http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/23/AR2010072303093.html?wprss=rss_metro/dc
Another 737 educators at risk
In addition to the 226 dismissals, which become official Aug. 13, another 737 teachers were rated "minimally effective," and will be given one year to improve their performance or also face dismissal. Rhee said Friday that job actions were "a more accurate reflection" of the quality of the 4,000-member teacher corps than has been available in the past.
Right. Because we need to punish teachers for failing, instead of support them so that they can succeed. That'll fix shit.
Quote from: Sigmatic on July 23, 2010, 11:29:23 PM
Right. Because we need to punish teachers for failing, instead of support them so that they can succeed. That'll fix shit.
Any other job not doing a good job will also get you fired.
This is dicks.
Quote from: Sigmatic on July 23, 2010, 11:35:09 PM
This is dicks.
The teachers are failing. What should we do? Continue to reward them?
Uh, believe me, no-one in the US teaches for the wonderful pay and opportunities the job presents. In fact, since teachers are required to be graduates, they'd probably earn more in the private sector anyway.
Also, that's nearly 1000 teachers out of a staff of 4000 at risk, if you include those already fired. There is no way they can survive those kinds of losses without massively rolling back on the quality and amount of teaching they do - which I suspect is entirely the point. What is more likely, they just magically found out that 1/4 of their teachers are morons, or that BUDGET CUTS are on the way and they have to axe that many just to retain core services?
My aunt is a teacher. She works unbelievably hard to help her kids, and her position is still in jeopardy because the school is losing funds, since the kids get such bad grades due to the bad neighborhood/poverty/high crime rate.
You fire one teacher, you fire someone who spent years and tens of thousands of dollars for the privilege to work in a classroom. You can't tell me a person like that doesn't really care about teaching. Just because you have some new test to rate teachers doesn't mean it's the teachers fault that kids don't do well on tests.
Quote from: Sigmatic on July 23, 2010, 11:41:41 PM
My aunt is a teacher. She works unbelievably hard to help her kids, and her position is still in jeopardy because the school is losing funds, since the kids get such bad grades due to the bad neighborhood/poverty/high crime rate.
You fire one teacher, you fire someone who spent years and tens of thousands of dollars for the privilege to work in a classroom. You can't tell me a person like that doesn't really care about teaching. Just because you have some new test to rate teachers doesn't mean it's the teachers fault that kids don't do well on tests.
Understand that I am very far from saying all teachers are not doing a good job. The vast majority I am sure ARE doing excellent work. But surely you can admit that many are just skating?
Quote from: Cain on July 23, 2010, 11:41:11 PM
Uh, believe me, no-one in the US teaches for the wonderful pay and opportunities the job presents. In fact, since teachers are required to be graduates, they'd probably earn more in the private sector anyway.
Also, that's nearly 1000 teachers out of a staff of 4000 at risk, if you include those already fired. There is no way they can survive those kinds of losses without massively rolling back on the quality and amount of teaching they do - which I suspect is entirely the point. What is more likely, they just magically found out that 1/4 of their teachers are morons, or that BUDGET CUTS are on the way and they have to axe that many just to retain core services?
Yes, it is a huge cut and budget concerns probably play a much larger part than they should.
Our education system is fucked. The teachers do fail, but you can't blame them for the fact that kids see school as a) a waste of time, b) a place to meet girls/boys, and c) a sham institution that's more about turning them into robots than giving them a strong foundation for a successful life. (C is actually true, but anyway...)
Ours is a disposable culture. Nobody gives a flying fuck about anything that isn't new, shiny, expensive, or dressed in practically nothing. Nobody wants to learn, because nobody wants to know the truth. Education is contrary to our society. How can we expect students in schools to really be curious, to really want to learn, when out here in the rest of the world we punish curiosity, marginalize intellect, and champion the Easy Way Out of everything?
Sure, blame the teachers. After all, they're only volunteers, practically. They should be doing a "better job." A better job of making up for the rest of society's lack of imagination, the rest of society's lack of patience and curiosity. A better job of picking up our slack. They're the last line of defense between a self-destructive society and the nearest precipice. Of course we should start picking them off, how else are we going to make a gap for the rest of us to go charging off the cliff?
Quote from: vexati0n on July 23, 2010, 11:47:46 PM
Our education system is fucked. The teachers do fail, but you can't blame them for the fact that kids see school as a) a waste of time, b) a place to meet girls/boys, and c) a sham institution that's more about turning them into robots than giving them a strong foundation for a successful life. (C is actually true, but anyway...)
Ours is a disposable culture. Nobody gives a flying fuck about anything that isn't new, shiny, expensive, or dressed in practically nothing. Nobody wants to learn, because nobody wants to know the truth. Education is contrary to our society. How can we expect students in schools to really be curious, to really want to learn, when out here in the rest of the world we punish curiosity, marginalize intellect, and champion the Easy Way Out of everything?
Sure, blame the teachers. After all, they're only volunteers, practically. They should be doing a "better job." A better job of making up for the rest of society's lack of imagination, the rest of society's lack of patience and curiosity. A better job of picking up our slack. They're the last line of defense between a self-destructive society and the nearest precipice. Of course we should start picking them off, how else are we going to make a gap for the rest of us to go charging off the cliff?
Well then, do nothing seems to be the answer. Carry on.
I've never had a teacher like that, at least in 6-12. Middle school, perhaps a few were less than satisfactory, but kids that age... you know. However, at least in 6-12 I never had a teacher who didn't come across as sincerely invested in my educational growth, whether or not I was interested at the time.
I've been through high school a bit more recently than you, and from my vantage point I am more wont to place the majority of the problem in the laps of the students and the administrations. The students are disinterested because life is so jam packed with entertainment and free time these days, and the administration are disinterested because they make more money by spending less and doing less.
If only the students had some kind of... oh, I don't know, some kind of adults who could live with them. You know, at home. If only there was some system we could devise where the sole responsibility for turning snot-nosed bratty little hairless apes into people wasn't entirely given to Teachers. Where, just maybe, the kids had examples of mature, responsible, fully-formed People right there in their own homes.
Well, a guy can wish.
Quote from: Sigmatic on July 23, 2010, 11:50:01 PM
I've never had a teacher like that, at least in 6-12. Middle school, perhaps a few were less than satisfactory, but kids that age... you know. However, at least in 6-12 I never had a teacher who didn't come across as sincerely invested in my educational growth, whether or not I was interested at the time.
