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race to the race to the top

November 25, 2009

Bloomberg to Klein: Use student data in tenure decisions this year

by Maura Walz, at 10:32 am

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The city’s Department of Education will use student test scores in teacher tenure decisions this year, Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced this morning.

Speaking at the Center for American Progress, Bloomberg asked Schools Chancellor Joel Klein to follow a new interpretation of the state law that bans the use of student performance in tenure decisions. The law only applies to teachers hired after July 1, 2008, Bloomberg said. Teachers up for tenure this year, who were hired in 2007, are not subject to the rule, according to this interpretation, and so will be evaluated using their students’ test score progress as a factor.

The announcement came as the mayor called on Albany to enact a number of legislative changes, including mandating school districts to evaluate teachers with student performance data and eliminating the charter cap, that would make New York State more competitive in its Race to the Top application.

Much more to come; the full press release accompanying the mayor’s announcement, and the text of his comments this morning, are below the jump.

MAYOR BLOOMBERG CHALLENGES ALBANY TO LIFT SEVEN ROADBLOCKS PREVENTING NEW YORK FROM WINNING THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION’S ‘RACE TO THE TOP’ EDUCATION REFORM COMPETITION

Mayor’s Proposals Could Net New York City More than $150 million of the $5 Billion Federal Program

Directs Chancellor to Start Using Student Performance Data Immediately to Help Make Teacher Tenure Decisions

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg today urged New York State education officials and the State Legislature to implement seven specific measures that will enable New York State to compete effectively for hundreds of millions of dollars that are available through the Obama Administration’s Race to the Top education reform program. The new program will grant $5 billion to states that move to adopt high standards; develop strong data systems that measure student growth and provide feedback to teachers; recruit, develop, reward, and retain effective teachers and principals; and turn around low-achieving schools. The Mayor also announced that he has instructed City Schools Chancellor Joel I. Klein to begin using student performance data immediately to inform teacher tenure decisions. The Mayor delivered his remarks at an event hosted by the Washington-based Center for American Progress, where he appeared with U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and Education Trust President Kati Haycock.

The Mayor urged State education officials and the State Legislature to take the following steps, each of which would add points to the State’s Race to the Top application score card – and, therefore, millions of dollars to City and State coffers. The Mayor’s proposals, which together could net the City more than $150 million in badly-needed federal funds, are:

  • Mandate all school districts in New York State develop teacher evaluation systems that use student performance data as one of multiple sources of input.
  • Use State Education Department discretionary grants to attract and retain high-performing math, science, and special needs teachers in low-income schools.
  • End “last-in, first-out” rules requiring principals to layoff or excess the newest teachers, even if they are among the best teachers, and instead allow principals to make such decisions based on merit.
  • Streamline the process for removing bad teachers from the classroom and the payroll, ending the ‘Rubber Room’ as we know it.
  • Ratify the nationwide Common Core Standards as soon as possible and without material alteration.
  • Eliminate the charter school cap and provide facilities funding for charter schools.
  • Impose a one-year limit on the time teachers can remain in an “excess pool,” as was done in Chicago, saving $55 million annually and enabling the City to close and replace the lowest performing 10 percent of its schools.

The following are Mayor Bloomberg’s remarks as delivered at the Center for American Progress.

“Arne, thank you and good morning everyone. Great to see you, Kati thank you for coming. I’m joined by Dennis Walcott, our Deputy Mayor for Education, as well as Joel Klein, our great Chancellor. I’m sure everyone here is thinking about turkey and pumpkin pie, and that’s fine. Tonight I’ll be watching the balloons being blown up. You can watch it on television. It’s an incredible experience. I actually can’t imagine as much hot air in one place, although this is Washington, so perhaps.

“It’s always a pleasure to be in the nation’s capital, particularly since this is the only city whose basketball team is doing as badly as New York’s, so I feel right at home. I ride the subway every day, and the only time anybody has ever yelled at me was one time as I was getting off a big, hulking guy looked at me, glared at me, and screamed: ‘Fix the Knicks!’ There are some things even a mayor can’t do.

“Before President Obama took office earlier this year, Rahm Emanuel told us that we should – quote – ‘Never allow a serious crisis to go to waste.’

“And so the President is not only working to stabilize the financial markets and save the auto industry from immediate collapse; he focused on the long-term economic challenges, including the auto industry’s public sector equivalent, and that is our school system.

“If you think about it, both the auto industry and our school system were built for another era.  Both were very slow to adapt to changing times. And neither can compete in the 21st century without major structural reforms that place consumers at the center of their operations. In the case of our schools, the consumers are the children.  Not the politicians.  Not the labor unions.  And not the ideologues.  Schools exist to ensure that children learn – as much as possible, as well as possible.

“And for the first time, I will say, the federal government is telling states through its ‘Race to the Top’ program: Discard policies that impede learning and adopt policies that promote learning – or forfeit federal funding.

“As Arne had said a number of times, ‘A state can’t enter Race to the Top if it prohibits schools from using student achievement data to evaluate teachers and that’s why California just repealed its prohibition on doing so.’

“In New York, the State Legislature passed a law last year that actually tells principals: You can evaluate teachers on any criteria you want – just not on student achievement data. That’s like saying to hospitals: You can evaluate heart surgeons on any criteria you want – just not patient survival rates! You really can’t make this up!  Thankfully, the law in New York is set to expire this June – but that is not enough.

“We will urge the State not just to prohibit but to require all districts to create data-driven systems to comprehensively evaluate teachers and principals.  And we want New York City to lead the way. As it turns out our lawyers now tell us after a very close reading of New York’s law, the current law does not actually stop us from using student data to evaluate teachers who are up for tenure this particular school year, because the way it was written it covers only teachers hired after July 1st of 2008, and those are not up this year.

“So today, I’ve directed our schools Chancellor, Joel Klein, to ensure that principals actually use student achievement data to help evaluate teachers who are up for tenure this year. It is an aggressive policy, but our obligation is to take care of our kids. And we’ll also begin creating our own comprehensive evaluation system that includes classroom reviews and student achievement data.

“Now, we all know that great teaching is reflected in more than test scores – but we certainly should never dismiss quantitative data in favor of subjective opinions that fit a predetermined conclusion. That might make all of us feel good, but it really doesn’t help our children.

“Using data to help evaluate teachers and principals will get a state into the Race to the Top, but as Secretary Duncan has repeatedly said, unless states take other major steps, they’re not going to get very far off the starting line.

“And for New York City, that’s worrisome from a short-term budget perspective, because in this economic environment, we cannot afford to leave federal money on the table. And it’s even more worrisome from a long-term economic perspective.  Any state that sits out the Race to the Top will lose jobs and revenues just as surely as car companies that sat out the race to build affordable hybrids, not to mention shortchanging our kids on the education they need to compete in an increasingly global and technological world.

