Hello - I just found your website and wanted you know about this website, www.reinstatedrart.com, sponsored by students and parents in support of a highly successful DC teacher [Art Siebens] who was dismissed from his 18 year post under [Michelle] Rhee's regime, with the explanation "you don't fit." I'm alerting the Daily Howler as well.
Eduwonkette outdoes herself today
All along the Eastern corridor, folks are buzzing about firing teachers. In New York City two weeks ago, the New Teacher Project once again called for the district to put excessed teachers who have not been hired after a year on unpaid leave. Last week in his Washington Post column, Jay Mathews also sang a paean about the virtues of principals firing teachers at will. And in Michelle Rhee’s proposed contract, teachers would give up tenure in exchange for performance pay. Now, she’s moved to “Plan B,” which involves giving “bad teachers” 90 days to improve, or else face dismissal.
In all three cases, the assumption is that principals know best, that they make decisions based on the best interest of students, that “kid issues” will be put before “adult issues” in hiring decisions, and that concerns about fair treatment are retrograde - even passé.
Yet right under Michelle Rhee’s nose, her own theory of action – that principals will always pick the “best teachers” – has been tested by the case of Dr. Art Siebens.
Read Eduwonkette"s full post on Siebens and Rhee. Make sure to read the comments.
(I put a choice selection below in comment #1.)
1 comment:
Selection of Comments from Eduwonkette's post:
George Soros' explanation of the financial mess applies here. If you have ten containers of water, and only one is poisoned, then they are still worthless. It does not take many arbitrary decisions to destroy a career before you poison the entire well of teaching talent. Would you commit to a career and buying a house etc. if you had a 2 or 3 or 5% chance per year to run afoul of someone who could destroy your career?
Why will there always be enough unfair decisions in a system with unchecked power? Its human nature. We're all supposed to learn that in Government 101.
John Thompson
1) The primary reason why there is high illiteracy in DC is because of the school system. In other words, you are saying that if we swapped DC kids into schools in Chevy Chase or Bethesda, places with high literacy rates, DC kids would be substantially more literate. Do you believe this is true?
2) Eliminating tenure would increase the quality of teachers in DCPS. I am having a hard time understanding where this fleet of exceptional teachers is coming from. Might it not be prudent to make investments in improving the teachers that we have, rather than just replacing them in large numbers? Yes, there are teachers that cannot, or will not, improve, and they should be removed. But I do not think - given the size of DCPS - that you are going to fire your way to a great school system.
3) "Competent teachers" are going to be rewarded, and incompetent teachers are not. The lesson of the Siebens case is that even teachers at the top of the distribution - those with demonstrated effectiveness, national awards, etc - can fall through the cracks. Why are you confident that principals will always - or even often - pick the "best teachers?"
Eduwonkette
If I thought Chancellor Rhee had a plan and it was fair, open, and transparent, were I a teacher I might sign off on the new plan.
But Chancellor Rhee has not yet demonstrated a commitment to open, fair and transparent processes, and she has denied the need for a plan (see the GAO report).
Most of us agree that something needs to be done. But what needs to be done needs to be more than throwing bombs at all levels, across most schools.
Richard Layman
Let's be clear. Dr. Siebens did not "fall through the cracks" of a big bureaucracy. Michelle Rhee got early notice of what was happening and personally supported it. I talked to her 2 months ago and she warned darkly that if I knew what she knew, I'd support his termination, too. It was utter BS and a nasty way to try to damage a fine person's reputation. I wouldn't trust Rhee with any teacher's rights.
Ross
Post a Comment