Archives for category: Teacher Evaluations
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The Gates Foundation Defends Its Agenda

By dianeravitch
August 8, 2012 //
4

Anthony Cody, the exemplary science teacher-mentor (NBCT), from Oakland, California, has engaged the Gates Foundation in a dialogue about its agenda.

Anthony was concerned that the foundation has propelled the frenzy to test more, to blame teachers for low scores, and to ignore poverty.

Vicki Phillips of the foundation responded here to his challenge.

And on the same page, you will see Anthony’s response to Phillips.

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On another site, for which there is no link, I saw the following comment on the foundation’s statement to Anthony Cody:

      Right off the bat Phillips presents us with an argumentative frame that does
      not exist — that there are people who “defend all teachers at all costs” —
      and uses that erroneous frame to claim a vaunted “middle ground” where, of
      course, all the “serious work” is being done, implying that anyone who
      disagrees with her agenda is not engaged in “serious work.”
      Then there’s this:
       “The notion that student learning should play no part in teacher evaluation
      systems, or that test scores should be the only measure of teaching
      performance, represent two extreme but unproductive camps.”
       Again, a made-up polarity. No one I know of maintains that “student learning
      should play no part.” She uses this false frame to conflate test scores with
      “student learning” and again imply that her point of view is the only
      “serious” and legitimate perspective.
      The whole emphasis on “multiple measures” is yet another erroneous
      construct. The crux of the matter isn’t whether to use multiple measures but
      whether to include erroneous measures and give them undue emphasis that is
      harmful to teachers and by connection students.
      Finally, she does nothing to contradict the now conventional wisdom that
      evaluation is something done TO teachers rather than WITH them because
        public school teachers can’t be trusted. That’s just my quick-and-dirty assessment of this PR blather.
      Another commenter on the same site wondered why Phillips did not acknowledge the foundation’s role in creating astroturf groups of young teachers who can be counted on to speak publicly against tenure and seniority and in favor of using test scores to evaluate teachers.
Categories Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, Teacher Evaluations, Teachers and Teaching, Testing

Read This, TNTP, and Learn Who is Really Irreplaceable

By dianeravitch
August 8, 2012 //
9

A principal sent this comment. TNTP used to be called The New Teacher Project; it was founded by Michelle Rhee. They released a report last week saying that the average first-year teacher is more effective than 40% of teachers with seven or more years of experience:

In my school and district we are losing some really great educators who take with them a wealth of experience. They are not the tired old teachers who “need to go”. They are the ones who know how to manage a class and how to achieve results. They are the leaders who have taught us how to be better teachers. They are the role models. Experience does count. They don’t worry about test scores, yet they have the best results. Go figure. We can all learn something from them. Sometimes young teachers don’t understand, but those of us who have been here a while recognize their worth. There is a lot of turmoil in education right now. Lots of great teachers, both young and old, are leaving because they are tired of being disrespected by adults in high places. It’s hard to believe this is happening. We have to keep speaking up until the truth is finally heard.
Categories Education Reform, Rhee, Michelle, Teacher Evaluations, Teacher Tenure, Teachers and Teaching

Future Meetings of the Cuomo Commission

By dianeravitch
August 8, 2012 //
5

Educators of New York state. Make time to attend a meeting of the Cuomo Commission. As reported here, the meetings in New York City and Buffalo were stacked with charter school advocates, TFA, and StudentsFirst. But as principal Carol Burris notes below, it is important that you are there. Sign up to speak. Who knows, you might be called to testify. Be there to witness. The future of the education profession and public education in New York is on the table.

Carol Burris writes:

Please attend future hearings. Although they provide the opportunity to testify, I cannot tell you based on my experience, that the selection process is fair.  I can tell you, however, it is worth the try AND it is worth being present.  Even if you do not speak, be there.  If you are allowed to testify, speak up for the profession that means so much to you and to the schools that mean so much to your children. 
 
Here is the schedule
 

 

 

 

Categories Cuomo, Andrew, Education Reform, New York, Principals, Privatization, Teach for America TFA, Teacher Evaluations

Another Way to Take a Stand

By dianeravitch
August 8, 2012 //
2

A group of principals in Long Island, New York, went to training sessions about the state’s evolving educator evaluation plan. When they realized that teachers would be graded on a curve and that half would be rated ineffective by design, they were horrified. When they realized that teachers who didn’t produce higher test scores would be rated ineffective no matter how highly they were rated by their principal, they were outraged.

And they wrote a petition to the State Education Department asking for a trial of this potentially injurious system.

Please sign their petition, no matter where you live:

1508 NY principals …over 1/3 of NYS, signed a letter, a detailed research based letter, against evaluating teachers by test scores. A few thousand teachers signed too. How about 1/3 of NY teachers signing?
Www.Newyorkprincipals.org

Categories Accountability, Education Reform, New York, Principals, Teacher Evaluations, Teachers and Teaching, Testing

Andrew Cuomo, No Friend to Public Education

By dianeravitch
August 7, 2012 //
22

Principal Carol Burris is one of the co-founders of the Long Island principals’ revolt against high-stakes testing. When she heard that Governor Cuomo’s commission would be holding hearings in New York City, she joined up with fellow principal Harry Leonardatos and they headed for the hearings.