“Today, I just want to take a few minutes to walk you through six other steps that New York should take to compete in the Race to the Top – and the more steps we take, the more likely we think we’ll be able to receive hundreds of millions of dollars in new funding that can only go to improve our system.

“The six steps fall into two broad categories: attracting and retaining more great teachers, and creating more great schools. And Mr. Secretary, I hope you hold all states accountable for submitting an application that achieves both. The time for excuses is over and this really is our nation’s future and it is in your hands. We will play our part, you can rest assured.

“The evaluation system that New York City is going to create will lay the foundation for each of the first three steps, including step one: paying higher salaries for higher-performing teachers and principals and for those with skills that are in the greatest demand.

“In New York City, over the last eight years we’ve raised teacher salaries by 43 percent, and veteran teachers in New York City now make more than $100,000 a year. I’ve always believed that if you want the best, you’ve got to pay for it and we really are improving the quality of teaching in New York City and the quality of those who are providing the service. We’ve also adopted, you should know, a bonus program – in partnership with our labor unions – that rewards teachers and principals in schools that meet their benchmarks.

“But sadly, like most places, New York City has difficulty attracting science and math teachers, because they have so many other career options that pay more.  And we’re also prohibited from paying the highest-performing teachers more money. This kind of lock-step pay scale is what you see in factory assembly lines – but teachers, we think, are professionals certified by the State!  And we need to pay based on skills, not just seniority – and we’ll start by demanding that our State Education Department changes the way it awards incentive pay.

“We want to see that money go to where it’s needed the most: to math, science, and special need teachers in low-income schools who receive high ratings on comprehensive evaluations. This would benefit students, schools, teachers, and our Race to the Top application – and rest assured, we will beat the drum among the public to make sure that this happens.

“The second reform that our new evaluation system would make possible – step number two – is ending a layoff policy called, ‘last-in, first out.’ Right now, as everybody knows, State law typically mandates that if layoffs have to be made, the newest teachers are the first to go – even if they are among the best teachers. The only thing worse than having to lay off teachers would be laying off great teachers instead of failing teachers. Remember who this system’s supposed to work for: the students, not its employees. With a transparent new evaluation system, principals will have the knowledge to make layoffs based on merit – but the ability to do so only if the State Legislature gives us the authority to do so, and so we will pressure them to get that authority.

“Third, our evaluation system will also give us the ability to identify the lowest-performing teachers, but it’s also a key criteria for Race to the Top funding. In New York City, removing bad teachers from the classroom is extremely difficult – and moving them off the payroll is even harder. When a teacher is removed from the classroom for multiple negative reviews, or for breaking the law, he or she can go to something known as the ‘rubber room.’ It is basically a suspension hall for teachers – with full pay. Believe it or not, we’re still paying teachers in New York City who have been in the rubber room for seven years – and counting.  Seven years!  This is the public’s money and this is the money that would otherwise go to pay those teachers who are helping our children. This is an absurd and outrageous abuse of tenure – and we’ve got to work with the State representatives to fix it.

“But let me be clear: We are not proposing an end to tenure. We are only proposing that our State Legislature streamline the process for removing failing teachers from classrooms and put an end to the ‘rubber rooms’ as we know it. Now, to ensure that students have more great teachers and more great schools, we are going to take a few more steps.

“Step number four in our list of six is the most important and that is raising standards. I believe that the federal government should require states to adopt a single national standard for all students and all subjects. But as Bill Bennett, one of Arne’s predecessors, once told me the reason we don’t have national testing is that conservatives hate anything with the word ‘national’ in it, and the liberals hate anything with the word ‘testing’ in it.

“Race to the Top very pragmatically skirts this ideological divide by incentivizing states to adopt a Common Core Standard – and I’m glad to say that New York State has signed up to be part of that. When the standards are completed next year, there will undoubtedly be pressure to water them down.  And so today, Chancellor Klein and I are sending a letter to our State Board of Regents urging it to ratify the standards, without material alterations.

“In New York City, we’ve built all of our reforms around raising standards and holding everyone accountable for results. That’s why our kids have made enormous progress on State exams, especially when compared to the rest of the state. The Chancellor of our Board of Regents, Merryl Tisch, has been a great champion of raising standards, which account for 14 percent of a state’s Race to the Top application – and we’ll give her all the support we can to raise them as high as she can get done.

“The fifth step we’ve got to take is lifting restrictions on growth of charter schools. This fall, a Stanford University study showed that charter school students in Harlem have performed at nearly the same level as students in suburban Scarsdale – one of the wealthiest districts in the whole country. No wonder the waiting list for charter schools in New York City is upwards of 40,000 children.

“I’m committing to open 100 new charter schools over the next four years – but we do need the State Legislature to lift the cap, just as Illinois and Louisiana have recently done, because we’re about to hit it.

“Arne has said that states with any cap will lose points in the Race to the Top, and I think he’s absolutely right to do so. We’ll also urge the State Legislature to provide charter schools with funding for facilities, just as New York City is doing for other schools. Charter schools are public schools – people forget that – and all public school children deserve to share in the resources that the State has.  To not do so is an outrage, and if the State doesn’t get this done, I’ve directed Chancellor Klein to sue, and see if we can’t get it done in the courts.

“The sixth and final major step that Race to the Top challenges us to take is turning around our lowest-performing schools. Since 2003, we’ve closed 91 schools in New York City — and the new schools that have replaced them have graduation rates 15 points above the citywide average.

“Secretary Duncan has challenged states to turn around their lowest-performing 5 percent of schools.  Arne: We’ll see your 5 percent — and we’re going to double it. Our goal is to turn around the lowest performing 10 percent of city schools over the next four years — by closing them down, and bringing in new leadership, and holding everyone accountable for success.

“But — and this is important — the only way that we can achieve that goal is to reform something called the ‘Absent Teacher Reserve Pool.’ Right now, when we close a school, some teachers don’t get hired back on, and many find jobs elsewhere.  But — some teachers do get hired back on, and many find jobs elsewhere, but some don’t. Those teachers can go to a reserve pool — and stay on the payroll indefinitely. When you combine the reserve pool with the rubber room, it’s costing us more than $100 million a year of monies that don’t produce better education for our kids. We just can’t keep wasting that kind of money. And — as Arne can tell us — Chicago has a one-year limit for displaced teachers — and we’ll urge our State Legislature to adopt the same.

“Now all of the reforms that Secretary Duncan and I have talked about today share something in common: They make sense! They are not Democratic ideas or Republican ideas.  They are common sense ideas.  And the way you make progress in government is by combining common sense with political courage, which the Obama Administration is doing.