I've been through high school a bit more recently than you, and from my vantage point I am more wont to place the majority of the problem in the laps of the students and the administrations. The students are disinterested because life is so jam packed with entertainment and free time these days, and the administration are disinterested because they make more money by spending less and doing less.
THIS. Fucking this! Teachers are very much constrained by what the administrators want. My former employer/debate coach from high school was forced to pass almost all her senior English kids who were failing because she expected them to actually work. And every teacher I ever had in k-12 was interested in helping me learn and grow (ok, except one, but he got hooked on heroin early in the first semester).
This is absolutely inexcusable. Quality is going to plummet, test scores are going to drop, and a year is not enough time to really improve. Moreover, the quality of kids you get can seriously affect your test scores. Sometimes you get a bad batch, so to speak (my mother's last class was an example of this - her colleagues called them "the class from hell" for a reason). Ones who don't have support at home (or are busy raising their siblings because mom and dad aren't or can't), or have medical stuff that can't be taken care of for one reason or another, etc. There are teachers who are going to be screwed because of something they can't control.
Personally I'm eagerly awaiting the post from the only other person on this board who (that I know of) is involved in education. Especially since my impressions of the US system, while vivid, are all second hand.
Edit: And there she posts!
Quote from: Sigmatic on July 23, 2010, 11:41:41 PM
My aunt is a teacher. She works unbelievably hard to help her kids, and her position is still in jeopardy because the school is losing funds, since the kids get such bad grades due to the bad neighborhood/poverty/high crime rate.
You fire one teacher, you fire someone who spent years and tens of thousands of dollars for the privilege to work in a classroom. You can't tell me a person like that doesn't really care about teaching. Just because you have some new test to rate teachers doesn't mean it's the teachers fault that kids don't do well on tests.
I also have an aunt who is a teacher, and she works unbelievably hard as well, etc, etc.
All the good teacher's I've had have worked unbelievably hard, and I wouldn't be where I am today if not for those teachers.
But there are a
lot of teachers out there who are in it for the power trip, who see their students as obstacles to good teaching, who think of themselves as generals in some kind of generational war between children and adults and treat their students as hostile forces. There are teachers who have gone senile in their post but refuse to retire, teachers who are outright paranoid, or who flat-out do not know the material they are supposed to be teaching. There are even teachers who mean well and put in all the time and effort and still can't win the respect of their classroom, or who spend so much time pandering to the students and trying to make things interesting that they forget to actually teach anything.
Given that children are required to go to school, we owe them a teacher who isn't wasting their time.
Are these cuts well targeted to the teachers who really are failing? I don't know.
QuoteA union survey of 1,000 educators earlier this year found that 52 percent answered "no" when asked if they understood what was required of them under the new teaching framework. Seventy-five percent said they were not provided adequate examples, either on video or personal demonstration, of what constituted a high-scoring teacher performance. About the same proportion said they were not provided extra support in areas where they scored poorly on initial observations.
From the same article. Be interesting to see if they try to fill all the vacant positions or not. I suspect the latter, and if so, that suggests this had less to do with educational standards than using a new toy to thin out numbers in a time of budget cuts. I would also suggest a fully staffed school, even if staffed inadequately, is still far better than than a school which cannot operate properly due to lack of staff. Even mediocre or quite poor staff can help lift the burden off better teachers, allowing them to do their jobs to the best of their ability.
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on July 24, 2010, 12:01:00 AM
But there are a lot of teachers out there who are in it for the power trip, who see their students as obstacles to good teaching, who think of themselves as generals in some kind of generational war between children and adults and treat their students as hostile forces. There are teachers who have gone senile in their post but refuse to retire, teachers who are outright paranoid, or who flat-out do not know the material they are supposed to be teaching. There are even teachers who mean well and put in all the time and effort and still can't win the respect of their classroom, or who spend so much time pandering to the students and trying to make things interesting that they forget to actually teach anything.
Given that children are required to go to school, we owe them a teacher who isn't wasting their time.
Are these cuts well targeted to the teachers who really are failing? I don't know.
I never, ever had or observed a teacher who was in it for power or saw students as the enemy, or was too senile to teach, and I went to school in three different states (Colorado, Texas, and California). My mother teaches in another, which I have volunteered in. In that time, I have seen a handful of bad teachers, who just didn't give a shit or couldn't win the respect of their classes or any of the other problems you pointed out. I had and observed one teacher who didn't know her shit - my botany teacher who seemed to think botany = horticulture. And that's it. Ever. Out of thirteen years of school, dozens of teachers, and even more years observing and volunteering in the poorer district in my area, in which my mother teaches.
Quote from: Cain on July 24, 2010, 12:13:28 AM
QuoteA union survey of 1,000 educators earlier this year found that 52 percent answered "no" when asked if they understood what was required of them under the new teaching framework. Seventy-five percent said they were not provided adequate examples, either on video or personal demonstration, of what constituted a high-scoring teacher performance. About the same proportion said they were not provided extra support in areas where they scored poorly on initial observations.
From the same article. Be interesting to see if they try to fill all the vacant positions or not. I suspect the latter, and if so, that suggests this had less to do with educational standards than using a new toy to thin out numbers in a time of budget cuts. I would also suggest a fully staffed school, even if staffed inadequately, is still far better than than a school which cannot operate properly due to lack of staff. Even mediocre or quite poor staff can help lift the burden off better teachers, allowing them to do their jobs to the best of their ability.
Makes sense. California changes their shit every single year and often enough, radically. It's then just shoved at teachers, and I highly doubt they're the only ones.
Depends, I would think, on how much of this is really about budget cuts. The massive cut that hit the school district I used to work in and went to really is about the budget, though they shuffled the cuts around so that most of them (21/30) hit the poorest school in the district. Those twenty one teachers are not going to be replaced.
Makes a person want to consider wacking the public school system and making it completely private. Which is a horrible idea, but horrible events cause considerations of other horrible ideas. Meanwhile, other school systems across the world are increasing in quality. So much for being #1!
