Message from TAG: Weingarten - Failed Labor Leader

UPDATED April 2

The message below was sent from Teachers Advocacy Group (TAGNYC). They blame Weingarten, perhaps not realizing the longstanding position of the UFT regarding people branded fairly or unfairly as "bad" teachers. The UFT has always been concerned about being seen as protecting teachers who have been labeled as "poor" for fear of negative publicity. The Richard Kahlenberg Shaker bio reports that as far back as the 1969 contract, "...a provision for the development of objective criteria of professional accountability" was agreed to by Shanker, who said, "those who can't be improved and who are functioning at a very poor level [what are the criteria?], we're going to have to have the courage to sat that...you may be good at some other thing, but you're not good at this."

Notice the use of the word "we're." Who, me kimosabe? All in the name of what I consider a phony professionalism. Don't get me wrong. Under proper conditions, teachers could play such a role and I would be all for teachers making these decisions - if they had control of the school environment. (I'll get into what I mean by this in a future post.) But they don't. Therefore, the union's job is to defend every teacher rigorously and leave it to some other agency to take care of incompetent teachers. I would favor a body independent of the DOE and the UFT.

Again from Kahlenberg (p. 288): Peer review was common among professors, doctors, and lawyers, who police themselves.Shanker said: "it would be the first time in the history of American education that teaches would govern themselves."

How does Shanker equate peer review of teachers with these professions, which have a higher level of control than teachers ever could have? And by the way, how many doctors have you heard of being "peer reviewed" out of the profession? In the early 80's Shanker said, "a lot of people who have been hired as teachers are basically not competent." Shanker was selling peer review as an alternative to threats to abolish tenure.

The "bad teacher and the unions that protect them is the cause of all the ills of urban public ed" argument is a bogus one. How do you explain the achievement levels in right to work states like Florida where unions have so much less control?

How about your own education experience? Think of your own teachers. How many extraordinary teachers did you have? How many horrors? How inspired or damaged were you by either end of the scale of teacher quality? Somehow many of us survived the bad teachers. I saw some kids in my school have one excellent teacher after another and those that would do well did and those that wouldn't do well didn't.

Teachers guts and experience tell them this is all a crock. Some young teachers just starting out see some impact in the early years. It took me about a decade to see the long-term results as kids started drifting back as they grew up. That's how you get some perspective.

The public seems in much more danger from incompetent police, doctors, lawyers and politicians (see one George Bush) than from incompetent teachers - the worst of whom are often driven out of teaching by the daily failure of facing kids' scorn. Or they just go into administration and abuse teachers who actually can do the job.

Though at times it may make your skin crawl, I recommend reading the Kahlenberg 400 page apology for Shanker's actions. That Al Shanker and the AFT have been promoting this claptrap surprises even veteran NYC teachers. Weingarten is just following a script laid out a long time ago.

Anyway, here's the message from TAG.

Weingarten: Failed Labor Leader

Randi Weingarten is looking to her new career as head of the AFT. That much larger pool of teachers must understand what they are getting. A failed labor leader. Randi, through her position, is in an excellent position to advocate for children and to negotiate health and welfare benefits for her membership. How well she performs either of these two functions demands future critical evaluation. What we address here is her inability to function as a labor leader. Make no mistake. Teachers are members of the labor force. We are not independent contractors or consultants able to individually control our own terms and conditions of employment. And the most important condition of employment is the right to remain employed. Remain in the profession we chose. Ms. Weingarten does not want to be seen as the protector of teachers' job rights: The press and the public would label her a "protector of incompetents." But the teachers who are being forced out of their jobs- the ATRs, the whistle-blowers, the questioners, the teachers who dared to exercise their transfer rights, and the teachers who make too much money - are not incompetents. These teachers are the scapegoats being used to further Bloomberg, Klein, and yes, Randi Weingarten's political ambitions.

Weingarten has proven she does not have the stomach to advocate for teachers' rights to their jobs. She has colluded in turning NYC teachers into at-will employees. Her defense for doing so- "The UFT was not strong enough to fight."

