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Peter Greene: Scott Walker Attacks Teachers and Public Schools Again

By dianeravitch
April 6, 2017 //
20

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker thought he could run for president based on his hardline hatred for public school teachers and public schools. He was rushing to enact Betsy DeVos’s agenda even before she became Secretary of Education. And his agenda is even more expansive because he wants to drive teachers out of public schools. It is hard to believe that Wisconsin was once a progressive state with this guy as governor.

Peter Greene here reviews Walker’s latest attacks on public schools and their teachers.

First, he proposes to punish any district that is not strictly enforcing his infamous Act 10, which slashed teachers’ pay and shifted the cost of their health benefits and pensions to teachers.

Second, he proposes to eliminate any required number of instructional hours for students. Wisconsin, under his backwards leadership, would be the only state in the nation that did not set forth a minimum number of instructional hours. He claims this would provide “flexibility,” but in reality it would be a boon to cybercharters and others who will cut instructional time and teachers to save money. For more on this proposal, read here.

Greene observes:

Not that this is about cutting costs. Oh no. And that may be true– it may be more about reducing the need for staff. Can’t find enough teachers who want to work under Wisconsin’s increasingly regressive system? Split your school into morning and afternoon school meeting every other day and you can get twice the students, at least, served by one teacher. Have trouble staffing classes that don’t actually affect your state report card? Cut ’em and send the kids home early.

More than that, this also serves as a big blast of freedom for charters. Set your charter up however you want, teaching whatever you want, meeting as often as you want, with as few teachers as you want. Scott Walker says that’s okay. Come be an edu-preneur, and we won’t tell you what you have to do, ever.

Would this reduce the number of teachers in Wisconsin? Of course– and thereby weaken that damn union and its ability to stand up to guys like Scott Walker. And of course this also accomplishes the goal of making public schools less and less attractive so that charter schools can look better by comparison (without having to actually get good). Will this have any effect on the education of rich folks who can afford to make sure their children get into real schools that do real educating? Of course not, and that’s undoubtedly part of the point–

Scott Walker has pushed hard on many reformster ideas, but the unifying principle seems to be one of the lowest of all reformy ideas– wealthy folks (who deserve their wealth or why else would they be wealthy) should not have the government taking their well-deserved money to provide services for lousy poor people (who must deserve to be poor, or else they wouldn’t be). And that include those damn teachers, who not only keep taking money they don’t deserve, but keep using some of it to try to organize revolt against their rightful rulers. These peasants need to be sent packing and forced to understand that their Betters will decide what these Lessers deserve– and the short list of what these Lessers deserve does not include an excellent, free public education.

Really, I try to be civil on this blog. So, either Scott Walker is determined to drive every last professional teacher out of the public schools, or he is a moron. Or both.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reform, Teacher Pay, Teachers, Walker, Scott, Wisconsin

Tennessee Court Case: Does a Student Have the Right to a Teacher, or Will a Computer Suffice?

By dianeravitch
March 25, 2017 //
52

Nashville student, Toni Jones, is suing the state of Tennessee, because she thinks she should be taught by a human teacher, not a computer. The state says those decisions are not left to students.

“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.”

“Metro argues that the judges should uphold a prior ruling dismissing the case. In February 2016, Nashville Chancellor Ellen Hobbs Lyle agreed with Metro’s argument and dismissed the case.

“Blackburn argues in the appeal it should be reopened. The Tennessee Education Association, the state’s largest teachers union, filed a court brief asking the appeals court to agree, saying teachers in classrooms are an essential part of a student’s education.”

Categories Teachers, Technology, Computers, Tennessee

Review: Will Higher Admission Standards for Teacher Education Produce Better Teachers?

By dianeravitch
March 23, 2017 //
34

The National Coucil for Teacher Quality issued a report calling for higher admission standards for entrants into teaching, specifically, higher SAT and ACT scores. This report was reviewed on behalf of the National Education Policy Center. It is interesting and strange that so many people think that scores on the SAT or ACT have remarkable predictive powers. The cardinal rule of psychometric is that a test should be used only for the purpose for which it was designed. These tests were designed to gauge likely success in college, but multiple studies have concluded that the students’ four-year grade-point-average is more reliable than either the SAT or ACT. Why would anyone think they predict good teachers? NCTQ should turn its attention to making the teaching profession more fulfilling and rewarding. At a time of teacher shortages, raising the bar will exacerbate the shortage.

