Classes will be "stacked" so that some teachers will have much more difficult kids than others. This is being done now, without this rating system, so after it comes into being, it will be worse.
This whole concept of blaming the teacher is insane. I feel sorry for the young people entering the profession.
Worse still, is it my fault when kids refuse to do homework, refuse to study- essentially refuse to take any sort of responsibility for learning? Teaching IS NOT a business, and we can't cut our losses and cut our "clients" loose when they are no longer "profitable".
Many of the new teachers don't have the love and desire for teaching that will make them stick around the system for the long haul- not in the climate that Bloomkleingarten have created.
This development is the next step in the privatization of education. If the profiteers and the libertarians have their way, more and more teachers will be denied tenure, based on the 'grade' they are given through standardized test score analysis. Then, those teachers will be, yes, rehired, but as independent contractors. They, however, will not be allowed to get those jobs themselves. Rather, a Blackwater will arise to ensure 'quality' teacher, i.e., take a piece of the action from the recruits. This new workforce will be hire-able and fire-able without cause, just like the Blackwater guards. And, while these teachers may indeed make a bit more money, they will be serving in the toughest, most dysfunctional districts. With firing without cause permissible, those teachers who rock the boat by questioning the methods, ethics, or pedagogical procedures of the recruiters or the supervisors will be let go. The result will be the most hard-to-staff district will not only stay that way, but also have a more rapid turn-over. Meanwhile, someone's company will be making a killing. At least until someone realizes that no one's accountable for privatized staff.
I would not be ticked off if these tests and NYS standards were sound, but they aren't. We need to make it known in an intelligent, clear way that the quality of these tests is not sound. For example when the same 5th grade child is given 5th grade tests from different years on consecutive days, the students will likely receive different test scores on the same test. The NY Daily News did this with a group of students and reported these results.
I -- like you NYCEducator am not afraid of data. I know I work hard/smart with my students, so my kids will do well by any reasonable measure. But b/c I am not a fool, I will not allow these poorly designed assessments to be used to define me.
What will more than likely happen is that more teachers will be pressured to mark the tests and their classes very leniently to push the kids along. Teachers will be told that a certain percentage must pass or else.
Ironically, what is being created is more social promotion. It's social promotion through fear and intimidation of teachers.
As a fairly new teacher, one who realizes how much more money her non-teacher friends make in this very expensive city, this type of 'evaluation' is one more reason to consider a new career before I've invested too much time in the system. I LOVE my job, but it is becoming more and more difficult to stomach the idea of more than a few more years of this kind of stuff.
Our principal has made it very clear to all of our important teachers (math/ELA) that we are participating in this and that they must improve all student scores. All but 3 of these teachers are currently Teaching Fellows. I'm not smelling success
The article said the union knew about this for months but kept it secret from the members. Instead of blasting this outrage all over the place and leading opposition to it, the union kept quiet. Typical. No matter what the leadership says, I believe they really don't think this is a bad thing. What else explains total lack of interest in putting up a fight?
They say they will fight it if it happens and teachers are hounded based on test scores. For the untenured, they can say anything since they have no real protections anyway.
For the tenured, what will go in is the principal will use the data to secretly target teachers and get them on other grounds that fit into the very loose structure of the contract. The union will know full well what is going on but be unwilling to fight it.
Wow...What happened to our union leadership keeping a checks and balances position towards "mayoral control"? This all gets sadder and sadder everyday.
I would like to draw your attention to this section of the article,
"The city’s pilot program uses a statistical analysis to measure students’ previous-year test scores, their numbers of absences and whether they receive special education services or free lunch, as well as class size, among other factors.
Based on all those factors, that analysis then sets a “predicted gain” for a teacher’s class, which is measured against students’ actual gains to determine how much a teacher has contributed to students’ growth. "
Is this a tacit admission by the city that class size and socio-economic factors do matter. At the end of the year the city should have data that could show that students in bigger classes do better or worse than their peers in smaller, other things being equal. What is the city prepared to do with that data? I have my answer -- probably nothing.
How do we fight to make the raw data publicly available?
its destiny. something like this was bound to happen sooner or later because of the transparent dissection of what public education is supposed to be. how can we stop it?
I realize I can only speak for myself, but as a young teacher, it makes me want to get the hell out of the profession. At least in NYC.
I am not shocked by this or by the UFT's non-response. I have always said that Randi has done more to destroy our union. And it's only because of her close ties to Hillary that she is getting the big promotion.
I don't know if my school is part of the program, but my principal always gets the interim test scores we give every few months. Sometimes, like in math, those scores fall because we haven't gotten around to covering the subjects. In fifth grade, we forgo the curriculum and teach graphing and data early on since it is also a part of the Social Studies Assessments. So when our kids get tested the first quarter, they fall behind.
