Parents defend memorial to Shuang Wen School’s ousted principal after city calls for removal. (DNAinfo)
Finalists from the Great American Teach-Off discuss the future of their profession. (GOOD)
A teacher compares Race to the Top competition to the Hunger Games novels. (School Ecosystem)
Queens parents, educators, and politicians met to discuss struggling high schools. (Queens Tribune)
Principal Carol Burris criticizes the state’s teacher evaluation agreement. (NYC Public School Parent)
Brooklyn parents are pressing the city to speed up toxic PCB testing. (Brooklyn Eagle)
311 has provided some parents with misinformation about new UES elementary school. (DNAinfo)
Teacher describes how teaching five periods straight led to illness. (DOENUTS Blog)
Principals’ union president Ernest Logan urges SED not to approve turnaround plans. (GS Scribd)
San Diego Unified School District struggles to serve 3,500 homeless students. (KBPS)
Father at elementary school rocked by sexual misconduct allegations shares advice. (Insideschools)
Goldstein: “Differentiated instruction” needed in Core Curriculum for ELL students. (Schoolbook)
Cuts in federal subsidies for AP exams will raise their costs for low-income students. (Schoolbook)
City and State is hosting a panel on college readiness next week. (GS Calendar)
Education Sec. Arne Duncan stuck to talking points in Daily Show appearance. (Washington Post)
State’s evaluation deal is vague on ways to help struggling teachers improve. (Quick and the Ed)
President Obama’s new budget proposes cuts to NAEP testing program. (Curriculum Matters)
Clay
Re: “Remainders: City calls for removal of memorial to ousted principal”
Maybe someday this title can refer to John Chase’s copy machine.
We can only hope.
MD
I have one important concern as a parent to which I have not seen a definitive answer (though I’m still looking). Can my child’s teacher, who is widely recognized as being excellent, be fired based solely on standardized test scores and against the wishes of her principal?
Nycdoenuts
The answer to that question is yes.
Guest
Explain?
http://twitter.com/nycdoenuts nycdoenuts
Sure. Sorry.
So the bottom line is that teachers, no matter how good, must be rated ineffective if their students do not do well on the standardized exams portion of their review. They get to that bottom line through the use of weighting.
It goes like this: Under the agreement, a teacher needs to ‘score’ a 75 just to be rated as effective (we need to ‘score’ a 65 just to avoid being rated as ineffective). Principal and ‘in-building’ observations count only for 60% of that score. The other portion of the score comes from the standardized exams. There are two sections for this. One round comes from the state (that’s worth 20%) and the other will (probably) come from the city (and is also worth 20%). A certain amount of ‘points’ (at least 15 of them out of 40) MUST be earned from the standardized exams portions of the teacher’s score in order for that teacher to reach a 75%.
Not to sound too wonky or like I’m on soap box, but: That’s in the best of circumstances. The way the state and NYCDOE will compute student test scores to a 1 – 20 score for a teacher will probably be based on a method called ‘Vallue-Added’ (or VAM). While there are different formulas for arriving at a ‘value-added’ score (a lot like the fact that there are many different recipes for hot chocolate), one commonality of value added is that it produces results (or teacher scores) that are unreliable (you’ll hear them they’ll talk about their being a HUGE ‘margin of error’ in the ‘value-added formula’ a lot. That’s just them talking about how the math behind VAM is just unreliable).
So if your child’s teacher has students who have a bad day on test day, or if they get some last minute students that they didn’t actually get to teach, or if the value added model miscalculates and makes the teacher responsible for students he or she has never taught (all of which has happened in the past (and not just once)), then that teacher will get a bad score from the standardized exams portion(s) of their review score.
Two bad scores of under 65 will get the teacher fired. It’s just that simple (That last sentence was sarcasm).
Hope that helps.
Vote NO!
Responding to what you wrote below. That is assuming that you earn the full “60 points” from the school building components of the rubric. When was the last time you received a “perfect” observation?
The judge last summer stated that the 65 point threshold was illegal. I wonder if anyone knowledgeable with labor law, could comment on how a 65 point threshold to exit the lowest tier could be legal with a four tier rubric, and a law which says multiple measures have to have meainingful weight towards the complete score? Is the May 2010 law now voided?
Guest
The students do not have to do well as implied. They have to show in aggregate progress. Let me assure you when all the students in a teachers class show absolutely no progress or backslide on these simple tests of basic reading and math skill they should be exploring other work.
http://twitter.com/nycdoenuts nycdoenuts
(Thus the words ‘at’ and ‘least’ in my comment.)
I honestly don’t know why no one -except for you- has been able to come right out and say that 0-64 for the first tier, and 65 – 100 for the other THREE TIERS is just plain ridiculous. Of course it is (completely ridiculous), but I think you’re the only one who’s been able to articulate in just the right way.
But it was my understanding that the 2010 law had always said that.
http://twitter.com/nycdoenuts nycdoenuts
Sorry if it seems like I implied. Let me be clear: STUDENT MUST DO WELL. Anything uncertain there? cool.
I swear there should be a permit for people who log on to speak about education. …..
”Let ME -the person who is commenting in absolute anonymity- explain to YOU how the mathematics behind a value added model -that hasn’t yet been invented- actually works … and then let ME-same anonymous person- assure YOU that any teacher who’s students do poorly on exams sucks anyway. Because although I’ll provide no evidence no back up my claim and won’t even provide any identity at all, I absolutely know what I’m talking about.” Sheesh.
Wait … Chancellor? Is that you??
Tell me, oh wise one, upon what formula will SED derive the standard of students showing aggregate progress? Please reply with the formula and a link, if possible, describing that formula!! Please make sure it’s not the same stupid formula that the NYCDOE has used for gr 4- 8; math And ELA because nearly everyone with a pulse is seeing how unreliable those results were.
http://twitter.com/nycdoenuts nycdoenuts
I wasn’t aware that the high school Earth Science exam was a simple test of basic reading or math. I also wasn’t aware that the senior level music exam in high school was a simple test of basic reading or math (wait, what is the music test again?).
Some schools are able to have a teacher teaching 5 periods of Physics or Calculus. It’s nice to have that type of resource. I wasn’t aware that the Physics or Calculus Regents’ Exam was a simple test of basic skill in reading and math.
Wait. Maybe I wasn’t aware of this because they’re not.
Guest
Hey donut — What’s your name?
Right, that’s what I thought.
http://twitter.com/nycdoenuts nycdoenuts
Given your previous comment, I’m surprised you thought of anything at all.
I don’t know about others, but I’m tired of people who claim to have a comprehensive understanding of this agreement -or of this law. Likewise am I tired of colleagues who claim to be surprised at the union backstab -when knife was used starting way back in December of 2009 when the law was first being drafted. I’m tired of people who claim that this law -or the agreement- is either ALL bad or ALL good and I’m suspicious of most who can assert either position definitively one way or the other (save for a few bloggers, some parent leaders and several commenters (who usually appear only on this site).
But I am way WAY past being tired of hearing from people how cock-sure they are that the standards of the law will be reasonable for a teacher to reach. You don’t know that. I don’t know that. No one knows that. Any assertion to that end -at this point in the conversation- is at best conflating this agreement with high student achievement and is at worst obfuscating -viciously obfuscating- its details, implications and unintended consequences.
Aggregate progress on simple tests of basic reading and math. Give me a break.
Spagnolagg
Man, it’s vacation time. Get a life!
Educator in awe
According to the deal that NYSUT agreed to, yes. That is the true sham of it all. Tests are effectively 100% of the evaluation process.
Guest
Unless the teacher the year before you cheated. In that case it would be impossible to show progress.
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