Questions TAGNYC has for Randi Weingarten:

1. Why did you not educate your membership about the implications of the givebacks in the 2005 contract? You and your lawyers knew the possible if not probable consequences. You can't blame the membership for running to take the money since you did not do your job in educating the membership. Labor leaders don't invoke the adage "Buyer beware" when the `buyer' is the membership.

2. Will you admit that you feared for the careers of the more senior teachers in the wake of the 2005 contract and the empowerment of principals? Will you admit that you communicated this fear to your district reps? You hoped Bloomberg-Klein would go easy on the senior teachers. You lost and we lost. Labor leaders should never "depend upon the kindness of strangers."

3. Why did you not rally the members to make a stand against Bloomberg-Klein? 80,000 plus teachers in your corner and you did nothing to get them on the street (strikes weren't necessary- why not mass protests during rush hours, etc)? Oh, right, you were and are afraid of antagonizing the public. Too cautious to be a labor leader.

4. Why do you tell your members "Wait until 2009?" You see 2009 as a time when friends of `labor' come back into office. How courageous! Who can't `lead' when times are good and ears are sympathetic. You failed to lead in tough times. Too many of NYC teachers- the competent teachers- have, and are suffering the devastating consequences of your failed leadership in the run-up to 2009. Will many of these teachers be employed in 2009?

5. Why do you hide behind the 3020a process? Rather than using the law as the pretext for not intervening, why are you not railing against the farce of the 3020a process?

6. Why don't you state publicly what is said privately by district reps, chapter chair people, and OSI: Frivolous charges of incompetence, verbal, corporal, and sexual abuse are being used by principals to remove competent teachers from their schools?

7. Why have you not led your members in vocal, body-on-the line protests against the absurdity of turning competent teachers into ATRs? Why won't you admit loudly and publicly that the ATR paradigm is the road to unemployment for high salaried, competent teachers?

8. Why have you not led your members in vocal, body-on-the-line protests against the willful destruction of competent teachers' careers by incompetent, insecure, and unethical principals?

9. Who is defending your teachers in the schools? Do you know that most of your chapter chair people and district reps have abdicated the duty to advocate? Do you know of the despair being felt by teachers who know they don't have a union willing or able to defend them within the schools?

10. How do you reconcile your claim to be an advocate for the students when their teachers- new hires and senior teachers- are stampeding out of the NYC school system?

11. On a NY1 news show last week, in criticism of the budget cuts, you chastised Klein and advised him to "Show some leadership in tough times." Ms. Weingarten, how have you shown leadership in protecting your competent teachers during the tough Bloomberg-Klein times?


Teachers are urged to email Ms Weingarten with any of these or other questions. IT IS PAST TIME FOR HER RESPONSE. Not an opt ed piece but a question and answer format where Ms. Weingarten does not control the floor, or the questions asked, or the time allotted to each response.
rweingarten@uft.org

Students have nothing to do with their performance

TEACHER QUALITY are the buzz words – a VERY convenient way to throw teachers under the bus for all the bad things that go on in schools.

A voice in the Wilderness at The Chancellor's New Clothes makes the point of the irrationality so deftly. Why not say a sick person's recovery depends soley on the quality of the doctor (not to say that is not a factor - a factor - not the sole or even the major factor?) How responsible are the lawyers for the guys on death row? Here is an excerpt, but make sure to read the whole thing here.

I made a comment that I thought was fairly innocent. “It’s interesting,” I said “to note that all of the explanations and goals have to do with teachers.” Literally, every statement looked something like “Teachers are not teaching consistently, Teachers are not planning regularly, Teachers are not engaging students,” and so on.

I could see the change in his demeanor. “Well, who else would you hold responsible for student performance?”

I just kind of looked at him. “Well, how about students?”

It was on. I had unwittingly thrown the gauntlet.

“That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard,” he began. “Students have nothing to do with their performance.”

Huh? I looked around the class to see if the other students had heard. They looked at me blankly.