The NCTQ is Gates-funded and endorses VAM to rate teachers. So they start with a strong bias towards standardized testing.

NEPC says:

BOULDER, CO (March 23, 2017) – A recent report from the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) advocates for a higher bar for entry into teacher preparation programs. The NCTQ report suggests, based on a review of GPA and SAT/ACT requirements at 221 institutions in 25 states, that boosting entry requirements would significantly improve teacher quality in the U.S. It argues that this higher bar should be set by states, by the Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP), and by the higher-education institutions themselves.

However, the report’s foundational claims are poorly supported, making its recommendations highly problematic.

The report, Within Our Grasp: Achieving Higher Admissions Standards in Teacher Prep, was reviewed by a group of scholars and practitioners who are members of Project TEER (Teacher Education and Education Reform). The team was led by Marilyn Cochran-Smith, the Cawthorne Professor of Teacher Education for Urban Schools at Boston College, along with Megina Baker, Wen-Chia Chang, M. Beatriz Fernández, & Elizabeth Stringer Keefe. The review is published by the Think Twice Think Tank Review Project at the National Education Policy Center, housed at University of Colorado Boulder’s School of Education.

The reviewers explain that the report does not provide the needed supports for its assertions or recommendations. It makes multiple unsupported and unfounded claims about the impact on teacher diversity of raising admissions requirements for teacher candidates, about public perceptions of teaching and teacher education, and about attracting more academically able teacher candidates.

Each claim is based on one or two cherry-picked citations while ignoring the substantial body of research that either provides conflicting evidence or shows that the issues are much more complex and nuanced than the report suggests. Ultimately, the reviewers conclude, the report offers little guidance for policymakers or institutions.

Find the review by Marilyn Cochran-Smith, Megina Baker, Wen-Chia Chang, M. Beatriz Fernández, & Elizabeth Stringer Keefe at:
http://nepc.colorado.edu/thinktank/review-admissions

Find Within Our Grasp: Achieving Higher Admissions Standards in Teacher Prep, by Kate Walsh, Nithya Joseph, & Autumn Lewis, published by the National Council on Teacher Quality, at:
http://www.nctq.org/dmsView/Admissions_Yearbook_Report

Categories National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ), National Education Policy Center, Teacher Evaluations, Teachers

California Teachers Form Statewide Alliance to Fight for Real School Reform

By dianeravitch
March 22, 2017 //
29

Teachers organizations from across the state of California have formed an alliance to fight for genuine School reform.

CALIFORNIA: 8 Teacher Union Locals Unite Against the Trump/DeVos Agenda, Fight for Public Schools through Collective Bargaining, Community Power

United around common struggles and a shared vision, The California Alliance for Community Schools is a groundbreaking coalition of educator unions from 8 of the largest cities in California, representing more than 50,000 educators. The alliance officially launches tomorrow, Thursday March 23 and includes: Anaheim Secondary Teachers Association, Oakland Education Association, San Bernardino Teachers Association, San Jose Teachers Association, San Diego Education Association, United Educators of San Francisco, United Teachers Los Angeles and United Teachers Richmond.

All 8 unions are uniting around statewide demands, through local bargaining as well as legislation, for more resources in schools, charter school accountability, lower class sizes and other critical improvements. Most of the locals are in contract bargaining or are interested in organizing around these key issues. The alliance plans to expand to include other labor and community partners.

As California faces a statewide teacher shortage, school districts issued more than 1,750 pink slips for educators last week. Trump released his proposed federal budget, which slashes funds for disadvantaged children, afterschool programs, teacher trainings and other vital services. Trump wants to spend $1.4 billion to expand vouchers, including private schools, and would pay for it from deep cuts to public schools. Voters in California have twice rejected voucher plans.

“We are reaching a state of emergency when it comes to our public schools,” said Hilda Rodriguez-Guzman, an Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment member and charter school parent since 1994. “We must support and reinvest in public education. I join educators in the fight for well-resourced, transparent, accountable, and democratically run schools, at the bargaining table and beyond.”

