Reading about school change for 4/4

My response is yes, but how? This question has become a very debatable issue as every latest school reforms around the country are centered on the students’ performance. How to evaluate student performance? I strongly agree with “By evaluating the progress of each individual student in their classrooms against that student’s own progress in earlier school years.  ….. takes into account …learning disabilities...” (CQ Researcher p.388) is a fair way to judge teachers’ success, according to Ms. Marcia Clemmitt. Then, should we use the mandated standard achievement tests to evaluate students’ performance? I would say no. I think we need to consider Finnish’s approach on their student assessments. We need to develop new ways to evaluate our students’ performance. Classroom teachers should have their independence, under their own school review, on their student assessment. The current standard achievement tests are very detrimental to our education system. Look at what happened this week, 35 administrators and teachers from Atlantic School District have been charged with fraud on their students’ test scores. The superintendent was awarded as “The Year of Superintendent” and the involved teachers were awarded with bonus. Parents are complaining about their children are actually three grades behind their current grades. So I think we need to come up with an adapted Finland student assessment soon.  

"It takes two years, $200,000 and 15 percent of the principal's total time to get one bad teacher out of the classroom."- Terry M. Moe, Hoover Institute (CQ Researcher)

This statement is truly startling.  Obviously we don't have a legitimate method for assessing teacher effectiveness currently across our US education system, but as students and future teachers most of us have had experiences with teachers who are ineffective, and not meeting their responsibility to students.  Whether this issue is a fault created by the unions or not, it seems detrimental to teachers, students, and school districts. 

This type of termination system allows for teachers (unless they're removed from the classroom--but continue to be paid!!) to continue to teach during this time.  This means two years worth of students are not receiving the education that they are entitled to.  It also can be argued that bad teachers cause a bad reputation for teachers as a whole.  This has been reflected in the media in recent years causing teachers to be blamed for failures within our school system.  While I believe that teachers do play an integral role in student achievement, and therefore, should be held to high standards, teachers that are not fulfilling their responsibilities are causing even more disrespect for the teaching profession than already previously existed.  In addition to students and teachers, school districts are also being hindered by an inability to fire ineffective teachers.  During this time period most of these teachers are still getting paid, while remaining ineffective in their classrooms, or continuing to get paid even after they've been removed from the classroom. This means that school districts are still paying full salaries for teachers who are not meeting expectations.  This is expensive and a waste of money, especially during a time when so many programs within education are getting cut. In addition, the teachers' poor teaching is reflected in low student performance, which is not only detrimental to students, but to the standards that schools and districts are held to as well.   

In an argument for practicality I think we should think more about how other professions hiring/firing processes work.  Obviously, each profession is different and we cannot expect (or want) to directly implement their processes onto the teaching profession, but I think it would be beneficial to recognize how other professions are held to certain standards, and to learn how those who do not meet those standards are dealt with (whether they are retrained, put on probation, or fired, etc.).  I, myself feel that I do not have a solution as to how our ineffective teachers should be dealt with, especially because as was mentioned in the CQ Researcher article, we do not currently have an effective way to assess teacher effectiveness. But I do believe that this practice of Principal's fighting for two years to potentially (they may not be successful) fire teachers who are thought to be ineffective is something we should all think more about.  Who is benefitting from this system? Who is being hurt by this system?  And is it possible to fix this process before we've developed a more effective teacher assessment strategy?

I have mentioned this before, but the readings for this week really support the idea that despite the immovable structures that confine schools (e.g. NCLB, standardized testing), in order to change any aspect of a school, teachers and principals have to model the way. Both Travers and Richman pointed out that shared leadership is one of the most important elements in school change. It also creates a sense of unity in the school and among the faculty. (Sahlberg pointed out the importance of achieving unity too.) After all, if schools are trying to tackle big systems and policies like NCLB, sending one principal or teacher out into the battlefield will be futile. After reading these texts, I’ve come to see school change as a strategy game, but one that has really high stakes.