Worth Reading....

...on teacher quality, the corporate model, pay for performance, NYC school governance, mayoral control, and commentary on Rotherham/Eduwonk tripe
These seem to be some of the push button policy issues facing educators, often promoted by pseudo educators looking to gain control of the public schools (for fun and profit.) Here are some selections and links for you to explore if you want to get a better sense of the debate.

The Offal Truth
On the recent Rotherham piece in the NY Times - look for a guest column at ednotes tomorrow. Meanwhile, Susan Ohanian came up with this comment:
Rich Gibson provides a valuable commentary on education offal offered up by the NY Times.
http://susanohanian.org/show_atrocities.php?id=7878


Teacher Quality Rears It's Ugly Head
I don't agree with the stress on "teacher quality" because there's no clear way to measure that factor. Some use SAT scores or how high in their class they finish or test scores of their kids or how nice they dress or just plain voodoo. Teacher quality is often reflected as a snapshot at a certain time, a certain day, a certain year, a certain class, a certain child in the class (have you seen how teacher quality improves when that one kid who has been tormenting you and the other kids moves?)

Sean Corcoran, guest blogging at Eduwonkette, seems to be on board with the TQ issue and sees higher pay as a way to attract higher quality teachers. It seems to make sense but I don't necessarily agree here too. We often see this point made by NYC Educator who often attributes the quality of his daughter's suburban education to paying teachers a high salary. Again I disagree. Offer those same teachers a 25% raise to go to one of the 10 most difficult schools in NYC to teach at and let's see how they do.

Seean Corcoran wrote on March 6

A large and growing body of research has demonstrated that teacher quality is one of the most (if not the most) important resources schools contribute to the academic success of their students. At the same time, the average quality of teachers has steadily fallen over time, and an increasingly smaller fraction of the most cognitively skilled graduates are choosing to teach (for more on this see here).

Vanderhoek believes that significantly higher salaries will bring these top graduates back to the classroom, and he may be right. Economists have linked this steady decline in teacher quality since 1960 to the rise in career opportunities for women and the sizable gap between teacher salaries and those of other professionals.

Read the full piece with all the interesting comments here.

Diane Ravitch on corporate models for schools
Diane Ravitch to Deborah Meier on their Edweek blog:

Who controls our schools? Should the schools adopt a model of operations based on "results" (test scores) and "incentives" (paying teachers, students, and principals for higher test scores)? Are test scores the "profits" of the school system? Who are the stockholders?

Full story here.

Ravitch references Eduwonkette's exploration of whether pay for performance creates success in the corporate world (can you spell E-N-R-O-N?)

Pay for Performance in the Corporate World

We often hear that education needs to operate more like the private sector. But few corporations tie their employee bonuses to quantifiable output in the same way that some performance pay plans tie teacher pay to scores. (See How Does Performance Pay Work in Other Sectors?)

For those who believe that corporate employees rise and fall based on the fates of their companies, here's a story ripped from the headlines: Washington Mutual is shielding executive performance pay from the housing crisis fallout. From the Wall Street Journal article:Read the full post here.

Eduwonkette references Richard Rothstein's paper:
Holding Accountability to Account: How Scholarship and Experience in Other Fields Inform Exploration of Performance Incentives in Education

Download a pdf of Rothstein's piece here.


Diane Ravitch on the History of Public School Governance in NYC
Download Diane's pdf here.
The mayoral control issue is going hot and here in NYC, with most critics still lining up for a continuance with checks. Ed Notes and ICE are moving more towards a very localized system for at least elementary and middle schools with real control residing in the hands of teachers and parents at the school level. We know this is pie in the sky but we think the ideas should be out there for the next time the system they install in 2009 fails and they have to come up with something else. I'm all ready for the battles in 2017.

The Worst Book of the 21st Century - a review

Susan Ohanian Notes:

Gary Stager offers a must read commentary on pop business book authors who claim to offer insight into learning.

by Gary Stager

New notes to accompany my review...

