Don’t believe the education “reformers”

[PETRUS]

Public schools are better than we think and efforts to quantify teacher performance are typically destructive

Three mildly heretical thoughts about American education: First, given the impossible assignment we’ve given them—an egalitarian mission in a nation rapidly growing more stratified by income and class—American public schools are probably doing a better job than they ought to be. One big reason is greater professionalism among teachers. A lot has changed since I wrote a Texas Monthly article documenting the awful state of teacher education back in 1979, mostly for the better.

<snip>

Second heretical thought: Very little good can come from treating teachers like part-time cashiers at an underperforming Wal-Mart outlet.

<snip>

Third heretical thought: All educational Miracle Cures and panaceas are wrong, and many who push them are charlatans—starting with the ubiquitous Michelle Rhee. Schools get better when communities get richer, rarely the other way around. Remember when charter schools and vouchers were going to save the world? There’s no evidence they’ve out-performed public schools.


http://www.salon.com/2011/11/18/dont_believe_the_education_reformers/singleton/

More at the link.

[dtexdem]

1. Actually, public school education is not all that hot.

But 'leave no child untested' is a major culprit in the decline -- by encouraging 'teach to the test.'

[PETRUS]

2. Agreed.

There is plenty of room for improvement. But a very important task is to reduce inequality and poverty, and the way the "reformers" that the article refers to assign blame and the solutions they propose ignore this and provide misdirection in a number of other ways.

[mike_c]

3. I am an academic scientist with a doctorate in the life sciences...

...and every single moment of my education occurred in public schools. I work at a public university, where the overwhelming majority of my faculty colleages-- all of them also holding at least one doctoral degree, were also educated in public schools and universities.

What part do you think isn't "all that hot?" I'm from a generations deep working class family, the only member of my immediate family to go to college. Public schools created opportunities that I would NEVER have otherwise. And it's clear that they served me well, helping me to break out of the cycle of dead end, rubbing every dime raw jobs that characterized the first third or so of my adult life.

Not so hot? I beg to differ. Public schools ROCK!

[joeglow3]

5. So, if I can find one rich person who was poor, our economy ROCKS?

Anecdotal evidence is NOT a valid argument. I would expect an academic scientist with a doctorate to know better.

[mike_c]

6. then what do you attribute my education to if not the schools I attended...?

I'm not just ONE successful student. The majority of the well educated people in this country-- the OVERWHELMING majority-- received all or part of their education in public schools. That's an enviable record of success.

One can counter with the argument that an equally large proportion of those who fail in school also do so in public institutions, but so long as those same schools are also churning out students capable of great academic success then the question becomes at least partly one of whose responsibility those failures really are. And if one argues that public schools are not responsible for the individual academic successes of their students then it's equally true that they're not responsible for their failures.

But the real weakness of your metaphor is that I'm not one, lone academic success. MOST academic success stories include public schools.

[joeglow3]

7. So, you agree the economy ROCKS? Why the protesting, then

The vast majority of millionaires are first generation. We need to not look at the economy and figure out why people who aren't millionaires are to blame.

This is an apples to apples comparison to your point. Using your logic, our economy rocks and OWS needs to quit whining.

[mike_c]

9. for pete's sake, I said NOTHING of the sort-- are you not capable...

...of staying on topic or do you always conflate unrelated topics to draw unsupported conclusions? This conversation is about the opportunities public education provides poor, working, and middle class students to achieve their intellectual capacities. And unlike the capitalist rich, which are a terrible metaphor in this case, their educational achievements need not be at the expense of others.

Sheesh.

[joeglow3]

13. I'll try once more

Note: I am addressing your LOGIC. I am showing how the basis for your claim would be laughed out of any educational setting due to a complete lack of scientific proof. I am putting it into context that is even more, in your face, as we recognize it as the bullshit RW talking point it is. There will ALWAYS be someone who is more successful than the average (otherwise, we would ALL be in the middle). Given that the VAST majority of students in this country come from public schools, it is common sense that they would make up the largest percentage of individuals in every spot of the spectrum. In short, your analysis of this issue is flawed. Quite frankly, I would expect greater critical thinking from someone with a Doctorate:


“I'm not just ONE successful student.”