Here we are trying to kill 2 birds with one stone and can still get penalized. Why doesn't the city and state work together across the curriculums and get them aligned for these tests? For instance, I make sure to teach Poetry before the ELA even though it's supposed to be taught in the Spring. It can't work that way. If you are going to test it, then we have to teach to the test.
I agree with Pissed Off's. Principals can use this to their advantage. Usually teachers did the reorganization, but my principal took that away a few years ago. Now she has already stacked classes with more of the better students going to "her favorites".
I also have to wonder what the DoE has in store for teachers who are either clusters, ATRs or teach subjects that do not require testing. It can't be good.
This is just one more symptom signaling the death of public education in New York City. It's been murdered by KleinBloomGarten and the stranglehold privatization now has on what was once a dysfunctional, now broken, system.
I meant to add to my above comment that this newest slap in the face of New York City teachers is the most heinous thing ever done to "evaluate" teachers. This will lead to the stacking of classes and teachers will be at one another's throats. Thanks Randi, you disgusting collaborationist. You have made union history, but will go down as the worst most corrupt teachers' union leader ever. Congratulations. I gave up raises and and a better salary all those years to have this, plus a virtual loss of basic seniority rights via the "ATR" program.
I have two words to say:
RECALL RANDI!!!
We need to get that loser and her sycophantic minions out of the UFT. We all know that Bloomberg and Klein want to destroy public education. What is so pathetic is how complacent and collaborative (isn't that a word that the UFT and the UFT Teacher Center love???)Randi Weingarten is about the destruction of education, teacher careers and above all, our union.
Remember, in the article it says that Randi has "grave reservations over the project." IN OTHER WORDS, she is not adamently against it. She is just rather annoyed and will make some pathetic speech and then wish it all away and then declare some pathetic victory.
Yeah, Randi--we know your game...you flap your gums but there is no action on your part...just empty, hollow words. Need proof--look at the ATR situation and look at Edwize where you don't allow free speech.
Randi is a weak leader and a weak person. She couldn't even come out of the closet publicly for decades although everybody knew...it's okay she's gay, but she was as disingenuous about her sexuality as she is about how she runs the union. She needs to resign or be forced out. She and Unity are even more disgusting than Joel Klein and Michael Bloomberg.
Let's see. The principals stack the most difficult children to teachers they don't like. Then, using the grading system and the DOE "gotcha squad", they charge the teacher with incompetence.
The "rubber rooms" keep on filling up and the DOE has met their goal of getting rid of older, experienced teachers.
Randi and her lackey, Leo just keep on dancing with Kleinberg as the teachers suffer.
I wouldn't necessarily fear principals stacking the "bad" kids in in their least favored teachers classes. The DOE data analysis is going to account for a students academic history "The city’s pilot program uses a statistical analysis to measure students’ previous-year test scores, their numbers of absences and whether they receive special education services or free lunch, as well as class size, among other factors."
I would fear the arbitrary nature of the tests that are used. That is where one of the holes in the DOE's plan is.
There is nothing wrong with data. Let's just make sure the DOE uses accurate data.
i feel like i've been beaten to a pulp, i'm on the floor screaming for help, and the DOE comes in and kicks me in the shins with this. this is indeed another good reason to leave the system or country. or maybe if we get angry enough and actually do some real civil disobedience.
What would happen if we all got together and, say, refused to administer the periodic assessments? Or, hell, the "real" ELA or math exam?
I have to prep my 8th graders for the social studies exam in June. I'm not a certified social studies teacher. My kids haven't had a certified social studies teacher all through their middle school years. But that doesn't make a difference, and it will be all MY fault if they don't get all 3s and 4s. Right?
Blaming Randi will get nowhere. She is executing policy that the UFT/Unity has supported for a long-time -- read the Kahlenberg book on Shanker to see the connections.
Her replacement will follow through on the same policies and if Shanker/Sandy had picked someone else they would have done pretty much the same.
Randi has exhibited great skill and strong leadership in doing what she has to do to control the membership. She even bought out an entire opposition, something even Shanker would never have done.
She is not weak but a strong advocate for the very policies that have screwed teachers. But her skill is in obfuscating and confusing the membership.
If you view her and Unity as being on the other side - a 5th column, a modern Vichy - her skills become very clear.
Yo Miss, you couldn't do that and get away with it. You could be brought up on charges of insubordination if you refused to administer periodic assessments. It's ashame that a young, energetic, idealistic involved educator like you is being driven into a state of such discouragement as to think of not continuing in teaching. New York City is a bubble of fascist corporate management of a school system. It's not that way everywhere, believe me. I'd encourage you to take your talent elsewhere. Contemplating a career as a New York City school teacher is an exercise in futility.
