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As schools enter the peak season for teacher tenure decisions, teachers who are up for tenure are reporting increased scrutiny from principals and superintendents.

A teacher contacted GothamSchools last week to report that her principal had surprised teachers up for tenure at her school with a request for a portfolio.

“The superintendent just informed my principal that each person up for tenure had to have an extensive portfolio demonstrating all the work they do that benefits the school,” said the teacher, who herself is up for tenure this year.

“There’s been stress, to say the least,” she said.

The portfolios are one of several ways district superintendents are soliciting evidence to back up their tenure decisions. The superintendents have always had the final say on tenure decisions, but they rarely challenged principals’ recommendations in the past. Now they’re under pressure to toughen the tenure process and deny tenure or extend probation more often. So they’re asking principals to justify all of the recommendations they make. Superintendents can ask for whatever documentation they like, including portfolios. Some superintendents are also observing classes themselves or sitting down with principals to analyze teachers’ performance.

“Superintendents have been told that nothing is a given,” said a high school principal. (more…)

I was teaching my precalculus class when the news broke that Cathie Black was no longer our chancellor. Precalculus is one of the very few classes I have taught in my three years that is not tied to a Regents exam, and for this reason it is one of my absolute favorites. I use an inquiry-based curriculum taught in a Socratic method style, with students initiating ideas for solutions and communicating their ideas with one another. The idea is to teach critical thinking, and to change students’ conception of math from one of a large collection of “steps” or “right ways to solve problems” into the complex yet accessible system of logic that it is. I am there as a guide and as a facilitator, to provide access to the vocabulary and language of the math, and on rare occasions to provide students access to particular solution strategies used in mathematics that may not be obvious based on anything they have learned previously.

In classes that are Regents-based I am only able to do this type of teaching to a very small extent. Inquiry-based learning requires time, and it does not lend itself well to broad, shallow curriculums. Teaching with the test in mind starts in the early grades, and it is especially prevalent in schools where students struggle to pass the exams, which are also often schools dominated by low-income students and students of color. Most of the ninth-graders I am preparing for the Integrated Algebra Regents exam in June came in struggling with many basic pre-algebra topics, which means that to prepare them in one year to receive a passing grade on the exam I have to review a lot of middle-school skills and focus on particular, Regents-approved “methods” for solving particular types of problems. Almost all of my students can solve a multi-step algebraic equation by this time in the year, but few of them truly understand why the method that I imposed on them actually works. They will remember the method in June when they have to take the test, but I personally do not believe that their critical thinking skills or their understanding of the meaning or purpose of solving an equation will have improved greatly in their time with me this year. How my students perform in June does matter a great deal for their futures and for our school’s future. But what they understand 20 years from now, and how the seeds planted now have developed by that point, matters much more.

Students in my precalculus class were incredibly resistant to the inquiry-based methodology at the beginning of the year. Several of them would complain consistently that I wasn’t “telling them how to solve the problems” or “teaching them the steps.” I was feeling so much resistance that I turned to my assistant principal for advice. I am lucky to work with an educational leader who holds a social justice view of education, and she gave me a riveting speech about how I needed to be completely honest with my students about why they have that view of mathematics, that they are wrong about what mathematics is, and that it isn’t their fault. “Students who look like me and who look like them are given a different type of education than students who look like you,” my assistant principal, an African-American woman, told me. “You need to tell them that their minds have been enslaved; that they have been educated to believe that they are good students if they don’t think and just perform as they are told. That is not educating. You have a responsibility to un-teach that view of learning and support them in learning to think for themselves.”

I want to be able to teach all of my classes like that. I know that in algebra there is a place for learning skills and strategies, but I wish every day that there was a great deal more of a place for deep critical thinking, for reflection, for developing conceptual understandings that will last longer than June. As long as high-stakes testing remains as high-stakes as it is, however, it is simply a reality that the curriculum will narrow and many teachers will focus on the specific skills students need to be successful on the exams. And the stakes associated with scores on these exams, including having one’s school shut down and its space converted into a charter, will remain incredibly high as long as the reforms being pushed in New York City and nationally do not shift course.

And so, when I went on lunch and heard the news that Cathie Black was no longer our chancellor, there was a piece of me that felt so much hope about a possible shift in that course. (more…)

• Two high school handball players say the city is selectively enforcing competition rules. (Brooklyn Paper)
• Dennis Walcott hobnobbed with students and courted the press at PS 261. (GothamSchools, NY1)
• Walcott said he didn’t think sexism played a role in Cathie Black’s firing. (Post)
• Twenty city students will take part in a “Top Chef”-style competition for culinary school scholarships. (AP)
• Students, staff, and advocates are rallying to save several Queens schools from closure. (Daily News)
• Geoffrey Canada will be a character witness in the trial of a financier accused of insider trading. (Post)
• The Daily News calls elected officials “a disgrace” for fighting against an Upper West Side charter school.
• Newark school officials are sitting on a lot of extra funds but can’t decide how to use them. (USA Today)
• A Chicago public school is requiring all students to eat the cafeteria food. (Chicago Tribune)
• Across the country, schools are still grappling with the best way to teach the Civil War. (Washington Post)

