Comments on: A teacher evaluation panel dissolves early after dissent

By: Lack of Management Skills

Lack of Management Skills — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 00:52:00 +0000

Everything GS said is the truth. You are not a grassroots movement. You are paid anti-union crew. How do you manage a classroom when you can’t manager a group that yhou yourselves invited?

By: Reapwhat

Reapwhat — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 00:48:00 +0000

The UFT needs to hire a couple of guys named Vinny to deal with Ruben.

By: Reapwhat

Reapwhat — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 00:47:00 +0000

You want to steal the jobs of other teachers and you think the tone was disappointing? If you act like a scab expect to be treated like one.

By: Unionlabel

Unionlabel — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 00:42:00 +0000

Why do you feel that it is ok for you to be a scab and a turncoat to your fellow teachers? Why would you not expect outbursts when you are trying to sabotage teachers careers? You are lucky that outbursts are all youve gotten so far.

By: Bronx Teacher

Bronx Teacher — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 00:18:00 +0000

I have to agree with Ruben. I think all this Evan and Sydney bashing is just plain wrong. Think about this. They could have gone into the private sector and earned big bucks. But no, they didn’t. Instead the put their money where their mouth is and took less pay, and lesser working conditions to do some good in this world. They both left teaching, and started an organization with one thing in mind. To help students, to work at making education better. Yet what happens? They are mocked.

Thursday night, from what I saw, things got out of hand. People were calling out without raising their hand. People were being rude to Evan. Gosh darn it, it was his meeting, E4E put it together so they get to lay the ground rules. It is the same as if someone came to your home and didn’t abide by your rules.

There is a lot of good about E4E. It is time we start listening to what they have to say.

By: Marat

Marat — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 23:34:00 +0000

Michael, I asked something similar a few hours ago. I don’t expect Ruben will answer either of us. I think he’s become so accustomed to the undeserved praise, that any commentary, even if it’s accurate, short of “E$E are visionary mavericks!” is just unfair to him.

Ruben, are you and E$E going to be at the UFT June 14th rally against layoffs? Or is it not Important enough for you?

By: Michael Fiorillo

Michael Fiorillo — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 23:13:00 +0000

“Led by Teach for America alumni who are no longer in the classroom, the group has quickly gained a high profile with the support of national philanthropists, including the Gates Foundation…”

Ruben, what exactly is your complaint about the “tone” of this statement? It comes off to me as a set of facts. Are they incorrect, or is the simple relaying of facts that reveal the superficiality and presumptuousness (at best, attempted sabotage of the union at worst) of this group’s founders too much for you to bear?

I’ve complained frequently about phrasing in GS articles that shades into editorializing: please interpret for me and other readers how this quote does so, or is this just more of your typical inability or unwillingness to reason?

By: URAScab

URAScab — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 22:42:00 +0000

SCABBBBBBBBB

By: URAScab

URAScab — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 22:41:00 +0000

scabbbbbbbbbbbbbb

By: Marat

Marat — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 16:31:00 +0000

Btw, to directly counter what you didn’t like about this piece, the description of Evan and Sidney as two TFA alumnus that left the classroom and the mention of how E$E is funded, well, isn’t it accurate???

O’Dowd, Snotgrass, and Sobel’s opinions, why do they need to be mentioned? Everyone already knows they tow the E$E party line. Heck, it’s the reason why they were on the panel.

By: Marat

Marat — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 16:07:00 +0000

Actually, this article seemed like the very first GS piece about E$E that didn’t pat your little group on the back with the undeserved “they’re mavericks” praise that you’ve gotten used to.

I hope GS continues to be critical of E$E, next I’d like to see a piece on your inflated claims of having 2,500 members.

By: Ruben

Ruben — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 15:39:00 +0000

I just want to add that the general tone of this article is somewhat disappointing. Beginning with the characterization of the disruptions as “dissent”, the sentence: “Led by Teach For America alumni who are no longer in the classroom, the group has quickly gained a high profile with the support of national philanthropists, including the Gates Foundation” and the original mischaracterization of the audience as majority charter school teachers, this article feels as if it was written with angry anti-E4E GS commenters editing over Geoffrey’s shoulder.

No mention of the other panel members, including Principal Angela O’Dowd, TNTP Talent Manager Kate Sobel and teacher/E4E Policy Team member Grace Snodgrass or their contributions to the discussion is made. No mention either of the survey that took place during the panel which showed the variety of years of experience in the crowd and was also an obvious attempt to gather immediate feedback to your policy paper.

I understand I have my obvious biases, and it’s pretty much impossible to please both sides at the same time, but I couldn’t help feeling frustrated by the tone of this article.

By: bee

bee — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 04:03:00 +0000

It was definitely not Jerry Springerish, ( no teacher evaluation/paternity tests that I could see) I thought it was a mite, Catcher in the Ryeish, with a sprinkling Stepford Wives and a smidgeon of Lord of the Flies.

By: Going Tonight

Going Tonight — Sat, 04 Jun 2011 22:55:00 +0000

* Grace Snodgrass was the teacher on the panel and on the policy team not Kate Sobel.

By: Going Tonight

Going Tonight — Sat, 04 Jun 2011 22:52:00 +0000

I also agree that the outbursts could have been handled differently. Evan should have taken one question from the audience in a show of good faith. Stuart waited until the question and answer segment to ask a question, clearly his goal was not to disrupt the event, but to make sure that Evan was not censoring out the difficult or critical questions.

Kate Sobel, the teacher who is on the E4E policy team and on the panel I found very confusing. She said that she wanted to know her strengths and weaknesses and what to work on as a teacher. Since she is a middle school ELA teacher, she should have a value added score. I am wondering how knowing what percentile she was in has informed her instruction. If we want assessments to improve instruction, they must be far more granular than giving a percentile rank. She needs to know what skills her students are deficient in, not only that a deficiency exists.

I think 40% of an evaluation based on high stakes, standardized tests is too much. That kind of weight on a standardized test means that the a corporation will be dictating curriculum that I teach. As a history teacher, that is a scary thought to me. Here is a preview of whats to come. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/13/opinion/13fri4.html

The proposal wasn’t all bad. I think the rubric to conduct evaluations is a useful tool. I can’t see any opposition to that. I also like the idea of students having a voice in evaluations.

By: Michael M. (parent still)

Michael M. (parent still) — Sat, 04 Jun 2011 22:13:00 +0000

Hi. I appreciated the video. Do you have more? Why no electrons on Mr. Pretty Pleas?

By: Bronx Teacher

Bronx Teacher — Sat, 04 Jun 2011 21:18:00 +0000

Wow! When I heard about this video I was expecting something out of Jerry Springer. I was so disappointed. This was nothing.

By: Marat

Marat — Sat, 04 Jun 2011 20:33:00 +0000

Still Kramer in the 14th paragraph.

By: Marat

Marat — Sat, 04 Jun 2011 18:54:00 +0000

Ruben, who was the E$E wannabe tough guy that was standing trying to intimidate Stuart?

Do you condone his behavior?

By: Gdecker

Gdecker — Sat, 04 Jun 2011 18:03:00 +0000

Thanks for pointing out the discrepancy, @Aa36b – made the fix.