom line: do we care about our children, our future, our society?”
Of course “we” do, and when I say “we” I mean those that are anti-Trump and not the deplorable that stand behind Trump and the GOP no matter what they do.
The few that do not care have been working hard for more than 45-years to reach this dismal point in US history and I think the masterminds behind it all are David and Charles Koch who dedicated their lives to build a machine designed to subvert the U.S. Constitution and to overrule the majority of sane and educated voters in this country.
ALEC only has about 2,000 members and they are the few that are allies with the Koch brothers. Even Bill Gates “once” belonged to ALEC so there must have been some common ground between the Koch brothers and Gates.
Lloyd L: Well-said. We need to find some way to shine the light on what teachers actually do (code for: put up with) on a daily basis in the name of educating and caring for children. Perhaps then “sane and well-educated voters” would be more active in protecting teachers against the mongrel moguls, aka ALEC and their buddies.
Thank you for this summary of “education spring.” I have shared it with former colleagues and friends.
I don’t think teachers should be afraid to say that YES they are protesting in their own best interest as well as the interest of their students. When you sit next to someone on a plane and the oxygen mask drops, you put yours on FIRST then you help others. It’s ok and it’s not selfish. You must respect yourself first. My mother used to say, “You teach other people how to treat you.” Hopefully these teachers will teach others how they want to be treated and will empower all of us to strive for a better education system.
Teacher: put on your own oxygen mask and then help others to put on theirs.
Billionaire: put on your own and then charge others $1000 a pop for your help. Alternatively: yank all the other masks from their sockets and sell them back to people at $1000 apiece.
Is it just me or is anyone else noting a major dearth of media coverage on the walkouts?
It’s not just you. It’s too complicated a story for the news readers who pose as journalists.
Good one. I think that Diane did a splendid job. All of us can learn from her skill as a writer and clear thinker.
I think the major media now treat teacher walkouts as “old news”
Keep an eye on North Carolina when the legislature returns to Raleigh on May 16.
Keep an eye on North Carolina when the legislature returns to Raleigh on May 16.
When they say they don’t have money for teachers, ask about the consultants:
“Follow education technology-reform projects, and you’ll find mixed academic outcomes and expensive consultants.
Take Fulton County School District, in Georgia. In July of 2015, the district paid more than $400,000 for alignment, strategy and professional services from Education Elements, a for-profit personalized learning consultant, according to receipts obtained by EdSurge from the district. Later that year, the district paid an additional $215,500 more for “professional services.” In less than two years, between 2015 and 2017, the district paid more than $4.5 million to the firm for personalized-learning consulting services.”
Teachers could really dive into these expenditures and see if some of this can be re-prioritized. I think people in Fulton County GA would be very interested to find out they paid 4.5 million for “personalized learning consultants” – I don’t know but I’d bet they’d rather pay the teachers who actually work with their kids.
Since lawmakers have apparently abandoned public schools completely maybe teachers could leverage these strikes into having a real say in how money is spent. All the polling says the public trusts teachers over politicians. They could just grab that and run with it.
https://www.edsurge.com/news/2018-04-26-million-dollar-advice-the-high-cost-and-limited-return-on-personalized-learning-consulting
All American POLITICIANS REGARDLESS OF YOUR PARTIES’ COLOR, red or blue or whatever, please read carefully Dr. Ravitch’s words of wisdom:
[start paragraph]
America cannot retain its position as a global leader unless it educates its children well.
Investing in our children is investing in our future. The states’ refusal to pay teachers appropriately, as professionals, is an admission by their leaders that they don’t care about tomorrow and they don’t care about the children of their constituents.
The push for charter schools and vouchers is simply a way of changing the subject. Privatization benefits the 1 percent, who don’t want to pay more taxes, but it does not address the funding inequities that rob our students and teachers.
Until now, we have been a world leader in science, medicine, technology, music, entertainment, the arts, sports and higher education. We can thank our teachers for that. Without the groundwork they provide, none of these achievements are possible.
If we kill our future, it hurts everyone. Without well-supported, professional teachers, we are nowhere.
[end paragraph]
Teaachers , parents and students in all States in America, please, MEMORIZE the only sentence:
“If we kill our future, it hurts everyone. Without well-supported, professional teachers, we are nowhere.”