As I attend my second conference in as many weeks where the keynote speaker is Daniel Pink, I feel duty bound to share some of my thoughts on why his popular pop-business book, "A Whole New Mind," may be the worst book of the 21st Century.

The book certainly contains little if anything to offer school leaders.

Recently, a lot of edubloggers were excited about a magazine discussion between Tom Friedman and Daniel Pink. Their performance was self-congratulatory, self-serving and intended to sell more of their respective books. Their cross-promotional exercise was brilliantly executed my two masterful self-promoters.

Read Gary's (who as a young 'un was in the local LOGO Users group here in NYC back in the 80's) at Susan's place here.

Happy Reading - if you have the stomach!

Quality Teachers vs. Small Class Size

All you need to control this crowd is a quality teacher.
The so-called Education reformers always pose demands for lower class sizes in terms of, "We will need so many more teachers and so many of them will be of lower quality, the impact of lower class sizes will be negated."

Of course, they always start off with the usual (say this out loud with your lips pursed):

Teacher quality is the single most important determiner of a child's education.

Ugh! Like either you're a quality teacher or you're not. No recognition of the impact on quality by conditions like class size, kids with problems, etc.

Unfortunately, the leadership of the UFT/AFT axis and most politicians have bought into this, which naturally leads to the "let's blame the teacher" and "It's all about professional development" and ultimately to a deskilling of teachers -- let's make teaching teacher proof - and what better way that teach to tests?

Two articles are worth taking a look at, both based on studies in England. "How Much Do Smaller Class Sizes Improve Teaching" here and Ed Week's "Teaching Quality Matters" .

There will always be a bell curve in any job.
Maybe we should not hold elections until we are sure all politicians are superior?
Or fight fires until all firemen are tops?
Close hospitals till all doctors are high quality?
Close down the legal system unless you can get Clarence Darrow?
Quality Lawyers? Quality Judges? - give me a break?
Or not put police on the street until we measure their effectiveness? They get credit in NYC for cutting crime by putting lots of police (did they measure their quality beforehand?) on the street.
So how come everyone is focused on quality teachers?
Because it's an excuse to do ed reform on the cheap.

Many teachers do struggle with things like control due to large classes. Many are well intentioned but the job is overwhelming. And there are superior people who can handle it all but we will never get all teachers to be superior - not with merit pay or no matter how much they are paid.

What strikes me is that the cost is always raised by people who didn't blink when enormous money appeared miraculously to fight a war. Imagine how demands for the same amount would be met as throwing good money away if a war on education neglect were declared.

A parent wrote on the nyceducation listserve:

I am not an educator, but a parent. I have had three children go through the public education system from Pre-K to High School. I can attest on a personal level smaller classes provide a better learning environment. The article cites the teachers we have as all being superior, or according to them we should get rid of the less than superior teachers and have the superior teachers teach to classes of 50 or 100. Since they are so good they can do that. Rather, in our current system, we have some superior, some good and some mediocre teachers. So baring the idea that we can just do away with the mediocre teachers, then wouldn't it be better for a mediocre teacher to be teaching to a class of 20 rather than 30. Maybe the less than perfect teacher would find the lower class size conducive to improving their teaching as they could then spend more time with each child. This seems to me like common sense, something sadly lacking in much of this ongoing debate.
Another parent followed with:

The other thing is that large classes cause much higher rates of attrition – so that you end up getting less experienced and less able teachers as a result and most high-needs, overcrowded schools. 50% of teachers said that large classes caused them to leave the profession – and in national surveys they say the best incentive program to attract them to and keep them working at high-needs schools would be small classes.

Does "Education Week" Violate Journalistic Standards?

Education Week, a national weekly read by the Ed cognoscenti, has been accused by Deborah Meier, David Marshak, Philip Kovacs, Susan Ohanian, Jerry Bracey, William Spady of violating journalistic standards by humping a point of view that backs the kind of insanity we've seen here in NYC. They sent a letter and want others to join them. Read this important letter at Susan Ohanian's place.

