NYS Teacher Evaluation Controversy from Rockville Centre Schools on Vimeo.
http://edupln.com/video/nys-teacher-evaluation-controversy
List of Protesting Principals Tops 1,000
Dec. 15, 2011, 11:42 a.m.By SchoolBookNearly a quarter of all principals in New York State have signed a letter objecting to New York State’s system of teacher evaluations.The letter, which was posted online, voices objections to a new state evaluation system that will rate teachers and principals based on student scores on standardized tests.The principals’ complaints include: The system has not been field tested; there are scores to rate only English and math teachers; state tests have repeatedly been shown to be unreliable.While more than 1,000 principals have now signed the letter, the numbers remain heavy on Long Island principals, where the protest started. Here are the numbers, as of Wednesday:Total 1,019 principals (22.4 percent of the 4,511 principals listed by the state). As of Dec. 11, the total was 902 statewide.Westchester 107Long island 507Rockland 32New York City 47
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More scandal at State Ed: Testing Firm Faces Inquiry on Free Trips for Officials
For commentary: Perdido Street School
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And here is some more commentary on Tisch from Reality-Based Educator:
She (Tisch) needs to be taken down.And then she ought to be taken to jail.
reality-based educator has left a new comment on your post "Michael Winerip Lays Waste to NY State Ed Departme...":
I have not seen Merry Merryl Tisch's name show up in the K12 Inc. articles that have surfaced lately - not in the Times article, not in the Wash Post article, not in Gail Collins' column on K12 and online ed. I even wrote Collins to say she should look into the Tisch connections so long as she is commenting on the political connections that the company has that enable it to finagle contracts. Never heard back from her, never saw her revisit the issue. I understand that the Tisch connection is through a subsidiary of K12 Inc. and the connection to Tisch is with her brother-in-law, not herself or her husband. Still, the thing stinks.
Somehow Merry Merryl never gets hammered in the press, even when she says stupid shit like state test results "have never, ever, ever exaggerated...” or the public hates teachers but will like them better when the new "objective" evaluation system is put into place...
http://perdidostreetschool.blogspot.com/2011/11/merryl- tisch-public-hates-teachers- but.html
She really is as bad as Eva on this stuff - a self-centered, accountability for others/no accountability for me demagogue.
Steiner was a putz, but it's clear Tisch put the knife into him and brought her man King to the NYSED to consolidate her power.
It would be nice to see Winerip take a look at how the state has done since Tisch has been there and have him ask her why she thinks all the problems are other people's fault, never her own.
She needs to be taken down.
And then she ought to be taken to jail.
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7 comments:
The contract the state signed with Pearson is supposed to expand testing for ELA and Math to 9th through 11th grade by 2013. Those scores will of course be used to evaluate teachers and fire the "bad" ones.
Interesting how "bad" Regents commissioners - like ones who claim the state has "never, ever, ever exaggerated" the test results when it is clear that the state has done this numerous times over the course of the last decade - does not lose her job.
Despite the abrupt resignation of the testing chief (Abrams), SED remains a laughingstock as far as effective testing is concerned. In fact, I would rate them ineffective two (if not ten) years in a row. Time to dismiss these clowns for incompetence - after sending them to a rubber room of course. Or will those at SED receive 3020a's for misconduct based on the state attorney general's investigation of the Pearson bribery/junket scheme? Stay tuned.
Oh yes, if the tests can't measure student learning, and the test developers are bribing officials to get their awful tests implemented, is it a good idea to measure teacher effectiveness using these tests?
Isn't it uncanny that so few signing principals are from the five boroughs???
New York City Eye
Where is Unity? Sleeping at the wheel as usual. Cowards. No matter how inept our union leadership has been, I've always tried to see things froM their perspective, give them the benefit of the doubt. No more. They have helped to destroy the lives of teachers and students. Every time I see a negative article about the mayor now in the NY Teacher, I cringe. They created the Bloomberg monster. Never fought him. Supported mayoral control twice. Did not support Thompson. My god our leadership is awful. Awful and dishonest.
"Isn't it uncanny that so few signing principals are from the five boroughs?"
Does this SURPRISE you?
Say what you will, but let's face it- the L.I. principals haven't been brainwashed and conditioned the same way that these "Leadership Academy" types in NYC have.
They became principals the old fashioned way- they EARNED it, and most actually rose through the ranks, unlike what we are experiencing in the NYC schools today.
Don't forget that LI principals are chosen by a Superintdent hired by a locally elected school board. While probably overpaid these guys are often true pros and would never ever hire a Lead Acad grad with little experience.
Now as one in the system since 1967 I saw and heard of plenty of bad principals. Remember, the law was changed in the late 60's that removed the civil service provisions and even the requirement on # of years teaching. Before that it was strictly civil service and some pretty weird people got in that way too.
So no system is perfect. But the one under absolute mayoral control is the worst. The solution is going to some community/school level control where teachers and parents at the local level play a major role in choosing who runs the school. There might be problems in this model too but the can be tweaked. I mean if you pick a loser you can rid of him/her. You will never get an Iris Blige or Valrerie Reidy but if you do they won't last long.
The principals on Long Island are often professionals who have earned that title. Most of them really look for what is best for the school and the situation, not out for themselves and performance bonuses.
*There are some LI districts to watch out for, but for the most part, most are okay.**
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