Read their gripping account of the proceedings, where the deck was stacked in favor of the corporate agenda.

They were among the first to register, but soon discovered that they would not be allowed to speak.

Who was allowed to speak? Campbell Brown, an ex-anchor for CNN who spoke about sex abuse in the schools (her husband is on the board of Rhee’s StudentsFirst, which she did not disclose); the TFA executive director for New York City; someone from the New Teacher Project (founded by Michelle Rhee); an 18-month-veteran of teaching who is now heading a Gates-funded group of young teachers who oppose tenure and seniority. “…they all represented organizations that embraced the governor’s policies, and they all advocated for the following three policies: state imposition of teacher evaluation systems if local negotiations are not successful, elimination of contractually guaranteed pay increases, and the use of test scores in educator evaluations.”

Although the two principals were told that the last 30 minutes would be reserved for those who signed up first–which they had–they were not allowed to testify. Instead the commission heard from the leader of Rhee’s StudentsFirst in New York. They thought they would be allowed to testify against the NY system of grading teachers on a bell curve, which guarantees that half will be found “ineffective.”

Please read this article. It is alarming. Governor Cuomo and his commission have aligned themselves with the enemies of public education.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Cuomo, Andrew, Education Industry, Education Reform, Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, Merit pay, New York, Principals, Rhee, Michelle, Teacher Evaluations, Teacher Tenure

Arne Duncan Says…

By dianeravitch
August 7, 2012 //
42

I hesitate to inflict this interview on my readers. You trust me to inform you and even on occasion to make you laugh with a good satire or parody. I try to shield you from pain and double-speak.

But I must share this with you.

Here is the latest interview with the Secretary of Education. It begins with a stomach-turning but accurate admission that education is the one thing that President Obama and the teacher-bashing governor of New Jersey Chris Christie agree on. How’s that for a reassuring opening?

When asked why the evidence for the reforms he is pushing seems weak, Duncan replies it is because they are new and therefore don’t have a 50-year track record. Oh, please, they don’t have any track record at all, yet he is pushing these untested, invalid measures on schools across the nation. Of course, everyone wants great teachers and great principals and great schools, but nothing he is doing is producing those results.

The questioner gently asks why there were no “dramatic” improvements in New York City or Washington, D.C. or Chicago, where Duncan was in charge for eight years. The answer is so vague as to be indecipherable. Ten years of Duncan-style reform in New York City, six years in D.C., twelve years in Chicago, and nothing to show for it. Just have faith! Believe!

I can’t go on.

Maybe you can.

But isn’t it nice to know that Arne Duncan and Chris Christie and all the rightwing governors are on the same page about how to deal with teachers and principals and schools and education?

 

 

Categories Charter Schools, Chicago, Corporate Reformers, Duncan, Arne, Merit pay, New Jersey, New York, Teacher Evaluations, US Education

Do First-Year Teachers Become Ineffective?

By dianeravitch
August 7, 2012 //
11

In response to the post about the “irreplaceables,” in which the New Teacher Project claims that an average first-year teacher is more effective than 40 percent of teachers with seven or more years of experience, teachers are asking the inevitable questions.

Why is education the only field in which experience is undesirable? In what other line of work would a first-year practitioner be considered better than those with years of experience? When you go to a hospital, do you want to see a doctor or a first-year intern or, for that matter, a new college graduate with no medical training at all?

And this:

If a first year teacher is more effective than one with seven years, what happens when that first year teacher has seven years? Does she too become ineffectual? I have been teaching for 16 years and know I am definitely better now than I was then. I also believe I will continue to get better with each passing year. This is nonsense.
Categories Alternate Route To Certification, Teacher Evaluations, Teachers and Teaching

Debating Testing

By dianeravitch
August 7, 2012 //
7

The New York Times recently ran a feature debating testing today.

There were my favorites in the debate.

This by Leonie Haimson.

This by Pedro Noguera.

Both make excellent points. Tests are overused and misused, as Leonie says; and accountability should be for those at the top, not just those in the classroom as Pedro says.

Standardized testing as mis-used today has become an obstacle to good education. Judging teacher quality by these flawed measures is ruining education.

Categories Teacher Evaluations, Testing

The Future of National Board Certification of Teachers

By dianeravitch
August 7, 2012 //
52

Nancy Flanagan is a nationally known teacher and teacher-advocate. I am honored to post her comment here because she has deep authority. And what she has to say is alarming. Pearson has taken over the National Board Certification process! Will they align it with their tests and the Common Core, where they are funded by Gates to develop online resources?

I am a National Board Certified Teacher. I also worked for the National Board as a certificate developer, assessor, and in their teacher leadership and policy outreach divisions, then returned to the classroom. I have seen National Board Certification from all sides.

