Archives for category: New York
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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

Principals Give Flunking Grade to NY Teacher Evaluation Scheme

By dianeravitch
October 1, 2012 //
12

New York had the bad luck to win $700 million in Race to the Top funding.

The politicians thought it would help balance the budget, not realizing that the grant would not be available to plug budget holes.

Now we know that principals think the costly, time-wasting evaluation system is useless. Eighty percent find it inaccurate.

Money will be wasted on this invalid system even as budgets are cut.

Some day we will look back at Race to the Top and wonder, “What were they thinking? $5 billion for that?”

Was it intended to demoralize teachers or was that an unintended consequence?

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

A Hero Principal: Every Principal Should Be This Honest

By dianeravitch
September 28, 2012 //
19

Several readers, including parents in this district, have sent me a copy of this letter written by Don Sternberg of Wantagh Elementary School in Long Island, New York.

Sternberg wrote a letter to the school’s parents at the start of the school year telling them about how the politicians and bureaucrats at Albany were messing up their child’s education.

He wrote:

What we will be teaching students is to be effective test takers; a skill that does not necessarily translate into critical thinking – a skill set that is necessary at the college level and beyond. This will inevitably conflict with authentic educational practice – true teaching.
Unfortunately, if educators want to survive in the new, Albany-created bureaucratic mess that is standardized assessments to measure teacher performance, paramount to anything else, we must focus on getting kids ready for the state assessments. This is what happens when non-educators like our governor and state legislators, textbook publishing companies (who create the assessments for our state and reap millions of our tax dollars by doing so), our NYS Board of Regents, and a state teachers’ union president get involved in creating what they perceive as desirable educational outcomes and decide how to achieve and measure them. Where were the opinions of teachers, principals, and superintendents? None were asked to participate in the establishment of our new state assessment parameters. Today, statisticians are making educational decisions in New York State that will impact your children for years to come.

Standardized assessment has grown exponentially. For example, last year New York State fourth graders, who are nine or ten years old, were subjected to roughly 675 minutes (over 11 hours) of state assessments which does not include state field testing. This year there will be a state mandated pre-test in September and a second mandated pre-test in January for all kindergarten through fifth grade students in school. In April, kindergarten through fifth grade students will take the last test [assessment] for the year.

Excessive testing is unhealthy. When I went to school I was never over-tested and subsequently labeled with an insidious number that ranked or placed me at a Level 1, Level 2, Level 3 or Level 4 as we do today. Do you want your child to know their assigned ‘Level’? What would the impact be on their self-esteem and self-worth at such a young age?

Inevitably, he said, teachers would look at students as more or less desirable because what the students do will affect the teachers’ evaluation scores.

He urged parents to do their part, but he laid the blame for this massive distortion of educational purpose where it belongs: on the State Commissioner of Education, the Governor, and the Legislature.

The new system is a mess. It is an outrage. It is a crime against education and against children. Parents need to know what the state (and federal government) is doing to their children. They need to know how good schools and good teachers are being demoralized.

Donald Sternberg is a hero of public education. He joins our honor roll.

If every principal explained to the parents what the state is doing to their children and the harm being inflicted on them, we would turn this nation’s failed corporate education policies around and let our educators educate.

Categories Accountability, Cuomo, Andrew, Education Reform, Honor Roll, New York, Parents, Principals, Teacher Evaluations, Testing, US Education

Study: Charters Putting Catholic Schools Out of Business

By dianeravitch
September 25, 2012 //
9

A new study says that for every charter that opens, a Catholic school closes.

The author, Abraham Lackman, who worked for the New York state senate when it passed the first charter law in 1998, said that no one anticipated that charters–which are publicly-funded and tuition-free–would drain students from Catholic schools, which are not tuition-free.

He says the charters are not as good as Catholic schools and cost the state additional millions of dollars.

The head of the foundation that supports charters in Albany said that parents make the choice. “We’re more concerned with where they’re going, not with where they’re coming from,” he said.

Categories Catholic Schools, New York

Race to the Top or Crawl to the Bottom?

By dianeravitch
September 17, 2012 //
4

This reader sees ominous signs as his school complies with the demands of Race to the Top:

Race to the Top is diverting teacher know-how, skill, talent, passion, etc to numbers crunching and reporting. taking valuable time away from figuring out how to teach well. We are heading rapidly to where the only people who will be able to get a deep enough education to be capable of being in charge of anything in the world will be those who can go to private schools.

Race to the Top is a misnomer – it is Crawl off the Bottom because it does not allocate any”measurable” value to AP classes, college credit offerings. art or music. Our numbers are measured by scores on academic tests. To comply with Race to the Top, we have to give our students a “pre-test” at the beginning of our classes this September, a test designed for students to fail because it is similar to what they will take as final exams at the end of the year. the point being to show improvement, but it means students all over NYS are starting off their year by massively taking tests they will fail miserably on, per requirement of NyS’ compliance with RTT.Every teacher I know learned in their earliest classes & experiences, that testing to show failures is VERY bad pedagogy.