“The Race to the Top is challenging the education establishment in a way that I think has never happened before, and New York City is ready, willing, and able to help the charge. The year ahead will tell us a lot about whether we’re going to bring our schools into the 21st century, or whether our schools — and our students — are going to be left clinging to the 20th century, as more and more countries pass us by.

“The President and Secretary Duncan have set the bar high – and if they keep the bar high, and if they keep the bar high, we really can give our children more great teachers, and more great schools.

“They deserve it. Parents demand it — both here as well as in Korea.  And it’s up to us here to deliver it.  So thank you very much, and now you’re going to hear from Kati Haycock. She is the President of the Education Trust, and she is well worth listening to. Kati?”

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  • Jeff S

    I can talk about the high schools as that is where I had experience. As I remember, there is a definite time limit which must be followed if a teacher is to be denied tenure. Regents exams are given at the end of the term. Also in some cases, teachers don’t teach Regents classes or may teach 1 Regents class. It’s not like the elementary and middle schools where every grade takes these flawed, moronic exams annually. So pray tell, how are you going to use student results on standardized exams in high school decisions. It would seem to me this would encourage teachers not to want to teach Regents classes….(of course passing the Algebra Regents is also very dependent on what students bring to the table. If a schools takes in many 1′s and 2′s and then they stick a teacher with these students and tell him or her the kids have to take the Regents exam, what sense does this make?)….It’s all nonsense. Let’s see if the union stands up to this illegal Mayor and the unqualified, inept, uncertified civil rights lawyer masquerading as an educator.

  • Jeff S

    Well now we’ll see just what teacher’s COPE money goes for. I presume the UFT will be able to derail much of this garbage most importantly the change in excessing rules and lay off rules, rules which have existed for a long time and also the abandonment of the protection of due process and of the ATR teachers…….

  • Mr G

    The city can’t even design a competent system to evaluate schools that people trust. A system that gave schools A’s on the progress report that no one would want to send their child to, can hardly be trusted to develop a sytem that could fairly evaluate a teacher.

  • John Hancock

    I have this quote stuck in my head, why I do not know

    “If a doctor, lawyer, or dentist had 40 people in his office at one time, all of whom had different needs, and some of whom didn’t want to be there and were causing trouble, and the doctor, lawyer, or dentist, without assistance, had to treat them all with professional excellence for nine months, then he might have some conception of the classroom teacher’s job. ~Donald D. Quinn

  • http://edintheapple peter

    DC comes to NYC

    In spite all the coziness between the UFT and the Mayor this speech clips the cord, the Mayor has embarked upon the same agenda as in Washington, the Rhee agenda, with a teacher contract hanging in the balance.

    With the RttT dollars as the goal, Bloomberg has adopted the Obama, Duncan etc. scenario, the question is: how vigorously will the union oppose the Bloomberg challenge?

    If the union does take up the challange, and forgo the Obama RttT dollars, schools will see increasingly sharper cuts, probably layoffs, and the “game will be on…” Maybe Mulgrew shold take a look at those Mike Quinn tapes, head of the TWU in the 60s …?

  • QueensParent

    I see there are more educators on here who continue to shun accountability and want to be able to do their jobs with no oversight or consequences whatsoever. That want more work rules to protect their hind quarters while they amass more and more pension credit until they get to that golden day of retirement when they cry “I did my best, or did I really?” and ride off into the sunset. They have an entire retinue of politicians standing behind them in support of this continued adults-first-children-last policy (after all, if you want a prime example of a bunch of do-nothing “leaders,” there’s the entire NY State Legislature) — but there is just one wrinkle in this big employment scheme called the NYC public schools: the federal government is about to dole out billions to states, stated OTHER THAN NY, who recognize that for the trillions we spend on education, we ought to be getting more than “I’ve done my best!” This is one instance where I hope NY gets left behind. NY shouldn’t get one penny of this money as long as it holds fast to this idea that classroom educators are perfect, bad ones should be left in place to harm more and more children, and student test scores don’t say anything about the kind of job a teacher is doing. The gig is up folks.

  • http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com Patrick J. Sullivan

    Peter, that was Mike Quill.

  • Philip Nobile (use name)

    Tie tenure to test results? No problem, not with Regents exams anyway. Teachers will simply scrub failures into passes, even more than they do already … with winks from the DOE and UFT. Have you seen any comment from the bigwigs on the Comptroller’s audit last week showing massive scoring inaccuracies on Regents? No story in the Times, Daily News, and only a briefer in the Post. 
    Don’t hold your breath for a story in THE TEACHER either, though one was proposed to editor Deidre McFadyen this week. 

  • Mr G

    The mayor’s comment that “You can evaluate heart surgeons on any criteria you want – just not patient survival rates! You really can’t make this up! ” shows the perils of allowing the department of creating an evaluation system. Often hospitals that are actually the best have a higher mortality rate than others. The best hospitals and surgeons will take on cases that other hospitals “concerned about their rating” will shy away from. If all you care about is test scores, thats all the practitioners will care about. If you solely evaluate teachers on test scores, thats all the teacher will care about.

  • Michael M.

    QP,

    Huzzahs… for a longer than usual rant, again bashing teachers.

    As if bashing teachers is equivalent to putting kids first.

    Question: How can you (as you have done) defend the inflated state scoring system, and in turn defend the inflated DOE School Progress Report grading system (as you have done), that gives 98% of NYC elementary and middle schools A’s and B’s… and then say teachers not only aren’t teaching, but are “harming” our children.

    Please pick one so I can keep up.

    Student test scores, at least as repackaged by the Office of Accountability. say 98% of teachers deserve A’s and B’s, no?

  • John Hancock

    Queens Parent,

    I never said I shunned accountability, and I would love input into what would make me a better teacher. I just have serious doubts to the tools used to measure accountability and to whom it would be applied.

    Are you not more embarrassed to live in a society that makes us beg for money that should not be a second thought. We spend more time watching reality TV, Dressing our pets, or a gambit of agendas more important than things like Education and then wonder why we are in the situation we are in?

    Rant done, goi

  • QueensParent

    JH–Give me a break! Every job has evaluation standards! Every job even mine. The difference is that you teachers feel nothing should happen to the rotten ones, and I assure you, there are rotten teachers that never should have been employed to begin with. They are still out there abusing children and robbing them of a future. The only thing is whether the UFT will keep protecting them. Like I said, adults first, children last.

  • http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com Patrick J. Sullivan

    That’s quite a blitzkrieg the mayor has launched against the State Legislature: order the chancellor to break the law on granting tenure, file suit to raise the charter cap and shut down 10% of schools. And all because “parents demand it”? I don’t think so. Putting a legal cloud over every tenure decision for the foreseeable future is not going to help anyone’s kids.

    Beyond the obvious problem with his usurpation of the powers of the Legislature, his actions will serve only to dramatically increase costs. The mayor should drop his brinkmanship and work with the Legislature and those of us in the public school community to responsibly address budget shortfalls.