Yes, put the oxygen mask on yourself first, then help others. it is a conventional way and THE ONLY WAY to survive and to sustain our future with dignity. Back2basic
“America cannot retain its position as a global leader” — unless you are talking about number of military bases and military budget, you need to clarify what do you mean by global leadership.
Figure it out, Gruff.
Gruff: “America cannot retain its position as a global leader” — unless you are talking about number of military bases and military budget”
We are a global leader in killing and destruction around the world. Trump may be proud of this. I’m not. I believe that if we are to once again be leaders, it will be because we have an educated populace who demands true freedom, respect and love for all people. Our leadership currently doesn’t even include former allies. We will never kill our way to peace. We must change the way we ‘lead’ and work to help people live in a world where equality and economic freedom exist. For too many they struggle to survive and too often see the famine brought by our planes that drop bombs indiscriminately. Love one another and help them is the way to become a true leader in this world.
Education plays an important part in making us realize what is important. Teaching to the test and low paid teachers with heavy loads means little is being learned.
Hi Gruff:
If you spend your time to read two links in this thread, and spend more time to reflect your own experience on your own definition of “global leadership”, then you will have the answer to clarify your definition.
1) From Dr. Ravitch:
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/opinion-ravitch-teacher-strikes_us_5ae0cab4e4b055fd7fc760fd?qdy
2) From Catherine Blanche King:
https://aeon.co/ideas/against-metrics-how-measuring-performance-by-numbers-backfires?utm_source=Aeon+Newsletter&utm_campaign=381c8f9d73-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_04_23&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_411a82e59d-381c8f9d73-70395829
Have you ever asked yourself that WHY immigrants love to come to North America? I have always wished to live in NY with the statue of LIBERTY since I was little in Vietnam. That means America, a country where humanity and freedom is respected, NOT where people live in fear of ignorant, corrupted dictator with the best military force.
NOBODY wants to be a slave for a culture where dictator and suppression which kill their offspring in war after war. Back2basic.
Diane, I sent your article to my brother in Boise. I don’t understand the economics of teachers having to strike if there is plenty of money. I figure we become more educated if we know what is being said. Oh boy.
“Move back to Illinois, I think you should pay more taxes than me. It’s so cool to watch the left unhinged. The hatred you libs have toward the President is stunning. I know you know nothing about economics, free markets etc… I’ll say it one more time, less taxes mean more jobs, more revenue for government. Americans had to put up with the worse president in our history, his name Obama. Your news is not honest about Obama or Trump. I love it when Trump cuts down fake news. How about teachers who who are teaching Socialism or communism New World Order? “
Get those same talking points from my trumptrainer friends. And, yes, I still consider them friends as I’ve known them for a half a century. I find the talking points pretty humorous, humorous in the stupid sense. It amazes me that college educated folks can believe the hype and bullshit that is put out by the regressive right. But then they’re sure I’m a commie pinko libtard dimshit. I laugh!
Duane: Welcome to the commie pinko libtard dimshit club. I believe there are a lot of us on this blog.
I never thought about teaching communism’s New World order. Might be a new career. First, I’d have to have someone explain to me what that is. I know that my brother believes that satan wants to a create new world order. Are these the same?
Yes, it is part of the same. I believe it has its origins in Kansas.
Duane: PLDC . . . . I like it. Where do I sign up? Ooooops. I’m THERE already!
Carolmalaysia
I think your brother wants to create a new word order:
“Americans had to put up with the worse president in our history, his name Obama.”
Thanks, Diane. Great article.
I just watched the evening news which reported that over 50,000 teachers marched on Phoenix. The governor has offered a twenty per cent raise, but over three years. We still don’t know if the teachers will accept. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/04/26/606011102/scores-of-schools-in-arizona-close-as-teachers-embark-on-massive-walkout
“In 2013 Arizona had 1,089,384 students enrolled in a total of 2,267 schools in 666 school districts. There were 48,866 teachers in the public schools, or roughly one teacher for every 22 students, compared to the national average of 1:16.”
If 50,000 teachers stormed Arizona’s state capital, it very well could have been almost every teacher in the state.