And to keep things in perspective, 60% of the federal budget goes to war & defense, compared to 2% to education. The rest of the cost of public schooling is carried by state & local governments. is that the kind of support that will allow this generation to run the country any better? I don’t think so.

Categories New York, Race to the Top, Teachers and Teaching

How Did a Good Teacher Get a So-So Rating?

By dianeravitch
September 15, 2012 //
12

One of our readers got his score from the state education department. He is in a state of shock and rage:

Today I’m angry, disgusted, demoralized,and frustrated. I am also firmly resolved to fight back against the tsunami of junk ideology that all good educators face these days.

I received my ‘growth score’ today from the New York State Education Department.

I know, I really shouldn’t care what my score is. I know 100% of my students tested at or above grade level in Math and English Language Arts. I know my class’ scores were near or at the very top of my district’s scores. I know my district is also at or nearly at the top of the region’s and states’ scores. I know I work my heart out and push my students to excel. My students always, ALWAYS succeed.

Yet according to the NYSED my growth score is so so. I’m rated effective with a growth score of 14 out of 20. Keep in mind, my student’s mean scale in math is 708.4 and ELA it is 678. I’m confident both scores are well above that state mean.

So why did I get a mediocre growth score?

The state’s explanation of it’s calculation should be a eye opener for all of us. Check out this junk math.

Click to access Teachers_Guide_to_Interpreting_Your_Growth_Score.pdf

Here it is in a nutshell..

They compare your students with similar students and measure how your students do to these similar students. You are then graded based on how much better your students did or how much ‘poorer’ your students did than these other students. They look for the gap between your students and the representative group of similar students.

Here the flaw…

If the representative sample of student all do well, your ratings will be negatively affected, because your growth is based on only how much better your students did than the group. In other words they look for a gap between your students and the group.

We all know that this year scores went up for everyone.. so as they rise, individual teachers get lower ratings, because the gap doesn’t increase. Sounds nuts doesn’t it? Goes against all the jargon about closing the gap.

It gets worse if you happen to have some high performing students in your class as well. Not much room for growth if you’re near the top, and your group is near the top. It’s a teacher’s advantage then to not take those high performing kids, It will hurt their growth scores.

My students did great, it’s a shame that NYS thinks they did so, so. Perhaps, if my students understood pineapples and hare races a little better, they could have correctly answered just 1 more question in that 6 hour marathon of testing correct, and all would be well.

We have a choice, we could start practicing saying, “welcome to Walmart”, for our next career or fight back. What say you?

http://rlratto.wordpress.com/2012/09/05/growth-scores-a-formula-for-failure/

Categories Accountability, New York, Teacher Evaluations

Syracuse Elementary Schools Drop Recess

By dianeravitch
September 7, 2012 //
29

In hopes of raising test scores, elementary schools in Syracuse are eliminating recess.

This discounts mountains of research about the importance of non-cognitive skills, which are often learned on the playground,

And too there is the pesky fact that children need tine to run and play.

A sound mind in a healthy body.

But not in Syracuse.

Categories Childhood, Pre-K, K, Education Reform, New York, Testing

Thanks, NCLB. Thanks, Race to the Top

By dianeravitch
September 6, 2012 //
9

A reader described the start of the new school year. It began on a sad note:

School started for me yesterday.  We had twos of professional development which meant our principal and a few other suits lecturing us about what we needed to do to keep our school from closing.  At one point the principal said, “if you have a problem with what I’m telling you, maybe this isn’t the right school for you”  very nice on the 2nd day of the new school year.
Today our local superintendent came for a minute.  He seems very sad.  He looked defeated.  He came to wish us well and tell us that NY state is now deciding which schools live or die.  NYC is no longer in the loop.  He said he doesn’t agree with the state but the bottom line is that everything hinges on the results of the ELA and Math state exams.  He said it didn’t look promising.
I work in an urban school with a high percentage of challenging children.  Each year as more children go to Charters we get those who nobody wants.   The numbers of elementary students are declining while the numbers of middle school are increasing as Charters cherry pick the best students and leave us the rest.
This is not considered.  ELA and Math scores only will decide our fate.
To have our Superintendent so defeated before one child has set foot into my school this year is troubling.  He said he just wanted to be honest with us.
What a way to start a new school year.

Categories Accountability, NCLB (No Child Left Behind), New York, Race to the Top

In New York, the Destruction Continues

By dianeravitch
September 1, 2012 //
7

New York state published a list of schools based on measures like test scores and graduation rates. At the top are “reward” schools. At the bottom are “priority” schools.

This is the amazing discovery. The schools that enroll mostly white and Asian students in affluent neighborhoods are doing a great job; they get a reward. The schools that enroll mostly black and Hispanic students in poor neighborhoods are doing a bad job; they are in line to get sanctions, interventions.

Bruce Baker did a statistical analysis, posted here. He called the state’s methods “junk science.”

New York City parent activist Leonie Haimson asked a question:

“Does anyone know if [state Commissioner of Education John] King looked at 5 year graduation rates as well as 4 year rates when putting together the focus/priority HS lists as he promised to do at the State Assembly hearings with the NCLB waivers?  