First–there have been well over 200 studies done on NB Certification, and nearly all show that NBC Teachers are highly effective. The studies have been done by major research institutions as well as university-based critics of national certification for teachers, and have examined all aspects of the process. The National Research Council published a federally funded, well-respected meta-analysis of the major studies in 2008, during the Bush admin: http://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?RecordID=12224

One more–here is a report written by actual teachers, analyzing the impact of National Board Certification on their practice, as well as a couple dozen major research reports. It addresses some of the familiar objections and remarks found in the comments on this blog:http://www.nbpts.org/userfiles/File/CTQ_Report_FINAL.pdf

In short, research has convincingly demonstrated that NBCTs are effective. Not “better” than other teachers–effective. And especially effective in low-performing schools–which supports state policies that provide stipends for NBCTs.

There are many candidates, like Teacher from the West, who find that they’re already reflecting daily, planning carefully, delivering instruction using multiple paths to learning, and assessing carefully– and that going through the process is simply an exercise in exhaustively documenting that practice. Others see NB Cert as professional development, learning to do things they weren’t doing before–and either experience is beneficial to kids and learning.

Yes, the NB experience feels annoyingly nit-picky. But that’s about psychometric integrity, not the NB being overly rule-bound. In order for scores to be psychometrically valid and reliable, teachers have to follow explicit assessment rules. It’s annoying–but clean assessment procedures are what yield useable data.

Here’s what I worry about: NBPTS has now been taken over by Pearson. The teacher-led, teacher-developed goals of the original founders’ mission–using teacher expertise to shape education reform–are so far from what we’re doing now it’s frightening. And–the US Dept Of Ed decided not to put the National Board in their last budget. They gave $$ to Teach for America instead.

Perhaps–as a profession–we need to be worried about the one major national attempt to set professional standards of practice. That fact that many states are dismantling their NBC programs (since they’re not getting federal money) is a harbinger of more de-skilling and de-professionalizing to come.
Categories Accountability, Pearson, Teacher Evaluations, Testing

Who Is Really an Irreplaceable Teacher?

By dianeravitch
August 7, 2012 //
11

We have lately heard that certain teachers are “irreplaceable.” So was the conclusion of a report by The New Teacher Project, an organization founded by Michelle Rhee to place new teachers in the classroom. TNTP always thinks big ideas that will push out experienced teachers and make room for the new teachers they recruit. TNPT is enamored with test scores as the bottom-line measure of good teaching because they are convinced their new teachers will raise test scores faster and higher than veteran teachers. Whether this is so, it is hard to say because the new teachers have never taught before and one year of data doesn’t mean much. So maybe after three or four years, it is possible to test their claims. The larger question, which TNTP never addresses or considers unimportant, is whether the ability to raise test scores is the very best way to measure who is a good teacher, who is irreplaceable.

Here is the tip-off to their self-interest: “In fact, in these districts, 40 percent of teachers with more than seven years of experience are less effective at advancing academic progress than the average first-year teacher.” Imagine that! The average first-year teachers (that is, the ones you can get if you work with TNTP) are far more effective that 40 percent of teachers with more than seven years experience! You can see where this is leading: experience is irrelevant because those great first-year teachers are better than 40 percent of the veterans. Why not ditch tenure and seniority and get rid of 40 percent of anyone who has taught for more than seven years? Unfortunately, the report laments, those ineffective experienced teachers were making more money than the average first-year teacher, which struck TNTP as blatantly unfair! Why not pay the highly effective, irreplaceable first-year teachers even more than the seven-year veterans and fire the veterans? I’m not clear about how they know first-year teachers are irreplaceable when they have no data until they are in their second year or third or fourth or fifth year. And maybe they are just good test-drill instructors. But since I don’t understand why anyone would think the way TNTP thinks, I can’t explain their thinking. Read it for yourself.

When the New York Times wrote its editorial advocating carrots and sticks, it was responding to the TNTP report, taking it as fact and truth.

Here is a different point of view about who is irreplaceable:

I was a good teacher before I went through National Boards. It was a grueling process–I had three episodes of shingles during that year, and cried the entire month of January. But I came out the other end a much better teacher, and I can document the impact I’ve had on student learning and student lives. If you’re NBCT, you’re highly effective–one might even say you’re one of the “irreplaceable” teachers that are beginning to make the news. BUT…you can’t use test scores to show student learning–it’s a much more complex and subtle process of actually looking at students as individuals and measuring learning in many ways. This is not comprehensible to anal-retentive number-crunching business-type reformers, who see the world in black and white–their world is binary. Research has shown that NBCTs are highly effective teachers. Several of my fellow NBCTs are leaving teaching for the private sector, and many others are retiring early, because of the “reforms” in education. So not only are the reformers destroying a program that increases teacher effectiveness, they’re driving effective teachers out of the classroom. I’m sad for our students, because they’re the ones that are getting the raw deal.
Categories Corporate Reformers, Education Reform, Rhee, Michelle, Teacher Evaluations, Teacher Tenure, Teachers and Teaching, Testing
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