Quote from: Hover Cat on July 24, 2010, 12:20:15 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on July 24, 2010, 12:01:00 AM
But there are a lot of teachers out there who are in it for the power trip, who see their students as obstacles to good teaching, who think of themselves as generals in some kind of generational war between children and adults and treat their students as hostile forces. There are teachers who have gone senile in their post but refuse to retire, teachers who are outright paranoid, or who flat-out do not know the material they are supposed to be teaching. There are even teachers who mean well and put in all the time and effort and still can't win the respect of their classroom, or who spend so much time pandering to the students and trying to make things interesting that they forget to actually teach anything.
Given that children are required to go to school, we owe them a teacher who isn't wasting their time.
Are these cuts well targeted to the teachers who really are failing? I don't know.
I never, ever had or observed a teacher who was in it for power or saw students as the enemy, or was too senile to teach, and I went to school in three different states (Colorado, Texas, and California). My mother teaches in another, which I have volunteered in. In that time, I have seen a handful of bad teachers, who just didn't give a shit or couldn't win the respect of their classes or any of the other problems you pointed out. I had and observed one teacher who didn't know her shit - my botany teacher who seemed to think botany = horticulture. And that's it. Ever. Out of thirteen years of school, dozens of teachers, and even more years observing and volunteering in the poorer district in my area, in which my mother teaches.
All of the examples I've listed have been from personal experience. Teacher quality varies widely, I guess. (Incidentally, my three states were North Carolina, Tennessee, and Ohio. Public, private, homeschool, Catholic, and mixed grades. Not the most stable educational history... )
There are great teachers, good teachers, decent teachers, mediocre teachers, even bad teachers ... and then there's the ones who actively interfere with learning.
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on July 24, 2010, 12:55:25 AM
Quote from: Hover Cat on July 24, 2010, 12:20:15 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on July 24, 2010, 12:01:00 AM
But there are a lot of teachers out there who are in it for the power trip, who see their students as obstacles to good teaching, who think of themselves as generals in some kind of generational war between children and adults and treat their students as hostile forces. There are teachers who have gone senile in their post but refuse to retire, teachers who are outright paranoid, or who flat-out do not know the material they are supposed to be teaching. There are even teachers who mean well and put in all the time and effort and still can't win the respect of their classroom, or who spend so much time pandering to the students and trying to make things interesting that they forget to actually teach anything.
Given that children are required to go to school, we owe them a teacher who isn't wasting their time.
Are these cuts well targeted to the teachers who really are failing? I don't know.
I never, ever had or observed a teacher who was in it for power or saw students as the enemy, or was too senile to teach, and I went to school in three different states (Colorado, Texas, and California). My mother teaches in another, which I have volunteered in. In that time, I have seen a handful of bad teachers, who just didn't give a shit or couldn't win the respect of their classes or any of the other problems you pointed out. I had and observed one teacher who didn't know her shit - my botany teacher who seemed to think botany = horticulture. And that's it. Ever. Out of thirteen years of school, dozens of teachers, and even more years observing and volunteering in the poorer district in my area, in which my mother teaches.
All of the examples I've listed have been from personal experience. Teacher quality varies widely, I guess. (Incidentally, my three states were North Carolina, Tennessee, and Ohio. Public, private, homeschool, Catholic, and mixed grades. Not the most stable educational history... )
There are great teachers, good teachers, decent teachers, mediocre teachers, even bad teachers ... and then there's the ones who actively interfere with learning.
I can't imagine having teachers like that. Those people do not belong in the classroom, or anywhere near it. I'm hesitant to ask, but are you sure you were reading all of those teachers correctly?
I can remember teachers who abused their power in the classroom. And I can remember one who really flipped out at the kids, like actual shouting and hollering with rage freakout. Still though, the ones who shouldn't teach have been a huge minority, in my experience.
I had one trig teacher who I really couldn't learn from, but then when I retook trig I had the best math teacher ever, hands down. So, yanno.
So the concensus is there are bad teachers.
The question isn't whether there are bad teachers, it is whether a new system which magically finds 20% of the sample of teachers unfit (and has what seems to be several real flaws in its execution) is really working as advertised, or is in fact being used as a soft method to cover up methodical and sweeping layoffs, and what effect this is likely to have on education in the area.
I also notice everyone skirting around the point that even mediocre or bad teachers (except in the worst cases) still have a role to play in schools because, as I pointed out, an understaffed school is actually going to perform worse than a fully staffed one unless every single teacher there is of mediocre or worse skill (statistically unlikely). 5-10% getting axed seems far more justifiable, especially if the layoffs were spread out as so to minimize the disruption to the educational system and they were actively seeking to fill the vacant posts. Again though, that don't seem to be the case here, based on the available evidence.
You can argue generally about zomg teh bad teachers until the cows come home, but let's try looking at the facts of the particular case, shall we?
I teach in Australia, and am still developing feelings about the systems in general.
There are teachers who work INCREDIBLY hard, and there are teachers who are waiting out the last couple of years before they retire/don't want to change industries because it means a whole new skill set.
There's a lot that can be done, the main points being
* Actively promote support additional for teachers who are in their first five years/ who are returning to teaching after a break (at prenent done where I am, but the efficiency depends on the school.)
* Actively promote sabbatical/industry change periods for teachers to give the option of gaining additional real world experience, with systems availible to ease teachers back into jobs.
* oh and the obvious CLASS SIZE DOWN, STAFF SIZE UP
* PR the shit out of teaching to actually make it appealing to the mainstream
* Offer transition support to teachers to avoid being in the situation of 'I'd leave, but i don't know what else to do...'.
*Also, make university courses A, standardised and B not a complete joke.
Quote from: Cain on July 24, 2010, 06:34:51 AM
The question isn't whether there are bad teachers, it is whether a new system which magically finds 20% of the sample of teachers unfit (and has what seems to be several real flaws in its execution) is really working as advertised, or is in fact being used as a soft method to cover up methodical and sweeping layoffs, and what effect this is likely to have on education in the area.
It isn't magic, it's just being enforced for the first time.
Quote from: Cain on July 24, 2010, 06:42:13 AM
I also notice everyone skirting around the point that even mediocre or bad teachers (except in the worst cases) still have a role to play in schools because, as I pointed out, an understaffed school is actually going to perform worse than a fully staffed one unless every single teacher there is of mediocre or worse skill (statistically unlikely). 5-10% getting axed seems far more justifiable, especially if the layoffs were spread out as so to minimize the disruption to the educational system and they were actively seeking to fill the vacant posts. Again though, that don't seem to be the case here, based on the available evidence.
