Priority schools are a natural focus of attention for NEA student members, and Tommie Leaders wants to make sure the word gets out.
Leaders is the 2010-2012 Chairperson and he says extending the student program’s famous community outreach events into priority schools could help galvanize and grow student membership while helping pull the program out of a current media shadow.
Tommie Leaders, NEA Student Program Chair
“We’re trying to make what we’re doing better known. There’s a lot of press with Teach for America and other programs like that. We’re kind of sitting in the background right now,” says Leaders, a student at the University of Nebraska at Omaha majoring in elementary education with endorsements in math, language arts, and social sciences.
“Whether it’s through YouTube or , social networking or other media sources, we need to show our work with these schools. We need to take this work to heart and make it our own,” said Leaders. read more »
The National Education Association hosted a National Summit on Family, School, and Community Engagement last week in Alexandria, Va where educators, education leaders, parents, family and community activists, business leaders and representatives of the faith community met for two days of small group and panel discussions.
Participants shared success stories and discussed the challenges faced with strengthening the bonds between families, communities and their public schools. Parents work hard and don’t have much time to visit their childrens’ classrooms. Sometimes there are language barriers between educators and families. Legislators don’t prioritize family and community involvement as highly as they should. Some educators could use more training in reaching out to parents. In other cases, the education system has changed so much since the parents were in school, they simply don’t understand it anymore. read more »
Negotiations continue in Seattle between the and the school district. Negotiations continue today (Thursday) according to a post last night:
“Much progress has been made at the negotiation table this week. As you know, Monday was added this week and the teams met for a half of a day. Both Tuesday and Wednesday, the teams met for full days and intense discussions.
“The teams will again meet on Thursday for another full day that may even extend into the evening. There has even been talk of adding more days if tomorrow does not provide enough time.”
The following from SEA’s website explains the situation and the details the historic change already negotiated by Seattle educators. Click the link below for a video on the situation in the school district.
For the past two years, Seattle educators have worked hand in hand with top district administrators to create a new model for growth and evaluation that focuses on helping Seattle’s students succeed. Now our superintendent is attempting a last-minute end-run around that collaborative process by demanding that teacher evaluations be tied to student test scores. So what’s in the Professional Growth and Evaluation plan (PG&E) that was developed jointly by SEA and the district? Why is it a historic change, how does it benefit students and help close the achievement gap?
It makes student progress the foundation of teachers’ professional growth
All certificated teachers will set annual student achievement goals which are specific and measurable.
Using the Professional Practice Standards as a guide, teachers will set professional growth goals to help obtain student achievement goals.
Recognizes clearly that “Student growth data shall be relevant to the teacher and subject matter, and must be based on multiple measures that may include classroom based, district based, and state based assessments as well as, attendance, discipline data, mobility and completion (course or year) rates of students. Student growth means the change in student achievement between two points in time.”
The joint PG&E plan focuses on student achievement goals AND linking Professional goals that enhance our professional teaching practice. SERVE sets student achievement goals without accountability for enhancing professional practice.
It helps take the guesswork and bias out of educators’ evaluations
Uses clear standards based on four domains from the research of Charlotte Danielson that have been tried and tested in other districts where improvement has been documented. The four domains are: Planning and Preparation, Classroom Environment, Instructional Skill and Professional Responsibility
Sets clear indicators of acceptable performance based on standards within each domain.
Culturally relevant practices are integrated in all four domains.
Establishes a four-level rating system: Innovative, Proficient, Basic and Unsatisfactory.
It increases the level of accountability for educators with a focus on great teachers in every classroom
For newer educators, it increases the number of required observations and conferences by administrators.
Requires any teachers not in the top two levels in any domain – Proficient or Innovative – to be on a Plan of Support.
Improvement plans are clearly defined for administrators and educators.
Establishes a support system in the form of Human Resource Consulting Teachers to assist educators who are on Performance Improvement Plans.
Maintains probationary process for either improvement or dismissal for those deemed Unsatisfactory in any of the four domains.
PG & E would be phased in beginning this year to replace the current evaluation system while ensuring that it is implemented with fidelity. It would be fully implemented by 2013-2014.
All teachers will participate in collaborative groups called Professional Learning Communities (PLC’s).
Enhances collaborative work amongst educators focused on the academic achievement of students with an emphasis on culturally relevant practice.
It uses student test data for teacher growth, not punishment
Educators are professionals and believe in accountability. The joint plan negotiated with the district mirrors the state’s goals to use test data correctly to improve teaching, and it has the support of Seattle’s educators.
The big difference? The state plan means teachers will be evaluated on their ability to use the student data to modify their instruction (which happens every day in the classroom) and, unlike SERVE, would not misuse student assessment results to deem teachers “good or bad.”
In addition to test data, SERVE would also rely on student surveys at the high school level. This ignores that some students may lack the sophistication to provide detailed qualitative feedback on instructional techniques. For instance, is a teacher “mean” or does that teacher simply set high standards and hold students accountable? In an era of instant communications, students could easily organize a negative evaluation for even great teachers whom they simply don’t like. The likely outcome of SERVE is skewed data that would not be reliable for high-stakes personnel decisions.
Recent reporting in the linking standardized test scores to individual teachers and threatening to label thousands of teachers by name as “effective or “ineffective” based on the scores, has ignited debate far and wide. NEA President ’s letter to the editor in , called the paper’s plan “irresponsible” and “misleading.” A former high school math teacher, Van Roekel said the value-added approach to measuring effectiveness is “famously inconsistent. In one case, 30% of math teachers who ranked in the bottom quintile one year were above the median the following year.”
