Who Will Be Left?

An excellent quote from a post over at Bridging Differences:

If we drive out those who are motivated by social norms, who will teach? How can we hope to have a stable education profession if we lose those who want to make education their career knowing full well that they will never get rich?

Read the whole thing.

Fury

I get a news alert daily that rounds up stories for me that mention Arne Duncan. I get preemptively irritated upon seeing it arrive in my mailbox. And for good reason.

Ugh.

For a guy who's spent, well, zero time as a student in a teacher ed program and zero time as a teacher - the amount of teacher bashing he engages in is mind-bogglingly amazing.

There's always a year's worth of irony in any given speech Duncan gives.

Now the fact is that states, districts, and the federal government are also culpable for the persistence of weak teacher preparation programs. Most states routinely approve teacher education programs, and licensing exams typically measure basic skills and subject matter knowledge with paper-and-pencil tests without any real-world assessment of classroom readiness.

Somehow he seems to miss the fact that these tests he's criticizing, these standardized tests, (that, I might add most of us taking them recognize as essentially meaningless) - are no different than the tests he loves so much for our students. And! The solution! Link up those student test scores to teacher ed programs! Except in this case, these tests are apparently not "paper-and-pencil tests," but "student achievement data."

What Makes a Good Teacher?

In discussions of merit pay, teacher quality and assessment, I generally ask those I'm arguing with this question: Think of your Great Teachers - those handful of teachers who really made a difference, the ones you can usually count on one hand. What made them so great? Can you even explain it fully? And if you can, how do you quantify that on a massive scale?

I gave a presentation on this topic about a week ago or so to one of my graduate classes. To get started, the class brainstormed what makes a good teacher. On the various lists, composed by pre-service teachers and veteran teachers, elementary and secondary teachers, were characteristics like honesty, hopefulness, dedication, intelligence, patience, and so on. Things like "knowledgeable, engaging and inquisitive, aware of student knowledge, interests & abilities." I should add that nowhere did anyone mention "raises student test scores."

On the flip side, it's a tad difficult to decide what we want from teachers when we don't all agree on the purpose of education. Is it to impart content knowledge? Build character? Nourish development? Nurture lifelong learners? Inevitably, at the end of these types of lists, I say, "All of the above."

So I find myself irked when Cowboy Duncan comes along to vilify the teachers unions for opposing merit pay. Yes, yes, we know. Teachers unions are destroying education. Protecting the "status quo." Mmmhmm. Now, I don't exempt the unions from criticism. But it's been what, half a year now? And we keep hearing the same story. Merit pay good. Teacher unions bad. He pats himself on the back for the Chicago Teacher Performance Pay Plan. One good thing about that plan: it incorporates peer reviews, from what I've read. How they do it, I'm not entirely sure. Bad thing: it's centered around test gains.

So how about this, Arne. Instead of repeating yourself ad nauseum, tell me what this merit plan looks like in your mind. The research is out there. The problems with value-added models of teacher assessment (using gains in student test scores) are well-documented. Viable alternatives are also well-documented. What do you see as the purpose of teacher assessment? Is it only as a means to determine pay? Or tenure? Quality teacher assessments actually lead to better teachers. In the meantime, until we get some details, I'm not all that thrilled about the idea of merit pay either. (Don't get me wrong. I'd love to make more money. And I think I'll be a pretty good teacher. But in terms of the grand scheme of things, I remain unconvinced it's a good idea.)

From the article:

Duncan pointedly advocated using student test score data to assess teacher effectiveness. "It's time we all admit that just as our testing system is deeply flawed, so is our teacher evaluation system."

Am I the only one who laughed out loud at that? So the answer to this is to use our deeply flawed testing system to fix our deeply flawed evaluation system?

I finished Educating Esmé: Diary of a Teacher's First Year yesterday. One entry in particular struck me, for it highlighted the utter absurdity of this system.

"At this point Rowisha turned around and started pounding B.B. with both fists until he fell to the floor, right there in the hall. It reminded me of when Twanette was beaten in front of me....B.B. shrived and whined. She screamed about his behavior and gang involvement and how she's-not-even-going-to-think-about-it-I'll-just-have-your-ass-hauled-into-juvenile-next-time-you-do-any-such-bullshit. I pulled her off B.B. She stormed off, disappearing around a corner. B.B. was hysterical, so I picked him up and hugged him and kissed him on the forehead and stroked the top of his head and told him it was going to be alright. Then Rowisha came back and hollered, "Don't baby this son of a bitch, his stupid ass doesn't deserve it, " and punched him once more. I still tried to help him get it together. In ten minutes he was going to have the Iowa Standardized Test of Basic Skills administered to him."