John Ewing, a mathematician and president of Math for America, wrote in Forbes about a conference he recently attended about education. He noticed that none of the experts at the conference were teachers. When he asked the conference leader, his question was dismissed.
He remembered that Mike Rose had done a check of articles in the “New Yorker.” Most of the articles about medicine were written by doctors. None of the articles about education were.
Ewing maintains that teachers should make major policy decisions, not politicians. I say, “Hurray for John Ewing!” (By the way, he wrote one of the best takedown of value-added assessment of teachers published anywhere, in 2011, called “Mathematical Intimidation: Driven by the Data.”)
Ewing writes:
Teachers are the ones who drive reform forward, not policy makers. Should teachers weigh in on issues that affect their students? It seems absurd to even ask such a question. Good teachers know their students best. When we ignore this, we make colossal mistakes, like creating bizarre testing regimes or proposing misaligned curricula.
Education suffers when we don’t value teacher expertise, but the worst consequence is something more lasting: The teaching profession becomes less attractive. The best eventually leave, fewer of the best enter, and over time teacher expertise declines, creating a downward spiral.
Yes, I know, not every teacher is an accomplished expert, just as not every doctor is. But many are, and they are the ones we need most. Instead, they leave. Worse, they tell brilliant young people who think about teaching as a career: “You can do better.” A 2019 PDK survey asked teachers whether they would advise their own children to follow in their footsteps; less than half (45 percent) said they would.
The week of May 4 is Teacher Appreciation Week in the United States. This year, instead of giving teachers a plant or a letter or a video (all suggestions from the internet), why not give them something they can use? Give them respect—the kind that recognizes their expertise. Otherwise, we might all soon be asking … “Where are the teachers?”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I’m reading ed reform on the coronavirus crisis. Predictably, it’s 100% echo chamber. The same 15 “experts” over and over and over, all 100% critical of public schools and 100% cheerleaders for charters and vouchers.
Here’s an example:
leonie haimson
LLC – webinar w/Wendy Kopp, WEF & Larry Summers pushing online learning
TFA, a tech billionaire, and Larry Summers. Those are our “public education experts”
I don’t know- is it actually FORBIDDEN in ed reform to speak to anyone who works in an actual public school? Is that barred?
They have to TRY to exclude 90% of students and families in the country. It takes real effort. Keeping the echo chamber pure of any public school input takes real gatekeeping, but they manage.
Exactly! Chiara, I always love your take on things. Thank you!
The problem with us teachers is that we’re not selling something. We don’t push products that wealthy donors to education policy makers and publications want to sell. We teachers care about supporting students and about supporting democratic society. Politicians don’t listen to us because there isn’t any money in it for them.
There was an op-ed in the Sunday WaPo that showed just how out of touch politicians are when it comes to education. While parents across the country — around the world — lament not being able to send their youngsters to school, Jeb! Bush wrote that online classes should be the forever future. What ignorance! Well, he’s selling something. I’m not buying.
Great to see this coming from someone on the outside of the profession. Truly. (But those of us on the inside have been saying the same things for literally decades…)
Thank you, John Ewing! And Diane!
The best publishing manager I ever worked under, Bill Gray, once started a meeting by saying, “I’ve been very successful in this business, and I’m going to start, today, by telling you how I did that. I found people who knew a lot more than I did and left them the hell alone to do their work.”
I taught at the beginning of my career, spent many years in publishing, and then went back to teaching. The main thing that I noticed that had changed wasn’t the technology or what fads the kids were obsessed with but, rather, how dramatically teacher authority had been undermined. In the old days, administrators typically treated teachers as the experts. They would say, all the time, “I don’t know. You know about this. You decide.” But now, teachers are terribly, sickeningly micromanaged. And this is disheartening and dispiriting in the extreme, for people rarely perform at their best in conditions of low autonomy.
One thing more comment on this topic, and that’s about the mechanism at work in these conferences. The experts who give TEDTalks and talks at conferences often have a key idea to sell, and often this is a magic elixir of some kind–a universal cure-all. The BIG IDEA to the exclusion of other ideas. Education is rife with these. “Don’t be a sage on the stage; be a guide on the side.” “Discovery is ownership.” and so on. But working professionals know that life and kids and situations are more complex, and there are many ways to butter toast. There are extraordinarily successful teachers who are lecturers but are so engaging, such magnetic personalities, that kids learn enormously from them. There are others who are incredibly patient nurturers and observers great at almost imperceptibly nudging children toward accomplishment on their own. There are times when it’s important to make a discovery for one’s self. There are other times when if everything has to be discovered and some of it is not simply be given, nothing gets done. Every trade involves a LOT of knowing the particular situation. If x and y, then z. If x and not y, then f. This is the stuff one picks up along the way–the feel for the situation.