You can argue generally about zomg teh bad teachers until the cows come home, but let's try looking at the facts of the particular case, shall we?
A bad teacher can do far more harm than good, even as a place holder.
For American schools, I'd add not penalizing teachers for stupid administers (like NCLB does) to Placid Dingo's list.
Quote from: Cain on July 24, 2010, 06:34:51 AM
The question isn't whether there are bad teachers, it is whether a new system which magically finds 20% of the sample of teachers unfit (and has what seems to be several real flaws in its execution) is really working as advertised, or is in fact being used as a soft method to cover up methodical and sweeping layoffs, and what effect this is likely to have on education in the area.
DC has a pretty sizable poor area, iirc, and that would mean a hit to already underfunded schools, even with Rhee's investments because four million is unlikely to be enough. Not this year, since according to the article, that's only about 4% of the corp (though that depends on how the layoff are dealt with), but next year, that's a huge chunk of teachers possibly gone. And like I said, a year isn't enough time, especially with the way new materials and criteria are usually handled, so I would predict a large layoff next summer, unless the union has its way.
In order to answer the methodical and sweeping bit, we'd have to get a look at teacher politics I would say.
I'm really not liking this.
QuoteShe has announced plans to significantly expand the use of standardized tests so that value-added data will be available in some form at all grade levels.
Taking more time away from students and teachers who may be seriously understaffed by this time next year. "Hey, let's take up more time with tests that are supposed to tell us how they're spending their time!" Ugh.
Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 24, 2010, 07:06:35 AM
Quote from: Cain on July 24, 2010, 06:42:13 AM
I also notice everyone skirting around the point that even mediocre or bad teachers (except in the worst cases) still have a role to play in schools because, as I pointed out, an understaffed school is actually going to perform worse than a fully staffed one unless every single teacher there is of mediocre or worse skill (statistically unlikely). 5-10% getting axed seems far more justifiable, especially if the layoffs were spread out as so to minimize the disruption to the educational system and they were actively seeking to fill the vacant posts. Again though, that don't seem to be the case here, based on the available evidence.
You can argue generally about zomg teh bad teachers until the cows come home, but let's try looking at the facts of the particular case, shall we?
A bad teacher can do far more harm than good, even as a place holder.
True. There is no easy answer to this, though. Frazzled, over worked, would-be-excellent-if-s/he-didn't-have-forty-kids teacher or a bad seat warmer - which do you pick?
Quote from: Cain on July 23, 2010, 11:41:11 PM
Uh, believe me, no-one in the US teaches for the wonderful pay and opportunities the job presents. In fact, since teachers are required to be graduates, they'd probably earn more in the private sector anyway.
Average teacher Salary in DC is 66k a year. Average Salary in the US for a college grad is 42k.
Edit, found average college grad-DC pay, which is 72k, I suspect that is distorted by government contractor and lobbyist jobs unique to the area.
My mom worked in the school system for decades, as an administrative assistant not as a teacher. I don't know how applicable the things she has told me are, since the place she worked is a small, well funded school. However she chose to put my younger brother into private school because she was sick of the administration. She never had anything bad to say about a teacher, although the teacher I had for 7th grade really was completely senile, there is no way she should have been teaching any longer. There were some outstandingly good teachers there in my experience, some that were not bad, and that one that was too old to teach. What gave my mother constant headaches though was the administration. The restraints that they put on the teachers were frustrating both for them and for the students, and because she handled the budget she could see how poorly it was allocated.
Quote from: Requia ☣ on July 24, 2010, 07:44:15 AM
Quote from: Cain on July 23, 2010, 11:41:11 PM
Uh, believe me, no-one in the US teaches for the wonderful pay and opportunities the job presents. In fact, since teachers are required to be graduates, they'd probably earn more in the private sector anyway.
Average teacher Salary in DC is 66k a year. Average Salary in the US for a college grad is 42k.
Edit, found average college grad-DC pay, which is 72k, I suspect that is distorted by government contractor and lobbyist jobs unique to the area.
The listed pay for teachers are for if they worked the full year, it is not what they are actually taking in. Teachers in areas such as California are not only taking pay cuts currently, but are not being paid for any time they spend outside of a classroom, including doing school trips, after school activities and prep work, as well as lunch breaks and time spent between classes or in free periods. In some cases, their actual pay is working out to be $10/hour or so.
Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 24, 2010, 07:05:46 AM
Quote from: Cain on July 24, 2010, 06:34:51 AM
The question isn't whether there are bad teachers, it is whether a new system which magically finds 20% of the sample of teachers unfit (and has what seems to be several real flaws in its execution) is really working as advertised, or is in fact being used as a soft method to cover up methodical and sweeping layoffs, and what effect this is likely to have on education in the area.
It isn't magic, it's just being enforced for the first time.
Did you even read the criticisms of the new system in the article? Or did you just read the first two paragraphs and cement into an opinion? It's a brand new system where teachers aren't being given the criterea on which they are being judged and not being given support when they are reviewed poorly in certain areas. Gosh, I wonder how that could turn out badly?
California is not DC. It's true that some places in America teachers are vastly underpaid, and California is certainly one of them, but that's not true for all of America.
The low hourly wage when you consider the unpaid overtime is also pretty typical for salaried employees here.
The people staying behind are apparently winning big too.
Quote from: The Washington PostThe average base salary will jump from $67,000 this year to more than $81,000 in 2012. Depending how well their students perform, teachers in the merit-pay program could earn up to $150,000, which would make them some of the highest-compensated urban teachers in the nation.
Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 24, 2010, 07:06:35 AM
Quote from: Cain on July 24, 2010, 06:42:13 AM
I also notice everyone skirting around the point that even mediocre or bad teachers (except in the worst cases) still have a role to play in schools because, as I pointed out, an understaffed school is actually going to perform worse than a fully staffed one unless every single teacher there is of mediocre or worse skill (statistically unlikely). 5-10% getting axed seems far more justifiable, especially if the layoffs were spread out as so to minimize the disruption to the educational system and they were actively seeking to fill the vacant posts. Again though, that don't seem to be the case here, based on the available evidence.
You can argue generally about zomg teh bad teachers until the cows come home, but let's try looking at the facts of the particular case, shall we?
A bad teacher can do far more harm than good, even as a place holder.