Wow, that is strong evidence that the teachers in Arizona have reached the limit of abuse and refuse to take it anymore. Good for them. Now, the rest of the teachers across the country should plan to walk out and protest too.
Utah’s ratio is about 23:1. The state counts ANYONE with a teaching certificate in the building as part of those numbers–administrators, counselors, computer specialists, the librarian.
Are the other states calculated this way as well?
Threatened: I know that Illinois calculated its ratio of teachers to students that way back when I was teaching there. Makes every district seem like class sizes are small. Totally unrealistic when compared to the reality of how many students were in classrooms.
I suspect that most of the districts and schools (public, corporate charter, and virtual for-profit charters) in the country use tricks to compute student attendance, the average class size and graduation rates with the same goal … to make them look better than they are.
I know for a fact that the district where I taught for thirty years did it. For instance, at the high school where I taught, the 9th grade had a student population that was always several hundred students larger than the senior graduating class with no info on where the students that didn’t make it to 12th grade went, and the graduation rate was based on the number of 12th graders reaching the end of the year who were still enrolled. If a student dropped out at any time from 9th to the end of 12th and graduation, they were not counted in the final numbers.
Promises not worth the paper on which they are written
“Gregg Garn, the dean of the college of education at the University of Oklahoma, said that who won or lost is yet to be determined. “The teachers clearly were able to make some good strides,” he said. “In the long run, if candidates that support education get elected, that’s what will determine who won or lost.” NYT.
If it ends as I suspect it will with these small gains . The downward spiral will continue.
If these teachers return to the schools, yet stay in the streets and in the capitals, we may have the start of a movement. The forces aligned against them are well organized . “Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob”. The only thing that organized money has ever feared is organized mob.
Teacher working conditions are student learning conditions in fact! Thank you, Diane and HuffPo.
Left Coast Teacher, glad to see you back! What’s in a name?
A teacher by another name would teach as sweet.
I third that.
Great to see you back.
LCT: And what you said is all of it in a nutshell, the crux of the matter.
Thank you for saying it &, yeah, welcome back (you’ve been missed)!
I missed being LeftCoastTeacher, but after I opted my classes out of an SBAC test, my admin had me running scared. Recently, though, I regained my true self. I care not what reformsters think!
You are very prescient in the article. The American people demand spending, but they refuse to pony up the taxes. That is why there is a $21 Trillion dollar national debt, that continues to grow. Many (not all) state constitutions mandate a balanced budget. Some (not all) states require a super-majority to raise taxes.
One by-product of these strikes, is that people may decide that the publicly-operated school system in their state is broken beyond repair. They may decide not to “throw good money after bad”, after seeing test scores and other metrics continue to decline, after many years of spending on public schools.
These strikes may force some citizens to seek to abandon their public school systems altogether, and demand school choice/vouchers/ESAs, as a means to avoid public school shutdowns.
I wonder if any of the strike organizers have considered this.
Charles, you make some very good points here. I’d thought about all of these things myself. (&, sadly again, the majority’s misinterpretation of test scores–tests that test NOTHING &, thus, mean NOTHING. We here know that not only should teachers NEVER have been evaluated by these tests, but neither should students–EVER). While I–as one has has been on strike (& a short & sweet one: lots of parent & public support, but, then, it was in the late ’70s,& the ALEC plan was just getting started {a large part of which is, of course, to vilify public schools & teachers so as to dumb down education & turn “other people’s children” into non-questioning, obedient slave wage workers)–support these actions, I truly believe that the oligarchs may be sitting back, rubbing their hands together w/glee.
And that they are hoping for violence, as well.
Too many teachers are worse off now, relatively speaking, than those who worked BEFORE Unionization became widespread in the 60’s through 70’s.
That period, by the way, corresponded with some of the best achievements in education in the country, with in methodology and results.
Coincidence? NOT!
Yeah, Dave, but it’s not because of the rank-&-file members.(OK is an example of this).
Read NYC Educator, for example, or even Susan Schwartz’s comments on this blog. As a long-time ILL-Annoy Ed. Assn. member, we had a great local & local leadership, but the state leadership often
(perhaps more than less) sold us out, & you can see many examples of that in both the AFT & the NEA all over the U.S.