-There is not just ONE successful formerly poor person.


“The majority of the well educated people in this country-- the OVERWHELMING majority-- received all or part of their education in public schools.”
-The majority of millionaires-- the OVERWHELIMING majority-- were poor and are first generation millionaires.

“That's an enviable record of success.”
-That’s an enviable record of success


“One can counter with the argument that an equally large proportion of those who fail in school also do so in public institutions,”

-One can counter that this same economy churned out people who did not become millionaires.

“but so long as those same schools are also churning out students capable of great academic success then the question becomes at least partly one of whose responsibility those failures really are.”
-but so long as this same economy is churning out these self-made millionaires then the questions becomes at least partly one of whose responsibility those failures are.

“And if one argues that public schools are not responsible for the individual academic successes of their students then it's equally true that they're not responsible for their failures.”

-And if one does not give the economy credit for so many poor becoming self-made millionaires, they its equally true they’re not responsible for the failures.

“But the real weakness of your metaphor is that I'm not one, lone academic success. MOST academic success stories include public schools.”

-There is not a lone millionaire who was poor. MOST millionaires involve poor people making it rich.

[fascisthunter]

21. desperation will do that

[Sarah Ibarruri]

12. It hasn't been all that hot since Repukes stuck their filthy fingernails in it nt

[ClassWarrior]

28. Precisely.

NGU.

[joeglow3]

4. The numbers of teachers fired is what bothers me

First, I hate to see anyone lose their job. That said, we as humans are flawed and these flaws will be represented in all areas within a reasonable variance of the average. I look at my job, and you see 3-5% losing their job in a year due to lack of performance. My wife (a nurse) sees similar numbers. I can look at the numbers of Doctors, Lawyers, CPA's, etc. who lose their license every year in our state and it is probably around 1%. And yet, most school districts I look at fire WELL UNDER 1% of their workforce for poor performance. There are areas where they average 0.001% of their teachers being deemed poor performers.

To me, that is unacceptable. Not because I want to see people lose their job. Rather, because simple statistics tells us that there are many poor teachers who are able to keep their jobs AND they have the responsibility of educating my children.

[AdHocSolver]

35. Complaining about supposedly underperforming teachers is missing the point.

What society should be measuring AND eliminating is underperforming school principles, vice-principals, and department heads.

Teachers earn their credentials by attending Colleges of Education. If a school system has a large number of underperforming teachers, then we should penalize the colleges that gave those teachers their teaching certificates/diplomas.

I worked for many years in technical fields in electronics and computer software development, and, in a majority of cases, it was axiomatic that the people who managed the projects that I worked on were clueless about the technology and how to appropriately apply it.

It seemed that the higher up you went in the organization, whether in corporations or academia, the dumber the "leadership" became.

This also holds true in education. I saw this first hand as I earned a teaching diploma from a "major" college of education and worked as a teacher for a couple of years.

The bottom line is that the educational "system" uses a flawed design, a majority of the people who run education are essentially incompetent and in no position to judge anyone's performance, and teachers are being scapegoated for deficiencies over which they have little or no control.

[patrice]

8. A significant part of the problems is QUANTIFICATION exclusive of QUALIFICATION.

As you observe, "... efforts to quantify teacher performance are typically destructive ...", hence "measurements" are ALL about counting things and what things are counted are determined/defined also primarily by counting.

Not that counting is NECESSARILY bad (it IS useful) but when counting becomes the source and the object of the system, the system becomes circular, self-referential, bereft of authentic memes, other than numbers, meme-less.

What is needed is to honor the qualities of individual learning. There should be more than just counting; phenomena, individual and group, should be authentically described by means of their unique qualities and those qualities should be included not only in evaluations but also in assessments at equal weight with the numbers.

This is sometimes referred to as authentic assessment and it would probably need to be implemented by means of multi-media resources.

[patrice]

10. Also, no matter what schools do, they can, at best, only patch up the effects of dysfunctional famil

ies and the functionalities of families are significantly affected by BAD economies.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

11. Public education has been modified according to right wing and capitalist ideas - no wonder

it's messed up.

I can list here the things they've done to public education to turn it into the ideal corporate entity, and that doesn't work. Complicit in this, have been Democrats, Democrats who are NOT educators.