All 8 unions will use the power of bargaining and statewide organizing to fight for:

Lower class sizes

Resources for high-needs schools and students

Shared decision-making at local school sites, critical to student success

Charter school accountability

Safe and supportive school environments

The first significant step is the launch of the bargaining platform and petition, which includes statewide demands and specific contract demands for each local union. The petition reads:

“As educators in large urban school districts across California we face many of the same challenges. We are particularly concerned about disinvestment in schools and communities, especially those with the greatest needs; educational policies that discourage authentic teaching and learning; and the rapid expansion of privately managed and unregulated charter schools at the expense of our neighborhood schools.”

We applaud the work of these unions, who are fighting back the Trump/DeVos agenda and standing together with their students and communities to reinvest in public education.

To find out more, contact each union for more information:

Anaheim: Grant Schuster, CTA State Council Representative on ASTA Executive Board, schusters3@charter.net, (562) 810-4035

Los Angeles: Anna Bakalis, UTLA Communications Director mailto:abakalis@utla.net, (213)305-9654

Oakland: Trish Gorham, OEA President, oaklandeapresident@yahoo.com, (510) 763-4020,

San Diego: Jonathon Mello, mello_j@sdea.net, (619) 200-0010

San Francisco: Mathew Hardy, Communications Director, mhardy@uesf.org, (415) 513-3179

Richmond: Demetrio Gonzalez, UTR President, president@unitedteachersofrichmond.com, (760) 500-7044

San Jose: Jennifer Thomas, SJTA President, jthomas@sanjoseta.org, (408) 694-7393

San Bernardino: Ashley Alcalá, SBTA President, ashleysbta@gmail.com, (909) 881-6755
—

THE CALIFORNIA ALLIANCE FOR COMMUNITY SCHOOLS
We are a coalition of California parents, community, educators, and students united in our commitment to transforming public education in ways that contribute to a more just, equitable, and participatory society.

Together, we are fighting for well-resourced, community-centered, publicly funded and democratically run schools that prepare our students with the intellectual, social, and emotional skills necessary for success in a changing and often turbulent world.

Our Platform for The Schools All Our Students Deserve

1. Low Class Sizes: Quality instruction for all our students depends on limiting the number of students in a class. Lowering class sizes improves teaching and learning conditions leading to growth in student achievement and positive social interactions.

2. Adequate Resources for All Schools with Additional Resources for Our High Needs Schools and Students: All schools and students deserve adequate levels of funding and support, including but not limited to quality early childhood education programs, lower class size, lower Special Education caseloads, additional educators, after-school tutoring, counselors, nurses, certificated librarians, and other resources to address our students’ academic, emotional, and social needs. Schools and students with the highest need should receive additional funding and support. Site based governing bodies consisting of democratically selected staff, parents, students, and community partners should be responsible for deciding how such additional supports are to be used.

3. Shared Decision-Making at Our Local Schools: The needs of a school are best addressed by the members of the school community. Site based governance by democratically selected stakeholder representatives is a critical component for school and student success. Districts and unions should provide joint trainings to fully empower these bodies.

4. Charter Schools Accountable to Our Communities: All schools receiving public money must be held accountable and be locally and publicly controlled. Unfortunately, many privately run, under-regulated charter schools drain needed resources from neighborhood schools, are not fully transparent in their operations, and fail to provide equal access to all students. Common sense standards and adequate oversight are necessary. New charter schools should not be approved without ensuring accountability and transparency and without a comprehensive assessment of the economic and educational impact on existing public schools.

5. Safe and Supportive School Environments: All students at publicly funded schools, regardless of ethnicity, gender, economic status, religion, sexual orientation, and immigration status, have a right to an academically stimulating, emotionally and socially nurturing, and culturally responsive environment that recognizes and addresses the many stresses that affect student performance and behavior. Adequate trainings and supports for restorative justice programs must be provided as an alternative to punitive disciplinary programs.

Categories Arts Education, Budget Cuts, California, Class size, Early Childhood Education, Funding, Real Education, Teacher Shortage, Teachers, Unions

New York: State Regents Consider Eliminating a Redundant Standardized Exam for Future Teachers: Do It!

By dianeravitch
March 19, 2017 //
52

It is rare to report that any state has eliminated any standardized test at all, but that is exactly what may be about to happen in New York.

A committee of the New York Board of Regents has proposed to eliminate the “Academic Literacy Skills Test for Teachers,” which is a useless hurdle. For now, the test has been suspended. Its future will be decided in July at a meeting of the full Board of Regents.

The test was adopted in 2014. It has a disparately negative impact on minorities. But that alone is not the reason to eliminate it. It should be eliminated because it has no predictive value about good teaching.