  • John Hancock

    QP,

    I absolutely think bad teachers should be fired, and I do get an evaluation and I am one of “those teachers” so you are incorrect. I just said I question the “new tools” used to evaluate our profession. I do not like the idea that we are dogs begging for the educational scraps called $$. PLEASE ANSWER THIS QP What job do you do and what are your evaluations at your job? I am curious.

  • QueensParent

    QP my job is not your business and it is not germane to this conversation. Why do you need to know? I get evaluated quarterly by my boss and those evaluations are factored into bonuses each year as well as, in past years, promotion decisions. Again, it’s pretty normal in life everywhere but NYC public schools.

  • John Hancock

    Sure it is, I want to educate you on what we do and how we are evaluated so you can be properly informed. I want to see how you are evaluated and what factors create your bonuses. I also want to change your evaluation without any real knowledge of what it is I am looking at and then fire you for many factors that are not within your control. Hey why not, it’s pretty normal for life as a teacher everywhere but in your world of whatever it is you do.

  • inexile

    I think the mayor has forgotten that he almost lost the election.  The parents of New York City are not on his side.  They didn’t vote for him.  Anyone with a child in public school these days understands that the mayor is delusional in regard to his and the Chancellor’s managing of the schools.  Why would anyone in the state legislature or on the city council want to be seen as an ally of a mayor who barely made it back into office against an opponent who practically didn’t even run a  campaign?  Why would anyone in public office want to be seen waging war against working class people; because make no mistake teachers are working class people.  Some people carry on on this blog like teachers are making millions.  Most parents like and respect their child’s teacher and realize how much work goes into a teacher’s job. Teachers are part of the working class and a backbone of neighborhoods and communities all over this city.  Why would a smart politician want to be seen as bullying them? Because make no mistake, the mayor is a big bully.

  • FedUp

    QP- I am an elementary school teacher in an inclusion classroom. Inclusion being what it is in NYC, I have students who really shouldn’t be in a general education setting, students who do receive services (but should), students with behavioral issues that no other teacher wants to handle, a handful of your average 5th graders, and one or two genuinely gifted students. I love my job. I have never refused to take on any student the administration has wanted to place in my room. Every year we create a real community in my classroom. All of my students demonstrate social and academic growth. I work my behind off. I am accountable, yet I deal with nearly zero parent and student accountability. I am sure you are not one of those parents, QP, but do you know I have to call homes over the weekend to make sure my students are doing their homework? Or that I have to feed my students some mornings because their parents don’t get them to school in time for breakfast and they can’t concentrate? Or that I have students with ADD who may skip questions on those all-important state exams because they were distracted by a squirrel on a telephone wire outside? These are my variables. Measure my performance, but use the correct instruments. Oh, and by the way, my room has more pull-outs, push-ins, and assorted sevices than you could get a handle on- how do we determine who gets the credit or the blame? When someone discovers the formula, give me a call. Until then, I will retain my healthy skepticism about the ability of the businessmen-running-education to create a valid measure of teacher performance.

  • FedUp

    Oops- that was “students who don’t receive services (but should)”- haven’t typed with that much passion in a while.

  • I noticed that…

    How can the mayor use a fair and reasonable evaluation system of teachers when you have a significant proportion of high schoolers who attend classes 40% – 60% of the time? Why should I be evaluated based on these level 1 students who have not shown any improvement since grade 1 and on, and were given passing grades because administration pressured teachers to push them on? Why should I be evaluated by an administration who has NEVER taught a day in his/her life and yet my career is in their hands? Why should I be evaluated when some of there students who live with parents who are alcoholic or drug users and their children have similar vices? Therefore, to evaluate me base on factors that are beyond my control where the mayor has not tried to address those students and parents who need lots of assistance from other city agencies, other than just sending them schools, is very unfair. Why isn’t the mayor going after these irresponsible, uncaring, apathetic parents who do not attend to their children’s needs and feel that the teachers have to raise them? QP, before you attack teachers, make sure to go to any school and find out the parents who are not doing their job and become an advocate for those caring, totally involved parents who believe, trust, and have faith in teachers.

  • Pingback: Bluster or Bullying: Is It All About the Race to the Top Dollars, or Has Bloomberg Decided to Confront the Union? Posturing for Obama/Duncan or Rolling in the Gutter With Mulgrew? Remember Mike Quill? « Ed In The Apple

  • Invictus

    That graduation rate as a sign of progress that Bloomberg has used show “progress” in the new City schools that have opened under his tenure makes me smile. Lets see whether the professors of the great majority of City Colleges agree that these, the newly graduates of the Bloomberg INC schools are worthy of the diploma they are carrying.

    All that tying performance to some bogus regents tests will equate to is simply, more scrubbing and questionable pressure to pass students who NEVER had deserved to pass.

    And, when these students actually “succeed” in accumulating enough credits to graduate, they will enroll in City Colleges and enroll in classes to drop out?

    QueensParent, come out and smell the roses, yes, there are incompetent teachers and there are incompetent people in every single field, even where you work. See where “performance” driven promotions and greed have lead to, the past Housing Bubble and the tottering of the financial system, where people got caught into a frenzy of speculation and book fixing.

    Check the obvious….

    http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2009/09/23/2009-09-23_hs_grads_not_ready_for_college__report.html

  • Citizen Genari

    The Mayor misrepresents many of the issues about how the education system works and what ails it. One example – from what I understand, the one person who has for 7 years been in the “rubber room” (where teachers are assigned while charges of misconduct are investigated and adjudicated) is there because the city has yet to prove its case, and can’t intimidate that teacher into resigning. Another example of fact-twisting involves the teacher reserve pool. Most of the teachers who languish in this pool are not there because of poor work abilities, but because, under this Mayor, schools’ staff budget allotments have diminished, and seniority has been disengaged from reassignment priority. The result is that principals are squeezed and (for fiscal reasons mostly) tend to hire lower-paid (newer and greener) teachers, rather than better-paid, more experienced (and older) ones. So much for rewarding excellence. Is age discrimination still against the law?

    The main misrepresentation, however, is the expectation that teacher performance can be accurately measured by student success (test scores). Nothing is that simple, but this claim is a great way for bad managers (from the top on down) to deflect attention from their own lack of competence. With no idea how to improve a poor situation, holding subordinates responsible for failure buys bad managers time. (The current NYC Department of Education has made it a policy to put people in charge who have little or no education experience, but do have a lot of ideas on how to run an education business.)