It’s time for administrators (and everyone else) to stop telling cats the ten steps they must take to catch a mouse. The cats know better, and they don’t want to hear it, and they will tell you, in their unique but very clear way to _____ off. They might scratch your eyes out or at least want to do so.
Years ago, I wrote Magic Elixir: No Evidence required! https://www.opednews.com/articles/Magic-Elixir-No-Evidence-by-Susan-Lee-Schwartz-130312-433.html
” Privatized America, for the wealthy and by the wealthy: ” magical elixirs” and charter schools, sold to the public as genuine solutions by businesses who have appointed and anointed themselves the ‘experts!. for the education of children who will not be children for long. No classroom experience or evidence required to purchase the curricula and materials that ENABLE learning, and the voice of the professional silenced.
Haa!!! Great, Susan!!!
“….”I found people who knew a lot more than I did and left them the hell alone to do their work.” ”
My first principal said these words to me many years ago. His school was filled with teachers who were dedicated and gave much more than anyone could imagine. He has been gone for over 20 years, but the school still gets students who move to our area for our school, even though the prevailing philosophy of administration is more in line with contemporary thought.
A thousand years after Rome became an empire and the senate became an entity without teeth, that senate continued to meet and make decisions. Reputation dies hard in the public mind.
Posted at OpEd News. https://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/John-Ewing-We-Should-List-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Education_Education-Funding_Education-Laws_Educational-Crisis-200504-8.html
with this link to Peter Greene’s post on this subject http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2020/04/demonstrating-why-business-ideas-dont.html.
Demonstrating Why Business Ideas Don’t Help Public Education (Example #3,244,781)
a few quotes:
“Sure, you can cut a school to the bones in the name of efficiency, but what you’ll have is the educational equivalent of a nation caught flatfooted by a global pandemic because it didn’t have the people in place to be prepared.”
Competition Guarantees Losers. “Ed Reformsters just love the bromide about how competition raises all boats and makes everyone better. And yet, the pandemic’s free market approach to critical medical supplies doesn’t seem to bear that out. States are being forced to compete with each other and the federal government, and all it’s doing is making vendors rich. This is free market competition at its baldest– if you have more money, you win. If you have less money, you lose. At some point, if it has not already happened, some people in this country are going to die because their state, municipality or medical facility will not have enough money to outbid someone else.
“The free market picks losers, and it generally picks them on the basis of their lack of wealth. The notion that losers can just compete harder, by wrapping their bootstraps in grit, is baloney. It’s comforting for winners to believe that they won because of hard work and grit and not winning some fate-based lottery, and it also releases them from any obligation to give a rat’s rear about anyone else (“I made myself, so everyone else should do the same”).
“A system built on picking losers and punishing them for losing is the exact opposite of what we need for public education. You can argue that well, we just want free market competition for schools and teachers, but if that kind of competition is in the dna of the system, it will stomp all over students as well, just as all free market businesses pick customers to be losers who don’t get served because they aren’t sufficiently profitable. Kind of like a low-revenue state or old folks home that can’t get its people necessary supplies because they don’t have enough wealth to bid with.”
“Compete harder” just means “be richer.” It is not helpful advice.
“The Scamateur”
Don’t ask expert, just ask me!
My career is “pol” you see
I don’t need to have a clue
Expertise is just for you
The rich and powerful interlopers have done everything they can to marginalize real teachers. They have been controlling policy for many years, and for at least ten plus years, political pawns have slashed school budgets. They have turned public education into a political football. Wealthy vandals have bought political representation that has put public schools on a test and punish treadmill. They have insulted and assaulted numerous schools and teachers. Despite the chronic failure of their privatization schemes, they keep inventing new ways to undermine public education. As long as public education is considered a commodity, and not a public service, they will continue to chisel away at democratic public education in order to transfer public funds into private pockets.
Supporters of public schools need to send a message to politicians. If your goal is to privatize our schools and destroy the teaching profession, you will not have our vote. We will work to get you out of office.
The problem is that most professionals (teachers, doctors, and others) don’t have time to watch politicians and make sure they don’t do things that are damaging to their profession.
