Archives for category: Administrators, superintendents
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What If “No Child Shows Up”?

By dianeravitch
October 31, 2012 //
15

Recently, school officials in El Paso were investigated and found guilty of pushing certain students out of school to prevent them from taking the state tests. The purpose was to boost the district’s scores and make it appear to be doing better than it was. Some children were literally excluded from school and never finished. The superintendent was convicted and sentenced to jail. This was disgraceful, and it was an indictment of the officials’ personal ethics, but also an indictment of the absurd high-stakes testing regime foisted on the nation by No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top. School officials in some district will do literally anything to get their scores up, even though it hurts children. This is wrong. And the system which it incentivizes this behavior is also wrong.

This blogger has a different take on the El Paso incident. He tends to view it as an example of “opting out” of testing. He longs for the day that “No Child Shows Up.”

Of course, if the superintendent in El Paso had told all children to stay home on testing day, he would now be a national hero to angry parents and educators. Instead, he is a convicted criminal because he did not have the best interests of children in mind. He told only the low-performing students to stay home or to drop out of school. He was not acting in their interest. He was acting from self-interest, trying to inflate the scores of his district.

Someday, all educators will have the courage to stop doing things that they know are educational malpractice.

Categories Accountability, Administrators, superintendents, NCLB (No Child Left Behind), Testing

Dear Dr. King: A Heartfelt Letter to the State Commissioner of Education

By dianeravitch
October 30, 2012 //
11

Tony Sinanis, a father of a third grade student in New York and principal of a school, writes a moving and sincere letter to John King, the state commissioner of education.

With all due deference to the state commissioner, he asks a series of questions about the purpose and quantity of tests now raining down on schools across the state.

Teachers are teaching to the test; children are concluding that are “no good” because they are not good at the testing.

Is this in the best interest of children?

Read the letter. Here is a sample:

First of all, our children are feeling overwhelmed, stressed out and they are starting to doubt their own abilities and it is only October. Why? Maybe it is because they are being subjected to numerous difficult tests and tasks as a result of the expectations of the Student Learning Objectives (SLOs) that have recently been put in place. Don’t get me wrong – I know pre and post assessments are critical and that various data points (when properly analyzed) can be a powerful tool for guiding future instruction and personalizing learning; but, when is enough, enough? Do they really need to take a paper and pencil test in the gym in first grade as part of a Physical Education SLO? Or do they need to take the TerraNova in kindergarten as part of a literacy SLO? Or does a second grader need to take an online assessment as part of reading and mathematics SLOs that can go on for hours? Are these types of assessments really developmentally appropriate (especially when considering some of our kindergarten students are still four years old)? Is the data we are gathering actually useful or even accurate? As I heard you recently mention, each district can negotiate their own SLOs so maybe not every first grader is taking a paper and pencil test in the gym but they are taking some type of assessment even though they have barely had a chance to get acclimated to their new teacher, classroom environment and school year. Is this really in the best interest of children? I am not sure but if it is, please let me know how so I can explain it my third grader who shut down during a mathematics SLO and said he was too stupid to finish and refused to take the test (by the way, his teacher wasn’t sure whether she should intervene because all she wanted to do was swoop in and take care of this little boy’s emotional well being but she worried that it might compromise the integrity of the test). Please understand that I am not questioning the importance of assessment nor the analysis of data to help us better instruct our students but in light of the new APPR and SLO requirements, my question is, are we actually doing what is in the best interest of our children?

Categories Accountability, Administrators, superintendents, New York, Testing

Is Tom Luna the Worst State Superintendent? CORRECTION!

By dianeravitch
October 23, 2012 //
37

If we had a race for the worst state superintendent in the nation, there would be many contenders. One thinks immediately, for example, of Tony Bennett in Indiana or John White in Louisiana.

By worst, I mean someone who has done his best to destroy public education–which is a sacred trust in the hands of the chief state school officer–and to demoralize the teachers who do the daily work of teaching the kids.

One of the top contenders for that odious distinction is Tom Luna of Idaho. Idaho is a small state and it doesn’t usually get a lot of national attention, but Luna has thrust it into the forefront of the national movement to privatize public education.

He was elected with the help of contributions from technology companies. A brilliant investigative report in the Idaho-Stateman last year documented how he raised campaign contributions from the education technology industry and became their darling.

Not being an original thinker, he called his program “Students Come First,” like Joel Klein’s “Children First” and Michelle Rhee’s “Students First.”

Despite a shrinking budget, he bought a laptop for every student and mandated that every student had to take two online courses in order to graduate. A token of appreciation to all those corporations that helped pay for Mr. Luna’s election.

He led a campaign to eliminate collective bargaining and often refers to union members as “thugs.” His reforms, known as the Luna laws, impose merit pay, which has never worked anywhere. He does whatever he can think of to demoralize the teachers of Idaho.

Is he the worst in the nation? There are many other contenders. It’s a close call.