    Classroom teachers can be blamed, harassed, and replaced like old batteries, but this won’t provide better education for public school students. (Expect a lot more “grade inflation” to please the boss, but no real benefits.) With so many personal, socio-economic and other factors influencing each student’s progress, rating teachers on student scores is almost like rating a weather-man on the weather. I just can’t believe that Mayor Bloomberg, Education Secretary Duncan, or President Obama really believe student scores can reliably measure a teacher’s ability, but it apparently makes great politics to peddle this crap to the public. It’s also wonderful way to neutralize a large well-educated segment of organized labor. No wonder Mayor Mike can’t stop raving about it.

  • http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/ norm

    How funny to read this from QP: “my job is not your business and it is not germane to this conversation. Why do you need to know? I get evaluated quarterly by my boss”. A little touchy and defensive, aren’t you about your work, though you are quick to make judgements about how other people are judged. I would bet there are as many political considerations at your job as at any other. Like if your boss didn’t like you personally it wouldn’t affect your evaluation. Unless you work the land of Alice and Wonderland.

    Also, don’t tell us what you do but do tell us what are the criteria of your evaluation. I bet it’s not all by the numbers or results but how you go about your work. MAybe how you dress. Or maybe some nice gifts for the boss.

    And by the way, every teacher does get evaluated by his/her boss, who are known as principals. And they get paid a hell of a lot of money to do these evaluations. And I bet some of them take test scores into account whether legal or not. These are empowered principals to pretty much do what they want to teachers.

    And also by the way, untenured teachers can be let go for wearing the wrong colored shirt. So the entire test score evaluation issue is no more than posturing by Bloomberg.

  • yomister

    “And by the way, every teacher does get evaluated by his/her boss, who are known as principals.”

    Actually, I was never evaluated for an entire school year by my principal. Nor was I evaluated by my assistant principal.

    At the (charter) school I work at now, our school leaders pop in any time they want. Sometimes everyday. The process is informal and teachers get feedback on the fly. It’s a much more holistic and meaningful process. That said, it’s in stark comparison to the contractual “drive by” evaluations which are time consuming, stress inducing, and (dare I say) utterly meaningless if neither party sees value in the process.

    And almost all of the recent research shows that an overwhelming percentage of teachers and principals find present forms of evaluation to be insufficient, unreliable, and waste of human capital.

    It will be interesting to see how the UFT handles this assault (well, other than running to court to seek an injunction – they know how to do that reliably, at least).

  • http://nyceducator.com NYC Educator

    Funny how one isolated example is presented as representative of an entire system. Since we’re playing that game, my principal walked in on me Wednesday afternoon. That was the third time he’s done that, not counting the actual observation he did about a month ago.

    In fact, at the unbelievably large public school in which I work, school leaders also pop in any time they want (though not every day). I’ve worked in 6 large public schools, and that was the case in each and every one.

    Finally, I’m glad you’re so amused by the possibility of 80,000 organized working teachers using legal means to protect their rights.

  • Michael M.

    I can only imagine how much more ornery QP would be if she had to fork out $500/year to pay for office supplies on HER job.

    (Still looking forward to a response to my 11/25 1pm question above…)

  • http://nyceducator.com NYC Educator

    I meant to say that’s the third time he’s done that since September.

  • Invictus

    This entire evaluation system as of the last 8 years have been based in nothing more than just intimidation of teachers masquerading as cooperative relationships to build “a more clear and trustworthy environment for our schools, to benefit our students….” I have read of a teacher who had been granted the seal of approval by the BOE for the past 20 years and all of the sudden, he was given Us on the row. How a teacher who has been described as satisfactory through 5 presidential/mayoral terms be found unsatisfactory all of the sudden. There is a clear mandate that comes from the BOE, and JKlein and King Bloom do not care to “hide” this fact anymore, to drive out the pillars of NYC Public schools on the premise of change and improvement. I have seen a senior teacher, given 2 teacher of the years awards being asked by administration “when are you going to retire?” and when she refused to go, be given punishing classes with the most disruptive or classes packed with 15 special education students without even a paraprofessional. What do you call that sort of move? Is it to “improve” the education for the underserved? What about that memo that was sent out by JK, to train administrators how to write more effective U rated observations in order to make them more solid when it comes to dismissal hearings?
    The UFT better get their strategy together because their message IS muffled, ineffective. What are they doing with the union dues? Hiring “U” rated publicists and second rate PR companies?

  • yomister

    NYC,

    Just relating my own personal experience.

    And I find nothing amusing about present matters; rather, I find it concerning that the UFT relies most heavily on litigation (and legislation). The issues approaching will be heavily fought in terms of persuasive public policy, an area of relative weakness for the UFT.

    That said, I do believe that the present system of bifurcated ratings has nominal (if not detrimental) value. What system of evaluation should be used? I dunno.

  • Realteacher

    Hey, Jeff.

    It’s the hour that the ship comes in!

  • Invictus

    Yomister, the point you have made is certainly valid and you have hit really the proverbial tip of a humongous iceberg. The things that are being experienced in NYC are just one aspect of a huge prism that covers the entire country and several cross sections of the entire US society. For example, the discourse about US school students falling behind more rigorous educational systems ranging from China, Japan, Korea and whichever other countries are for the US society that has to do with the suburbs and other more economically stable enclaves and NOT the NYC public school system which is often non US born, from broken families and economically disadvantaged classes. The attempt of the politicians with the last name of Duncan, Obama, Bloomberg to improve an entire and vastly different school system and its subset of problems with just one solution shows the narrowness or lack of forethought in their actions. In other words, their pro student, anti establishment, anti union tirades are simplistic perhaps because the entire cross section of the America they are talking to itself has got no clue of why their children are underperforming after all that is given to them, from the latest fashion, to the latest technology and everything else that their children seem to need.

    I am honestly tired of even Mr. President comparing the educational system of Korea as a model. Korean being an extremely homogeneous and competitive society where moms and dad slave away and spend about 50% of their take home income into making their children into test taking, superman studying students who need to get that nth percentage point in order to get admittance to the best University programs.

    Arnie Duncan blabbing that the US needs to expand the hours and also the days in school to be competitive is utter nonsense, as if students who barely find joy in the 8 periods they spend in school and who often find more joy in playing hookie and going to class are going to “buy into” that message that more hours of class will translate to a “better life” is something that they truly desire.

    The difference between the US vs Korea/Japan/China is that there, yes, the hours and also the days of school are longer but there one thing that they have learned to do, never ever to undermine teaching and teachers.

    So, let me get this clear, we will expand hours of class, days of school, take away tenure, allow students to do what they please, to play hookie, to have parents and administrators to boss teachers around while we insult and ridicule the teachers who are supposed to make it all happen with the lowest pay average of many professions?

    That will be a recipe for sure success.