Thank you for that assertion without evidence or argument. Ever worked an understaffed school? Teachers are more stressed, classes are larger and you have to rely on supply teachers, who the kids don't respect or listen to and have absolutely no clout. It's a recipe for disaster which is far worse than a teacher who doesn't know the material as well as they should, isn't motivated enough or treats the kids in a too harsh fashion. At least they'll get
some classes where the teacher is motivated enough to look out for their needs and isn't too stressed and overworked to have the time.
Quote from: Hover Cat on July 24, 2010, 07:38:16 AM
For American schools, I'd add not penalizing teachers for stupid administers (like NCLB does) to Placid Dingo's list.
I haven't heard a single good thing about NCLB from the teachers here. Even mentioning it causes scowls and quiet curses.
Quote from: Hover Cat on July 24, 2010, 07:38:16 AM
For American schools, I'd add not penalizing teachers for stupid administers (like NCLB does) to Placid Dingo's list.
Sorry, could someone please attach an Australian friendly translation?
Quote from: Placid Dingo on July 24, 2010, 10:45:47 AM
Quote from: Hover Cat on July 24, 2010, 07:38:16 AM
For American schools, I'd add not penalizing teachers for stupid administers (like NCLB does) to Placid Dingo's list.
Sorry, could someone please attach an Australian friendly translation?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act
This should help
Quote from: Cain on July 24, 2010, 09:35:24 AM
Quote from: Hover Cat on July 24, 2010, 07:38:16 AM
For American schools, I'd add not penalizing teachers for stupid administers (like NCLB does) to Placid Dingo's list.
I haven't heard a single good thing about NCLB from the teachers here. Even mentioning it causes scowls and quiet curses.
Most of the teachers and administrators I work with say the same. And that's part of the problem. The whole "teach to the test" idea which is limiting for some students. I think it is about time NCLB is either scrapped, or paired with a parallel initiative that normalizes and institutionalizes alternative education modalities. If a kid does better with experience-based learning, that should be an option and the determinent of success for that kid shouldn't be determined by the NCLB standardized testing. There is so much information out about kids who simply don't do well with tests. The education system needs to do a better job of weaving those ideas into public school curricula.
Of course, another tough piece is economics. I work in two of the largest school districts in the state, one of which is the poorest district in the state and has the largest dropout rate. Now, that school district is stocked with good people. Great teachers, great guidance counselors, and the superintendent is top notch. But they just can't overcome the economics and how crushing that is on a child. If a child is born in a family that has this culture that their futures are predetermined to be fail. There will never be any motivation there to learn no matter how good the teacher is. I would wager this is an element at play in many of the DC neighborhoods.
Quote from: Cain on July 24, 2010, 09:14:00 AM
Quote from: Doktor Charley Brown on July 24, 2010, 07:05:46 AM
Quote from: Cain on July 24, 2010, 06:34:51 AM
The question isn't whether there are bad teachers, it is whether a new system which magically finds 20% of the sample of teachers unfit (and has what seems to be several real flaws in its execution) is really working as advertised, or is in fact being used as a soft method to cover up methodical and sweeping layoffs, and what effect this is likely to have on education in the area.
It isn't magic, it's just being enforced for the first time.
Did you even read the criticisms of the new system in the article? Or did you just read the first two paragraphs and cement into an opinion? It's a brand new system where teachers aren't being given the criterea on which they are being judged and not being given support when they are reviewed poorly in certain areas. Gosh, I wonder how that could turn out badly?
So how can the effectiveness of a teacher be fairly measured? FTR I think 'teaching to the test' is a horrible thing and should be abandoned.
You're right. And it wouldn't be done if it didn't cost so much less. What schools need is, unfortunately, a lot more funding. School budgets have been getting the axe for too long without reprieve, and at this point there is no other solution that ends in better education.
Quote from: Requia ☣ on July 24, 2010, 09:21:21 AM
The people staying behind are apparently winning big too.
Quote from: The Washington PostLast month, union members and the D.C. Council approved a new contract that raises educators' salaries by 21.6 percent but diminishes traditional seniority protections in favor of personnel decisions based on results in the classroom. The pact also provides for a "performance pay" system with bonuses of $20,000 to $30,000 annually for teachers who meet certain benchmarks, including growth in test scores.
Teachers being bullied into working for bonuses premised on standardized testing. What could go wrong?
....................................
The whole thing's a perfect example of what happens when business administration takes over education. They'll always get funding for more standardization and untested teacher evaluation systems, but money for books, computers and software, afterschool programs, teacher training, support staff, building repairs and so on is off the table.
I'd like to see an area breakdown of the layoffs. If it's the same as here, already underfunded schools are usually the ones that take the hardest knocks from this kind of shit.
Got to say, the scale of this is sickening. And whatever DC pulls off in terms of policing schools, our local boards try to push through (usually about 5 years later). Very scary stuff. What Sigmatic said: This is dicks.
Quote from: Requia ☣ on July 24, 2010, 07:44:15 AM
Quote from: Cain on July 23, 2010, 11:41:11 PM
Uh, believe me, no-one in the US teaches for the wonderful pay and opportunities the job presents. In fact, since teachers are required to be graduates, they'd probably earn more in the private sector anyway.
Average teacher Salary in DC is 66k a year. Average Salary in the US for a college grad is 42k.
Edit, found average college grad-DC pay, which is 72k, I suspect that is distorted by government contractor and lobbyist jobs unique to the area.
That's ignoring the cost of living - DC is fucking expensive. Teachers who've been doing it a long time to well enough in pretty much any district - my mom's been teaching for twelve years now and makes ~$65k a year, I think, and we have the lowest cost of living in the state here. However, that's contingent on having a union. Teachers in districts without a union are vulnerable to a lot of shit, larger paycuts being one of them.
Quote from: Cain on July 24, 2010, 09:11:56 AM
The listed pay for teachers are for if they worked the full year, it is not what they are actually taking in. Teachers in areas such as California are not only taking pay cuts currently, but are not being paid for any time they spend outside of a classroom, including doing school trips, after school activities and prep work, as well as lunch breaks and time spent between classes or in free periods. In some cases, their actual pay is working out to be $10/hour or so.
They've never been paid for prep time or any of the other stuff. Paycuts, yeah, those they're taking now. But that's generally a very small one - 1% pay cut in my mom's district this year. A tiny bit less for each teacher saves the district a lot of money.