His proposals are up for a vote this year. We will see if the people of Idaho are ready to outsource their children and public schools to for-profit corporations.

[CORRECTION: LUNA IS NOT UP FOR RE-ELECTION UNTIL 2014; HIS PROPOSALS–KNOWN AS THE “STUDENTS COME FIRST” LAWS or PROPS 1, 2, 3–ARE ON THE BALLOT NOVEMBER 6].

A reader in Idaho sent the following information:

An interesting development in Idaho politics is that not a single Democrat supports the “Students Come First” bills, or Props 1,2,3 as they are now commonly referred to, but nearly every Republican does support them, even though many Republican voters don’t. A recent poll was taken that shows props 1,2,3 losing support among voters, the real question is whether that will lead to more Democratic legislators (85/105 Idaho legislators are Republicans). Another interesting development is that the “Vote yes” folks only raised less than half of what the “Vote no” folks did ($500,000 vs $1.3 million), and I’m not really sure why. I think part of it might be that the state is trying to pay very little for the laptops (I think we’re looking for laptops and maintenance for $309/unit) and no company has taken that, and I also think the state is trying to pay half the normal rate for online courses, so for-profit education has held off on contributions.

Categories Accountability, Administrators, superintendents, For-Profit, Idaho, Privatization, Teachers and Teaching, Technology, Computers

Vermillion Parish School Board Joins the Honor Roll

By dianeravitch
October 22, 2012 //
4

Vermillion Parish School Board in Louisiana joins the Honor Roll as a hero of public education because of its refusal to bow down to the unjust, unwise demands of the State Department of Education. The Louisiana State Department of Education is not at all “conservative.” It believes that bureaucracy should override local control and that the people should hand their local schools over to the whims of the state.

The Louisiana Department of Education chastised four school districts for refusing to obey the Legislature’s command to pay no attention to seniority or tenure when laying off teachers. Three of the four districts–including Vermillion–are among the top 15 districts in the state.

You see, the Legislature thinks it knows more about how to reform education than the best districts and the best educators in the state. Ditto State Commissioner John White, who has only two years teaching for Teach for America and has never been a principal or a superintendent until he was suddenly elevated to his present job by Governor Bobby Jindal, who wants to privatize public education and implement the full ALEC agenda.

The Legislature passed a law (Act 1) last spring saying that layoffs should be based “solely” on demand, performance, and effectiveness. Vermillion’s attorney says that the board has a policy based on the same criteria, but it uses experience as a tie-breaker. Unfortunately, in the eyes of the state, the high-performing Vermillion has a teachers’ union, and the district agreed with the union that seniority or tenure would be used as a secondary way to reduce staff.

Anthony Fontana, a member of the Vermillion school board, spoke plainly about what the Jindal administration was trying to do:

“This is an opportunity for Jindal’s administration to bad mouth public education,” said Fontana. “This is another attack on public education. We are not going to stand for it. We have to stand up and fight.”

Jerome Puyau, the superintendent elect of Vermission Parish Schools said, “Our policy does protect great teachers by adding more objective criteria, it takes away the possibility of politics coming into play whether it is the board or superintendent who institutes it. Vermilion Parish respects the experience, certification, and training that great teachers have achieved through the years and has always placed these criteria for major consideration in hiring which is a major reason that Vermilion Parish has been so successful with student achievement.”

This contretemps makes clear what is behind the Jindal agenda: Not improving schools, but privatizing them, even if it ruins the good schools that already exist in Louisiana.

For standing up to the Bullies of Baton Rouge, the Vermillion Parish School Board joins our H0nor Roll as a hero of public education.

 

Categories Administrators, superintendents, ALEC, Jindal, Bobby, Louisiana, Teacher Tenure

Tony Bennett: Fiasco in Indiana

By dianeravitch
October 15, 2012 //
5

Social media has allowed educators to contact one another and express their views. The news they tell does not often get covered in the local press. The educators’ insights are worth sharing.

Read this post from Indiana about State Superintendent of Education Bennett, no friend of public schools.

Bennett is running for re-election against veteran educator Glenda Ritz.

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Chiefs for Change, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Indiana

Why Schools Fail

By dianeravitch
October 15, 2012 //
3

A retired principal, Pat Buoncristiani, writes to describe what she learned in many years of experience..

She writes:

When I was the principal of a struggling Title 1 school I grappled for the reasons behind my children’s difficulties. Others would make suggestions – it’s because their parents don’t care, it’s something about their race, it’s because they have bad role models and so on. It seemed apparent to me that the underlying cause of all this was simple and yet extraordinarily difficult to deal with. It was poverty. Until we deal with the rising tide of poverty in our society too many of our children will continue be swept by this wave into lives that fail to provide them with the means to be effective, enriching members of our society. The soil is poverty and the plant will not grow true and straight in such an environment. Some schools have made great gains in an environment of poverty, but they are too few and we do not seem to have the resources to apply those measures that made them succeed to every school that needs them.

