A teacher who’s starting at a new school this week explains why

reading list

September 4, 2012

A teacher who’s starting at a new school this week explains why

by Philissa Cramer, at 1:02 pm

Like educators across the city, Mark Anderson is back in the classroom today. But it’s not the one he left in June.

Anderson chose to look for a new school after two years as a special education teacher at a struggling Bronx elementary school. In the Community section today, he explains what motivated his move — and argues that administrators at schools like the one he left could stem their annual teacher exodus just by being nice.

Anderson writes:

I can’t say that I am an “irreplaceable” teacher. But I do know that some of the teachers that I have worked with are, and that we have chosen to forsake our school.

The education policy group TNTP coined that term this summer in a report that calls for changes to teacher retention policies. The top 20 percent of teachers are “irreplaceables,” TNTP concluded, and yet they must be replaced far too often. Like many educators, I may take issue with some of the flashpoints of TNTP’s report — the aggrandizing term of “irreplaceable,” the focus on firing “low performers,” the notion of merit pay, or the idea that the wheat can even be separated from the chaff given the measures that currently exist.

But … the report got one critical point right: most teachers depart due to a failure in school leadership. As the report further notes (under “low-cost retention strategies”), the remedy for this failure can be heartrendingly easy: All it would often take to retain some effective teachers is a few positive words of recognition.

Not only were words of recognition absent at his old school, but teachers who should have been praised were criticized while teachers who declined to make the extra effort escaped censure, Anderson writes. The dynamic is reversed in his new school, he reports.

http://twitter.com/mandercorn Mark Anderson

Philissa: A correction. I worked at that school for 3 years!
Z111m

TNTP is a meaningless set of letters and Tim Daly knows NOTHING about education.
He is simply part of the “reform” movement funded by neo liberals who want to cut the long
Term tax costs that come with pensions.. He and his ilk are out to profit off of children and most of them have never spent successful careers teaching anything or anyone. They are a sham and I pray for anew mayor who sends these carpetbaggers packing. And by the way,
Most of the folks they would call irreplaceable based on inaccurate and ridiculous tests
Are what most of us would consider spoiled, arrogant scabs who are part of an affirmative action program for the children ofthe wealthy… What happened is that their mommies and daddies bankrupted Wall St. are back looking for new ways to milk the public teat…
This system under The Little Dictator cries out with corruption..Klein goes to workimmediately after leaving for Newscorp for millions selling his ARIS data system and nobody complains?
If he was still prosecutor he could put himself away.
Bronx teacher-lady

I also worked at a school where it seemed that the strongest, most involved teachers received the poorest treatment. After five years of successful teaching and an excellent reputation amongst colleagues and parents, a new assistant principal (under a new Leadership Academy principal) harassed me horribly, on and off, for three years. That, coupled with a particularly difficult class that I received no support with and three years of administrative incompetence which seemed to thwart every effort I made, I became so physically ill I had to leave. Interestingly, I wasn’t the only good teacher that left during that time period.
A.S.Neill

no point in just repeating from my experience that most ed administrators lack social skills or high social-emotional intelligence. What I can’t figure out though is whether this is just reflective of average lack of social skills among educational professionals as a group (or any professionals for that matter) or whether ed administrators are a special self-selected sub-group that typically lack this trait. Perhaps more ambitious and power seeking people just have lower social skills in general. Difficult to say.
Michael Fiorillo

Mark,

There have always been power hungry, inept, psycho, vindictive (feel free to add your own adjective) principals. What’s different now is that teacher churn is de facto policy, and is desired by those who have unchecked power over the schools. There’s no accountability for these principals; if anything, Tweed rewards this type of behavior.

The “irreplaceable” teacher is really a euphemism for a twenty-three year-old who will do what he/she is told, have their probation extended in perpetuity, take and eat s#!% and seek to escape well before they qualify for a pension. They are not only seen as replaceable, but in ed reform utopia, they’d be literally interchangeable.
Public Consensus

My story is similar to yours. After teaching successfully for 7 yrs at the same public HS in Queens, a new AP came in and gave me terrible schedule of classes and she harassed me horribly. She picked her target one at time, by now half of the department is gone. I left after one semester with the new AP because it just was not worth my time or worth sacrificing my health. It’s a shame that the Chancellor and the mayor talked about attracting and retaining highly qualified teacher like me, and yet my school administrator made it so unbearable that I left voluntarily.
Public Consensus

You’re right. Many of these new principals are such dictators that they don’t care to built consensus and support among the faculty, parents, or the community. The principal will do whatever he/she wants. Regardless of how great your suggestions are, if you don’t follow the dictator, the dictator will throw you under the bus!
http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/ Norm

Let’s never forget who is in charge of that school administration. Tweed, Walcott, Bloomberg. They support every act that a principal perpetrates on the teachers. In their world teacher turnover is a good thing — cleaning house. In fact turnover is a sign of bad leadership and should put up a warning sign if we had leadership at the top interested in retaining quality teachers.
Let’s hope this truly comes true: The dynamic is reversed in his new school.. As a long-time skeptic I will hold judgement.

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September 4, 2012

A teacher who’s starting at a new school this week explains why

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