I had my own recent bout with an Ed Week editor when they printed an article biased in favor of a report on teacher quality by Britain's Sir Michael Barber who was embraced by Bloomberg/Klein for his half-baked policies in England (now under some repudiation – I'll check it out in an upcoming trip to London.)

An article called "Teaching Quality Matters" states (my emphasis):

The world’s top-performing school systems and those coming up fast have a lesson to teach the others: Put high-quality teaching for every child at the heart of school improvement....

Neither resources nor ambitious reforms have been the answer to the need for school improvement, say the authors, Sir Michael Barber and Mona Mourshed of McKinsey & Co., the London-based consulting firm responsible for the report. They point to “massive” increases in spending and popular reforms—prominently, class-size reduction and decentralization of decisionmaking—that have failed, they say, to much budge the needle of student achievement many places.

You know. The old line about all you have to do is fix teacher quality and you overcome all (I'll write more on this soon.) But then again, the UFT's Randi Weingarten, the Clintons, et al. all sign on to this bull.)

I sent the following letter to the editor, who I've spoken to a few times in the past (and have some sympathy for, as she was once trapped in a train station for hours with nothing to read but Education Notes.)

I was wondering if Michael Barber, a noted trasher of class size as a factor, cited specifics of the studies he cites? He says many places. Did he give one example? If not, shouldn't he be challenged to do so instead of being allowed to leave the impression that class size reduction doesn't work?

I received this reply:

There are a few references in the report, but it is not really a scholarly work. I don't have it with me. I think his argument rests more on the fact that there has been a lot of class size reduction in places where achievement has stayed relatively flat, such as in many U.S. school systems. I think that is generally true, although you could certainly argue that classes need to be still smaller. I didn't have much space to offer challenges and had to give what space I had to people assessing the general worth of the report, which you should be able to get on the Web. You might a letter to the editor if you think his conclusions are misleading.

"Generally true?" "Many US school systems?" How about which ones? Where's the actual research to cite this, not that I trust research, which can be slanted in so many ways. But Ed Week is part of the cabal against spending real money on Ed reform – is is so much easier and cheaper to blame the teachers. How about Ed Week calling for an accurate study (like we really need a study to tell us that much smaller classes, which I bet the elite critics pay a fortune to assure their own kids experience - like Bloomberg's kids going to Spence with 14 in a class) instead of adopting the "generally true" standard of research.

The article, which you can read in full here, did include the following bone:

David P. Baker, who has extensively studied the results from international math and science tests, praised the study for clear conclusions that hold the possibility of pushing policymakers in valid directions. He said his own research showed that countries that reduced the spread in teacher quality tended to have higher test scores. At the same time, the Pennsylvania State University professor said the report might have taken better account of the effects of social disadvantage, which has a profound influence on school performance [the Richard Rothstein view].

I never wrote that letter to the editor, but I think now is a good time.
Here is a list if you wan to join the party.

Virginia Edwards, Editor and Publisher gined@epe.org
Gregory Chronister, Executive Editor gchron@epe.org
Lynn Olson, Project Editor for Quality Counts lolson@epe.org
Karen Diegmueller, Managing Editor kdieg@epe.org
Mark W. Bomster, Asst. Managing Editor mbomster@epe.org

What Did Randi Know and When Did She Know It?

The shot that was heard around the NYC teaching corps was fired on Martin Luther King Day as teachers awoke to a front page article in the NY Times announcing that a secret program was in effect to evaluate teachers based on test scores.

Rather than argue the case against, we want to focus on the role, or lack of role the UFT has played.

With every passing day more and more teachers see that the UFT is not on their side but acts as an intermediary for the powers that be. In essence, they represent the interests of people like Bloomberg and Klein to the members, using obfuscation and confusion to give the members the impression they are on your side.

If you're asking why they function this way, we would have to delve into the history of the labor movement and the role union leaders have played to control the militancy of the members - militancy that could threaten their own power.

