Archives for category: Teachers and Teaching
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Steven Singer Wrote a Book…For You!

By dianeravitch
November 21, 2017 //
7

Steven Singer wrote a book! You probably know his Blog called “Gadfly on the Wall.” I often repost his writing because he writes with clarity and passion and first-hand experience.

His book is “Gadfly on the Wall: A Apublic School Teacher Speaks Out on Racism and Reform.”

It was published by Garn Press.

Steven explains here why he wrote a book and how it feels to see it in print.

He writes:

“How did this happen?

It was only three and a half years ago that I sat down at my computer and decided to write my first blog.

And now I’ve got a book coming out from Garn Press – “Gadfly on the Wall: A Public School Teacher Speaks Out on Racism and Reform.”

Like the title says, I’m just a public school teacher. I’m not important enough to write a book.

A blog? Sure. That could disappear any day now.

All it would take is WordPress deleting the site or maybe the power goes out and never comes back or a zombie apocalypse or who knows…

But a book. That’s kinda’ permanent.

It has mass and takes up space.

That won’t just poof out of existence if someone unplugs the wrong server.

It would take some sort of conscious effort for a book to go away. People would have to actively work to destroy it. They’d have to pile those rectangular paper bundles in a fire pit, douse them in gasoline and light a match.

Otherwise, they’d just maybe sit in a basement somewhere in boxes, unopened and collecting dust.

Or could it really be that people might actually crack the spine and read the things?

It’s a strange sort of birth this transition from cyberspace to 3-dimensional reality.

And it’s about to transpire with selected bits of my writing.

I am flabbergasted. Shocked. Almost in denial that this is really happening.

Did I mention that I’m a public school teacher? No one is supposed to listen to us.

School policy is made without us. Decisions impacting our kids and our careers are made by people who haven’t seen the classroom in years – if ever. And when we politely raise our hands to let people know that something isn’t working, the best we can hope for is to be ignored; the worst is to be bullied into silence.

Read the rest. Steven has a beautiful quote from Ray Bradbury’s “Fahrenheit 451” that all of us can live by.

Categories Joy, Teachers and Teaching

Wisconsin: What Happened to Teachers After Scott Walker Crushed the Unions?

By dianeravitch
November 21, 2017 //
24

David Madland and Alex Rowell of the Center for American Progress reviewed the impact on education of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s infamous Act 10, enacted in 2011, which crushed unions.

Some teachers left the profession or the state. Salaries and benefits declined. The average age and experience of teachers declined. Teachers moved from district to district, seeking higher pay.

They wrote:

“Six years ago, the state of Wisconsin passed the highly controversial 2011 Wisconsin Act 10, which virtually eliminated collective bargaining rights for most public-sector workers, as well as slashed those workers’ benefits, among other changes. These attacks on public-sector workers are spreading throughout the country. Iowa recently passed an Act 10-inspired law with similar policies affecting public-sector workers and their unions.1 Other states and members of Congress are considering enacting such policies, and with its ruling on Janus v. American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), the U.S. Supreme Court may act to weaken public-sector unions and teachers’ ability to collectively bargain.

“This issue brief examines the impact of the law on Wisconsin’s K-12 public education system and state economy. While this brief focuses on Act 10’s impact on Wisconsin teachers based on the data available, the same forces driving changes in the teaching workforce can also affect the broader public sector. Proponents of Act 10 insisted that reducing collective bargaining rights for teachers would improve education by eliminating job protections such as tenure and seniority-based salary increases. As Gov. Scott Walker (R-WI) argued, “We no longer have seniority or tenure. That means we can hire and fire based on merit, we can pay based on performance. That means we can put the best and the brightest in our classrooms and we can pay them to be there.” However, the facts suggest that Act 10 has not had its promised positive impact on educational quality in the state.”

Teachers have lower pay, lower pension and health insurance benefits. There is more turnover as teachers move from one district to another seeking higher pay. Act 10 had its intended effect of smashing unions, which represented 14.1% of workers in 2011, but only 9% now.

What kind of country thinks the way to get better teachers is to cut their pay and benefits?

Scott Walker is a puppet of the Koch brothers. His vision of the future is mean and stupid.

Categories Koch Brothers, Teacher Pay, Teachers and Teaching, Unions, Walker, Scott, Wisconsin

Tennessee: Is a Computer a Teacher? Does a Student Have a Right to a Teacher?

By dianeravitch
November 14, 2017 //
39

A Tennessee court might rule on whether a student has a right to a teacher, and whether computers count as teachers. The district wants the case dismissed.

Do the rights of Tennessee students to a public education extend into the right to have a teacher, and if so, does a computer program count?