Critics complain that the Regents are “lowering standards,” but that is nonsense.

To get a license to teach in New York State, applicants must take and pass four exams. In the contemporary mania for testing, policymakers decided that one test was not enough; two tests were not enough; three tests were not enough. No, future teachers had to take and pass four tests, all of them at the expense of those who want to teach.

The Regents, led by Regent Kathleen Cashin–a former teacher, principal, and superintendent–conducted a review of the tests. The Cashin committee concluded that the most useless of the four tests was the ALST. It is a 43-question exam that costs future teachers $118, takes about three-and-a-half hours, and has no predictive value whatever as to who will be a good teacher. Here are sample questions. Like all standardized tests, some questions have more than one right answer. If anyone can explain how this test shows the qualities of a good teacher, please let me know.

Like all standardized tests, the ALST has a disproportionately negative impact on people of color. There is a higher failure rate among blacks, Hispanics, and Asians.

If the test actually predicted who would be a good teacher, maybe the state could ignore the disparate harm to racial minorities.

But nothing about the test has any relationship to teaching. It is a test that weeds out anyone who can’t think like test makers think. It does not predict who has the knowledge and skills to teach well. It does not predict who has the sensitivity and concern to be an effective teacher for children with disabilities. It does not predict who will succeed as a teacher of students with limited English skills. It does not predict who will be successful in any kind of classroom.

Perhaps Harvard or Yale might find it to be a good substitute for the SAT, to weed out all but the most advantaged students. Perhaps law schools might find it useful to gauge reasoning skills.

But it is not a test of the skills of teachers and should be eliminated as a requirement for teaching in New York state.

Categories New York, Teacher Education, Teachers, Testing

The Nation: Teachers Are on the Front Lines to Protect Vulnerable Students

By dianeravitch
March 10, 2017 //
8

Teachers are on the front lines to protect students targeted by the Trump administration: immigrant students, Muslim students, transgender students. Never in our national history has the federal government threatened the safety and security of students. It is a new and terrible day in America.

Teachers are first responders in protecting their students.

The article reports on a march sponsored by New York’s Alliance for Quality Education.

“Those civil rights are extremely important…. People want to be protected from ICE agents and they want to be protected from homophobic bullying,” says Billy Easton, executive director of the Alliance. “But they also want to be provided the quality education that’s going to open up the opportunities in life that they deserve.”

The social principle of education as a public trust resonates beyond school grounds. The March also demanded reforms to state criminal statutes that enable youth as young as 16 to be tried as adults for certain felonies. And in resistance to standardized testing and rigid math and reading standards, activists seek holistic, multicultural curricula that speaks to students struggling with structural oppression and poverty.

Allie, a young high-school teacher, attended the rally on behalf of her Brooklyn school, which serves as a last resort for “at risk” youth who have gotten caught up with jails and police. There, she says, “the kids who are having the hardest life outside of school and would need more social workers, two teachers in a room, extra help—[they] go to the schools that don’t have the resources to provide that…. They get blamed for not getting through because we’re still under this idea of the American dream where it’s their fault; they just didn’t work hard enough. And they work their asses off.”

But she learns every day from her students’ determination: They brave the unimaginable just to get to class, for a chance to get the equal education they deserve.

“I’ve seen my students over the summer begging for money to eat in the subway…. They’ll take the free lunch that they get and they’ll give it to their kid…. They are so strong. And the fact that they’re still trying to get themselves educated is amazing.”

Categories Resistance, Students, Teachers, Trump

Teacher: What Mike Pence Did to Schools and Teachers in Indiana

By dianeravitch
March 4, 2017 //
58

A retired teacher shared the story of Mike a Pence’s role in transforming the schools of Indiana:


Our former governor, Mike Pence, absolutely loves vouchers.Under his “leadership” Indiana became a national leader in giving vouchers to students and families. In fact, we have the dubious reputation of being one of the fastest-growing voucher states. We have a ridiculous merit pay system where highly-effective teachers in the wealthy Carmel-Clay school system received a bonus check of $2422, whereas highly-effective teachers in the poorer school system of Wayne Township a few miles away received $42. Because of Pence and the Republican legislature, many schools in areas of high poverty are struggling financially. I retired from Muncie Community Schools where I was offered an early retirement incentive of staying on the teacher health insurance plan until I turned 65. Hundreds of other employees and I took the “bait” and were promptly dropped from the plan, leaving us without health insurance. Now because of the inequitable funding to schools (and because of a new local superintendent who doesn’t appear to like teachers much), the school board has made its final contract offer to teachers (as reported in our local newspaper, the Star Press):

• A 10 percent reduction in salary for teachers making between $36,005 and
$61,006 for 2015-16.