  • http://www.parentadvocates.orgwww.nycteachers.com Polo Colon

    There is nothing new to this! Teacher tenure has been under attack by this administration ever since their dictatorship dynasty began! For years, we have been warning those who were not too brainwashed that might listen, that the demolition and ultimately abolition of tenure was the grand design of Chancellor Bloombucks and his Autobot Klein! These transformers of truth, justice and the American way have just raped the people of New York City with ending the people’s two-time mandate for term limits! They have imperiled democracy and have made a mockery of democratic rule. An election was just stolen by the theft of purchase, which means that any dictator can come in here as a decepti-con and transform democratic rule by the mere means of magic by way of money! These megalomaniacal masters of misinformation, medioority and manipulation of the masses through slight of hand micromanagement would better serve the world as CPA’s, since they have no real experience in teaching to be able to overhaul the educational process in New York City to yeild positive progress! Mr. Klein recently resigned from his creation, the Leadership Academy that trains Principals to become the promulgators of the new regime of incompetency with marching orders to trim the budget by getting rid of over 40 years of age teachers who are experienced, senior and tenured in order to get in 2 rookie teachers in the place of 1 tenured teacher! (Forgive me, CPA’s, as this administration would cast such a negative aspersion on your honorable occupation, some might say they would give you all a bad name!) As they filled up the rubber rooms to accomplish this goal, a beneficial side-effect for the administrators-gone-wild was to have the teachers’ union weakened, as teachers who were more vocal and able to fight for their rights and for the union to be stronger on these issues, have all but disappeared and the rookies have not a clue how hard the union had fought in the past to strengthen tenure foir their own benefit! This past summer, Mr. Klein sent out a letter to the principals asking them to rehire the experienced teachers that were being let go because there was now a void in the system of experienced teachers and the schools were not in very good control or shape academically. Apparently, he realized that the mark was overshot and they’d better fix everything in a hurry before the reports exposing their failures came in. Ask people in the know and they will tell you about the abject failure of this administration in NYC, contrary to the propaganda spun out by them! And not only don’t the parents have any real say in what goes on educationally here or on how the tax levy money is spent, but now, the people of New York City won’t as well, due to the finagling of Bloombucks and his cohorts, the acceptable mob of the gangs of New York. Ask Diane Ravitch, Patrick Sullivan, Barron, Jackson and Thompson! There has been NO Progress in the schools at all that they can display, despite 140 or so billion dollars, eight years and 3 reorganizations! If there were, they would have been parading them with Bloombucks’ treasury in full effect, especially recently, in his pre-election deceit! As Charles Barron recently pointed out on the steps of the Tweed Courthouse, in a mock takeover of the building by the people, less than 50% graduation rate after 8 years and 140 or so billion dollars is not progress and not acceptable! The Black and Latino communities will be reeling for years after the effects of the dismal failures of this administration are manifested! A whole generation is on the verge of being lost in the shuffle! The teachers are demoralized and are working in fear of losing their jobs under administrative terrorism, violations of the law have been indemnified, the schools have been stripped of the arts and there’s a partridge in a pear tree, running the whole gamut. A whole decade of disastrous drive-by education in NYC has unfolded as these goons perpetrate their snow job and shell game on the public with impunity and actually get lauded by sycophants and paid assassins of educational integrity! Are they really sincere about their “Children First Initiative”? How could they be, when the outcome is “Contractors First”! If they really cared about teachers and teaching, they would be more supportive of teachers, not less and less each day! They blame teachers for administration incompetence! That is the truth that is hardly mentioned! Legalized criminals! What a tragicomedy and a farce! You can’t make this stuff up! By the way, kudos to Los Angeles, where Bloomberg tried to get the mayor and the people there to replicate New York’s fiasco, but got soundly trounced twice as the court upheld the people’s rejection of the absurdity of the Bloomberg/Klein educational export!

  • http://www.parentadvocates.orgwww.nycteachers.com Polo Colon

    Here’s a snipet that can be verified here by Mr. Sullivan that poiunts out how ludicrous the DOE and Mr. Klein’s dealings with the public have been in the heavily-scripted and rubber-stamped PEP meetings:

    Patrick Sullivan, a member of the Panel for Educational Policy, representing Manhattan, recently asked Dr. Marcia Lyles, Deputy Chancellor, Mr. Klein and the Panel for Educational Policy, “You say there is progress, but what you say and what is shown on the screen are two different things! So what kind of progress are you talking about: positive progress or negative progress?”
    The roomful of attendees, seeing the same ridiculous thing, erupted with laughter!

  • http://nyceducator.com NYC Educator

    Yomister,

    I got the clear impression you were implying there’s no evaluation in public schools. While I’m sure there are exceptions, that’s absolutely not the norm. Of course the UFT relies on legislation and litigation. What else can you do when you have an administration that openly defies laws on a regular basis? I only wish the UFT placed less faith in the good will of these folks, which is a consistent and inexplicably repeated error in my view.

    As for the Bloomberg agenda, the default here in NY is at-will employment, where working people can be fired for any reason or no reason. That’s what Bloomberg wants for teachers, and none of this is new at all. Joel Klein’s 8-page contract laid out this administration’s vision for working people–no rights at all.

    I’ve got a kid who wants to be a teacher, and that’s not the future I want for her. It’s not the future I want for my students either. Blanche DuBois may believe in the kindness of strangers, but I don’t.

  • Jeff S

    Now that there has been some time for things to settle, and also reading the article in today’s NY Times on the Mayor for Life’s quandry regarding the teacher’s contract, one must begin to think that his Honor was not really seriously thinking he could get any of this junk through. Clearly, most of this stuff is a deal killer for the union (or should be) so……is this his attempt to stuff down a much lower raise and tell the teachers they should consider themselves lucky that there are no givebacks here.

  • http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/ norm

    Yomister

    Your experience as a teacher and with the union should make you aware of the ineffectiveness of the UFT in so many areas. Even the law they had passed protecting teachers up for tenure from having test scores be used was somewhat bogus and mostly for PR for the members. I get too many calls from non-tenured teachers who have just about no protections. And some of them are asked to sign a waiver extending tenure for a year. Now Bloomberg claims, and will probably win, that the UFT even didn’t get this one exactly right by leaving a loophole. And of course the law expires this June and the UFT will do nothing to fight it. So a lot of this is smoke and mirrors.

    I find it hard to believe that you think the major problem in this school system is how teachers are evaluated. When you say, “I do believe that the present system of bifurcated ratings has nominal (if not detrimental) value. What system of evaluation should be used? I dunno” you are expressing the essential contradiction in coming up with a system of judging teachers.
    If you don’t know, why would anyone else know?

    What about student evaluation? Parent? Colleagues? Independent auditors?

    Or maybe let’s just not bother. I could make that case too and argue for using the money saved for supplies. There seem to be as many teachers under assault for political reasons as for bad teaching. Our struggle should be to create the best conditions possible for every teacher to do their best. Of course some may be “better” than others, though the term “better” is subjective. Some are better at some things than others.