Those questions were posed to a state appeals court Tuesday during oral arguments in a case involving a Nashville student, Toni Jones, that could set a statewide framework defining school districts’ obligations to their students.

Jones was a freshman at Pearl-Cohn High School who was pulled out of an algebra class before an end-of-course test and placed into a computer-based credit recovery program, Jones’ lawyer, Gary Blackburn, said. He said the student was struggling in the algebra class but had a passing grade.

The appeal stems from a lawsuit Blackburn filed in 2015, alleging the district was padding test scores by moving Jones and others to the other program. Several teachers who spoke out about the testing practices are suing the district in a separate case, saying they were inappropriately reprimanded by the district.

He said precedent set in Tennessee court cases entitled Jones to a teacher, and that due process protections were violated when she was moved into the other class without notice to Jones or her family.

“The slippery slope so to speak is that if a teacher is not essential, then a school system can be offered entirely by computers,” he said. “Students can be placed in a gymnasium and put a computer on a desk, and say, here is your teacher. And we’re going to have a hall monitor to keep you from acting up. That is basically what happened to Toni Jones. That’s not teaching.”

Does a computer count as a teacher? Is a corporation a person? What do you think?

Categories Teachers and Teaching, Technology, Computers, Tennessee

Andy Hargreaves on “Teaching for Good”

By dianeravitch
November 13, 2017 //
13

Last month, Andy Hargreaves of Boston College spoke at Wellesley College about the essence of the teaching profession. Andy has studied teaching and teachers around the world and has received many honors for his work, which seeks to raise the esteem of teaching as a profession. He won the Grawemeyer Award in 2015 for his work with Michael Fullan.

Andy spoke at the Annual Diane Silvers Ravitch ‘60 Lecture at Wellesley. He graciously agreed to speak on short notice after Linda Darling-Hammond fell ill.

Here is a video of the occasion.

The key to successful teaching, he has learned, is collaboration. Teachers work together, plan together, support one another in their work. Their work is focused on their students; it is seldom a solitary endeavor.

I am happy to announce that the 2018 Lecturer in this series will be the outstanding scholar Yong Zhao. I look forward to the event.

Categories Teachers and Teaching

Alan Singer: Does The NY Times Editorial Board Read Its Own Paper?

By dianeravitch
November 9, 2017 //
26

Alan Singer did not like the editorial in the New York Times declaring that certain charters with high test scores should be allowed to hire uncertified teachers.

If only they read the news stories in their own newspaper, he writes, they would have known better.

He writes:

“Do the editors of the New York Times read their own newspaper? The opening line of their pro-charter school editorial offered faint praise for charter schools. Apparently, “New York City is one of the rare places in the country where charter schools generally have made good on the promise to outperform conventional public schools.” If the statement is true that New York City charter schools “generally” outperform conventional public schools, what about the rest of the charter school industry in the United States?

“According to the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, “In 2016-17, there are more than 6,900 charter schools, enrolling an estimated 3.1 million students.” In New York City there are only 227 charter schools that enroll a little over 100,000 students. That means 97% of charter schools in the country and 97% of the children attending charter schools are outside New York City and many do underperform. In Michigan, 70% of the charter schools score in the bottom half of the state’s school rankings. As a result of “charterization,” Michigan declined from being an average performing state on math and reading tests to one of the worst. These do not seem like a reason to endorse an expansion of charter schools in New York City or to advocate for removing regulations from the existing schools.

“I visited two excellent New York City charter secondary schools, one in Queens and one in Brooklyn. Neither is part of a “not-for-profit” charter school network or a private for-profit charter school company. Part of what makes them good schools is that they function just like regular public schools, educating diverse young people without making exaggerated claims for student performance or lobbying state officials for extra privileges and waivers.”

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Privatization, School Choice, Teachers and Teaching

Peter Greene Lambastes the New York Times’ Dumb Editorial on Charter Teachers

By dianeravitch
November 4, 2017 //
29

Peter Greene says the New York Times’ Editorial praising the removal of any standards for charter teachers was written while the fact checkers were out to lunch.

“The editorial notes that charter schools “made good on their promise to outperform conventional public schools,” which is a fact-check fail two-fer. First, it slides in the assertion that charters are public schools, even though NYC’s own Ms. Moskowitz went to court to protect her charter’s right to function as a private business, freed from state oversight. If NYC charters are public schools, then McDonald’s is a public cafeteria. Second, it accepts uncritically the notion that charters have “outperformed” anybody, without asking if such superior performance is real, or simply an illusion created by creaming and skimming students so that charters only keep those students who make them look good.