It has gotten so bad that we quite literally need watchdogs to keep track of what our supposed “representatives” are doing to make sure they don’t sell the farm out from under us.
Career politicians are the source of many of our problems.
We badly need term limits
So true, SomeDAM. These rich vandals do not even want the people to have a say in public education. A lot of states have worked to make educational decisions a top down imposition. In Florida the governor and his cronies manipulate to try to neutralize the authority of locally elected school boards while they place greater authority in the governor and legislature.
we quite literally need watchdogs to keep track of what our supposed “representatives” are doing to make sure they don’t sell the farm out from under us.
This is, ofc, why the Diane Ravitch blog is so important
public school lobbyists?
SWith the current situation teachers must be heard. Not just any teachers but those who realize the system of education was never designed for all children.
Teachers, tell the politicians to get out of stupid. When kids return their skills will be all over the board: https://savingstudents-caplee.blogspot.com/2020/03/when-kids-get-back-to-school.html
There are three million public school teachers and millions of retirees. Our expertise spans ages 4 to 18 (K to 12) in core academics, special areas, special education, classroom management, and much more. The reading, math, and science “wars” have given many the impression that we still can’t articulate best practices. But that’s only because the variables that can dictate success are as wide ranging as the near infinite variety of individual and collective (class) personalities, stages of development, and backgrounds that we encounter. What works for one of us does not work for all of us. So which teacher could possibly speak for all of us? However letting billionaire edu-meddlers speak for even one of us is something we should fight tooth and nail.
Amen
The reality is that we are siloed away from their world—and although I bristle at us vs. them, there it is. I’d never be in the same room as Wendy Kopp. There won’t be a gala to celebrate a $50 donation in our sphere. We don’t have Wall Street execs on our boards. We know this already.
—But we have something they don’t have: the respect of the American public whose families we serve. They’ll never get the joy of a student’s translating a Latin sentence for the first time; the awesomeness of a reticent learner’s effort on a Geometry problem; or the thrill of an ELL’s speaking an English sentence. They understand 3 things: money, power & control.
I have not given up hope—and this is my 36th year as a (mainly) Latin teacher & Union member—that the combined strength of our dedicated professional teachers & staff and the support of our families WILL be enough to withstand the inanity of their movement.
Our biggest challenge, I think, is teaching the public that we’re still a worthy investment. 85% of us still believe. No, we’ll never rub elbows w/ a Gates, Broad, Bush or Walton. But within our communities and states, being teachers means much more
than they’ll ever offer. Is there any other reason we don’t get invited to their parties?
Evidently, you have to be Jeffrey Epstein to get invited to their parties.
Ouch!
Which begs the question: who would even want to be invited to their parties?
Other than Harvard and MIT profs, that is.
Hard to tell Jeffrey from them. After all, he had the office, too.
Ain’t that something that Harvard, Yale & Columbia have all sold their ivy souls to get a piece of the reform action? This is the typical channel for the current leadership: decent undergrad school, TFA, Broad-backed leadership MBA, then ‘policy’/TFA-alum-started charter leadership/superintendency/state director of Ed/other titles too long for this blog…
We mere career teachers just ain’t part of that circle. It’s as if they’re afraid they’ll catch cooties if they mingle with the masses— for whom there is great disdain.
Right on, Kelley. You are not invited to their parties because you have to be a celebrity or a billionaire to gain admission.
But what you do is far more important than what they do. You change lives day to day. Long after Gates, Broad, the Waltons, etc. are gone and forgotten, your students will remember you.
I agree with this article, but want to point out one thing that I hear too often, “The best eventually leave, fewer of the best enter, and over time teacher expertise declines, creating a downward spiral.” I have never liked that when I hear that the “Best” ones are leaving. Teaching is not a competitive sport. There is no “Best”. The “award” winners that I have seen are ones who take time to promote themselves or ones that others (teachers or admin) promote. There is no relationship between “best” and award winners. I retired earlier than I “should have” because I felt like I didn’t have a say anymore. Most of my career was spent learning what was best for kids and I could change accordingly. Teaching in our district turned into “trying to please your boss” instead of doing what was best for kids. I absolutely hate to see what has happened to education, but in no way do I feel that the “Best” have left. There are many good teachers still in the profession and many good ones are going into education. Unfortunately, many good ones have left and many are going elsewhere.
Do teachers and/or politicians understand that we have been doing the same thing for decades and expecting different results?
The reading wars have been ongoing for decades basically because the pronunciation of phonemes is taught wrongly in almost all schools throughout the world.