Quote from: Nurse Rhizome on July 24, 2010, 06:32:02 PM
Quote from: Requia ☣ on July 24, 2010, 09:21:21 AM
The people staying behind are apparently winning big too.
Quote from: The Washington PostLast month, union members and the D.C. Council approved a new contract that raises educators' salaries by 21.6 percent but diminishes traditional seniority protections in favor of personnel decisions based on results in the classroom. The pact also provides for a "performance pay" system with bonuses of $20,000 to $30,000 annually for teachers who meet certain benchmarks, including growth in test scores.
Teachers being bullied into working for bonuses premised on standardized testing. What could go wrong?
The concern I have here is less about bullying and more about teachers cheating. It's not hard to do, frankly, even though these days when the kids are done with a test, they're given a sticker to seal the book shut. Care and a little bit of tacky glue can cover that up.
Quote from: Nurse Rhizome on July 24, 2010, 06:32:02 PM
The whole thing's a perfect example of what happens when business administration takes over education. They'll always get funding for more standardization and untested teacher evaluation systems, but money for books, computers and software, afterschool programs, teacher training, support staff, building repairs and so on is off the table.
This is correct. The books the poorer district is using are pretty much ancient, except for their English and math books, because that's what they're tested on most. My mom's kids' history books are from about 2002, if that.
Quote from: Nurse Rhizome on July 24, 2010, 06:32:02 PM
I'd like to see an area breakdown of the layoffs. If it's the same as here, already underfunded schools are usually the ones that take the hardest knocks from this kind of shit.
Yep. My old high school is the poorest in the district and taking almost all the losses. It's also the one falling apart. I'd also add that it's the regular teachers that will be the ones leaving - not the AP, honors, or any of the other fancy teachers like that. The regular ones for the majority of the student body and the special ed teachers are going to be the ones to go.
Edited for quote fail
Well, there's the part about not working during the summer. My aunt lives pretty minimally so she can vacation during the summer, and that's just enough to keep her sane.
WIll look at NCLB in a sec, I'm familiar with the name but not the details (except that Michale Moore says it is a Very Bad Thing)
I am familiar with the hideousness that is teaching to the test, which should be averted anywhere it possibly can (which really, should be everywhere).
There's a very very good reason to have standardised testing; so professionals (teachers, admin etc) can obtain data of use to them, to let them know what they are doing well/poorly at, and where, and to gather this data on a large scale systematic level.
When you tie test results to pretty much anything else, you have a number of issues waiting to rear their ugly head.
Right. Because we totally want a nation of people who were all taught the same exact facts.
I'm down for that. That totally doesn't make it extremely easy for textbook publishers cough texas cough to sneak in complete rubbish to the entire nation's classrooms.
Quote from: Sigmatic on July 25, 2010, 03:47:23 PM
Right. Because we totally want a nation of people who were all taught the same exact facts.
I'm down for that. That totally doesn't make it extremely easy for textbook publishers cough texas cough to sneak in complete rubbish to the entire nation's classrooms.
Texas is pretty much setting the standards these days, I would say (Cram probably has a better idea than I do, though). I would point out that in some areas, the exact same facts are fine, like in the sciences. Everyone should have an idea of what covalent bonds, for example. And even in American history. We just need to reform how textbooks are done.
History is trickier though, because the phrasing and nuance can cast different light on different subjects. There's a great deal of political motivation to control the way history is conveyed, and the only good way to learn history is to read different accounts of the same events. If all the history books gave the exact same accounts, and if all historians have the same version of the facts, then there's no controversy, but our history tends to be rife with glossed over problems and atrocities, and lionized and vilified characters. Which to believe?
Quote from: Sigmatic on July 25, 2010, 09:05:32 PM
History is trickier though, because the phrasing and nuance can cast different light on different subjects. There's a great deal of political motivation to control the way history is conveyed, and the only good way to learn history is to read different accounts of the same events. If all the history books gave the exact same accounts, and if all historians have the same version of the facts, then there's no controversy, but our history tends to be rife with glossed over problems and atrocities, and lionized and vilified characters. Which to believe?
I'm aware of that, lol. I intended to teach high school history at one point and I always intended to teach my students that while certain facts are concrete, how we interpret them isn't. The basic facts is what I meant (I should have been more clear about that, yeah?). George Washington was the first president,Thomas Jefferson was involved with the formation of the government, Martin Luther King was assassinated - these are facts and people who must be included in all text books. My argument is that we need to reform how textbooks are produced so that things like Texas's bullshit retard exclusion of Jefferson isn't forced on everyone else. I don't have the answer as to how, but the way we do it now sucks.
Okay, yeah. Agreeing at the top of my lungs. :lol:
Quote from: Sigmatic on July 25, 2010, 03:47:23 PM
Right. Because we totally want a nation of people who were all taught the same exact facts.
I'm down for that. That totally doesn't make it extremely easy for textbook publishers cough texas cough to sneak in complete rubbish to the entire nation's classrooms.
I'm not certain, so I apologise if this isn't directed at me.
But at a primary school level, testing tends to focus on literacy and numeracy, not 'do you know this true fact'.
So a question might be;
What is (3+4) (10 + -3)
There might be an answer space or there might be a multiple choice Question.
The data is useful, not just for IF they get it wrong, but HOW.
If the answer is B and most say A, then they are barking up the wrong tree. So something we teach them is confusing them in the way we do it.
BUT if it's B and they say... pretty much everything they CAN say, then they DON'T GET IT AT ALL. Which is extremely useful for a teacher.
Same deal with English. Questions are things like
What is the mistake in this sentence: ["I'm going to tell you're father about this," yelled James.]
There's no kind of
'Explain why Australia is justified in lowering immigration'
propaganda-y questions.
Those subjects are pretty hard to slant, it's true. But when you get history or literature in the curriculum, it becomes very easy to slant. That was my only gripe.
The NCLB act has got to go. A large number of my coworkers used to be teachers until it passed, then decided to jump ship into textbook publishing. They didn't want their careers to be jeopardized by the insane amount of bureaucracy that it introduced into education. Did you know that they start teaching kids how to pass state exams in KINDERGARTEN? yeah, after learning the names of shapes, there's naptime, and then they spend a few hours familiarizing themselves with grading rubrics.
There are so many factors which influence student performance - levels of funding being a huge one. Teacher skill is just one slice of the pie. Even if you're the best teacher in the world, your students are still going to perform poorly if your school doesn't have any money.