• Dennis Walcott says he’s “not interested” in the “absurd” idea that he might run for mayor. (Politicker NY)
• Colorado plans to evaluate all teachers, in all subjects, by their students’ test scores. (American Prospect)
• A collection of the varying and sometimes contradictory explanations for Cathie Black’s firing. (NYCPSP)
• Black’s failure has implications for the national trend of non-traditional superintendents. (Hechinger)
• A rundown of the most promising high schools that have seats for shut-0ut students. (Insideschools)
• Student activists released a report detailing the negative effects of school closures on students. (Ed Vox)
• A mom describes waiting to hear her son’s name picked in the Community Roots lottery. (Insideschools)
• Norm Scott detects a pattern of unrest emanating from Brooklyn’s District 14. (Ed Notes)
• The federal budget deal includes $700 million for a second version of Race to the Top. (Politics K-12)
• What Ed Sec Arne Duncan said at the Education Writers Association meeting. (Flypaper)
• A Canadian principal is soliciting 10-photo school tours. (The Learning Nation via Mrs Ripp)
• La.’s schools chief was rebuked for not announcing John White’s appointment earlier. (Times-Picayune)

Board of Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch visited a struggling Bronx high school today that is hoping to convert into a charter school in order to prevent the city from closing it.

A teacher at Christopher Columbus High School said that Tisch toured the school today, stopping into teachers’ classrooms and talking to principals at several of the schools that share the building. The teacher said that Tisch was there to discuss the school’s charter conversion aspirations.

Though city school officials have said that they have no intention of allowing the school to convert into a charter school, teachers took Tisch’s visit as a sign of hope that state officials haven’t ruled the plan out.

Tisch has personally campaigned for more charter high schools, calling on charter school networks to take a risk on older, more difficult students.

“It’s really time for charter schools to say to me, ‘I don’t want to just grow my own, I don’t want to operate in this zone where I am the darling,’” Tisch said at Hunter College in 2009. “I want them to dig in and say, ‘what can we do to help?’”

City Department of Education officials said today that Columbus should not be allowed to convert into a charter school — keeping its staff and students the same — because of its years of poor performance. (more…)

Chancellor-designee Dennis Walcott joined P.S. 261 first graders for a dance and movement class.

On his first visit to a public school since being named Chancellor-designee, Dennis Walcott breezed through Brooklyn’s P.S. 261 like the warm weather soothing the city today. As he strode in, memories of March and his deposed predecessor, Cathie Black, seemed to fade.

He chatted easily with third graders about gardening, read to a class of first graders, and took his turn at kickball during second graders’ recess. Dropping in on a dance and movement class, Walcott climbed onstage and, following a teacher’s orders, posed like a flower, then like a tree, and then tried to follow along with the class’s “alley cat dance” steps.

“I feel like I’m in a commercial,” said a first-grade student.

“A commercial?” said Walcott, laughing. “Some people may see it that way.” (more…)

Dee Alpert, a longtime special education advocate whose close analysis of official documents kept city and state officials on their toes, died suddenly over the weekend.

Alpert, who also commented frequently on GothamSchools, died of a cerebral aneurysm, according to a report from her son posted Saturday night to the NYC Education News email list.

For many years, Alpert ran the Special Education Muckraker website, which is no longer active. The site collected special education news and Alpert’s analysis of city and state education data. Alpert told EdNews.org in 2007 that she entered the special education fray after witnessing what she described as a “corrupt administrative proceeding” over the way a student had been treated by his school district.

“I’m a child of the ’60′s, and I guess that trying to right some very obvious governmental wrongs was just part of my generation’s thing,” Alpert said.

At a time when adversaries in education debates often shout past each other, Alpert earned a reputation for engaging thoughtfully with those who disagreed with her. (more…)

Change at the top:

• Once tightly organized, the city Department of Education after Cathie Black’s tenure is in disarray. (Times)
• Black’s downfall highlights the reality that the education reform debate is deadlocked. (Times)
• City government employees had bets placed on when Bloomberg would fire Black. (Post)
• Dennis Walcott was part of all of Bloomberg’s education decisions except the one to hire Black. (Post)
• Walcott fielded the City Council’s questions but didn’t impress the UFT’s Michael Mulgrew. (Times)
• The city is positioning Walcott as Black’s opposite, but their policies are no different. (Daily News)
• Walcott spent part of his first day fielding questions on teacher layoffs. (Wall Street Journal)
• Congregants at a Brooklyn church backed Walcott, but worried about their local schools. (Times, Post)
• Having to reprint diplomas twice this year because of the chancellor switches is costly for the city. (Post)
• Michael Goodwin: Bloomberg is dismissive of public opinion, so Black’s firing was a good step. (Post)
• Andrew Wolf: Walcott represents just a continuation of Klein’s and Black’s policies. (Daily News)
• Mike Lupica: Black’s hire was like when George Steinbrenner hired a football coach. (Daily News)
• Michael Benjamin: Walcott has the charm, savvy and local ties that Klein and Black lacked. (Post)
• Timothy Hacsi: School superintendent picks are increasingly made based on politics. (Times)
• The Post doesn’t think it will like whoever Merryl Tisch chooses as the new commissioner.
• Black conceded she was not prepared to be chancellor. (Fortune, Times, Post, Daily News)