[SheilaT]

14. If the public schools were all as crappy

as claimed, then Harvard, Princeton, Yale, et al, would be filling their ranks with ONLY students from private schools.

What I have been most struck by in my years as a parent of children in school (and they attended both public and private schools) was how the very vast majority of teachers are dedicated to what they do and care a great deal about the children. Yeah, there are some crappy teachers out there and my kids had some of those, but there is NO profession filled only with the absolute best at that field. And teachers deserve to be supported. No one does a good job while being constantly criticized and threatened with firing. That's a sure-fire recipe for unhappy employees who only do the minimum to get by and who spend their time counting the hours until the work day ends or the months until they retire.

[MichiganVote]

16. +1000

[joeglow3]

18. You bring up my issue

"Yeah, there are some crappy teachers out there and my kids had some of those,"

Mine too. Statistically speaking, it is expected that there will be an average percentage of teachers that are bad (probably in the 2-4% range). This would make sense, as this would be close to what you see in just about any other profession (we are all human, after all) and explain why we all usually have an experience or 2 with a bad teacher.

"but there is NO profession filled only with the absolute best at that field."

-This I agree completely with. The problem is that in many school districts, you see well less than 1% of teachers being terminated for under performing. I have seen multiple school districts where that number is less that one tenth of a percent over a period of multiple years (meaning less than 1 in 1,000 teachers is deemed poor). Now, if these numbers would accurate, the odds of so many people having been exposed to a poor teacher would be essentially zero. I don't know why you find so many poor teachers still teaching, especially when you see so damn many qualified teachers being let go around the country. Unfortunately, this taints the entire profession and provides easy ammunition to use against all teachers.

[The Straight Story]

15. I could post all day about this (I work in the education field), but here is something that bothers

me.

Back in the 90's the dems proposed OBE (outcome based education) which was basically NCLB - and the republicans opposed it. Once bush got into office the roles reversed.

Both sides seem to be for it.

And as I said in another thread - teachers are seen as managers now and students as employees.

Teaching is not the same as running a 7/11.

[MichiganVote]

17. Managers in business are not evaluated nearly as harshly as teachers are now.

And none, I repeat, none of these new teacher "evaluation" methods relate to proven success strategies that help teachers or kids grow.

Let's get real. In an occupation dominated by caring dedicated females-the assholes are punishing them for belonging to a union. That is the only thing the turds who call themselves leaders care about.

[joeglow3]

19. And yet we school districts where 0.005% of teachers are fired for being bad.

The numbers of teachers being fired for being poor teachers seems to run contrary to that.

[MichiganVote]

23. True story

According to the new evaluation system in Michigan, teachers are on a point by point system that determines whether can/will be determined to be "highly effective".

So,at an elementary school IF a teacher does not directly point at the "highly motivational" saying that is posted on the wall in every classroom, including Kindergarten, and state that saying out loud to the students at the time an administrator comes into the classroom--they lose a point.

IF they are behind their desk at the time an administrator comes into the classroom--they lose a point.

IF they take more than 3 sick days--the state allotment--they lose a point.

Get the picture? All that is going to happen in Michigan is that valuable teachers will quit. That's it. NOTHING the Michigan state legislature has put into law is intended to help kids learn.

[joeglow3]

24. What is the answer?

We can both agree that is a bullshit method of evaluating teachers. What is the proper method? Clearly, the numbers losing their jobs for being bad are so low, we know for a fact that there are many bad teachers still in the classroom.

[MichiganVote]

27. Really? How would we know that? You and I agree that there is no decent eval. system.

How can anyone evaluate anyone with a lousy system?

No, we don't know for a fact that there are many bad teachers. We know for a fact that legislators and dept. of ed bureaucrats can't write decent evaluation procedures. That's really all that's been proven so far.

[joeglow3]

33. Simple statistics

Is your position that teachers, as a whole, are such a rare exception (all hundred thousand plus) that they have 1/100 the number of bad employees of every other profession?

[MichiganVote]

37. I know statistics. Statistics require data. Flawed data produces more flawed data.

The basis on which teacher performance is being measured is now intended to facilitate the failure of union membership.

