Must See Video: Gary Rubinstein at GEM Teacher Evaluation Forum

There's supposed to be this evil union only about the adults but they really aren't doing a good job at that. --- Gary Rubinstein on UFT/NYSUT and teacher evaluation

In a brilliant presentation Stuyvesant HS teacher Gary Rubinstein uses statistics to punch holes in the high stakes testing standardized testing program. He also finds evidence in the stats that charter schools cream better students. Then he addresses the reason why Bill Gates and Michelle Rhee opposed the release of data scores --- they knew people like Gary would be able to show how irrelevant they really were. "It's like in trying to measure temperature, you count the number of people wearing hats."

Then he addresses the issue of why a union agreed to any of this, even 20% given that under the current system almost everyone potentially can be rated ineffective. He offered the union his help to salvage the other 20% but has not heard back yet. There's supposed to be this evil union only about the adults but they really aren't doing a good job at that.

GaryRubinstein's blog: garyrubinstein.teachforus.org/ 

Event sponsored by Grassroots Education Movement, Class Size Matters, Parents Across America. See videos of other speakers posted on the Grassroots Education Movement Vimeo channel.

GEM/PAA/CSM Teacher Evaluation Forum: Gary Rubinstein from Grassroots Education Movement on Vimeo.
April 17, 2012




See all videos from the forum
Leonie Haimson: http://vimeo.com/40760269
Carol Burris: http://vimeo.com/40748945
Khalilah Brann: http://vimeo.com/40758701
Gary Rubinstein: http://vimeo.com/40754465
Arthur Goldstein: http://vimeo.com/40740344
Q and A: http://vimeo.com/40772352

Afterburn:
Michael Winerip takes on the stats in the school grading reports in today's NY Times.
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Gary Rubinstein Rolls Steve Brill

We will look back at the remedies proposed by the reformers the way we now look back at the use of leeches to cure diseases. --- Gary Rubinstein

Two common critiques of high-achieving charter schools are that they get their results though “cherry picking” and attrition. --- GR

I admire Gary Rubinstein, who teaches at Stuyvesant HS in NYC because unlike my rants he goes after the ed deformers in a reasoned and analytical manner, taking apart the platform of the ed deform (which he terms anti-reform) one plank at a time. As Gary pulls out nail after nail, the entire structure begins to topple. As a 20 year alum of Teach for America who is still in the classroom, Gary has enormous credibility.

Here he takes on the almost farcical Steve Brill, who I believe should publish data reports on his performance as a lawyer. Gary takes apart Brill's book of distortion, "Class Warfare" point by point. Really brilliant work.

Those of us organizing the GEM/Class Size/Parents Across America April 17 are proud to have Gary join Carol Burris, Arthur Goldstein and Leonie Haimson on the panel.

Gary concludes his devastating review with this hopeful analysis:

I feel certain that the reformers will lose this battle but in doing so might have actually caused something good to happen.  With propaganda like ‘Waiting For Superman’ and ‘Class Warfare’ they have awakened the proverbial sleeping giant.  Anti-reformers are now operating with a new sense of urgency as they band together to fight these well meaning, but hopelessly ignorant, interlopers.  Giving a sense of urgency to the anti-reformers who can pursue authentic research-based reform might be the silver lining here.

Fifty years from now it will be interesting to reread this book with the hindsight of what happened.  I believe that soon the ed reform ‘bubble’ will burst.  All the invented gains will be exposed and those who participated in the cover up will be banished to obscurity.  We all will finally realize that early childhood education is a much worthier investment of money than test prep and accountability.  We will give up on ‘value-added’ measures when we realize that they will be too costly to ever be accurate enough to tell us anything better than principal observations already do. We will look back at the remedies proposed by the reformers the way we now look back at the use of leeches to cure diseases.

Excerpts from Gary Rubinstein's

My review of ‘Class Warfare’ in the Journal of School Choice

http://garyrubinstein.teachforus.org/2012/03/20/my-review-of-class-warfare-in-the-journal-of-school-choice/

This is a preprint of an article whose final and definitive form has been published in the Journal of School Choice © 2012 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC; the Journal of School Choice is available online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15582159.2012.650106