In other news:

• M.S. 223, one of the city’s best middle schools, is fighting to remain that way. (Times)
• For district schools fighting off charter co-locations, it’s an uneven, uphill battle. (Times)
• The teachers union and other groups called on the city to support, not close, failing schools. (Post)
• Many teachers returned to the classroom from the rubber room after paying fines. (Post, NY1)
• Walcott defended the policy, saying all teachers found guilty shouldn’t be punished the same way. (Post)
• Families from the Brandeis HS building are suing to stop a charter school from moving in. (NY1, DN)
• Bloomberg’s 2008 pension deal with teachers added $100 million a year to pension costs. (Post)
• Brooklyn Heights parents want to expand P.S. 8 into a middle school. (Post)
• Nearly 1 in 5 students who took the city’s private schools admission test got an inaccurate score. (Times)
• The Board of Regents is considering relaxing “seat time” requirements to facilitate online learning. (Post)
• Thousands of city teachers rallied in solidarity with their embattled colleagues in Wisconsin. (Post)
• Teach for America founder Wendy Kopp sleeps in on Sundays — until 6 a.m. (Times)
• Bronx Science’s salutatorian was accepted to six Ivy League universities. (Daily News)
• Manhattan Media’s Tom Allon says changing the exam is one way to diversify Stuyvesant. (Daily News)
• Regulation of for-profit education is threatening Kaplan, and the Washington Post. (Washington Post)
• Low-income high school students picked up prom dresses at a gown giveaway. (Daily News)

• Black, happy to wear designer suits again, says learning schools was like learning Russian. (Fortune)
• Parents and educators in Harlem and Greenpoint had diverse reactions to Black’s departure. (City Room)
• Bloomberg defended Cathie Black as “phenomenally competent” on his radio show. (DNA Info)
• Dennis Walcott visited his old elementary school today with his grandson, a student there. (City Room)
• A coalition is fighting for a national search for a new chancellor, not Walcott. (Prospect Heights Patch)
• A parent says Bloomberg “satisficed” — settled for someone who seems good but falls short. (NYCPSP)
• Walcott may fit a pattern of chancellors who are reformers “with a softer touch.” (Capital New York)
• Grassroots Education Movement: this week proves that “the Bloomberg ship is sinking.” (Norm’s Notes)
• Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries is very happy to see Cathie Black go. (Fort Greene Patch)
• A city education reporter says schools chancellors aren’t relevant under mayoral control. (City Room)

Meanwhile:

• Gen Y teachers want more feedback than their veteran peers, an AFT analysis finds. (Teacher Beat)
• An economist estimates the value of teachers based on their students’ future earnings. (Joanne Jacobs)
• Study of KIPP finds black students are less likely to leave KIPP than district schools. (Ed Week)
• John Merrow’s new book argues the goal should not be better teachers, but a better job. (News Hour)
• Robert Jackson told Dennis Walcott that pushing to end LIFO is beating a dead horse. (Wonkster)
• Learn more about going educationally green at a Department of Education fair. (Insideschools)
• Two views of balloons highlight how teachers and parents see schools differently. (GS Community)
• John White tells New Orleans television that he is committed to listening to parents. (WWLTV)
• A Newark high school is a finalist for Obama’s commencement challenge. (Politics K12)

Chancellor-designee Dennis Walcott testifies at the New York City Council's Education Committee's Budget Hearing

City school officials said today that they would need roughly $300 million to avoid laying off thousands of teachers next year.

Today’s twice-delayed City Council hearing on the DOE’s preliminary expense budget for 2012 focused on how to avoid teacher layoffs and the current “last in, first out” rules that require the city to lay off teachers based on seniority.

Testifying before the City Council for the first time in his new role as chancellor-designate, Dennis Walcott fielded questions about how the city can avoid mass layoffs. And, although he’s still being referred to by some DOE officials as Deputy Mayor, Walcott was treated just like his predecessors by the Committee: with skepticism.

Council members were quick to offer their congratulations and support to Walcott, but then became less welcoming when the subjects of teacher layoffs and ending “last in, first out” rules were raised.

Many council members questioned whether or not Mayor Bloomberg had requested enough funds from Albany, with several suggesting that perhaps the $600 million Bloomberg requested ($200 million of which was set to go to schools), was deliberately low, perhaps as a strategy to continue pushing for changes to “last in, first out” rules. (more…)