Randi Weingarten has known about the program for months but kept quiet about it - she claims she did not know the specific schools which we all know would have been easy for them to find out and warn the teachers. And even if they couldn't find out, a public exposure at the time would have allowed teachers in all schools to confront their principals and ask point blank if they were part of the program. That would have forced them to tell them or basically lie to their faces. At the very least the UFT could have thrown a monkey wrench into the DOE plans but chose the sounds of silence.

Therefore, view Randi Weingarten's words of outrage - I guess she wasn't all too outraged all these months - and promise to fight the plan as the usual empty words designed to obfuscate the issue and confuse the members.


Marjorie Stamberg has written a strong piece posted at the ICE blog:

DOE's Secret Plan for Merit Pay...Without the Pay!

Here are a few choice excerpts related to the UFT's role in all this:

Naturally they had to do it in secret.

The Times revealed that that the DOE has a program in which 2,500 teacher in 140 schools across the city are being evaluated on the basis of their students' test scores.

Did you know about this? Of course not. Because they've kept it under wraps. Now Randi has a statement out (on the UFT website), calling the secret program misguided and claiming it is in contradiction with the "commitment...to collaboration and working together.. in the School Wide Bonus Program." No, there's no contradiction--this is all part of the same program and the UFT leadership has acted as enablers.

The Times said that Randi Weingarten and the UFT knew about this secret program for months and said nothing to the teachers! In a quote, Randi said she could not reveal it because she was told "confidentially" by the DOE and did not know which specific schools were involved. She said she "had grave reservations about the project and would fight if the city tried to use the information for tenure or formal evaluations or even publicized it." (So now it's public--I wonder what she's going to do?)

But we should all ask our UFT reps what they knew about this secret plan and when they knew it.

As members of the UFT executive board, and as district UFT reps, were they informed about the existence of this program before today? Did they know about it when they were asking us to be part of this agenda? Or did Randi keep it from them as well?

I urge you to read the entire Stamberg piece.

Some of the best commentary is over at NYC Educator where his cohort Reality Based Educator did a piece yesterday - and make sure to read the comments.

ICE mail also had quite a bit of discussion and I'll put some of that up in a future post.

One of the themes of the Times piece is the usual "teacher quality is the most important determiner claptrap. Of course, Weingarten and her political cohorts the Clintons say this all the time, which puts the blame for failure clearly on the teacher. So I don't believe the UFT is against this plan philosophically.

But you know my view of Randi and the rest of the Unity Caucus crew is that they are 5th column collaborators, or, Vichyists, if you will.

Michael Fiorillo echos some of these thoughts in a post to ICE-mail:

Apparently, the UFT fundamentally seems to agree with them: rhetoric made for public consumption aside, they clearly support the "testing as achievement" regime, as confirmed by their support of a merit pay plan that enshrines testing, use of management-framed data in making tenure decisions, passivity regarding testing mandates stemming from NCLB, testing used in rating and school-closing decisions, etc.

This is what a "bi-partisan," "post-ideological" political landscape looks like: corporate self-interest and stealth privatization masquerading as "reform," and ambitious union misleaders helping them manage the transition.

Witch Hunts for Teachers

graphic by DB

Thursday's NY Times article on the DOE's attempt to start a with hunt to remove ""poor" - read - "tenured, higher salaried" - teachers sent another chill down the spines of NYC teachers. Are they hiring lawyers to remove bad cops or lawyers or doctors? How about that doctor that risked 600 patients with hep C and is not sent to the doctor RR. How about police who are of "lower quality?" These people can actually kill people.

Why the focus on "bad" teachers and how hard it is to get rid of them? Getting rid of a doctor is almost impossible. There are doctors practicing who are not board certified. Do we see bad lawyers being disbarred ( to the RR of the legal profession)?

The witch hunt is part of the concerted attack on teacher unionism as a supposed obstruction to education, part of the general plan of assault on the public schools.