The problem is not the method. A little thinking will tell us that many children left school as illiterates during the whole word as well as the phonics period. Many, including Diane Ravitch, learned to read and are teachers today from the whole word period.
What was the common mistake during both these periods? They taught pronunciation of phonemes wrongly which disengaged many smart kids from learning to read.
Diane, get the politicians and teachers to discuss this and the reading wars will end.
Ewing’s critique of the ed conference, & his follow-ups, are spot-on. The U ed prof views ALL teachers as any sage-on-a-stage does his students: empty vessels to receive his expertise. This disappears the process of teaching– where teachers actually learn how to educate– entirely. I’m guessing that’s a tic baked into many in his profession– it justifies it. City/ state admins are going to have a worker-bee view of teachers. In right-to-work states, that’s exactly what they are. In states with strong teachers’ unions, govt admin is “management,” so workers have some voice; mgt pronouncements ignoring teachers are opening gambits in a negotiation. Remnick’s an editor– his view of education as “like politics or sports” is comically straightforward. I guess even The New Yorker is a rag looking to boost circulation.
Not listening to teachers or not including them in discussions about education is like having an engineer telling an artist what and how to paint, or having an artist telling a civil engineer how to build a bridge.
Many people are responsible for demeaning teachers and setting false expectations for them. The worst of the worst are economists like Eric Hanushek and his economist wife Margaret Raymond who eagerly provide dubious data to almost anyone who wants to prevent teachers from collective bargaining. Then there is Betsy DeVos who knows more about yachts that teaching.
Researchers at the “The New Teacher Project” otherwise known as TNTP are still at it. About a decade ago TNTP studied teacher evaluations expecting to see something like a bell curve triage, sorting the best teachers from average teachers and the worst. They are still working at “human capital” solutions to poor test scores, first set forth in their insulting re-publication of “The Widget Effect.”
Teachers may be the most qualified to speak about education but they are not well-organized as a collective and with political clout. Our large teacher unions (AFT, NEA) are not regarded as professional associations even though they have issued codes of ethical conduct (e.g., https://www.nea.org/assets/docs/Code_of_Ethics_Education_Profession_NEA_HB_2019.pdf)
A reasoned definition of a profession is this: A majority of people are engaged in a full-time occupation having gained entry by specialized preparation in higher education programs and participation in governing member-associations. These associations have published codes of conduct and ethics specific to the occupation. Members of the occupation are often, but not always, subject to passing state and/or national tests followed by licensure to practice and periodic updates authorized or required to maintain professional standing. This definition is adapted from a lovely history of the meaning and corruption of meaning of the term professional. https://www.somegreymatter.com/professional.htm
There are professional associations for almost every subject matter in schools, for school administrators (superintendents, principals, supervisors) for counselors, IT specialists, librarians, the “Council of Chief State School Officers” and so on. I do not know if there are published codes of conduct and ethics for all of them, but I do know that none have the professional clout associated with membership in the American Bar Association, for example, or the American Medical Association the most “elite” among professions that also include architecture, engineering, veterinarian medicine, nursing, and the occupation of historian. https://www.historians.org/jobs-and-professional-development/statements-standards-and-guidelines-of-the-discipline/statement-on-standards-of-professional-conduct
There can be no doubt that the assault on professionalism in education has been unrelenting for decades. It was jump started by the Reagan Administration with the 1983 publication “A Nation at Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform.” Regan wanted to end a federal post dedicated to education, then occupied by conservative Terrel H. Bell and later by William Bennett. https://www2.ed.gov/pubs/NatAtRisk/risk.html
Diane and others know more than I do about the coordinated efforts to rid teaching of any claims to professionalism. Many of these efforts are aided by economists and billionaires who think education is not different from a business where teachers are overpaid service-providers.
Nation at Risk may have jump-started disrespect for teachers, but it came to flower in the address Bob Dole gave accepting the nomination for president. He laid all educational problems at the feet of teachers. That was 1996. He may not have won, but four years later we got Bush II and NCLB, brought to you by a bi-partisan effort to improve us. Until Warren and Sanders came out with the suggestions they did during the last campaign, every political leader who ran for office seemed to have done polling that made them think that it was OK to bash teachers.
As for “professionalism,” I am required to keep a folder documenting my professional behavior as part of my personal evaluation. Are other professions similarly required by state law to prove they are behaving a certain way?
It’s a powerful opinion piece in Forbes, a respected financial periodical. Speaking truth to power.
Hopefully it continues to gain traction.