This "hundred thousand plus" workforce consists primarily of females in a profession which by necessity demands nurturing and compassion with our society's youngest members.

I believe that on the basis of those qualities, there are few women (or men) who cannot demonstrate that ability. But the reality today, is that teachers, mostly women, are being judged on whether they can point to some stupid motivational saying and THAT determines whether they are "highly effective."

Frankly, I think students should be asked what they want in a teacher. I guarantee you they won't care whether Mrs. Smith belongs to a union.

[joeglow3]

39. I think teachers do a bit more than demonstrate nuturing and compassion

I can look back at my childhood and clearly remember which were bad and good. I have 2 kids in school and, fortunately, all 5 teachers they have had have been great. I am dreading my 3rd grader going into 4th grade, as it is common knowledge 2 of the 3 4th grade teachers are shit. A coworker of mine had such problems with one last year, that he spent over $2,000 on a tutor. This tutor sat in the class on multiple occasions, was shocked with the way the teacher behaved, sat down with the teacher and principal and constructively explained how to be more effective and NOTHING changed. Sadly, this is FAR from the first issue with this teacher. We know 2 separate parents who pulled their kids out mid year and home-schooled for half a year. Yet, both of these teachers still have jobs.

I disagree with the notion that teachers are the one profession with 99.99% perfection in hiring quality employees.

[AdHocSolver]

36. The solution is to redesign education in this country. The entire system produces failure.

Schools are currently designed to operate like factory assembly lines. People don't learn anything useful in such an environment. Students are considered passive vessels into which knowledge is poured.

Real learning takes place when the goal is problem solving. The teacher-student relationship should be one of master-apprentice, the teacher transferring skills to the student motivated to learn them.

[proud2BlibKansan]

31. So you are judging a profession based on how many FAIL?

Are you serious?

[joeglow3]

34. We seem to do that regarding our economy.

[proud2BlibKansan]

30. In Florida under the new merit pay system,

teachers are being not only evaluated but also PAID based on student test scores in subjects they don't teach. The Math teacher doesn't get a raise unless Reading scores increase. Or the P.E. teacher. Or the Spanish teacher, etc, etc. . .

[MichiganVote]

38. Yup. Ditto x2 in Michigan. Again, its another way to bash female professionals.

[fascisthunter]

20. but a DUer told me to

yet so many honest DUers told me different, and then I personally researched to find out education reformers were frauds too.

[proud2BlibKansan]

22. Follow the $$$$$$

In order to profit from education, the reformers must prove our schools NEED reform. If that means lying to achieve their goal, they will lie. So they do.

The truth is our schools have consistently improved over time. Graduation rates have gone up, dropout rates have gone down and test scores have improved. When we compare kids in other countries to their peers here, (which is a fair comparison since those other countries we are always being compared to don't test ALL their kids), our kids outperform the others. So in reality, we're number one instead of number 37.

But we certainly can't let facts get in the way of profit.

[Sabriel]

25. Keep in mind that the reformers are non-teachers from business

I'm an educator, and so I wouldn't presume to enter a hospital and tell them how to manage care, improve services, make patients healthier, etc.

Yet it's perfectly fine for gazillionaires--who have neither taught nor attended a public school--to tell public schools how to improve themselves and/or better serve their "customers."

Meaningful reform happens from within, led by a self-motivated group of dedicated people...teachers and administrators alike.

Head over to the Education forum and read the thread with the Smithsonian article about why Finnish schools succeed. It's not about a homogeneous population; it's about the value placed on teachers and education and the philosophy that schools will do whatever it takes to help a single child achieve. If we want to do that, we'll have to change the culture of the US.

I'm not optimistic.

[PETRUS]

26. Yes.

As I understand it, charter schools were initially an idea that came from teachers and were supported by the unions. But then came the for-profit EMOs...

[Gabi Hayes]

32. you understand exactly correctly. and about 20 percent of all charter schools today

are run by for-profit entities, under various guises

when it all started there were ZERO such schools

quite the trend....

[Starry Messenger]

29. k&r

"education reform" is hedge fund astroturf. All efforts to reduce the pay and rights of a labor force only mean one thing--profits for corporations.