    Are there teachers who don’t give a crap? Yes there are. And it shows in their work. But they can also figure out ways to get good scores. In fact some of the poorer teachers were pretty good at that and had few concerns about their kids not getting a fuller and better rounded education. They would never bother to take their kids on a trip (which is a lot of work) or provide enrichment and excitement for their kids. Ironically, my principal loved these people the most.

    My solution is more teacher control of the work place. That would make everyone more responsible to each other and not to a supervisor who is often a crap shoot in terms of competence. If teachers chose their supervisors (as they often do in Europe) I think we would see better supervision, not worse. Can we find any examples of this? I say why not try some experiments and see what happens.

  • Citizen Genari

    The Mayor’s recipe for educational success is becoming clear to me: Teachers simply have to learn how to cut the right size hole in the student’s head, insert the knowledge hose, and everything else will fall into place. When test scores start to fall, just twist the hose around until it gets better. And don’t be afraid to twist hard – your job depends on it. (We don’t really even need teachers – just people who are good with a hose.)

    Telling children that teachers, NOT STUDENTS, are responsible for their test scores is the kind of “accountability” that will sink any educational system. Give me a break, Mr. & Ms. Politician!

  • Guy Fawkes

    One month ago, New York City voters chose incumbent Mayor Michael Bloomberg for a third term as mayor over challenger Bill Thompson. Education was one of the most important and hotly contested issues of the campaign. With such a close margin of victory, we can presume that many New Yorkers did not share the mayor’s views on education. If the mayor hopes to build a broad consensus for his schools leadership, one might ask: Do any of Thompson’s policy ideas deserve the mayor’s consideration?

    Last week, Mayor Bloomberg announced that a cornerstone of education in his third term would be linking teacher tenure to test scores. As a new teacher comes up for tenure at the beginning of their fourth year of teaching, student testing data could be used to determine the teacher’s effectiveness and whether they should gain tenure. This measure is opposed by the United Federation of Teachers, which believes that many measures should be used in addition to student test data when assessing teachers. Unclear in Bloomberg’s plan was how test data in ELA and math would be used to evaluate teachers of music, art, science, and social studies, that have no or very infrequent state tests. Many teachers in these subjects are asked to incorporate ELA and math standards when they are barely related to their discipline.

    Thompson saw this overdependence on two state tests as a weakness of Mayor Bloomberg’s education plan. His platform called for moving away from testing and teaching the “whole child”. Most students in grades 3-8 are only tested in English language arts and math. Thompson called for focusing on “science, civics, history, arts, music, geography, and physical education”. Under mayoral control these subjects have suffered in favor of the two subjects covered by state exams. Bloomberg and other school leaders have emphasized the importance of making our students competitive in the global economy. In the 21st century, citizens and leaders will need to know the background of global problems and how government institutions work in order to use these tools enact change. If our students will have to interact with people from around the world, they will need to be exposed to the arts, history, and culture of the peoples they will meet and work with. Sacrificing the ability to be informed and culturally literate citizens certainly won’t make our students more competitive. Equal weight must be given to equally important subjects and tested through alternative assessments to the state exam, such as portfolios employed by some schools in the city.

    Though Mayor Bloomberg won the election and Thompson’s ideas are not required to carry any weight, the failed candidate has a point about teaching “the whole child”. ELA and math are important subjects aren’t the only subjects that our children need to learn. If students are going to be prepared to change and improve the communities where they live, they will need tools that history, civics, and the arts can provide them. Thompson’s plan to emphasize these other subjects is in the best interest of our students. I hope that in the mayor’s third term he take this idea and implement it.

  • I noticed that…

    A system that evaluates teachers should be fair and have criteria that will focus on teaching and learning with various elements that involve the classroom environment. However, this evaluation system that Bloomberg’s demanding is focused not on teaching and learning, but on tenure period! His obsession to have tenured denied to new teachers is nothing else but a feeble attempt to bust the union. Tenure is not only granted to teachers, but to guidance counselors, social workers, psychologists, secretaries, attendance teachers, etc. These UFt members do not teach to any high-stake state exam, yet tenure is granted to them after 3 years. Bloomberg’s attack on attaching test scores to tenure is absurd.

  • Jay

    Look, because of the witch hunts against teachers, perpetrated by the bad managers mentioned in a previous post, teachers everywhere are scared for their jobs much more so than in many other professions. When I sold furniture or waited tables or guarded auto facotires, I wasn’t scared every week of getting canned for reasons that are truly beyond my control. People who make the analogies to other professions fail to recognize that a teacher, unlike all others, can be given some incredibly defective “parts” and sometimes it’s really hard to make that BMW when half the parts are corroded and disfunctional. To save money over the years, too many special-ed kids have been “mainstreamed.” This just happens to fit necely with that “inclusion” philosophy so trumpeted by the bizarre “social justice” movement. Okay, put ten kids in my room that are borderline psychotic, ten kids who are five grade levels behind and ten average kids, with a genius or two, and tell me that that’s progress and that “outcomes” will be stellar for all. As a teacher for 15 years, a hard working one who always gets excellent reviews, I can tell you that what happens is that the smart kids feel hopeless, the average kids decline, and the rest enjoy their free audience for their wackiness. Sure, I can “build relationships” with the students and get some minimal amount of work for them to pass, but is this an optimal learning environment? Every teacher I know who works in the inner city is so full of such horror stories. None of this is the fault of the teacher. It’s administrators and “activists” who create these conditions, then when graduation rates go down, when discipline problems go up and when the quality of education is so bad that more people flee to the suburbs, everyone blames the teachers, and we did not create, nor would we recommend such conditions. To further cover their misplanning, the admins then stop enforcing discipline because every infraction reported goes on THEIR evaluations, so behavior problem kids learn fast that they can do pretty much whatever they want. Again, the teachers are not creating this. When test scores freefall, admins pressure teachers (under threat of excessing) to inflate grades, give undeserved creits, etc. And the “social justice” people go right along with this, thinking that this is the way to serve minorities who have to face “structural inequality.” Fols, teachers are not the problem, only the pawns. Under the new proposals, I would never work in a high needs school because being as stellar (statistically) as I am with my kids, I wouldn’t want my career ruined because of poor quality ‘students’ being shoved in my class. I also am attempting to get out of Regents classes, as well, for even though I am a great teacher with really admirable pass rates, do I want my career trashed because one year I might have a really subpar class?

  • http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/ norm

    Every teacher has a variety of classes over a career.
    Even if you are in a top school they are trying to come up with a way to measure your performance by comparing the results of your kids to other teachers in your school.