Many NYC high schools like Columbus etc. justifiably complained that they were being punished for taking in a lot of new immigrant kids who didn’t even speak English when entering the school.  Six years would be even better for schools with a lot of ELL kids.

 Of course nothing makes any sense here about “rewarding” schools that primarily are made up of wealthy white and Asian kids and/or require entrance exams so they can further replicate, like Anderson and Stuy.  Is that the federal/state answer to eliminating the achievement gap?”

Norm Scott, retired teacher, prolific blogger and lead producer of the film “The Inconvenient Truth Behind ‘Waiting for Superman’,” summed up this policy as “Insanity Reigns.” This policy, he writes, “will force the most struggling schools to focus resources on tests instead of doing what is necessary.”

Carol Burris reviewed the list and discovered only two charter schools in the state at the top and two at the bottom. She writes:

I have been perusing the Reward Schools List produced by New York State and was quite surprised to find how few charter schools are on it. There are two to be exact– Bronx Charter School of Excellence and Williamsburg Collegiate Charter School. To make the list, you must first be in good standing,  that is you must first make AYP. Certainly Ms. Moskowitz’s charters do that. See the link she posts here: http://www.successacademies.org/page.cfm?p=11

The schools cannot have growing gaps between groups and the performance index for those groups relative to comparative groups must be in the top 20%. Given that low SES students are compared with low SES students, I would imagine Success Academies do well, as indicated on their website. 

However, there is a final criteria to be a Reward school.  For the past two years, your students must show yearly growth that exceeds the median growth for students in the state. Growth scores are adjusted for poverty, ELL status and SWD status. You can find the requirements to be a high performing, reward school here: http://roundtheinkwell.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/rewardschoolsidentificationtechnicaldocumentation-2.pdf

 There are 53 New York City public schools on the Reward school list. Some are test ins, but others are neighborhood schools. Given all the hype about Success Charters and KIPP schools, wouldn’t you expect to see those schools on the list? Could it be that they keep kids at minimum proficiency but do not get them to grow?  I think these are questions worth asking.

 By the way, there were two charters on the priority schools list (the troubled schools list) as well.

Teacher Julie Cavanaugh teaches children who live in low-income housing projects. She wrote (on Norm Scott’s blog): “…cash rewards and options for opting out of some state regulations for schools that are doing great, which is correlated with population. More external pressure and “accountability” for schools that are not, which has to do w/ population, but no policies to actually help these kids…  as long as we are going by test scores the results of programs like these will be the same:  schools with highest concentrations of ELL/Special needs/and children living in poverty will be “low achieving” and schools with low poverty rates (or no poverty) and small numbers of ELLs and special needs students will be “high achieving.”

Here is the list of schools in New York state. Do your own analysis.

Categories Accountability, Education Reform, New York

NCLB Waivers and Junk Science in New York

By dianeravitch
August 31, 2012 //
8

Bruce Baker has another brilliant analysis, this time gauging the validity of school ratings just released by the state of New York. A thumbnail sketch: New York is stiffing its neediest schools and districts.

Here are the takeaways:

1. The waiver process is illegal. It is not the prerogative of any federal official–not even a cabinet member–to decide to disregard a federal law and to substitute his own policies for the ones in the law. If the law stinks, as NCLB does, revise it. That’s the way our legal system works. Once the precedent is set, any future cabinet member may decide to change the laws to suit his or her fancy. That’s wrong.

2. New York state released a list of schools in relation to their “performance.”  Surprise, surprise! Here is what Baker discovered:

Notably, schools in “good standing” are lowest BY FAR in % of children qualified for free lunch, percent of children who are black, or Hispanic, and are also generally lower in percent of children who are limited in their English Language Proficiency. Race and poverty differences are particularly striking!

In short, the Obama/Duncan administration has given NY State officials license to experiment disproportionately on low income and minority children – or for that matter – simply close their schools. No attempt to actually legitimately parse “blame” or consider the possibility that the state itself might share in that blame.

AFTER ALL, NEW YORK STATE CONTINUES TO MAINTAIN ONE OF THE MOST REGRESSIVE STATE SCHOOL FINANCE SYSTEMS IN THE COUNTRY! 

The third takeaway is that the state violates its own funding formula and underfunds all schools, but especially the schools that enroll the neediest students.

“…the current New York State school foundation aid formula is hardly equitable or adequate for meeting the needs of children attending the state’s highest need districts. But to rub salt in the wound – FOR THE PAST SEVERAL YEARS, THE GOVERNOR AND LEGISLATURE HAVE CHOSEN TO DISREGARD ENTIRELY THEIR OWN WOEFULLY INADEQUATE STATE AID FORMULA.

Even worse, when the Governor and Legislature have levied CUTS TO THAT FORMULA, they have levied those cuts such that they disproportionately cut more state aid per pupil from the higher need districts. As of 2011-12, some high need districts including the city of Albany had shortfalls in state funding (from what would be expected if the foundation formula was actually funded) that were greater than the total foundation aid they were actually receiving.“

Categories Budget Cuts, Cuomo, Andrew, Education Reform, Federal Waiver, New York, Race to the Top
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