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Poverty

The Next Targets of Corporate Reform

By dianeravitch
October 9, 2012 //
21

Mike Petrilli of the conservative Thomas B. Fordham Institute summarizes “What’s Next” for reformers (some prefer to call them privatizers).

Race to the Top was a great coup for the privatizers/reformers.

Now they plan to follow up with a direct assault on schools of education, abetted by NCTQ’s forthcoming rankings, to be published by US News. NCTQ was created by the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation a dozen years ago, and saved at the outset by a $5 million grant from Secretary of Education Rod Paige. In 2005, it got caught up in a federal investigation for taking money from the Department to speak well of NCLB. Read here to learn more about NCTQ.

The privatizers intend to move on principal evaluation, to make it more like teacher evaluation (test scores matter).

Pension reform will be high on their agenda.

Privatizers will promote digital learning by removing seat time requirements and following the guidance of former Governor Jeb Bush on this subject. No mention is made of the negative evaluations of cyber charters, both by Stanford’s CREDO and the National Education Policy Center, or of exposes that appeared in the New York Times and the Washington Post about the awful performance of cyber charters.

Gird your loins, folks, the privatizers are flush with victories in Wisconsin, Louisiana, Ohio, Michigan, Maine, Florida, and other states, and they are coming back to do some more reforming.

Categories Accountability, Administrators, superintendents, Alternate Route To Certification, Bush, Jeb, Charter Schools, Common Core, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, For-Profit, Louisiana, Pensions, Principals, Privatization, Race to the Top, Teacher Evaluations, Technology, Computers, Testing, US Education

Make the Best of It?

By dianeravitch
October 2, 2012 //
20

Carol Burris has valiantly rallied her fellow principals in New York to oppose the state’s test-based evaluation system created in response to Race to the Top.

Carol is principal of an exemplary high school in Rockville Center, New York.

Some readers responded to her latest post by saying, “look, it’s over. They won. Live with it. Make the best of it.”

I hear this all the time: Stop fighting. The train is leaving the station. Resistance is futile.

Carol answers here:

I will continue to put my energies into bringing this awful system down even as I seek to protect my teachers from it as best I can. There is nothing that the creators of this system would like more than for us to ‘make the best of it’. The ‘make of the best of it argument’ was what inspired MLK’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail. I am so glad that King wrote that remarkable letter and did not take the advice to slow down and make the best of segregation.

Categories Accountability, Administrators, superintendents, Education Reform, New York, Race to the Top, Teacher Evaluations

When Education Doesn’t Matter

By dianeravitch
September 22, 2012 //
17

Louisiana under Bobby Jindal is diminishing the value of certification. State Commissioner of Education John White (ex-TFA) thinks that nothing more is needed than a college diploma to be a teacher. Extra degrees, like a masters or a doctorate, will not be recognized or rewarded  in this state. In other words, they want students to get more education but not their teachers.

This teacher wonders if she can get her money back:

I earned a Ph.D. In Curriculum and Instruction from Louisiana’s flagship university to strengthen my pedagogy and to live in the joy of learning. With each passing day my degree is becoming irrelevant. Do I have grounds to demand the return of tuition and punitive damages for establishing what are now false certification and academic advancement requirements that are no longer needed to be a teacher in Louisiana?

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Education Reform

What Is Peer Assistance and Review?

By dianeravitch
September 7, 2012 //
19

A reader in Maryland wrote to second the nomination of Joshua Starr as an outstanding superintendent who supports students, teachers, principals, and schools and resists harmful federal policy.

One of the outstanding features of the Montgomery County schools is the PAR approach to teacher evaluation. It is about 1,000 times better than VAM or VAA or any of the other test-based methods now dominating federal and state methods.

It’s an honor to serve under Josh Starr in Montgomery County, MD. He is a very approachable Superintendent (day one: call me Josh). He travels extensively to all the schools in the county, which is quite a feat. He knows the dangers of too much testing. He tweets regularly (MCPS and MCPSSUPER).

And yes, our PAR system is good. It’s detailed here:
      http://www.mceanea.org/pdf/PAR2012-13MCEAGuide.pdf

One of the things I like most about PAR is this. If a teacher is found to be not teaching at an acceptable level, they aren’t just tossed under the bus. As we all know on this blog, there can be a multitude of reasons why someone is not teaching well, or maybe not as well as they used to. That teacher, once identified, gets help from a Consulting Teacher, who is a long time teacher of that subject. The two teachers work together for a year on helping the teacher become better, in whatever area(s) they need help in. At the end of the year, the PAR panel decides if the teacher has improved and can stay, or if the teacher should then be let go.

Bringing on new teachers is an expensive process and a big investment for the local community. Canning them after some bad test scores, without first trying to help that teacher correct any deficiencies, is a waste of taxpayer money. PAR helps preserve that investment.

Categories Accountability, Administrators, superintendents, Teacher Evaluations
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