    I am as strong on this issue as anyone but I must question teachers who describe kids as “poor quality.” and say “a teacher, unlike all others, can be given some incredibly defective “parts” and sometimes it’s really hard to make that BMW when half the parts are corroded and disfunctional.”

    Even in my worst classes most of the kids were decent. Maybe learning disabled or from difficult homes, but decent.

    I’ve considered certain kids damaged but never thought of them as corroded. I don’t think this is a matter of semantics but of attitude.

  • Invictus

    I would not have chosen the words that Jay used to describe the students that he/she indicates are “broken/corroded” or any other negative word. But, as I have mentioned this one before to some people I know, the great majority of children I have taught are great kids but not necessarily great students.

    To go back to the argument, I would not place my tenure or my job on the line depending on how they perform in their standarized tests. After all, who in the right mind would put their necks on line for students who have missed 110 schools days the previous year, have an issue when you tell them to focus and buckle down to work and still miss school sporadically this year? How do you expect these children to do in standarized tests?

    This is the absurdity of the argument when it comes to what King Bloomberg and his Joe K want for the school teachers.

  • http://edintheapple peter

    Invictus

    For argument sake, what if one teacher was successful in getting the same kid(s) to come to school regularly and do well on standarized tests … would the teacher receive a pat on the back, and/or higher salary, etc… and the teacher(s) who were not successful in getting the kids to come to school regularly … should we seek to replace them with teachers who have the same qualities as the “successful” teacher?

  • Invictus

    Peter, It is assumed that test have a baseline and perhaps an intent to distinguish different groups of testees, empirically, for improvements. The problem in the system we are dealing with is that most students can be taught to take a test, I have seen many cases. Would you reward a teacher whose majority of students have passed the Math B regents, with a 65 or better? A math teacher I once knew told me that the first part of the test consisted of about 40 multiple choice questions, and according to the state rubric that year, if you have gotten 12 of those 40 right, you would “Pass” the test, WITHOUT having to do any of the larger more time consuming graphing and other extended exercises in the back.

    To reward teachers for having the majority of their students to pass THAT test, I do not think so.

    Moreover, if you look at the small schools that have smaller classes where the entire administration and the teachers are bearing down on students with individualized care, the children might benefit, but at what cost?

    The turnover of the staff and the head administration rate of these newly fangled schools is terrible and their success rates begin to drop steadily after the first year.

    There needs to be a sustainable model where the faculty and the Administration structure is longer lasting and not a Potemkin village model that follow a Boom and Bust pattern.

    Moreover, do you believe that the type of education that is being provided at the small schools or even the regular schools today should reflect what the students will encounter in the real world?

    Then perhaps we should wonder to guess what a College lecture hall truly resembles a regular HS classroom in NYC. There is nothing in common.

    That is what the great majority of these cookie cutter graduates have problems finishing our 2 or 4 year colleges, and THAT is a crime on the poor, to make them believe that their diplomas are worth something later to find out that they have not gotten prepared for the real world.

  • Philip Nobile (use name)

    ATTENTION PLEASE: get real–we teachers have the ultimate antidote to high stakes testing, an infallible job-saving solution to the oncoming crisis. It’s old fashioned, tried and true test tampering that is equally pleasing to the DOE and UFT. Why pretend otherwise? In your heart, you know I’m right.  

  • Invictus

    Mr. Nobile:

    The emperor has clothes. Wink. Wink. I have a tendency to believe that many of those schools that got A and Bs in their Progress Report earned them due to their increased capacity of “making” grades look better, and that is something where they did not do “group work” or “workshop models” for.

  • Pingback: Visions of Free Weekends Danced in My Head « Kathy Nida

  • Abismael Gonzalez

    Nice to see Norm, and a name I’ve seen on different forums, Polo Colon, i.e. Hipolito Colon, preaching the good word on this site. I guess it all continues: Bloomberg and Klein will move ahead with their perpetual use of teachers as political pawns, in order to enhance their national standing, as Obama moves toward the end of his first term. Do I sense a 2012 run for the presidency by Billionairerberg, during which, as during his third term run, he harps on his education “achievements?”

    As for Queens Parent, you know nothing about our profession, except that we impart information. There is much, much more to what we do. I’m humble enough to know that I likely know little about the intricacies of your profession, but you, sir/madam, do not understand humility or how to communicate, which is why your points are so skewed by whatever you think you know that you come off as biased, pompous and self-righteous.

    By the way, that leads me to my other point, just because you were in a grade school classroom, back in the 60′s, it doesn’t mean you know about how truly sick some of the students and principals are, in the current New York City Dept. of “Education.”

    John Hancock was nothing but nice to you, and even conceded some points to you that he shouldn’t have. You still disrespected the man. I won’t concede anything, because your points are all wrong. Again, you know nothing about the amazing work that we do: WE ARE EDUCATION. Without educators, no one, including yourself, would be in a position to function at high levels, because they’d lack fundamentals.

    No, we don’t have accountability: we have the railroading of numerous teachers, for the sake of accountability stats that the mayor uses to wash the brains of self-righteous, sanctimonious know-it-all “citizens,” like you. And yes, some of us actually support each other, many just cover their behinds. People like you prove that we must the former, at all costs.

    Polo, just one thing, as a former teacher who was only in the system for a couple of years, as a result of having been set up by an unethical principal, I’d like you to know that they’re going after us (non-tenured teachers) just as much as tenured teachers, just in different ways: discontinuances, denials of tenure, and our u-ratings are often career ending and swift. Three of my former colleagues are actually unable to find jobs, because of having been unfairly marked as incompetent, by unscrupulous principals, while working in schools unfit for any professional. One actually found a position, but the DOE blocked his hire.

    Principal Quality, Please!

  • Invictus

    Of the 7 school closures that were announced, there were a couple of these boutique schools that Bloomy opened since his absolute control of NYC Schools. So, being a small school does not guarantee work without much upheavals as it was once thought.

    Perhaps this entire process of closing and shutting schools based on some bogus School Progress reports and the like is simply 1 card out of many that are being used to outwit and destroyed the hard earned protections that teachers have earned through the decades. It is a shame.

    What also amuses me are the people in the Teaching Fellows and other non traditional teacher training programs that demanded that ATR/tenured teachers be fired in order to “give them jobs” perhaps thinking that they would be better than the experienced teachers that were hugging up the teaching positions and yet, lets see the outcome, several small schools staffers have themselves become ATRered, abused, Ued and everything else.

    The only way that fellow teachers and union members will survive the continuous barrage and the attacks to our basic right from King Bloom and his lawyer sidekick is to stick together in principle and action, divided we will be cut into pieces and there will be nothing but little match stick of schools in NYC down the road.

    PS: I totally entirely agree with you Abismael G. Nevertheless, this site with the likes of opposite opinions shows that we are simply preaching to those in the know and not to the audience that REALLY needs to hear how it really is.

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