• A 28 percent cut, including a 20 percent reduction in salary retroactive to July 1,
2016 and the cancellation of two pay checks in the 2016-17 contract.

• Contributing a fixed total to insurance premiums, equal to about 68 percent to the
health insurance option

• Eliminating sick bank contributions

• Eliminating additional pay for teaching a sixth period

• Eliminating the $150 professional development stipend for teachers

• Eliminating retiree benefits

• A one-time salary raise to the minimum of $37,000 for any teacher currently
making less

Thank you, Vice-President Pence, for ruining the teaching profession in Muncie and in the entire state of Indiana.

Categories Education Reform, Indiana, Teacher Pay, Teachers, Vouchers

Trump’s Choice for Secretary of Labor Loves Charters Schools, Hates Unions

By dianeravitch
December 8, 2016 //
37

To learn more about Trump’s choice for Secretary of Labor, read what he wrote about how to reduce poverty in California. 

 

In Andy Puzder’s worldview, when government tries to ameliorate poverty, it only makes it worse.

 

A simple solution: free enterprise, less government regulation, more charter schools, no tenure for teachers.

 

That’s it, folks.

Categories California, Charter Schools, Teachers, Trump

Jersey Jazzman: What Can We Learn About Betsy DeVos from Her Husband’s Charter School

By dianeravitch
November 26, 2016 //
5

Betsy DeVos likes to point with pride to her husband’s charter school. See, she implies, I know what I am talking about. My husband started a charter school called the West Michigan Aviation Academy, located at the Gerald Ford Airport in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where the DeVos family lives.

 

Jersey Jazzman found that there is another side to the story. 

 

Dick DeVos’s charter school has one of the lowest shares of special education students in its county.

 

Understand that Betsy DeVos is absolutely fine with this. In her opinion, we would be better off segregating children who “struggle” from those who do not….

 

Dick DeVos’s charter school enrolls relatively few Limited English Proficient students….

 

We can debate whether it’s a good idea to isolate many of these students from the rest of the community. But we all have to agree — unless we’re totally ignorant of the realities of school finance — that schools serving more students with special needs must have more resources. One would think, therefore, that a school like WMAA, with its relatively small special education and LEP populations, wouldn’t be spending nearly as much as the other high schools in the area.

 

One would be wrong….

 

Dick DeVos’s charter school spends more on salaries for all employees per pupil than almost every other high school in its county. Hmm… well, Betsy DeVos says she wants to pay “good” teachers more. Maybe all that extra money is going into instructional salaries…

 

Or not….

 

Despite its high spending on total salaries, Dick DeVos’s charter school spending on instructional salaries is fairly typical. Which leads me to wonder: where is all that extra money going?

 

It is not going to pay highly experienced teachers. Like other charter schools in Michigan, DeVos’s charter school has a large proportion of inexperienced teachers.

 

Teachers gain the most in effectiveness over the first few years of their careers; yet nearly half of the teachers at Dick DeVos’s charter school have less than three years of experience. 

 

The takeaway:

 

High spending schools, enrolling proportionally fewer students with special needs, taught by inexperienced teachers. That’s Betsy DeVos’s vision for American education — just ask her husband.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Categories Betsy DeVos, Billionaires, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, English Language Learners, Funding, Privatization, Special Education, Teachers

Good News from New Mexico!

By dianeravitch
November 14, 2016 //
9

A reader sent the following good news:

I would like to share some public education wins in New Mexico. There were twenty-two educators running for the NM State Legislature, fourteen were educators from AFT NM and eight from NEA NM. Unfortunately, not all of the twenty-two educators won their races. The good news is that nine of the AFT NM educators did win their seats and three of the NEA NM educators won their seats. We now have twelve educators in the NM State Legislature fighting for public education and labor along with other non-educators who are champions of both public education and labor.

Twelve of the 22 educators who ran for the state legislature won! Now, that is great news! The legislature will hear their voices when they make decisions about the schools.

Categories New Mexico, Politics, Teachers
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