“The Times thinks the warm body rule is “a reasonable attempt to let these schools avoid the weak state teacher education system that has long been criticized for churning out graduates who are unprepared to manage the classroom.” Their support for this is a decade-old “report” by Arthur Levine, and even if that report were the gospel truth, that does not shore up the logic of saying, “I’m pretty sure the surgeons at this hospital aren’t very good, so the obvious solution is for me to grab some guy off the street to take out my spleen instead.”

“The Times also commiserates with charter hiring problems.

“New York’s high-performing charter schools have long complained that rules requiring them to hire state-certified teachers make it difficult to find high-quality applicants in high-demand specialties like math, science and special education. They tell of sorting through hundreds of candidates to fill a few positions, only to find that the strongest candidates have no interest in working in the low-income communities where charters are typically located.

“Oops. There’s a typo in that last part– let me fix it for you: “only to find the strongest candidates have no interest in working for bottom-dollar wages under amateur-hour conditions that demand their obedience and donation of tens of hours of their own time each week.” There.

“But if you want absolute proof that the Times had no access to fact-checking for this piece, here comes multiple citations of the National Council on Teacher Quality.

“If there is a less serious, less believable, less intellectually rigorous in all of the education world that the NCTQ, I do not know who it is. Kate Walsh may be a lovely human being who is nice to her mother and sings in her church choir, but her organization is– well, I few things astonish me as much as the fact that NCTQ is still taken seriously by anybody at all, ever”

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Teachers and Teaching

Mitchell Robinson: The Reformers’ Great Lie: “It’s All About the Kids”

By dianeravitch
October 14, 2017 //
19

Mitchell Robinson writes that reformers have an obnoxious habit. When they are caught in a lie or an awkward situation—like having their true motives revealed—they say plaintively, “But it’s all about the kids.”

As though it is okay to bash teachers, drive them out of the profession, lower standards for new teachers, because…it’s all about the kids. That is the assumption behind such fake names as “StudentsFirst” and “Kids First.” What about a Family? It is all together, not kids before mom or dad. How stupid!

He writes:

“It’s a common refrain among the reformer Illuminati whenever they experience any push-back against their anti-teacher, anti-union, anti-public education, anti-Motherhood-apple-pie-and-hot-dogs agenda. You can bet your bottom privatization dollar that as soon as these edu-tourists hear any reasonable, evidence-based rationale refuting their radical positions on teacher evaluation, tenure or the use of Value-Added Measures, they will inevitably blurt out the one magic incantation they believe will repel all attacks, confident in its power to tug at the heartstrings of any parent/voter: “But, it’s all about the kids!”

(“Let’s leave aside the notion for the moment that this well-funded clique of hedge fund managers, investment bankers and failed morning show hosts suddenly cares about kids after spending their entire adult lives making backroom deals and raiding pension funds. There is obvious power in this spell, which is designed to cut through logic and reason, and appeal directly to the most primal instincts of any parent.)

“The truth is that education and schools are not, and should not be, all about the kids. If we truly want our schools to be healthy, highly-functional institutions, then every member of the school community must be treated with honor, dignity and respect. This includes adults as well as children.

“It means that every person who works in the school–from teachers to principals, from custodians to secretaries, from bus drivers to cafeteria workers, from nurses to counselors, from students to parents–deserves to work and learn in an environment where they feel trusted and valued.”

It means that the working conditions of teachers cannot be separated from the learning conditions of students, and that when one member of the community is devalued there is a devastating ripple effect across the rest of the community.

Categories Corporate Reform, Teachers and Teaching

TURN: A New Vision for Public Schools Where the Teaching Profession Makes Decisions

By dianeravitch
October 12, 2017 //
38

The Teacher Union Reform Network (TURN), composed of leaders from both the AFT and the NEA, issued a report representing their vision of what good public schools should do to improve student learning and to build a respected teaching profession. The link contains both the executive summary and the full report.

The report begins with this rationale:

With major changes to public education coming from top-down prescriptions in recent decades, schools have shifted from their original purpose – advancing the common good. More than 20 years ago, the National TURN began convening classroom teachers and teacher leaders for a series of open discussions around the country. We asked participants: How must we strengthen public education in ways that reflect the collective wisdom of teachers? How can public education, once again, become “the great equalizer” and the foundation for our democracy? How could it be made to benefit all our students, not just some? And how must we change, too, so that teachers and their unions become agents of needed improvements?

Our TURN: Revitalizing Public Education and Strengthening Democracy Through the Collective Wisdom of Teachers lays out a fresh, exciting, teacher-led vision on what it will take to improve our public education system and reestablish its rightful place as the cornerstone of our democracy. Drawing from research-based practices and the experiences and ideas of classroom teachers across the country about what works, we highlight creative and innovative solutions that place students at the center of learning, support teachers as professionals, promote equity, and advance negotiated agreements that improve student learning. The report provides a clear and compelling roadmap for education policymakers, practitioners and advocates alike towards a revitalized system of public education that benefits all our students.