Back when I was taking a class called Sociology of Education, I saw a documentary about this one county in Indiana (?), where they didn't have enough money to repair the leaks in the roof. Predictably, kids were reading at about four grade levels under the target. A third of graduating fifth graders were illiterate. Jnder NCLB, they're just going to get less funding. The documentary said that the amount of money needed to get all schools in the county to the point where the kids can read at the expected levels wouldn't even be a ton of money. Equal to the cost of one fighter jet. The teachers were furious!
really sends a message about this country's priorities, no?
Quote from: Cramulus on July 26, 2010, 07:47:25 PM
The NCLB act has got to go. A large number of my coworkers used to be teachers until it passed, then decided to jump ship into textbook publishing. They didn't want their careers to be jeopardized by the insane amount of bureaucracy that it introduced into education. Did you know that they start teaching kids how to pass state exams in KINDERGARTEN? yeah, after learning the names of shapes, there's naptime, and then they spend a few hours familiarizing themselves with grading rubrics.
There are so many factors which influence student performance - levels of funding being a huge one. Teacher skill is just one slice of the pie. Even if you're the best teacher in the world, your students are still going to perform poorly if your school doesn't have any money.
Back when I was taking a class called Sociology of Education, I saw a documentary about this one county in Indiana (?), where they didn't have enough money to repair the leaks in the roof. Predictably, kids were reading at about four grade levels under the target. A third of graduating fifth graders were illiterate. Jnder NCLB, they're just going to get less funding. The documentary said that the amount of money needed to get all schools in the county to the point where the kids can read at the expected levels wouldn't even be a ton of money. Equal to the cost of one fighter jet. The teachers were furious!
really sends a message about this country's priorities, no?
You're missing the point, Cram. The NCLB Act is designed to produce a permanent aristocracy.
Neither party will eliminate it. They've been working towards this since 1968.
None of this would be a problem if we could use childrens' literacy to kill terrorists.
Quote from: Sigmatic on July 26, 2010, 08:04:06 PM
None of this would be a problem if we could use childrens' literacy to kill terrorists.
Pffft. Nobody wants to kill terrorists. They want to spend money killing terrorists.
And that doesn't include rampant socialism like "universal education", which only lets the terrorists win.
Stupid progressives and their...progress.
Quote from: Cramulus on July 26, 2010, 07:47:25 PM
The NCLB act has got to go. A large number of my coworkers used to be teachers until it passed, then decided to jump ship into textbook publishing. They didn't want their careers to be jeopardized by the insane amount of bureaucracy that it introduced into education. Did you know that they start teaching kids how to pass state exams in KINDERGARTEN? yeah, after learning the names of shapes, there's naptime, and then they spend a few hours familiarizing themselves with grading rubrics.
There are so many factors which influence student performance - levels of funding being a huge one. Teacher skill is just one slice of the pie. Even if you're the best teacher in the world, your students are still going to perform poorly if your school doesn't have any money.
Back when I was taking a class called Sociology of Education, I saw a documentary about this one county in Indiana (?), where they didn't have enough money to repair the leaks in the roof. Predictably, kids were reading at about four grade levels under the target. A third of graduating fifth graders were illiterate. Jnder NCLB, they're just going to get less funding. The documentary said that the amount of money needed to get all schools in the county to the point where the kids can read at the expected levels wouldn't even be a ton of money. Equal to the cost of one fighter jet. The teachers were furious!
really sends a message about this country's priorities, no?
On top of that, schools that don't preform well get less funding, and after a certain number of years (five or something - I don't remember for sure), they fire all the teachers. I cannot emphasize enough the effect of the administration on teachers' ability to teach.
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 26, 2010, 07:48:44 PM
You're missing the point, Cram. The NCLB Act is designed to produce a permanent aristocracy.
Neither party will eliminate it. They've been working towards this since 1968.
I really wish I didn't suspect you were right.
Quote from: Hover Cat on July 26, 2010, 09:09:03 PM
I really wish I didn't suspect you were right.
Suspicion, my ass. It's cold, hard fact.
Poorer schools = less resources = worse scores on tests = less Title I funding.
Richer schools = more resources = better scores on tests = more Title I funding.
It's a feedback loop.
Richer schools don't usually get Title I because they're not lower-performing enough. But yeah, I do agree that NCLB is just fucked up six ways to Sunday. It's like the health care deal we just "got," it's the "best thing we could get," so it's what's going to stick. It unfortunately leaves "behind" all the kids whose parents don't give a rat's ass, and those who just can't, for whatever reason. And then the fact it's a GODDAMMED UNFUNDED MANDATE is another stick in the craw.
Washington (CNN) - The House is expected to vote Tuesday on a scaled-back version of its original war funding bill, which would drop billions of dollars for unrelated domestic programs, including money to help struggling states avoid teacher layoffs.
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/?fbid=fL9v4Hjua92
Having a parent who has worked in a Louisiana school system for 30+ years, it's pretty easy to see how NCLB has hooked the hose to the poopnozzle and turned it on full blast. The middle school at which she works is watching helplessly as the budget cuts head their way. A few years ago they had some of the highest standardized test scores in the parish, lucky them, but now that the inevitable decline is on its way the money will slip out with it, putting pressure on administration who are mercenaries disguised as middle-aged women in business suits.
In the meantime the kids refuse to work. They act like shitting animals, breaking/stealing whatever they can, whipping their dicks out under the desk to compare size and taking as much as they can without giving anything back. Public school down here is the lunch dole, a place to store your brat so you don't have to raise him yourself - because kids like that are innocent, their parents are just a vision of what they will become. Down here, people think teachers should be dealing with other people's inadequacies at child-rearing for them, mindlessly handing away their offspring to the state and screaming whenever someone asks them to take some fucking responsibility. Oh, and if you really love teaching, you should be doing it for free. The conservative wingnuts agree and are the main proponents of this because they want to keep seeing the smudgy folks fail in a state-run system, smugly advancing their agenda.
I give thanks to Strife, the Mother of Competition that I got an education at all! That I got into a decent college, got a decent education, because I wanted to better myself and not live like another state ward.