It is very dangerous rhetoric (from Weingarten to Bill Clinton to Joel Klein) to bring up the issue that the most important thing in education is a quality teacher because then witch hunts ensue. In fact what is a quality teacher? We have the same bell curve of quality (a very thin term to use) teachers as in any other job - superb to average to below average to awful.

But the people judging have a different agenda. I saw in my own school my principal support one of the most incompetent and abusive (to children) teachers because he was loyal -- he knew how to play the game.

I know of a 20 year teacher under attack at a middle school. The other day I spoke to a colleague of hers and she told me the admin in her school targets one teacher a year for u rating as a demo of power and to keep people in line.

So the Jack Welch philosophy leads to quotas. - get rid of your negative people and the "bottom" 20%. (And if you haven't read it yet read Mary Hoffman's wonderful piece "Jack Welch is My Daddy" at the ICE web site http://ice-uft.org/daddy.htm which details the impact of the Welch/Leadership Academy principal at her school (also my former school.)

Eduwonkette on Teacher Effectiveness

For the past few months I've been using my 2-minute speaking time to "educate" the members of BloomKlein's Panel for Educational Policy (the rubber stamp replacement for the old Board of Education) on the concept of what makes for a quality teacher.

I will continue those attempts tonight. Of course, it all falls on deaf ears (except for Manhattan rep Patrick Sullivan), but why not at least point up the contradictions in basing an entire body of educational policy on the concept that the quality of a teacher has more impact than any other item - class size, socio-economic conditions, etc. I raised some of these issues in a Teacher Quality, Part 1 post. A key point is that all the forces - Broad, Klein, Weingarten, the Clintons - are aligned on the same page without any clear understanding, or interest, in the research on the issue.

Along comes a brand new blog by eduwonkette, clearly someone with a research-based finger on the trigger of many of these push-button issues. (I intend to raise many of these points as I can at the PEP.) Expect insights galore from this blog.

(Kickline roster (from left to right): Eli Broad (Broad Foundation), Kati Haycock (Ed Trust), Michael Bloomberg (NYC), Michael Petrilli and Checker Finn (Fordham).)

This week, eduwonkette will post a daily article on teacher effectiveness, touching on issues that all members of the kickline, which should include Weingarten and Bill Clinton (any photoshop people out there, feel free) have been ignoring.


Introducing eduwonkette
http://www.eduwonkette.com

The Teacher Effectiveness Kickline
From Eli Broad and Michael Bloomberg to George Miller and Checker Finn, we’re awash in chatter about measuring and rewarding teacher effectiveness. This week I’ll consider some of the problems with these proposals. What’s missing from this discussion, I argue, is a full exploration of their potential consequences for students, teachers, and schools.

Let me note that I am not opposed to measuring and rewarding teacher effectiveness in principle. But it’s more complicated than most commentators would like to acknowledge, and I hope this week’s postings will help us think about that complexity.

Monday: Acute tunnel vision syndrome - The teacher effectiveness debate focuses only on a narrow set of the goals of public education, which may endanger other important goals we have for our schools.

Tuesday: Neglecting the school as organism - The teacher effectiveness debate ignores that teachers play many roles in a school. Experienced teachers often serve as anchoring forces in addition to teaching students in their own classrooms. If we don’t acknowledge this interdependence, we may destabilize schools altogether.

Wednesday: Ignoring the great sorting machine - If students were randomly assigned to classrooms and schools, measuring teacher effects would be a much more straightforward enterprise. But when Mrs. Jones is assigned the lowest achievers, and Mrs. Scott’s kids are in the gifted and talented program, matters are complicated immeasurably.

Thursday: Overlooking the oops factor - Everything in the world is measured with error, and the best research on teacher effectiveness takes this very seriously. Yet many of those hailing teacher effectiveness proposals missed out on Statistics 101.

Friday: Disregarding labor market effects - The nature of evaluation affects not only current teachers, but who chooses to join the profession in the future and where they are willing to teach. If we don’t acknowledge that kids that are further behind are harder to pull up, we risk creating yet another incentive for teachers to avoid the toughest schools.