Cynthia McCabe’s excellent reporting on the controversy at found a wide range of critics across the spectrum. A little closer to the ground in LA, the held their Leadership Conference over the weekend. While presenting information about , we had a chance to catch up with a UTLA member who provided real 101 on the controversy and the issue beyond.
Alex Caputo-Pearl is Lead Teacher at the Social Justice and the Law Academy at in West LA and here’s what he had to say about the LA Times, about measuring teacher effectiveness and more importantly, about using evaluations to make a real difference in students’ lives:
“In a nutshell, the Los Angeles Times is an institution in the city of Los Angeles that has typically and historically been anti union, using a tool, this value added measure, which uses standardized tests in a high-stakes way to say whether a teacher is quote, unquote effective or quote, unquote ineffective. The problem with it is that we know standardized tests are one important thing to look at in student development, in teacher formative assessment; they can’t be used in a high-stakes way with kids or teachers. Every study that’s been done on that says that you can’t just rely on that single measure because it’s not reliable and it’s not even made for that purpose.
“What we’re trying to do at UTLA – we have a teacher effectiveness group that’s been working since this spring. We are trying to come out with policy for the UTLA House of Representatives to adopt in the Fall and then move into a plan and political strategy. What we want to do is take a proactive approach to this issue and we take the best of what’s out there in terms of Linda Darling Hammond’s work up at Stanford, Diane Ravitch’s work, work that we have here in LA like the Institute for Standards, Curriculum and Assessments; take the best elements at work and propose a real plan for teacher support, development and evaluation. And we’ve got some real allies in that fight – we’ve got West Ed working with us. It’s not an issue of us not wanting to put something out there; it’s going to happen. It’s complicated to put that together; it’s a complicated issue.
“The way the Los Angeles Times spins it and the way that some of the most anti-union board members spin it is that this issue is only about teachers who need to be dismissed, the so-called ‘bad teachers.’ One of the things we have to do is reframe it and say that’s actually not true at all; this is an issue about the 10 percent 15 percent, 20 percent of teachers who are exemplary and how they can help others; the few on the bottom end who are right now ineffective but need support and then the huge number in the middle. The real question for teachers and for kids is ‘how do we move the mediocre teacher to a place where they’re good? How do we move the good teachers to a place where they’re very good?’ – those are things that will make a difference. It’s not going to be dismissing 200 teachers out of a system of 45,000 – so we’re trying to take a comprehensive view and really talk about what kind of formative evaluation for a teacher over time supports their development and what kind of ultimately summative evaluation do we need to put in place where in fact you can dismiss teachers if they haven’t responded to support.”
Last week, Talk Priority Schools reported on a that exposed the shaky qualifications of some firms marketing themselves as school “turnaround specialists.” Some of these companies have practically sprung up overnight, as they try to get a share of billions in federal being awarded to some of America’s lowest-performing schools.
Now, Rep. George Miller (D-CA), chair of the House Education and Labor Committee, has announced that he intends to hold hearings to review companies that contract with school districts to help improve schools. , Miller said that ”it seems some companies with little or no expertise in education are purporting to be experts in school turnaround to try and take advantage of available federal money.”
Critics of the federal School Improvement Grants process have long argued that many schools desperately in need of additional support will not receive a dime. There will be a culture of winners and losers — and as the SIG process rolls forward, the schools on the losing end are unsure how to proceed.
As part of the , priority schools from throughout the country crafted plans to institute reforms such as firing half their staffs, lengthening the school day or year, and adding professional development and other instructional supports.
But what happens to those best-laid plans when schools find out they won’t receive any SIG funding?
WANTED: School turnaround specialist to boost achievement at struggling school with history of academic, social problems. Will be responsible for guiding major personnel and instructional decisions. NO PREVIOUS EXPERIENCE REQUIRED!
Doesn’t exactly inspire confidence, does it? But , the opportunity to tap into federal dollars through the School Improvement Grants process has turned many individuals and organizations with little or no experience into overnight school turnaround specialists.
Should cafeteria workers be held responsible when students fail to meet academic standards? Believe it or not, that is exactly what is happening in several Chicago schools, were dozens of cafeteria workers are being fired by schools implementing the “turnaround” model as part of the .
Schools receiving SIG funds must choose between one of . The turnaround model requires the firing of half the staff, and several Chicago schools have put cafeteria workers on that list, .
The cafeteria workers say they have received excellent evaluations and are good at their jobs — so why , as food servers, are they being held responsible for their schools’ academic performance?
But it’s happening, and many of these workers are likely headed to the unemployment line. To read the full story, click .
If politically popular education “reforms” are so effective, why are they only being implemented in lower-income communities – predominantly communities of color?
That was the question that ran through a framework for improving education released by leading civil rights groups this week. Titled , the framework was drafted and signed by seven leading civil rights groups, including the (NAACP), the and the .
“For far too long, communities of color have been testing grounds for unproven methods of educational change,” the report says, arguing that reforms advocated by federal and state governments should have to meet an evidence threshold before being foisted upon schools.
Over on the Priority Schools Campaign website (), teachers and education support professionals are invited to from around the country. Jennifer Little in Somerset, NJ writes:
“, a Model School of Excellence for the Arts has struggled to bring those same results to the academics. However, we have made AYP for the past 3 years and have been building a program that integrates arts with academics to engage more students, diversify teaching styles and reach at risk students. Our critically acclaimed yearly docudrama brings social studies, civil studies, theatre, video and dance together in a moving, engaging and demanding piece of theatre for social change which inspires our students to reflect not just on history but on their role in their community both within the school and within the community. One student last year said, “We live in a fishbowl in a big ocean. We have to look outside and see what the rest of the world is doing. Get involved with others outside our lives.”