And here is the vision:

Our TURN: Revitalizing Public Education and Strengthening Our Democracy Through the Collective Wisdom of Teachers

As teachers and teacher unionists, we believe that teaching and learning can be transformed if we embrace a new vision of education that rests on four pillars, each of which bears equal weight:

1. If we want schools to prepare student to be career and college ready, thoughtful citizens, and reflective human beings, then schools should be safe, learner-centered and well-resourced to serve the needs of each individual student.

2. If teachers are the most important in-school determinant of student learning, then teaching must be recognized as a true profession.

3. If America needs to tap into the talents of all students, irrespective of their background, then educational excellence must be inclusive and education redesign must be accompanied by changes in other aspects of students’ lives.

4. If all education policy must ultimately be about enhancing opportunities for students to learn, then collective bargaining (and other forms of collaborative decision-making) between teachers and management should always aim to advance student learning.

The Teacher Union Reform Network (TURN), a coalition of teachers and teacher union leaders from AFT and NEA union locals, was founded 20 years ago “to promote progressive reforms in education and in teacher unions.” To all who are engaged in the debate about the future of public education – whether practitioners or policymakers — this document lays out precisely what we aspire to.
We begin with our idea of what education, schools and classrooms could and should look like, then turn to the policies needed to bring about that vision.

It is a good report. It refutes the common refrain from corporate reformers that there is no alternative to their cramped and toxic practice of high-stakes testing and school choice. It is a public school response to the Betsy DeVos’ belief in the free market of charter schools and vouchers for religious schools.

This is a worthy presentation of a well-resourced public school system, staffed by experienced teachers whose collective voices are represented in the policymaking process, and whose voices carry more weight than those of the politicians who write unreasonable and impossible mandates.

Categories Teachers and Teaching, Unions

New York: SUNY Committee Votes to Lower Standards for Charter Teachers

By dianeravitch
October 11, 2017 //
43

The Chancellor of the New York Board of Regents, Dr. Betty Rosa, and the state Commissioner of Education, Dr. MaryEllen Elia, released this statement:

“”We strongly disapprove of today’s actions by the SUNY Charter Schools Committee. With the adoption of the latest proposal, the Committee ignored our concerns and those of many others in education. Over the past several years, the Board of Regents and the Department have raised standards for our teachers and are working to uplift the entire profession through efforts such as TeachNY. This change lowers standards and will allow inexperienced and unqualified individuals to teach those children that are most in need – students of color, those who are economically disadvantaged, and students with disabilities – in SUNY-authorized charter schools. Lowering standards would not be acceptable for any other profession; this is an insult to the teaching profession. With this irresponsible action, the SUNY Charter Schools Committee has eroded the quality of teachers in New York State and negatively impacted student achievement.”

http://www.nysed.gov/news/2017/statement-board-regents-chancellor-betty-rosa-and-state-education-commissioner-maryellen

Charters need lower standards for teachers because they can’t retain teachers. They have high turnover of teachers. The working conditions and hours are difficult. Many teachers leave because of the harsh disciplinary regime.

Categories Charter Schools, Education Reform, Teachers and Teaching

Join Me for Andy Hargreaves’ Lecture at Wellesley College on October 19: TEACHING FOR GOOD!!

By dianeravitch
October 11, 2017 //
4

Andy Hargreaves is an internationally renowned expert on teaching and a proponent of teacher collaboration. He very kindly agreed to step in at the last moment when Linda Darling-Hammond, the originally scheduled speaker, fell ill and was unable to travel.

Andy Hargreaves is Thomas More Brennan Chair, Lynch School of Education, Boston College. He is a renowned scholar of international education, teaching, and education reform who consults with organizations and governments all over the world, Andy Hargreaves is author or editor of over 30 books. He will describe what teaching for life, not just for tests, skills, careers, or individual gain looks like in different communities internationally where teachers work together to fight for dignity, peace, and democracy, even in the most difficult circumstances. Drawing on examples from around the world, he will discuss how we can help teachers in the United States work together to teach for good in their communities.

Andy Hargreaves received the Grawemeyer Award in 2015 with his co-author Michael Fullan for their work on the transformative power of teacher collaboration.

We will miss Linda, but are so fortunate that Andy agreed to speak. It will be a great evening. It won’t be live-streamed, but the video will be posted on YouTube.

Screen Shot 2017-10-10 at 7.29.43 PM

Categories Education Reform, International, Teachers and Teaching
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