Since it involves a lot of strategizing, teachers and leaders have to figure out how to make the resistance work to their advantage. For example, in Baker (the school) “test prep was embedded in authentic classroom instruction to develop writing, problem solving and higher order thinking skills. It was an integral part of lessons rather than narrowly focused on skills needed to do well on the test” (18). Also, on p. 19, it says that students assess/rate each other’s work, which helps “engage students as agents in their own learning.”

 If we think of the exams and NCLB as stepping stones that can help us reach our bigger goals, then maybe we can begin to accomplish both what the state/district demands and our own vision of education (i.e. more creative learning and teaching). Of course this is hard to do and we can see that the principal and the faculty at Baker worked really hard to achieve a balance. This is why even figuring out how to work within these structures requires a lot of creativity, which is actually the topic of our group teaching for next week.  

I’ll end with a quote from the principal: “If you want people to appreciate the work you do, unfortunately, you’ve got to hit the mark…if this school hits the mark this year, somebody’s going to look a little more seriously at what we’re doing” (25). From the information that we received in this research, I think they’re doing a good job modeling the way.

In the CQ article: "'Critics focus too much on proposals for firing unsuccessful teachers while ignoring plans to use...public recognition to reward teachers whose students improve,' [Broad Foundation director] McGinity says."

My initial reaction was that this was a ridiculous point; what kind of teacher works hard so that they will be recognized in the city newspaper? Certainly not the teachers in successful schools in Finland, and certainly not the teachers I know and respect. It should not come as a surprise that I am opposed to business-style competition as a model for improving schools, or anything for that matter. But in the Cook and Travers pieces I was reminded that there is a different type of validation.

In the Cook article; the use of consensus was cited as a reason for success within the Julia Richman Education Complex. While slow and sometimes difficult (like many of the best educational reforms- maybe all?) consensus is a process which can validate the thinking of all participants who approach it in good faith.

In contrast, the Travers demonstrated the frustration that educators feel when their work is not validated. The Baker school distrcit was implimenting reforms and strategies which were having a positive impact, but the impact was not validated by the district or the state testing.  "Baker was one of the schools [that would have made AYP under PVAAS], a significant achievement for the school, because it validated the school's commitment to support the learning of all students." To be sure, this would have been less significant had the district not been also threatening punitive action against the school. But validation not related to official AYP calculations were still important: "Baker was one of the schools [that would have made AYP under PVAAS], a significant achievement for the school, because it validated the school's commitment to support the learning of all students." (29) On an individual level, teachers expressed that it was important to them to get feedback from the principal and teacher-leaders. On a personal level, although I certainly would not teach or recognition or be more likely to become a great teacher with the promise of my name in the paper, having my thoughts and work validated by professors and collegues is important to me.

Maybe educators do need to feel validated, just not as the high-stakes accountability advocates mean it. A collaborative rather than competitive validation.

Reading Travers’ article about how Baker continually failed to make AYP really made me question what are standardized tests measuring and how are they being designed.  Baker sounded like a really great school: my main criticisms of the article were that we didn’t actually get any real time in class observations (they may have great philosophy but struggle to implement it) and the issue of attendance was brought up a few times and stuck out to me (if kids aren’t in school, how are they expected to learn?).  But besides that, I was really on board with the way the Travers described the schools, especially the concern for every child’s education, it’s connection to the Coalition of Essential Schools, and what seemed to be very regular opportunities for teacher development and meetings.  It was really sad to see how the pressures of testing negatively impacted the things I thought were so great about the school.  For example, instead of focusing on every child, the principal felt pressure to “think more strategically” and instruct teachers to do things like select the “chosen ten” and essentially track the students based on test scores.  I also was sad to read that the school does less project based tasks, because although I understand these projects are time consuming, I think they teach important skills like critical thinking and the ability to work as a team.

As I read the article and was for the most part impressed with Baker school, I kept wondering, “Why aren’t they passing the tests?”  Rather than blame the school and the students though, I question how these tests are being designed.  What are they asking for? Yes, I agree that having standards is necessary to an extend: all students need to be able to read for instance.  But how does one go about testing that? And how can we be relying so heavily on test results if the tests might be faulty?