Funny how I just wrote a letter to the editor using the same word "stacked" that PissedOff, Schoolgal and somene else used above, and I just paraphrased it a moment ago on the ICE blog, after reading their article on the same subject.
1. Standardized tests are given in only some subjects and not in others - like phys ed, the electives. Not fair from the get-go, and already against Art 22.A, which deals with "inequitable application" of the provisions of the contract. It's inequitable when you rate some teachers by one assessment method and others by an alternative method.
2. Nothing prevents principals from putting the fix on the teachers they don't want by stacking their classes with the more difficult kids and the poorer learners.
The DOE is setting up a system that is contemptibly open to real abuse. I don't even know how it can stand up in law.
It's also not clear who in the administrative hierarchy will be reviewing the data spew and calling the shots on tenure and termination -- the principal or someone higher up. A teacher's fate may be decided by someone he's never even met.
What happened to my comment?
I would not worry about principals stacking classes with struggling kids. DOE is going to say it will account for where the kids started because this new system uses longitudinal data rather than focusing on snapshots. Focusing on principals stacking kids as our main line of defense gets us no where. That line of argument is offensive -- especially to parents. Kids aren't bad -- this system is.
The flaw in this plan are the assessments that are being used. These assessments were not designed as tools for rating teachers. The assessments barely do the job assessing children. The assessments are hugely inconsistent from year to year. To base a whole new teacher rating system on faulty data is like building a mansion on a shoddy foundation.
Let's not kid ourselves. The DoE knows perfectly well how flawed this plan is. They may be short-sighted, but they're not dumb. Moreover, though they may pretend they learned nothing from the School Progress Report fiasco, they are likely reeling from the backlash.
No, there must be a hidden agenda here. How else to explain such a misguided, destructive, and offensive plan, not to mention the secrecy around it?
Do we have a legal right to know what's going on? If so, we need to demand the information. If not, we still have a good chance of learning more, anyway. With a plan as "contentious" as this, something will leak. Some principal with a conscience will get fed up and talk.
I agree with Geoff that this news is like a kick in the shins. However, I don't think it's cause for leaving the profession. Look around: this "show results or else" mentality is everywhere. I'm reading a fascinating book by Luc Ferry called What Is the Good Life? It discusses, from a philosophical perspective, how the "cult of performance" has taken priority over search for meaning and transcendence. The "good life" today is all about measurable success--but it was not always that way, nor does it have to be that way forever.
Rhoda,
This appears to be your comment:
http://www.haloscan.com/comments...?
src=hsr#243646
If you made any others, I don't know what happened to them.
EZ - a. No one said kids are "bad." Some kids don't (or won't) learn as quickly or as well as others. Other kids act badly in the classroom, hurting their own performance and everyone else's around them.
Use a parallel, if you need to, in the gym class. Extremely obese kids just can't run or jump or play sports as well for reasons of their own make-up. Their lack of success in phys ed is specifically and in reality theirs, not really the teacher's -- at least not enough the teacher's fault to make a tenure or termination decision on.
We are ALWAYS being assessed, that's for sure. It's using these tests - when you can't control the variables and when there is a possibility of assessing people on specifically unequal terms -- that's where the danger is.
Ms. Tsouris--I know you're right about the insubordination, but man, it's exciting to think of hundreds of teachers in an organized civil disobedience against the assessment obsession... 
This is exactly what they want to do - create fear in all of us. For us the qustion has to be how do we fight this? This isn't about anyone individual (i.e., Randi) this is about us. If we buy into their demonizing of public education then we let them win. It comes back to us and mobilizing and pushing back. I want to know what my colleagues in my school are going to do about it. I know I'm going to start fighting.
This is exactly what they want to do - create fear in all of us. For us the qustion has to be how do we fight this? This isn't about anyone individual (i.e., Randi) this is about us. If we buy into their demonizing of public education then we let them win. It comes back to us and mobilizing and pushing back. I want to know what my colleagues in my school are going to do about it. I know I'm going to start fighting.
NYC Educator,
I made another comment on here and said that I didn't mean to be so harsh about Randi, but felt that she shouldn't be asleep at the wheel all the time when such evildoers are in charge of the DOE....
I posted it but then haloscan went blank...and then I tried to post something so I posted what happened to my comment and didn't see that either....
I don't know what happened...but apologize for any confustion I caused.
Great blog! I appreciate your hard work and dedication so much.
After Weingarten came out with her own grading system, I decided to do one of my own and blogged it last night at Under Assault. It's based on terror levels, Severe to Low.
"I see it this way. When the staff lives in fear, they can’t do a good job. Simple as that. . . ."
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