-
Quote from: Cain on October 12, 2013, 01:28:09 PM
Bump (https://www.nsfwcorp.com/dispatch/education-hostage/#rssowlmlink):
QuoteThanks to the boom in lobbying and government contracting, the nation's capital is no longer a town of middle-class bureaucrats - it is now one of the wealthiest places on Earth, and one of the planet's most unequal cities. With the Beltway's rich typically sending their kids to private havens like Sidwell Friends, the D.C. public school system ends up serving a disproportionately low-income student population, which means it needs a lot of money if it has any chance of succeeding. That's because economic status is such an enormous factor in educational achievement and because successfully combating poverty's deleterious effect on educational achievement requires extra resources for "wraparound" services. To help raise that capital, private foundations in recent years swooped in with resources.
It sounded great - suddenly, there seemed to be no need to raise taxes on the cash-bloated multinational corporations stationed in D.C. The celebrated philanthrocapitalists were in the nation's capital to save the day! Except for one problem: the foundation money came with an implicit and then-unprecedented threat. Championing the punitive, unproven and often counterproductive pedagogical agenda of standardized testing, draconian school shutdowns, mass teacher firings and union-busting charter schools, the conservative foundations gave Washington, D.C. residents the hostage-taker's ultimatum: if they and their democratically elected city councilors did not obediently submit to the corporate "reform" agenda of then-Chancellor Michelle Rhee, then there would be consequences. More specifically, if they ever removed Rhee from her public office, then the foundation money would be summarily withdrawn, and kids would be harmed.
Backed by these corporate heavies, Rhee told residents who were critical of her destructive and cheating-plagued term that when it comes to public education policy in her city, "It's not a democracy." The result of the hostage taking thuggery? As PBS Frontline reported, after Rhee's tenure, Washington is "still among the worst in the nation and D.C.'s high school graduation rate dead last." And yet while the hostages suffered, Rhee has been handsomely rewarded for her loyalty to the hostage takers, as the same plutocrats bequeathed her a high-paying job and a well-financed corporate front group all for herself.
Just saying.
But corporations will always do what's best for us!
Right?
The invisible hand knows best!
Rhee, and like-minded leaders in other school districts, contends that the best way to overhaul schools is to intensively monitor the performance of every adult, including janitors, and measure it by multiple yardsticks. For teachers, that includes evidence that their students meet or exceed predicted rates of growth on standardized tests, a metric known as "value-added."
Pffft, because everyone knows that schools should be run just like any other business, with carefully constructed evaluations of performance and proper graphs and PowerPoint presentations showing "rates of growth".
Because we're not at all dealing with human beings and a process that can't always be evaluated numerically and education isn't a vital part of society that shouldn't be treated like selling potato chips.
Quote from: Pere Ubu on October 12, 2013, 05:06:08 PM
Rhee, and like-minded leaders in other school districts, contends that the best way to overhaul schools is to intensively monitor the performance of every adult, including janitors, and measure it by multiple yardsticks. For teachers, that includes evidence that their students meet or exceed predicted rates of growth on standardized tests, a metric known as "value-added."
Pffft, because everyone knows that schools should be run just like any other business, with carefully constructed evaluations of performance and proper graphs and PowerPoint presentations showing "rates of growth".
Because we're not at all dealing with human beings and a process that can't always be evaluated numerically and education isn't a vital part of society that shouldn't be treated like selling potato chips.
Not to derail or anything but what's up with that?
That mentality is fucking EVERYWHERE.
Quote from: Bu☆ns on October 12, 2013, 05:50:07 PMThat mentality is fucking EVERYWHERE.
CORPORATIONS ARE HOLY BLAMELESS CREATURES AND WALK AMONG US AS GODS :cainftw: :cainftw:
Quote from: Bu☆ns on October 12, 2013, 05:50:07 PM
Quote from: Pere Ubu on October 12, 2013, 05:06:08 PM
Rhee, and like-minded leaders in other school districts, contends that the best way to overhaul schools is to intensively monitor the performance of every adult, including janitors, and measure it by multiple yardsticks. For teachers, that includes evidence that their students meet or exceed predicted rates of growth on standardized tests, a metric known as "value-added."
Pffft, because everyone knows that schools should be run just like any other business, with carefully constructed evaluations of performance and proper graphs and PowerPoint presentations showing "rates of growth".
Because we're not at all dealing with human beings and a process that can't always be evaluated numerically and education isn't a vital part of society that shouldn't be treated like selling potato chips.
Not to derail or anything but what's up with that?
That mentality is fucking EVERYWHERE.
Not only is it run like a business, but it's also pseudo-scientific. They claim objectivity, since their measures are numerical values, yet unlike scientific procedure, a failure of a model does not lead to a change in said model. There's no reason a numerical measure /couldn't/ help make decisions, but when failure of the model leads to the continuation of the model i.e., hypervigilance in the form of termination, well, isn't that the very definition of insanity?
Either that, or their values are such that the model is doing exactly what they want.
This is fucking depressing.
Quote from: Kai on October 12, 2013, 10:15:47 PM
Quote from: Bu☆ns on October 12, 2013, 05:50:07 PM
Quote from: Pere Ubu on October 12, 2013, 05:06:08 PM
Rhee, and like-minded leaders in other school districts, contends that the best way to overhaul schools is to intensively monitor the performance of every adult, including janitors, and measure it by multiple yardsticks. For teachers, that includes evidence that their students meet or exceed predicted rates of growth on standardized tests, a metric known as "value-added."
Pffft, because everyone knows that schools should be run just like any other business, with carefully constructed evaluations of performance and proper graphs and PowerPoint presentations showing "rates of growth".
Because we're not at all dealing with human beings and a process that can't always be evaluated numerically and education isn't a vital part of society that shouldn't be treated like selling potato chips.
Not to derail or anything but what's up with that?
That mentality is fucking EVERYWHERE.
Not only is it run like a business, but it's also pseudo-scientific. They claim objectivity, since their measures are numerical values, yet unlike scientific procedure, a failure of a model does not lead to a change in said model. There's no reason a numerical measure /couldn't/ help make decisions, but when failure of the model leads to the continuation of the model i.e., hypervigilance in the form of termination, well, isn't that the very definition of insanity?
Either that, or their values are such that the model is doing exactly what they want.
Crazy. That's always been sort of what kids tend to suspect. Even growing up my fellow classmates were subjected to a lot of new experiments with various programs. And it's almost they do it to show that they're doing something rather than actually improving.
It's more like a shuffle rather than a actual plan.